Guild Wars 2

tkalamba.2541:

Kintari.4172:

Testing is hard, but not testing is even harder. It’s something that if you go into it with the mindset of “there’s no way to catch this”, then you won’t.

My point is, I do not believe Anet has the capability to test something that happens when a large number of players gather like this. They simply cannot replicate the number of concurrent users and connections that seems to trigger the glitch on their own. The only was to do this is open up a public test server to test changes to code, but that in itself has issues.

QA teams never have the numbers required to do a large scale test, hence why we have public betas. It’s also next to impossible to predict what a code change may effect on the long run.

I suppose they can run a test server, as mentioned, but I assume there are all sorts of roadblocks behind that. Nothing is as simple as alot of people on forums these days assume.

As someone who has built tools to automate exactly this kind of process, I can tell you that it is possible to do a lot better. Further, there is nothing to be gained by simply saying “oh it’s too hard, we’ll never catch something that requires a lot of people playing the game”. And yes, a PTS is invaluable for all the stuff you’d never think to test for internally, which is sort of my point.

I don’t remember saying it is possible or even desirable to test for absolutely everything. This particular behavior isn’t 100% consistent, but it happens enough, and to enough people, and results in a game so broken, that their processes need to be able to prevent stuff like this.

Yeah, it may require more things than just zoning in, but if these are things that happen to a normal user over the course of an average gameplay session … ?

Testing is hard, but not testing is even harder. It’s something that if you go into it with the mindset of “there’s no way to catch this”, then you won’t.

Oheson is 100% correct in that this was preventable and should have been prevented. Now, clearly ANet doesn’t want things like this to happen, and I think it’s a bit of an overstatement to say or suggest they don’t test at all, but this should not have happened. Their testing processes were not sufficient to catch this one, they should have been, and let’s hope they are next time around.

Draygo.9473:

Also punkbuster is terrible, and if installed I will no longer play gw2.

I hate it with a passion. It’s unreliable, piece of kitten, that doesnt even do its job properly. Last game I played with it, it gave me all sorts of trouble. From the get go on a new game it was kicking me out of servers for a variety of reasons (nothing to do with cheating… some other bullkitten).

Yeah I had a friend that could not install video drivers from her laptop manufacturer because PB didn’t recognize them. Terrible.

Draygo.9473:

Or in scenarios where you have to provide limited trust to the clients do spot checking by the server on x number of clients at a time. Flag suspet clients, and ban outright cheating clients.

Its also difficult to tell the difference between a cheat and a client bug.

If anet wrote code to ban everyone that was at 10,000 feet, they would have ended up banning engineers using rocket boots in the water as a bug launched them way up in the air :P.

So yeah, it isnt easy.

Right, it isn’t easy. And you make a good point regarding client bugs, which is why it’s important to have an actual person in the loop at some point. You can’t just automatically ban people for stuff like this, but it helps tremendously to have something sift through the massive amounts of data to make some kind of sense of it before a human has to look at it.

rndmize.9274:

That’s not what he’s saying. Using a system that scans for known hacks on the client is like is like plugging holes in a leaky old boat – there’s always going to be more of them and you’ll always be behind.

The correct solution is to assume all information received from the client is unreliable and have it confirmed by the server doing calculations of its own.

Exactly. If a person is capable of looking at a player flying through the air, or teleporting through a wall, or moving at a high speed for unusually long periods of time, there is no reason in theory why a program cannot look at the same data, and judge whether or not this gameplay is within normal limits, or is likely to have been caused by tampering, before escalating it up to a human to make the final determination.

ArchNemesis.4897:

Kintari.4172:

SblatHUN.6025:

And where is the Dagger nerf on thief?
This is kinda useless cause 75% of the thief is using dagger.

Hopefully, they are fixing the stealth / rendering issues first before addressing backstab / stealth builds. Because that would be the sensible order to go about things. We’ll see.

Just like we’d hope they would do the sensible thing and adjust Quickness instead of hastily nerfing P/W?

I doubt it. I don’t even use S/P outside of PvE. The nerf is stupid, plain and simple. Us thieves aren’t crying because we got nerfed, we’re upset because instead of fixing the problem, (Quickness / haste) they slapped a band-aid on something that isn’t cut.

They took the wrong approach on this one, no doubt. Doesn’t mean they’ll screw up again in the same way the next time they nerf something. Doesn’t exactly inspire confidence either, lol.

Namu.5712:

You can never stomp out hackers, it is a 24/7 war. You write detection code they write code to bypass that detection method.

The best approach is server-side monitoring, flagging, and reporting of behaviors that are likely cheating. Client-side scans will always be bypassed, but if you are flyhacking, speed-hacking, or glitching through terrain, you can’t hide that fact from a program that is watching and intelligent enough to understand what is and isn’t possible.

I don’t find it that difficult to land a backstab once I get into stealth. Do I always get it? Of course not. But it’s not like it’s impossible to land against halfway-decent players.

I am a fan of ArenaNet too, but they deserve to get beat up over this one. This kind of problem should never make it out the door under any circumstances. I know they’ve stated “we’re aware, it’s serious and we’re working on it”, which is an important 1st step, but I think it’s only fair if players continue to voice their dissatisfaction until the problem is resolved.

Dual.8953:

Galandil.9641:

Well, I think that no one with a sound mind will tell you that the problem was in PW, but that it was, er… it IS in Haste in conjuction with PW. And so they nerfed PW. Way logical. :>

It’s more logical for a temporary fix to a stand out skill. Quickness effects 6/8 class in this game so it has more tied to it, making it harder to change.

Also, just because they nerfed PW doesn’t mean they will never re-buff it. In any case, if you’re really disabled by PW’s nerf, imo you need to reassess the flexibility and adaptability of your build and/or playstyle.

Sure, but they are going to have to change Quickness, so it would make sense for them to just do it first. Besides, in my experience, skills rarely get re-buffed after something like this, at least not within around 6 months or so.

Players can and always should adapt to changes like this, but that says nothing about the quality of the changes themselves.

I could be wrong, but I think most people just dislike being globalled, or even close to it.

SblatHUN.6025:

And where is the Dagger nerf on thief?
This is kinda useless cause 75% of the thief is using dagger.

Hopefully, they are fixing the stealth / rendering issues first before addressing backstab / stealth builds. Because that would be the sensible order to go about things. We’ll see.

Rather than nerf backstab Thieves, they decided to give everybody Invisibility. Brilliant. Well played, ArenaNet.

Not trying to troll, l2p, or make balance arguments here, so just take this for what it is. If you find 100 blades is problematic for you (it is for a lot of people), try slotting Shadowstep, because used properly, it is 2 get-out-of-100b-free cards in a short window of time.

bwillb.2165:

The entire global mechanic is what’s OP though. Some skills benefit from it more than others, but the whole thing is OP. Pistol Whip without haste was not OP; fairly weak, in fact. They didn’t “fix” anything, they just gave a flat damage nerf to an already subpar skill because of how it could interact with another skill, and that’s just not the right way of doing things. That’s the LAZY way of doing things. That’s the unbalanced way of doing things.

Right. And it isn’t a question of “do we nerf PW or do we nerf Quickness”. Quickness WILL get nerfed sooner or later, you can take that to the bank, because 100% increase is just too good. So why not do it first, and then bring abilities like PW and/or HB into line after?

Boo hoo. I find it highly amusing that Thieves of all classes are complaining. The Thief class has one of the easiest 100%-0% combo in the game (not the highest, just easier than most other classes) a 15% reduction on a spam able skill is nothing. Just look what Eles got hit with, THIRTY THREE PERCENT.
I’ll let that sink in a bit. THIRTY THREE PERCENT. On a skill that has like a two minute cooldown. Is it really so terrible that Arenanet is actually balancing the game and making it so to be good you have to, you know, use ALL of your skills instead of just 2?
Don’t get me wrong, I am by no means gloating about a Thief nerf. I do think it is justified though seeing as how they just have to spam 2 or 3 buttons to get the job done (similar to most other classes).
I will admit that I mainly play an Elementalist, but that is purely for the play style and not the damage. I tried a Thief in sPvP, the damage was sickening. I could be half as coherent and hit 1/4 the buttons as a Thief (and actually kill someone) than I can do on my Elementalist (which only makes them run away or just plain finish me).

What I find ‘highly amusing’ is how you seem unable to find the elementalist forum. That, and the QQing about a nerf to an underwater elite. I play an Ele alt, and certainly didn’t think they needed a nerf, but you’re just asking to be trolled with this. Take it somewhere else.

Come on ArenaNet, this is like defcon-5 gamebreaking right now. This (the new issue introduced Oct. 7) as well as the horrendously bad player culling behavior need a fix ASAP, even an interim fix is better than nothing, which is in turn better than taking a step backward. Step it up.

Mandra Madador.1709:

You know what…
I run a survival, hit like a girl pistol dagger build.
I have been playing pvp since release and before that.
I have a great time wining every fight almost every encounter.
1v1, 1v2, 1v3.

I’m not in your shoes to understand your over exaggerated pain about this nerf, for I don’t use any one of the abilities that were nerfed.

All of us are still learning to become better, why does every one here jump to a conclusion and assume that this build/skill was the end of the road and it was as good as it gets?

To all of you throwing out blames and posting how you cant do anything. Have you tried fixing your problem your self before being completely rude towards Anet?

Isn’t that the point of evolving? When you’re face to face with your problems, don’t cry, dry your eyes, and fix them.

Games in general are supposed to make us better at thinking.
What you’re asking for and crying for is just hitting a brick wall.

What if they made it a 5% nerf, what if they made it a 20% nerf…holly crap!!
Work with it.
They DO know what they are doing.
They are working professionals and have been so for many, years.
They have successful games under their belts; tons of experience!

You guys on the other hand… what have you done?
If you think you know better? Go make your own game.
Go find a publisher and work on a pitch to wow them to fund your game. Go hire a team of concept artists, go hire a team of 3D artists, go hire a team of coders.
Go compete against other giants of companies that do mmos.
Do it your self if you think everything revolves around your problems.

You know what, you wouldn’t make it out of the door, you guys have no character.
You guys are behaving like a bunch of kids. Maybe you are.

This is a ridiculous post. Of course people are going to do their best to hold game developers accountable for changes made to the game. This is only right.

By your logic, we should also give ANet a pass on the completely busted player culling issue (which was made worse in last night’s patch, probably by accident) because hey, they know what they are doing, right? In the meantime, just adapt!

It may also surprise you to learn that adapting to changes and giving feedback about them are not mutually exclusive activities. You can do both.

Poorly thought out feedback riddled with inaccuracies is one thing, but you can’t just say “don’t give any feedback at all, go make your own game” lol. Choices matter, games can and do become worse when bad choices are made, and people who like those games generally don’t want to see that sort of thing happen.

Keep your hands off my shortbow.

Yeah, I don’t like to see a game lose ‘unique’ mechanics or ‘flavor’ as I call it, but I wouldn’t miss downed state 1 bit if it were removed, for all of the reasons you mentioned. It’s especially frustrating to go in against 5+ players and manage to down 1 or 2, and end up having to run.

Niim.9260:

Kintari.4172:

My only issue with this change is that they did it before looking at Quickness. PW with quickness is a completely different animal compared to PW without.

The major problem with a lot of abilities is haste, not the ability itself. Let’s face it, if you sit through a full channel of unhasted PW you deserve to take the full damage.

I would rather they apply a 15% damage reduction to all quickness related skills in the game.

Exactly. I think it’s obvious to anybody paying attention that they will have to tone down Quickness. Changing Quickness will impact a lot of things, but it will impact channeled abilities like Pistol Whip and Hundred Blades the most. So I don’t understand why they would nerf PW base damage first. It just seems … not the smart way to go about it.

My only issue with this change is that they did it before looking at Quickness. PW with quickness is a completely different animal compared to PW without.

I thought it was cool how Basilisk Venom’s Stone effect was a unique mechanic, but it was possible to get a lot more mileage out of BV with a venom sharing build. I don’t think keeping someone locked down in an unbreakable control effect longer than 1-2 seconds is OK. I’m not sure changing it to a stun is the right way to go, I probably would have just made the Stone effect not stack at all.

Ranged classes that deal lots of condition damage, especially the ones that can just spam it with slot #1.

A lot of people go condition build for shortbow, but you might be surprised just how well a power/crit build works.

If you press a movement key once you are in or right about to begin the PW slashing animation, it will break the animation, cancel the attack, and move you. This does not include simply holding down a movement key, it has to be a new keypress that occurs after the PW root takes effect. My guess is you are doing something like this without realizing it.

Yeah, I mention quickness more because I think it’ll get nerfed regardless of the current state of Thief, and it does affect any Thief that runs any form of Quickness (notably trait in Crit Strikes, Rage sigil, or Haste), which does include at least some backstab thieves. But you’re right, it isn’t a Thief specific issue. As for Assassin’s Signet, to me it seems nearly certain that it will get changed; like you, I also don’t know to what.

Believe it or not, game developers aren’t perfect and don’t always get it right. Sometimes there exist genuinely overpowered classes, abilities, or builds. Backstab Thief is currently one such build. It needs to be changed. Hopefully the change isn’t too severe, but it needs to be changed nonetheless.

As Dee Jay correctly noted, past a certain point, it ceases to be possible to balance high power with low survivability. This only works within a certain range.

I see a lot of people defending the current state of backstab thief with the “l2p noob” card. I suggest you all do exactly that, because it’s going to get changed, the only question is what (my bets: assassin’s signet and possibly quickness), when, and by how much.

I’ve hit backstabs for 13-15k. I’m not the only one. I’m not even particularly good at a backstab build, because I hardly ever play it, because I know it’s over the top and will most likely get nerfed.

It doesn’t matter what the circumstances are really; I don’t think 1-shotting or near 1-shotting is good for an MMO.

Don’t really care how we have to spec, what we have to give up, what we have to do, or how stupid our opponent has to be, the fact is that it (our ridiculous burst) can and does happen. I know many classes that would love to have the option to spec like this and get the same results and they cannot.

However, there are 2 things that I believe ArenaNet should absolutely address first, before making any (more) nerfs. Quickness, and the absurdly long delay in between destealthing and rendering. Changing / fixing these 2 things will have a noticeable impact on Thief balance, among other things. Balance the core game mechanics and technical issues first, then get the class balance fine-tuned.

Smoke combo field + leap finisher = stealth
Black Powder followed by Heartseeker most likely

edit: y i so slow

I agree with those who say Heartseeker isn’t the problem, Pistol Whip isn’t the problem, and neither is Haste the problem. The problem is Quickness, which is just completely over the top right now, across the board. I run a setup with 2 possible Quickness procs, so I’m basically asking to be nerfed here.

It’s ridiculous how fast people drop when these proc. Not surprisingly, it’s really difficult to balance skills when the output can be either X or 2X. Blizzard learned this lesson back when Mortal Strike was -50% healing, other games have learned it, and no doubt ArenaNet will pick up on it too.

I don’t think a nerf to any particular class ability for granting Quickness is justified, but the effect itself needs a serious look.

First it looks for a path from start to finish. If no path is found, you go nowhere. If a path is found, then it checks the line connecting start to finish for collisions with obstacles. If there is a collision, it puts you at the point of the closest collision.

Sometimes, the pathfinding check fails even when there is a valid path. This is most likely because there is a limit to the length of paths that will be checked, in order to keep the processing requirements within reason.

I’m on a weird schedule temporarily, and I get to see DH’s night crew every night. Usually it’s between 4 – 7 am EST. I’m not going to blame them for doing what works in the current system. Good for them. The people who say there is no gentleman’s agreement are right.

That said, I don’t think the current system is perfect, and I think threads like this are just evidence of its flaws. The scoring metric needs to change in a way that makes night capping somewhat less effective, while still allowing players who play during those hours to contribute meaningfully to the outcome of the match. I mean really, I see no problem with top tier servers having to organize shifts to be competitive with one another, but when you’ve got mid-tier servers feeling like it’s a requirement, something needs to be looked at.

As far as the actual DH night crew itself, a few observations from someone who routinely runs into them:
1) It is better organized than their daytime zergs
2) It does have a lot of people, way more than we can ever muster for defense during those hours
3) The level of defense at SF objectives is such that they could probably cap our stuff with sheer numbers regardless of organization, if I can get 5 defenders at a tower in EB I am lucky, and it’s not enough anyway lol
4) They do use a lot of rams
5) They generally are not in more than one place at a time

Take note of #5 SF, because it’s the most important

SoR’s tactics have been evolving. They got spanked in round 1, and seem to be getting more coordinated. Good for them. I personally have no problem facing the same opposition again, quite the opposite actually, because you get to see all 3 sides evolve and adapt.

Kelesti.2458:

Kintari.4172:

Hundred Blades CHARGE WAP WAP -> Shadowstep -> /dance
Moa -> ??? LOL! Y U SO BAD!

This is you finding a counter to Hundred Blades! Congratulations. This wasn’t happening in beta for most people, because they didn’t actually see a counter to it. Now, glad that we’ve discerned you are capable of cognitive thought, let’s see you apply that to Moa.

Should look something like this:

Moa – ??… DODGE .. /dance

You could even replace that with a thief centric stealth flavored move, if you so desire. Or a Guardian activating Aegis. A parry flavored Riposte style move?

If your definition of ‘skill’ involves taking all of mine off my action bars for 10 seconds, I think I’ll pass, thanks!

You are passing. That’s why you let the skill wreck you, when you’re just getting outplayed. It’s not even the good elite when it comes to team play.

Of course it can be dodged. No need to restate the obvious. The point I was making is what happens when it isn’t dodged (or block/invul/etc), compared to what happens when other stuff isn’t dodged. Or did you think that maybe I just prefer to let warriors charge and immobilize/KD me first so I can needlessly burn my 60 sec stun breaker when a simple dodge would have done instead?

And yes, you all like Time Warp, we get it, that’s great, but entirely irrelevant.

Kelesti.2458:

When people were getting shredded by Hundred Blades Warriors, they weren’t getting 10 seconds to live (because they played badly).

Hundred Blades CHARGE WAP WAP -> Shadowstep -> /dance
Moa -> ??? LOL! Y U SO BAD!

If you missed the tell on Hundred Blades, you didn’t have 10 seconds to live. You had no control over your character, and were dead almost instantly.

LOL no? See above.

The fact that people don’t know how to respond to it before (or stand there like a moron after) is what gets them killed.

This is an excellent point. I’ve been wanting to ask the Mesmer community, what does your ideal rotation of chomp, kick, peck, and screech look like? Also, for your “Moa Form” build, do you build for greater range on beak attacks, fluffier feathers, or sharper claws? What do you slot for your gap closer / escape? I’ve been meaning to do the theory crafting but just haven’t gotten around to it yet.

If you have a problem, skill up.

If your definition of ‘skill’ involves taking all of mine off my action bars for 10 seconds, I think I’ll pass, thanks!

Sure, but when you fight a backstab thief, a hundred blades warrior, or someone who deals heavy condition damage, at no point do you find yourself unable to actually play your class for 10 consecutive seconds. That’s the issue.

You could give Moa a 30 minute cooldown for all I care, it’s still a poor idea for a skill regardless of how often it can be used.

Apparently most Mesmers don’t like Moa as much as Time Warp so they slot TW instead, and I’m willing to bet most non-Mesmers dislike losing their class abilities for 10 seconds (I know I sure do), not to mention the aforementioned bugs with minions and forms.

So where exactly is the problem then in reworking this broken skill? At worst, the skill gets gutted and you … continue to use Time Warp. At best? It gets turned into something you might actually slot. Everybody wins!

For the record, I don’t think it’s as much OP as it is just plain aggravating. I didn’t pick ‘Moa’ at character creation.

@Rall: Would you like those golems back? I think we still have most of the pieces laying around SM.

There are huge issues. Invisible enemies, and ability delay in very large battles are my top 2. At the risk of sounding overly dramatic, these kinds of issues can make or break a game. The first 1-3 months after launch is when a lot of players will make their first impressions and decide whether or not they want to keep playing. Granted, GW2 isn’t subscription so people can leave and come back as they please, but nobody wants to get ROFLed by invisible warbands even if it is free of charge.

They absolutely have the power to fix / improve this experience, they just need to place a high priority on it and get it done.

Step 1: Introduce ‘WvW Influence’ for guilds to accumulate via participating in WvW activity

Step 2: Add guild perks which can only be acquired through spending WvW influence, one of which is the ability to designate a commander.

There, job done

Time to watch more DH and SoR dance in my arrow cart fire. Hooray!

Seriously though, I was hoping this would happen, because it was very close and hard fought, and any shuffling probably just would have made things worse. I know how that sounds, being on the winning side and all, but … take it for what it is. Game on!

This was an extremely entertaining matchup. So many highlights, like defending SM yesterday with 7 walls down lol.

Darkhaven has a strong off-hours crew, and it forces us to work around the clock to secure as large a lead as possible. Rall on the other hand has the hatred of all of our pugs after our matchup with them and FA, which creates a lot of problems for us. I think with a little more organization they could be a a big problem.

I am glad the matchmaking is smart enough to recognize what a well-matched round this was. See you in the field.

More non-combat-enhancing rewards for WvW can’t be a bad thing. There are some already, but more is even better in this case, as long as the rewards are purely cosmetic/vanity. I play WvW because I enjoy it, but it wouldn’t be bad to have some sort of extra recognition.

Plus, any system that lets the less experienced players on your side quickly identify people who are more experienced and likely know what to do, is a good thing in my eyes. So I like the idea of ranks in this regard. The commander system is a good start but I feel more is needed here.

I support any effort on SF to coordinate and get things done right.

theonewhoknocks.8641:

Instead of testing for a week you could put an option “use experimental camera” in the menu and collect feedback and bug reports from us, the players.

But thank you for finally addressing the issue, I thought it was never coming.

Seconded, this is probably my #1 issue overall, and it’s good to hear it is being looked at.

The ability lag has to do with the way the client/server handle processing game events. ANet knows about it, and I don’t think there’s much you can do to mitigate it.

As for invisible characters, this has to do with the delay in loading and preparing a character for rendering. Better hardware, in particular a faster HDD, can help with this, but even with great equipment it’s still very apparent — players still take forever to load in during situations like SM last night.

My top issues in WvW are ability activation delay in large fights and invisible enemies (characters not appearing at all until fully loaded which takes a while).

As for night capping, scoring needs to be adjusted to take into account how many players are actually in the zone playing. More people playing and fighting (on all 3 sides) should = faster point accumulation.

Oceanic and Euro players have every right to play and have their actions shift the balance of WvW, but right now their influence in that regard is out of proportion to their population. Restricting playtimes or regions isn’t the answer; make the scoring metric reflect the level of activity that is taking place.

Also, Orbs have an unbalancing effect, change their bonuses to be non-combat-enhancing, thanks.

I was there — Sorrow’s Furnace, defending. The lag was ridiculous. We wiped most of Sanctum of Rall in the throne room right before you guys entered, but then I couldn’t see half the enemies or use any of my abilities in less than 5-6 seconds.