Ok what is it about this debuff that made Anet decide to give it to EVERYONE.
Seriously, every second mob applies this Condition.
Every class seems to apply it with an auto-attack.
It’s everywhere…it’s so abundant it’s ridiculous.
Not only is it a fairly potent Condition against melee classes, it also helps cover additional Conditions that may be applied.
This is bad game design if you’re going to hand out Conditions like Candy during Halloween.
They serve as a rally point for your Zerg. A sentry is the perfect place to gather everyone.
Devs are always more inclined to buff, because players like reading about buffs more than nerfs.
But I agree with Ezrael. MMOs especially have constant power creep. Not only via gear, but also players are getting better and more efficient.
Nerfing is a far healthier approach in such an environment as it’s much easier to predict. It also makes it easier to buff specific underutilized skills without throwing the entire class out of balance.
Jayne is correct, we do want to address this. It’s mostly a matter of having a more reliable system that lets us track when people are doing this things in order to reward them. Currently we are not able to track that well, if at all. Which means we can’t assign rewards to them. We absolutely believe that defending and scouting are critical to success in WvW and want to be doing more to reward them accordingly.
As an intermediate solution I suggested the WXP flasks we find in WvW shouldn’t be consumable by ourselves. Instead they’d be something we could only forward to other accounts and thus it would be a way for the community to award contributing players.
Nah, D/P actually requires situation awareness and initiative management. It’s not exactly the most intuitive build.
Pistol/Dagger is probably the easiest build to do well in. All it requires is the constant use of two skills and basic dodging. It’s survivability also makes it very forgiving should you ever fail.
I wouldn’t say it’s all that strong though, but it’s easy to be “ok” at.
I’m not really sure there are any demanding builds out there. Most Thief builds rely on one or two simple gimmecks that are abused to the max. However I do have to add that I respect a solid Thief build that can consistently win without relying on heavy burst ala Backstab.
I agree that the huge disparity between base HP is a huge balance issue within the game.
I’m not sure why the devs settled on such a huge gap, it makes no sense.
It makes PvE very hard to balance because mobs have to hit for static amounts. What takes 50% of a Warrior one-hits most Thieves,
It makes PvP balance harder than it needs to be too. Elementalists and Guardians could easily give up a little healing power in favor of a higher health pool. It would slightly reduce their ability to bunker without nerfing their overall survivability.
Thieves too might lend themselves to more than just high pressure damage builds. Maybe a higher HP would help make other builds more viable.
To me 13k, 15k and 17k HP sounds far more reasonable than what we currently have.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
Yeah CC used to be good in this game, coming from other MMOs. But then in evolved into an AoE spam-fest with much of this AoE being CC as well.
Targeted, telegraphed CC is fine.
But most CC in GW2 is not that type.
I’ve explained this a 1000 times now…
Bunkers exist because some classes in this game can instantly kill you from 100 to 0 in 1 second….
If you’re not one of these classes….You go Bunker…
There is a reason you don’t see classes like Ranger go Glass Cannon
There is a reason D/D Ele was popular.
Its not because Glass Cannon can’t be done….Its because if you do it, Other Glass Cannons in this game will instantly kill you.
There’s some truth to this.
The fact that Thieves as glass cannons have an inherent advantage over other glass cannons has basically forced every non-Thief into a somewhat survivable build.
Now you can argue if that’s a good thing or not, but if it wasn’t for Thieves I’m sure we’d see more offensive builds being popular.
Combining a tanky character like a Guardian, Engineer or Elementalist with a glassy Thief is extremely potent because it’s hard for the enemies to track the Thief during team-fights and most end up focusing on the tank.
Not sure what 3rd character you’d want in there since it would need to be firly mobile and tanky as well.
I’d suggest a Guardian or Elementalist + Thief + Warrior.
I’ve been both on the receiving end and the dealing end of the tank + Thief combo.
It’s incredibly powerful and I can understand why some consider it OP. It’s very hard to counter such a high pressure Thief when you’ve got other thing exploding and knocking around you.
What you’re doing, and what he’s doing in the video… it’s called coordinating, if you mean the combo in general… I’m sorry that those people he killed in the video mindlessly kept running forward as one of their buddies was getting plowed … It’s OP that they’re mindless, i will give you that.
It’s not that simple unless you’re gonna call everyone “mindless”. It’s incredibly hard to counter the Thief in situations with so many targets. Countering a D/D Thief is all about denying him Cloak and Dagger which is nigh impossible in such situations.
It doesn’t make the enemies bad or even mindless. Just be on the receiving end yourself and you’ll see.
All this number-crunching about Initiative regeneration is worthless.
You have to play-test it to really evaluate the difference.
And then there’s things you can’t predict. Like how much more we’ll be able to use stuff like Infiltrator’s Arrow and other Shortbow skills.
And then there’s the fact that most maths is based on the idea that we are attacking a target constantly, which is almost never the case, not even in PvE.
I think this patch, while it’s going to nerf a few builds like Dagger/Pistol, is going to be an overall buff for Thieves. I just don’t think it’s a good buff because it’s not making the class more engaging to play. Instead it’s making the entire Initiative system much more forgiving.
I never quite understood what people expect INSTEAD of zerging.
I mean everyone always expresses their disdain for it, but what else are 150 players on such a tiny map supposed to get up to? Roleplaying?
That said, yes removing the AoE cap would be nice. But the cap exists for a reason….because ANets netcode is easily overwhelmed by having to calculate damage against many targets at once.
That said, I honestly think Zerg vs. Zerg battles are the best thing about GW2 WvW. Everything else is rather generic and forgettable.
When I move on to a different MMO it’s those zerg clashes that will make the most lasting memories.
I’ve been both on the receiving end and the dealing end of the tank + Thief combo.
It’s incredibly powerful and I can understand why some consider it OP. It’s very hard to counter such a high pressure Thief when you’ve got other thing exploding and knocking around you.
I agree that some Engy builds are borderline overpowered. They are just flying under the radar because they aren’t all that popular and because Warriors are the focus of most balance topics.
I think that what makes Engies so powerful is their synergy with tanky stats combined with Condition Damage, just like Necros.
Aka. you can combine Toughness, Vitality and Condition Damage, thus getting a very tanky, but also very threatening build.
And then you have the fact that Engies can dump quite a lot of different conditions on their target….and you have something borderline OP.
Addressing this gear scaling issue would probably help bringing both Necros and Engies back in line without affecting their fundamental class mechanics.
Oh and the +/- 40% Condition Duration food has to go.
Even if Oil were more durable it would just delay an attack for a few more seconds.
The problem with Oil as I see it is that it is rarely used for it’s intended purpose. It’s incredibly effective, which is why it’s the first focus target of an attacking zerg.
But the position make it extremely vulnerable.
Maybe making it immun to player damage would work, but in turn making it take damage from Ballistas (hell knows they need a purpose).
Then a Zerg would need to decide whether to take it out using a Ballista or risk the threat of an Oil attack.
It’s funny how we debated “night-capping” ab absurdum over a year ago. Even then it was obvious how flawed the system was.
ANet’s response then was “all is fair in love and war”.
Basically “deal with it”.
I wonder if their views have somewhat evolved since then….
Making objectives worth more if they are upgraded is a bad idea. The bigger server will have the more upgrades creating an even larger gap in PPT.
Instead, you should earn bonus one-time points when capping an upgraded structure, depending on how upgraded it is. This makes the stronger server a more attractive target and works towards encouraging the double-team against first place that needs to happen for competitive WvW.
Hmm, maybe you’re right.
I would have argued that a weaker server could then focus on holding a few upgraded keeps rather than rolling through the map. But then I remembered that it’s all about the size of your zerg and holding 4 Towers or 1 Tower isn’t harder or more challenging. A T3 Tower will fall no matter what if the enemy zerg is 2-3 times your size.
Your idea is better because it makes stronger Towers and Keeps more attractive targets.
After a year of following RvR I think we all have an opinion on the WvW scoring system.
While I don’t think it’s fundamentally flawed it really doesn’t do much to encourage close and intense matchups. Instead in 9/10 cases the matchup is decided by the end of the first night.
It is an objective system, I’ll give it that, but I don’t think it’s really all that great for the game.
Problems I see:
- Very little incentive to defend. Every identical structure is worth the same. Lost a T4 Tower? Nevermind, that paper tower we just capped is worth the same amount of points.
- System encourages to attack poorly defended structures rather than heavily defended ones. Why bother going after that T3 tower when that T1 tower is worth the same.
- No comeback mechanic. WvW is really all about coverage and there’s little a scoring system can do to mitigate that. Still, it would be nice if the stakes were increased throughout the duration of the matchup so there is something worth fighting for.
- Not enough emphasis on kills. Killing is an integral part of WvW and I believe it needs to be better reflected in the score. The Bloodlust buff attempted this but it’s an extremely “gamy” mechanic and not really fun.
- Night-time too important for the score, relative to player participation. Your night-coverage has a disproportionate effect on the overall score. Even having 30 more players online at night can shift the score massively in your favor.
- Playing the “tick”. When going for a cap the tick is often considered. Holding Stormmist until the tick is a common goal, because you know you can get it back before the next tick and thus won’t lose points. Again, an extremely “gamy” mechanic.
Anyway, you may have your own thoughts on what problems the PPT system has.
But I think it’s important during this debate to not get distracted by associated, but not directly related WvW issues like the small maps, relative ease of capturing towers, zerging etc.
So what do I think should change?
- One point per kill. This should happen as it gives weight to what WvW is ultimately about. Find something else for the Bloodlust buff or make it add points for finishers. Regardless, kills should matter and matter a lot. This would also help mitigate the disproportionate importance of night activity.
- Objectives should scale with their level. So a T3 Tower should tick for more than a T1 tower. This should make holding objectives more important, rather than simply running a Karma-Train. It also means that if a server can keep hold of 1-2 T3 towers they may still have a chance to comeback.
As to what extent..that’s hard to say. But if a regular Tower is worth 10 points, then a T2 tower should tick for 15 and a T3 tower for 20.
- I also think that supply-camps are overvalued, considering how easily they can be capped. Being worth 5 points per tick is too much, especially since they are already valuable for their supplies. I think they shouldn’t be factored in to the score at all, or if they must, then only be worth 2/3/5 points.
- Individual scoring per objective. I don’t think the whole “tick” mechanic is particularly good for the aforementioned reasons. I think it would be better if every objective “ticked” individually. So a T2 tower might tick for 1 point/minute while T2 Stonemist would tick for 1 point/20 seconds.
- Bloodlust could actually be turned into a “comeback mechanic” by working only for the server that currently has the lowest score. They’d still need to cap the ruins but then they’d get additional points for finishing, helping them to close the gap.
All combined I think these changes would benefit the game and make matchupps more exciting. It won’t stop the importance of coverage but it may be slightly less snowballing.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
How about cant revive while being in combat. Not sure to what extent though. To just fully dead or just downed.
Disallowing revives from downed-state would defeat the entire mechanic.
But disallowing revives of dead players while in combat would do a lot of good for the game. Not just in WvW, think of Tequatl for example…
Yeah, CC spam in this game is reaching a breaking point.
It was fine 9 months ago when most builds were focused on either dealing lots of DPS or being unkillable. But this CC spam has got to stop.
I got feared 4 times in rapid succession while fighting a Necro on point. 4 times….wtf?
Warriors being able to AoE stun every few seconds is equally broken.
This game and its mechanics simply weren’t designed with this sort of abundant CC in mind. They need to nerf the amount of CC…especially AoE CC…or introduce a new anti-CC mechanic.
Crowed Control was something GW2 handled a lot better compared to most MMOs previously. But while they’re still fairly short, the amount of them…and that so many are AoE, is really hurting the game.
I observed this a number of times.
Item I salvage while in the PvP Lobby (Mists) do not count towards the Salvaging Achievement. I could observe it today where I had 196/200 for my Agent of Entropy and salvaged 4 PvP items and got no update.
But when I returned to the regular World I would get the salvaging points.
It may also apply to the Daily Mystic Forge crafter, but I’m not sure about that.
Either way, this is extremely inconsistent and illogical for some achievements not to be tracked in the mists.
Coverage decides everything in WvW.
So whatever server has the most coverage, wins.
I was wondering what it might take to optimize my build for Zerging (with a guild).
In the Zerg I am mostly used for stacking Might and finishing downed players. At times I’ll chase down softer targets but with Power, Toughness, Vitality gear that’s often not so easy.
I was thinking of the following build:
15 point into Deadly Arts for Lotus Poison, giving you AoE Weakness with your AoE poison. That should help take a punch out of your enemy’s melee train.
30 Points in Critical Strikes because duh. I’d probably pick Executioner over Hidden Killer as well.
10 Points in Shadow Arts, because I consider Shadow’s Embrace to be mandatory and it’s the only way we can shake mass condition spam.
15 Points into Acrobatics for Feline Grace for the extra dodges and HP. I could also go 25 Points into this tree, pick up Pain Response and Fluid Strikes at the expense of Shadow’s Embrace but I feel that would make me too susceptible to various conditions.
Looking at this build now, it’s identical to the one I used to run in PvE.
I think we’ve all seen this a lot of times.
You’ll be fighting one of the popular minion-spam builds, typically a Necromancer or a Ranger.
You will be in stealth, trying to position yourself for a Backstab. You are right behind the Ranger/Necro and have him targeted.
You execute your Backstab….only to hit one of his bloody minions next to him.
WTF?!
Why do I even bother targeting things if the game override my decision. It does this even when I am “aiming” the camera perfectly at my target of choice. BAM it will turn around and hit something else.
This is really annoying and one of those things that make minion builds more resilient than they should be. Because it happens constantly.
A few days ago I had the unexpected “pleasure” of an instantaneous ban, right in the middle of a live play session. At first I couldn’t quite figure out what had happened until I tried to log-in again and read I had been banned for botting.
Now this has been remedied and that’s fine. But I must question the methods by which botters are detected.
For starters, I have two characters, a Thief and a Mesmer. None of the two are particularly good for botting to the point that it would barely make sense at all.
Then there’s the fact that I hadn’t participated in any notable PvE over the prior week. I might have followed a Champion train for 15 minutes at some point, or grinded some T6 mats, maybe done the odd temple event…but nothing that would ever lend itself to botting.
Hell, the day I was banned I had spent all my time either in sPvP and WvW, constantly killing people left and right. Don’t tell me bots have become so advanced.
My point being is that having a person simply look at my activity log for 10 seconds would have shown that I am not botting. It would have been immediately obvious, without a shadow of a doubt.
And I think if you’re going to be throwing out permanent account bans to individuals for no apparent reason you owe them as much as a quick look at their activity log. It would save you a hassle on both ends.
I’m not even all that sure Daggers deal more single-target damage when compared to Sword. A Cloak and Dagger + Backstab combo only hits for about 10.000 when running Arah. A single Pistol Whip will get close to that while only needing 2 seconds to execute.
Even if Daggers deal a tiny bit more single target damage in theory, once you account for the “frontstabs” and the odd premature Cloak and Dagger I’m sure you’ll find Sword mainhand actually being far more effective in PvE than Daggers.
I mean against most mobs all you need to do is spam Black Powder for melee immunity. That’s hard to top.
I get the idea behind having instances unlock as a reward for the culminating event-chain of a given zone. It even works, to an extent, with Arah even though the same applies there.
But everywhere else, most notably in the Citadel of Flame, the whole instance locking is just incredibly annoying. All it does is force people to jump around various guesting-servers to find an unlocked server.
Nobody feels compelled to actually do the annoying and unrewarding event to unlock the instance because it just resets again every 30 minutes.
You really need to drop the concept of locking Instances due to some event-chains, especially if events reset so frequently as they do here. It’s just a massive inconvenience otherwise and not in any way fun or rewarding. When you have a group set up and ready to go you don’t want to spend 5 minutes kittening around trying to game the system so you can actually do what you set out to do.
You should simply not be able to resurrect dead players while in combat.
This is the most detrimental and broken game feature in WvW. All it does is empower the zerg to the point of invulnerability.
I agree that the defense needs more support.
There are two separate issues though that make defense so futile.
1. Relative weakness of structures against Siege and trash-damage.
Basically a 40 man zerg can punch through a standard gate in 30-40 seconds, giving defenders barely a chance to react, let alone set up defenses.
I agree that “Reinforced Gates” should be the first structural upgrade you make since they are the most vulnerable.
Second, the amount of trash damage done to a gate should be limited to melee-weapons only. That would severely limit the ability of a zerg to punch through a well defended gate. Now kicking the gate in would require a little more strategy and risk.
I don’t agree that Golems are a problem. Yes, they maybe a little too cheap and readily available but I think it’s important for WvW that you can’t bunker in endlessly. Offensive tools need to outweigh the defensive ones in the end and Omega Golems accommodate that niche quite well. But maybe they do need to be made a little more expensive and less easy to “mass produce”. Golems are fine in small numbers, but the fact that you can stockpile them so easily is arguably overpowered.
2. But the second big balance blunder is the inability to wipe an attacking zerg, without having one of your own. A lot of this is due to the ability to resurrect and revive everyone, even while in combat. So even if you do score a number of kills while defending, the zerg just resurrects them within a few seconds. This doesn’t give defenders the opportunity to shift the momentum and drive the attackers off.
Limiting resurrections to “out of combat” would really help alleviate this issue a lot.
3. Active defending is suicide. For some reasons, the way the engine calculate line of sight and ground targeting, standing on walls is far more dangerous for defenders than it is for people attacking. Standing on walls, shooting down is the best way to get yourself killed. And this is completely counter-intuitive and needs to be changed.
Walls need to give and advantage…even a range-advantage, to the defenders, not the attackers. I mean someone with 900 range can barely hit the foot of the wall but someone with 1200 range can wreak havok on the entire palisade.
Frankly I think the OP is wrong.
The current nerfs have very little to do with stealth and honestly, people stopped complaining about Thieves a long time ago.
While I agree that the implementation of Stealth isn’t favorable towards balancing, it’s not a big deal anymore in the context of this game.
I used to think the Initiative system made Thieves simpler and somehow…easier to play.
After all, a lot of the time you can just spam your most effective move. Is Death Blossom your signature move? Then spam it ALL the time…
I also never felt like we made significant trade-offs for over-extending on your Initiative. Until I played D/P I never really felt like Initiative limited me in any way.
But then I actually spent significant time playing other classes, classes with cooldowns and recognized just how much dumber and shallower they are. It really is just about using all your skills, switching weapons…using all those skills….switching back again.
At least a Thief switches weapons based on his situation. Most other classes will switch weapons just to get to use skills. I never realized just how stupid this system of short CDs with little/no resource management is.
Yes, a Thief would be easier to balance if he had cooldowns. But the game-play of all classes would be better if they had to actively manage real resources instead of just spaming their skills in CD.
The entire crafting materials setup is entirely out of whack.
For the longest time there was hardly any demand for mid-tier items so naturally mid-level mats were cheap. Then it didn’t matter that you need 4 Soft Wood to craft a single log.
But now that there is demand, these imbalances have become exasperated.
They should at least drop the Soft Wood requirement from 4 to 3, to bring it in line with other materials.
But honestly, I think the biggest problem with crafting is that practically everything boils down to various types of Wood or Ore. They really need to add something else to the crafting process that creates all the dowels instead of basing them on Wood and Ore as well.
I don’t think more excessive punishment will really fix the problem.
I don’t oppose the idea of a 10 hour queuing ban but don’t expect it to fix the problem.
People AFK because queue times are long. If I have to queue for 5 minutes don’t expect me to wait around all that time. Eventually I’ll go off doing something else, or maybe alt+tab out of the game and forget about my queue.
I can’t really blame people for that. The system just needs a way to compensate for quitter and afkers.
It should be able to draft in a replacement if 3 members of a team report someone for being afk. If that players win the match, it should count, if he loses, it should not. That should be enough encouragement to participate in forgone matches.
That, or the game doesn’t start until everyone has clicked the “I am ready” button. If someone hasn’t clicked 30 seconds before the game starts they are replaced.
Rarely,
only when my fingers accidentally slip from WSAD to EDSF.
…and yet you turned around and killed them off.
So obviously the price of such excessive immobilizes is high because even 21 second weren’t enough to kill you.
Oh, and here I was hoping we might see revealed returned to 3 seconds in sPvP.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
Maybe next year we might actually see traps and venoms become viable choices.
Guys guys, he’s clearly trolling.
I’m surprised you didn’t see that.
My take on the buffed Assassin’s Reward is that while its buff combined with more Initiative to burn (in most scenarios) may result in a substantial increase in power it won’t fundamentally change to the role of the trait.
It will still just be another way for the Thief to add a little passive healing when the biggest threat to Thieves is burst damage.
That said, combining Omnomberry Pie with the new Assassin’s Reward and Pistol Whip spam should prove to be quite effective in terms of healing.
But I doubt it will factor much into PvP.
I was just watching: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDKE_cIvOMs
this really good match-up between the two competitive teams and here too the outcome was decided by rezzing.
For me this clip highlights that, compared to stomping, rezzing is just far too easy. In most cases it’s faster than your average stomp while also being much less susceptible to interrupts and stealth.
Finishing vs. rezzing is out of balance in favor of rezzing and this should really be fixed.
Let me preface this that I am generally positive regarding the balance preview for Thieves. While I don’t necessarily agree with every change I do like the boldness of it compared to the previously rather passive approach to balancing.
That said, regardless of the actual nature of these changes I feel they really miss out on addressing some fundamental Thief problems.
If you had asked me prior to the preview what I consider to be Thief issues I’d have mentioned.
- Lackluster Venoms builds
- Underpowered and inconvenient trap mechanics
- 4 second revealed in sPvP
- Channeled abilities vs. stealth
- Reliability of Shadowsteps
- A large number of unpopular or problematic traits (I’m looking at you, Last Refuge)
- Extremely limited combat range (wtb 1200 range).
- Conflicting DPS and weapon-sets.
Now are evade spam and perma-stealth problematic too? Yes, surely they are, but they are much more specific issues.
I feel it would be a missed opportunity to make such fundamental changes to Thieves without addressing many of their lackluster traits and abilities.
LoL, if anything D/D is getting better.
More Initiative regeneration means you don’t even need Infusion of Shadows any more and can play with both Blind of Stealth and Condition cleanse.
Nothing in the patch-notes preview makes me thing D/D is getting any weaker than it was before.
I agree, the pigeonholing in regards to Sigil choices seems a little unjustified.
You can’t actually Heartseeker through a single Black Powder 4 times. It just doesn’t last that long.
I do think perma-stealthing will become a bit more difficult, albeit not impossible. But to be honest, Black Powder is what makes Dagger/Pistol so effective, and that’s getting easier to spam. I don’t actually “perma-stealth” that often when using Dagger/Pistol.
So really I don’t see it as a huge nerf. In fact you could almost stand in Black Powder permanently just by relying on passive Initiative regeneration.
Thieves have a niche in PvE by being able to deal a lot of damage. But unlike Warriors, they do have to make trade-offs to achieve that damage, which makes them very susceptible.
More than anything, knowing encounters will help you survive.
With that caveat out of the way, I think Sword + Pistol is the best weapon-set for most PvE content. Black Powder is an excellent way to tank trash mobs and Pistol Whip spam can help your survive boss encounters in melee (if you know your timings).
Of course, eventually you should carry every weapon set with you so you can adapt. But having the Shortbow (for AoE) or Pistol/Pistol (for single target) ranged DPS is always a good choice.
As for gear and traits, I’d recommend getting Soldier gear at first (Power, Toughness Vitality) and then continuously replace those items with Beserker gear as you become increasingly confident.
For traits, 15 points in Acrobatics is always worth while, maybe even 20. The rest should go towards improving your DPS.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
To me it sounds like most builds are going to end up with MORE Initiative than before, meaning they can completely ignore any additional Initiative regeneration.
I mean buffing passive Initiative generation to 1/Sek. is a MASSIVE buff with unforeseeable consequences, even with nerfs to the trait-regeneration.
As far as I see it, Dagger/Dagger for example won’t even need Infusion of Shadows any more to sustain itself and neither will Pistol/Dagger. Only Dagger/Pistol might end up with a nerf to perma-stealthing.
And while I like the changes overall, I’m not sure if they’re really doing much to improve Venoms or many of the other under-appreciated Thief traits.
The Deadly Arts tree in general could do with a major overhaul, as could many of the passive damage increases. I think that would do more for Thieves than simply altering already popular traits.
Wow, I’m impressed by the scale of these changes. They should certainly help spice thing up a little. I’m impressed that you are willing and able to pull off such sweeping changes as balance has been a very passive topic over the past year.
As for the actual changes, I find the potential outcome impossible to predict.
The Thief changes especially….could open up an entire new world of builds. I agree with the general idea of reducing the amount of Initiative gained from traits but buffing the passive regeneration may have unforeseeable consequences.
In many cases I could see Thieves simply ignore Initiative traits altogether. And that’s probably not a desirable outcome either.
Well at least waypoints allows for some pretty epic defensive battles to occur and are one of the few advantages a defending force will enjoy.
I agree that their current use is slightly exploitative but overall it’s good for the game. Without waypoints even Keeps would just melt away under the awesome power of the zerg. Defenders only real option to defeating a zerg would be having a bigger one, and that’s not always a real option.
I’d support changes to waypoints, but not before some other, more fundamental changes are made.
Hey everyone,
-snip-
I agree with that stance. You can’t add mechanic that discourage people playing together, that’s what MMOs are all about after all.
I think that most of the fundamental WvW problems (the steamrolling, the scoring and the persistence of zerging) are all tied to one big issue. The small maps.
Now there’s probably not much to do it, but with maps being as small as they are, the larger, more dominant force doesn’t have the disadvantage that normally comes with a lot of territory. In fact it’s easy enough for a single zerg to defend and entire Borderland as speed and size is in their favor.
I have no doubt in my mind that a lot of the WvW issues would be mitigated by having significantly larger maps. But the GW2 engine seems to be really limited in that regard, for some reason.
But there are things that can be done to help address current issues.
1. Less hand-holding for zergs – Make it more feasible for a smaller defending force to pressure an attacking zerg by reducing the speed at which you can revive and limiting resurrections to out of combat. At least that way you can build up a little momentum on the defending side instead of watching all your efforts be nullified by all the easy rezzing.
2. Make walls less of a death trap – Yeah, standing on walls is a sure way to die, especially when the zerg is significantly larger than your own. This is completely counter-intuitive as it makes defending more dangerous than attacking.
Finding a way to limit range when shooting up, and increasing range when shooting down, would really help, as well as fixing some of the line-of sight issues when shooting down.
3. Limit “trash” damage against doors to melee weapons only – There’s no reason to enable a 80 man zerg to kick down a door within 30 seconds. People run with zergs because everything becomes increasingly faster and easier. Siege weapons, and siege weapons only should be the way to break open doors. The reason I think melees would be ok is to give Burning Oil a more important role. Also, sometimes you do need a little trash damage. But it should be a high risk/reward scenario.
4. The score system, while objective, doesn’t facilitate close and exciting matches. Instead it’s all about coverage aka. having enough people online at every hour.
Rarely does the system result in close matches, very often it results in blowouts.
In my opinion the flaws are:
-Kills and winning fights aren’t important enough (not even with Bloodlust).
-Holding keeps during night hours is too rewarding and important for the relative effort.
-Coverage is too important.
-Personal rewards do not align with what is best for your realm. This is a big problem as I see it. A player should, ideally, not be forced to chose between “winning” and between “personal rewards”. But in GW2 they do just that. Personal rewards are maximized buy running Karmatrains…aka. massive capping zergs that have little interest in defending or even maintaining whatever they conquer while the “points per tick” system is all about holding whatever you own until the next “tick”.
You need to redesign the WvW reward-structure so that “winning” and “personal rewards” are maximized performing the same thing. What is best for your realm, should be best for you as well.
What that means in practice is more difficult to deduce.