Guild Wars 2

Thaia.5146:

I expect that my alts will keep ALL of their skills and traits they currently have – if not – I will request a compensation for every single skill that was taken from them (and I encourage everyone to do the same) beacause I’ve spent time and money to make their builds look how I want and I’m not going to do that again because someone after 3 years of development thought “hey, let’s turn everything upside down!”.

Wait… unless I’m mistaken, you can’t buy skill points in the gem store with real money. Are you saying that you were so bereft of gold that you had to put real money into gems and lose some of that money in the conversion to gold to buy skill points? That’s just crazy dumb…

Also, there is no single build that you won’t be able to use on a level 80 character. There’s being over dramatic, and there’s just being silly. This whole conversation has moved well into the latter category.

Everything I’ve seen with voxels turns destructible objects into immersion-destroying minecraft blocks.

No thanks

How will the Revenant fit? With a shoehorn, most likely.

MiniEquine.6014:

MattyP.6954:

I think the goal of removing Spirits Unbound was similar to that nerfing engi turrets. Spirits were something that could just be dropped and forgotten about (except for occasionally activating their secondary effects). That doesn’t promote active play, and it’ll be interesting to see what changes they make to compensate for the lack of mobility.

Like the turret engineer, running a turret build (especially now) is incredibly laughable.

Anet needs to adjust these skills to promote active play while at the same time not nerfing the things into oblivion. Right now it’s on track to just become yet another set of utilities on top of the “DO NOT TOUCH” pile.

Oddly enough, I still run a turret engineer build in SPvP, and people laugh until I CC them to death :-). You just have to learn to play with the tools you’re given. That being said, I do think that ANet will probably rework turrets to promote active gameplay and make them more viable.

As the game stands (or stood before the turret nerf), various classes got “drop and forget” persistent skills of varying utility that didn’t really promote any sort of active play. Warriors have banners, Rangers have Spirits, Necromancers have Minions, etc, etc. It seems to me that ANet is trying to make each of these work in such a way that discourages “drop and forget” gameplay while still making them viable. It’ll be a difficult needle to thread, but I think that it’ll work out for the better.

Iason Evan.3806:

While I appreciate everyone’s opinion on the subject(I also appreciate some people’s attitudes more than others)the main draw for me with this game was having multiple ways to do things. I could level with exploration. Or with dungeons. Or with open world events. Or other ways. Taking away the ability to play the game how I want is really limiting. I spent a really good chunk of time doing this. I think my opinion is valid that this chunk of time I spent doing what I did to earn skill point scrolls shouldn’t be brushed aside.

We should be able to choose if we want to keep the skill point scrolls we earned previously instead of them automatically being converted. I don’t think having options like that is too much to ask for.

Actually, there will be no mechanism to spend skill points as they currently exist in the game after the specializations patch, so… yeah… making Anet run two parallel skill systems because a segment of the player population doesn’t want to adapt to (a very necessary, long-overdue) change is probably too much to ask for.

I have an alt warrior for WvWvW, and I have no issue with melee. That being said, I run quite the tanky support character with Soldiers/Clerics with Sword/Warhorn and Longbow with lots of shouts.

It just depends on how you play the class—a YOLO zerker warrior will almost always die to a zerg.

skowcia.8257:

MattyP.6954:

Being able to hot-swap utilities in combat provides a level of flexibility that no other classes have, so of course the have to balance by removing flexibility in other places. It’s a new class, but it isn’t supposed to be better than any of the other classes.

Yeah, but what if you end up with other abilities that are useless in x situation?

For example Shiro most likely will get shadowsteps – why you would use that with hammer weapon where you want to stay at max range? Unless it ground targeted and can be used to escape you already ends up with useless utility. There are many examples like it. Mallyx pain absord..yeah cool for teamfights, whats about solo settings? Useless.

Then create your builds around legends and weapons that work together for the gametype you’re playing. Also, skills are only useless insofar as you can’t find a use for them—that doesn’t mean that they don’t actually have a use.

I think the goal of removing Spirits Unbound was similar to that nerfing engi turrets. Spirits were something that could just be dropped and forgotten about (except for occasionally activating their secondary effects). That doesn’t promote active play, and it’ll be interesting to see what changes they make to compensate for the lack of mobility.

Being able to hot-swap utilities in combat provides a level of flexibility that no other classes have, so of course the have to balance by removing flexibility in other places. It’s a new class, but it isn’t supposed to be better than any of the other classes.

I think that there is a bit of an issue with how this whole Trinity Discussion has been framed. I don’t think that GW2 will ever have a system where there is a dedicated healer, a dedicated tank, and dedicated DPS. It doesn’t fit with game, and it doesn’t fit with what Anet has revealed their design philosophy thus far.

What we’ll probably see in a GW2-flavored trinity system is a situation where every player is expected to play 2 of three roles (Damage, Sustain-Support, Condi-Support), and gear choices will have to compliment the roles players want to fulfill.

Roles:

• Damage: Basic DPS
• Sustain-Support: Support Through Healing/Tanking/Boon-sharing and general mitigation
• Condi-Support: Support Through CC/Debilitating enemies with Conditions

There will always be YOLO Zerkers who will go full DPS, but most players will probably go for some combination of the three above to provide maximum party flexibility. Some examples:

• Explosives/Inventions Engineer Running Settlers and PS for Condi-Support and Sustain-Support through Elixer Bombs, upcoming healing traits, and all of the condis in the explosives line and weapon sets
• Shout Warrior running Zealot Gear with Longbow/Sword Warhorn providing boons, condi removal, and AoE heals on top of consistent damage for DPS and Sustain-Support

I don’t think that it will be about shoehorning people in to a certain role—it will probably be about making roles more attractive to play.

Spear will be land-based eventually. Sooner or later, ANet will run out of weapons to give the new Elite Specializations that make any sort of sense, and they’ll have to add more weapons to the game.

I can see what will happen if they don’t…

“The new elementalist specialization will get pistol mainhand… The 1 skill in Water Attunement will be ‘Squirt’.”

So… a bunch of people are complaining that GW2: HoT will not have enough content even though nobody outside of ArenaNet knows how much content GW2: HoT will have at launch.

Makes sense.

For point capture/defense events, I don’t think it matters because you simply have to be in the area. For boss fights, they might make it so that it is based on continuous time in combat proximate to the event, contribution to healing, contribution to break bar, etc. It’s kind of hard for me to believe that ANet would be making these structural changes to play and not compensate in the event reward system.

Between a Megabyte and a Terabyte, give or take a gig or two.

I hope that was helpful.

cocowoushi.7150:

Agreed, this all doesn’t make sense in a story telling way. Like it was said above, one could IMAGINE that the Zhaitan storyline is your Rev essentially playing through the events in a Fractal-ish manner in the Mists.

But if it’s just a simulation it makes no sense for others to be calling you the Commander. If that happened in some alternate universe.

They could incorporate time travel nonsense to “make it fit”

XD

LTREEVEY.2348:

anabasis.7346:

The “random and harder to read attacks” idea is one of the most widespread and myopic suggestions ever. It punishes skilled and knowledgeable players that know when to use active defenses while rewarding unskilled players that use more tanky gear.

It promotes the use of passive defenses to soak up damage instead of using active defenses to prevent taking any damage.

Boss attacks should have tells, this is AI design 101. If someone is skilled and knowledgeable to see a telegraphed attack coming, he should be able to use his active defenses to avoid it instead of having to use tankier gear because attacks have become randomised so he cannot dodge them anymore unless he gets lucky with his dodges.

Even worse, those who defend this bad idea are doing it for the sake of gear stat variety which makes their cause even less justifiable.

How is using Tanky gear rewarded, if it takes longer to clear content and get the prize? Isn’t that why Zerk is the Meta, because you can loot faster/earn more over time?

Tells already exist in game, so in watching for the tell acting accordingly, we are in agreement, but how is looking for a telegraph rather than knowing a pattern differ if they both require an action from the player? I am more in favor of “varying patterns” than randomness.

There is merit in arguing for “randomness” and if people want other sets to be recognized as acceptable(because almost everything is viable), what’s less justifiable about that?

Zerk should still be the most efficient gear set to speed run dungeons with, but it should be much harder to do so. There’s higher reward, so there should be more risk associated with it.

Foefaller.1082:

MattyP.6954:

Foefaller.1082:

I get that, I’m just saying the way they worded it sounds like there are no choices within each legend itself. I think most of us here were hoping for there to at least be a set of utilities within each legend to chose from, but it looks like every Revenant channeling Ventari will have the same exact 6-0 skills as every other Ventari-channeling Revenant with the only possible difference being the order they are in the skillbar.

Yeah, the customization would come mainly from weapons, stats, traits, and what stance they choose to pair with Ventari. A Glint/Ventari Revenant would play differently than a Jarlis/Ventari Revenant would play differently than any of the other legends.

…but a Jalis/Ventari Revenant with a Hammer will have the same skills as every other Jalis/Ventari Revenant with a Hammer, with no additional options within each legend.

I’m not talking about a meta build either. If I pick those two as my Revenants legends, I have no other way to customise the skills I use beyond their order in my skillbar, no other options within those legends, and no way, beyond traits and a single weapon set, to differentiate my playstyle from other Revenants who picked those legends. Are you okay with that?

We’ll find out after I play the class.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/hidden-arcana-role-playing-the-revenant/

Most people called this, but I was hoping that there would be some difference in the personal story for Revenant characters, both because I want to experience something new and because the timeline gets all wonky, with the personal story taking place before Rytlock goes to the Mists.

I’m mildly disappointed—I was hoping to have a WoW Deathknight-like situation where they started you at an elevated level, gave you an introductory quest/story chain, and then inserted you in the story at that point (Joining an Order would be a good place for that)—but I’m still excited to play the Revenant.

Foefaller.1082:

I get that, I’m just saying the way they worded it sounds like there are no choices within each legend itself. I think most of us here were hoping for there to at least be a set of utilities within each legend to chose from, but it looks like every Revenant channeling Ventari will have the same exact 6-0 skills as every other Ventari-channeling Revenant with the only possible difference being the order they are in the skillbar.

Yeah, the customization would come mainly from weapons, stats, traits, and what stance they choose to pair with Ventari. A Glint/Ventari Revenant would play differently than a Jarlis/Ventari Revenant would play differently than any of the other legends.

Foefaller.1082:

From Today’s article:

This skill will summon the tablet to appear next to your character. After you bring the tablet into the world, your skill bar will fill with the five legend-based skills, all of which manipulate the tablet.

The five skills. As in, these are the five skills you get when channeling that legend, and there are no others you might chose from.

Which means, when it comes to skills, while every other profession has at least six choices to make (A heal skill, three utility skills, an elite skill, and at least one weapon set) Revenants will have 3; A weapon set and two legends.

Having half as many decisions to make when outfitting your skill bar compared to every other profession seems extremely limiting, especially when those options weren’t that many in the first place. Hopefully it’s just a typo, or I’m reading it wrong, but somehow I doubt it.

It’s an inversion of the standard way skills are customized in game. Essentially, the Revenant utility skills are like a secondary set of weapon skills (I think they have lower cds than other professions, if I’m not mistaken), with their Profession Mechanic involves switching those skills as other professions would switch weapons. In that case, Legend would have it’s own set of healing skills, and you equip them as you would a weapon, while your weapon skills have to be switched out of combat, like most professions have with utility skills.

Faux.1937:

MattyP.6954:

Eolirin.1830:

rapthorne.7345:

given the spec is a support spec, I doubt it will have high damage.

People seem to be highly resistant to the notion that there’s something other than Berserker DPS in the game.

Given that all the specs thus far have a very specific role, is it really outside the realm of possibility that HoT’s content will be designed with more than DPS berserker mindless pew pew involved?

I strongly believe that they are giving us these specific roles because we will be in need of them with HoT

Hell, a very strong argument can be made that there’s already a lot of content in the game that requires something other than full out zerker builds for the 99% of the playerbase that can’t play completely perfectly, it’s just that no one is interested in doing any of it, because it can’t be beaten with the ‘meta’ builds, and the rewards for the content that can be ends up being substantially greater for the same time investment.

Frankly, I think the only part of the game that truly pushes people toward zerker is Dungeons. Silverwastes, as an example, really rewards build diversity.

<<< Zerker day one, Again I love DPS play styles I hate support rolls.

I personally just like Aggressive play styles that wrecks.

Nothing is wrong with zerk in gw2, the simple AI, blocks/reflects and blinds just makes it meta/easy to use, This will change in HoT for sure but there will always be DPS’ers no matter what.

Oh, I totally agree. The issue isn’t with the stat combo, it’s with the content.

MiniEquine.6014:

MattyP.6954:

DieselFueled.3257:

$10 for an expansion to an mmo that has been around for almost 3 years with no subscription fee or pay to win features. More than $10 is not worth it to you? Poor Anet. There is no satisfying some of you people.

The full game was literally $10 multiple times very recenently. That’s less than I pay for 2 pints, or a weeks worth of coffee, or lunch at Subway.

/shrug

You pay $10 for lunch at Subway? What do you eat?!

Their cheapest subs are about $3.80 after tax for a 6", but if you get a 12" and it’s not their ham, meatball, Italian, or whatever ones, you’re looking at around $7 just for the sandwich. A drink and chip thing is an additional $2.10 – $2.60 or so, which could put you easily near $10. Make it a premium sub and you’re looking at almost $10 from the sandwich alone.

Wow… sounds like I’m saving money by not eating at subway :-P

Their bread:meat ratio was always a bit off for me anyways.

Dragon Ruler X.8512:

Not sure why this got merged?

Because there’s like 6 “fix the zerker meta” threads right now.

Eolirin.1830:

rapthorne.7345:

given the spec is a support spec, I doubt it will have high damage.

People seem to be highly resistant to the notion that there’s something other than Berserker DPS in the game.

Given that all the specs thus far have a very specific role, is it really outside the realm of possibility that HoT’s content will be designed with more than DPS berserker mindless pew pew involved?

I strongly believe that they are giving us these specific roles because we will be in need of them with HoT

Hell, a very strong argument can be made that there’s already a lot of content in the game that requires something other than full out zerker builds for the 99% of the playerbase that can’t play completely perfectly, it’s just that no one is interested in doing any of it, because it can’t be beaten with the ‘meta’ builds, and the rewards for the content that can be ends up being substantially greater for the same time investment.

Frankly, I think the only part of the game that truly pushes people toward zerker is Dungeons. Silverwastes, as an example, really rewards build diversity.

Orpheal.8263:

Sure thing, I coudl read into this too much, but thats just my impression that I got from the blog.
If the thing turns out to be nothing but simple voice dialogues that do appear just randomly, like all others for all other classes…then I have nothing said.

Quote:

A revenant’s legends are not merely echoes of the past but are fully sentient, with opinions and personalities of their own.

Activating skills will occasionally trigger in-game dialogue from the legends, and the player character will sometimes respond with race-specific dialogue of their own. Depending on the legend your revenant has summoned between fights, you may also hear some >> small talk out of combat <<.

That doesn’t sound too different from audible shouts and pet commands to me, not to mention all of the character flavor dialogue you get for getting boons and conditions and on random big hits (“There’s one to remember me by!” comes to mind). The only difference will be a difference in voice.

I know that they’re working on improving AI in general, so I find it hard to believe that those updates won’t make it into the base game eventually, even if not until after HoT is established.

Orpheal.8263:

Yeah, but only because all those classes are older and from begin on in the game is no reason to let them have not also too class specific on their unique mechanics based on animations and voice acts, like what Anet plans here for the revenant, that they will be talking with their various Legends, as if they are able to hear their voices in their heads with all havign their own personalities ect. which are also like I understood it influencable, based on which legends you use while you play.

The whole blog makes it sound liek beign alot more, than just beign some simple generic voice files but far more like a system, that should give the player the full impression, that the legends are more than just only a simply combat relative mechanic for this class, but that they play also a big role in the whole character identity of your character and how the legends do see you, in regard of how you use then and you you play with your characters…

This goes way beyond everything what the other classes have in regard of interativity and thats why I made up these examples for all classes.
If they are going so far to make such an effort to make the legends of the revenant to look and funtion like complete own beings with their own identities, opinions and personalities that will be played out while you play your character, it would be more than nice, if ANet would put such an effort into the other classes also too and add more interactivity to them based on their class mechanics.

Thats all what I did say.

Part of it is the flavor of the class, that’s for sure. That being said, we don’t know what changes they have in mind for the existing classes that will be bundled in to the existing classes. Mesmers are unique snowflakes with their magic butterflies and phantasms, as are Rangers with their Pets and Engineers with pretty much everything they do—and ANet can make all of the classic classes more unique just to differentiate them from their elite specs.

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

DiogoSilva.7089:

NikeEU.7690:

Ofcourse they have. The stats on your gear either help you sustain or they help you do damage. Besides boon duration, which can be offensive or defensive, they are all one or the other. What else is there? Offense or defense. A simpleton could see that the only role for gear is offense or defense. You want there to be more, fine, but your wants are not the current reality.

Healing Power is support. Boon and condition duration are support, as well, although they come mostly from traits/ food and not gear. Toughness is meant to sustain against direct damage, vitality against sudden bursts and condition damage. All of those effects can be build-defining in a pvp environment.

It is true that current PvE’s reality is a failure in that regard, but Anet is still focusing on making different stats more meaningful. The changes to condition damage, new foes with tougher armor, new traits that give a massive amount of precision, boon duration on gear (although that one is currently useless) or the more varied foe attacks are all attempts to tone down the “zerker” gear meta.

Where’s the skill surviving an encounter just because you had sufficient: a) Vitality, b) Toughness?

Where is the dodge button and blocks and evades and reflects in all of this? Where do we draw the line that passive defense stats like Vitality and Toughness bring nothing to the table other than allowing more unskilled players to withstand harder encounters?

Why should active defense be rewarded less/the same as a player who doesn’t care about that and uses passive defenses?

I say that is dumbing the game down and that is why I disagree.

Think of it this way: Zerker stats increase the reward by making dungeon running more efficient. The way to create incentive to run other sets is to increase the risk (in making running that set require a higher skill cap) as the reward increases.

MiniEquine.6014:

MattyP.6954:

Also, they announced the closed beta last week, so that was news as well. Would you rather them barf all of their info up at once and have us wait months for any additional word?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8u7px_GzWQ

Plus 1 for the Street Fighter clip

Also, they announced the closed beta last week, so that was news as well. Would you rather them barf all of their info up at once and have us wait months for any additional word?

Jerus.4350:

Thing is gear doesn’t change gameplay. It simply enhances the gameplay choices you make.

Toss Clerics gear onto a GS+Axe/mace 65003 Banner Warrior and the way you play it optimally doesn’t change at all.

This is the reason why I feel the anti-zerk stuff to be silly.

Wanting support builds to have more use in PVE, sure, but it’s the BUILD we’re talking there, not the gear. And, honestly, it is quite powerful. Check out Skady’s Cleric Guard Fractal videos, it’s quite impressive. Now yes, the content doesn’t require it, nor do you really see any benefit in a quality team, but it sure can carry like a champ.

I’d love to see content that has us considering more BUILD options, but focusing on gear is just stupid because they’re just stats. Nerfing zerker (and all 3 offense stat gear, there’s 4 of them remember) won’t change my play style, it’ll just change the name of my gear… maybe.

My issue is that there are so many mechanics in GW2 that don’t get real use because stat combos that work with them are so inferior to zerker. As an oft-cited example, conditions are broken, so Ravager and Sinister will always lose to zerker, dps-wise. The fact that most dungeon damage (and a lot of encounters) are completely avoidable without that much skill is evidence that dungeons as a whole need a rework more than running glassy gear is necessarily “better”.

To put it a different way, selecting your character’s stats should consist of meaningful decisions, but when running glass has little to know downside, that is what will always be picked. I actually can not think of any other game where running full glass is optimal unless you have an absurd amount of skill.

Faux.1937:

Now wait a sec, is it 100% confirm that You MUST be in Ventari to use staff on Revenant?

I don’t think it’s confirmed at all, actually.

Skoigoth.9238:

@Dragon Ruler X

Could you please explain to me why you feel this urgent need to “fix the zerker meta” in a concise and comprehensive manner?
Even after dozens of threads similar to this one, I still fail to see any valid reason justifying the bulk of the proposals presented here to “fix the meta”. Whatever that means…

Speaking for myself, it does come down to preference, but I have some valid reasons, IMHO.

• The Game Mechanics in PvE, particularly in dungeons, heavily favor one gear set over others, resulting in a lack of diversity and a lack of player choice in the matter.
• GW2 is a game that touts its high degree of character choice and customization, so it should support some degree of real choice in gear selection.
• The fact that one gear set is so heavily favored by dungeon design creates an atmosphere of of intolerance towards people who, for whatever reason, choose to run other gear sets, even if differences in DPS and running time are minor

Those are my reasons. I run a variety of gear sets in WvWvW, sPvP, and Silverwastes, and I like each of my characters to have a different playstyle associated with them (my Ranger is zerker, my Engi is Dire/Rabid, etc), and I don’t necessarily want to carry another gear set around just to speedrun dungeons (something that isn’t that fun to me anyways, even if the rewards are good).

Designing gear and dungeons in such a way as to make it so that one stat set isn’t so heavily favored will make dungeons more accessible (even if difficulty isn’t reduced) and move the emphasis from farming speed runs to actually having fun, interesting encounters.

ronpierce.2760:

Called it… So there you go. Revenant, a specialization and a weapon. Same as any other reveal. Even had a feeling it was staff because it was just updated. No more silly debate:

Sir, there will always be silly debate on these forums.

DiogoSilva.7089:

A melee staff with high DPS will probably be reserved for another profession’s elite spec (warrior?).

Revenant’s martial staff is support.

My guess is that Thief will get staff in a future round of Elite Specializations. They have a martial-artist vibe about them anyways.

After reading the post, I really hope the Ventari’s tablet mechanic isn’t as gimmicky as it sounds…

Also, the legend it primarily synergizes with (Ventari) is a pacifist…

Jelle.2807:

Nothing quite so elaborate is needed. All that needs to be done is for enemies to

A. Hit more frequently and have higher total dps, so you can’t use active defenses to avoid most of all damage (though still require active defenses to avoid a large part of it depending on profession)

B. Put party wide relatively unavoidable pressure damage, so some amount of party support and healing is necesary.

C. Not rally downed players on death. Rally on kill in pve has always been bad design and should be a pvp thing, it lets players go all out knowing they’ll rally anyway if they burst something down.

Edit: Also more enemies need cleave attacks to corner stacking dies horribly.

I generally agree with everything but C. With consistent pressure damage, it will be harder to sit in the fire to res an ally, and downed players will die faster. Removing the rally on kill mechanic kind of kills all of the play involved with downstate.

DiogoSilva.7089:

penelopehannibal.8947:

It says part way through “and the revenant will be the first profession to use the staff as a melee weapon in Guild Wars 2.”

Please. Please. Please tell me there will be another profession that uses Melee staff!

Of course, it’ll be the warrior’s elite spec.

Melee Staff Thief would be really interesting, eventually (definitely not this round of elites—I’m pretty sure Thief will get rifle). I can see a lot of Monk as martial artist in the Thief, given how acrobatic the thief is.

Belenwyn.8674:

Another problem is that Arenanet has designed trinity-encounters for a non-trinity system. All encounters are centered around damage and kill of a boss target. This is fine for a trinity system where damage dealers can only deal damage.

In a non-trinity system where all classes can fill all roles trinity encounters lead to monotony and metas. GW2 needs non-trinity encounters with multiple tasks that favor different approaches to reach the goal. There could even be a decent fraction of encounters where DPS has no/low relevance and a full zerk groups would finish the encounter much later than a full giver or nomad group.

I remember the WoW boss that you had to heal to death. It really threw my guild for a loop when we first ran it.

Dragon Ruler X.8512:

I like your thoughts here, but I thought I’d point out that you penalized Zerk gear, just in a less extreme way ^^;

“Don’t Punish Berzerker gear, but it would be good to make other sets more interesting….Other examples include giving Berzerker’s Armor a chance to apply vuln on hit, Knight’s Armor a chance to gain retaliation when struck, Cleric’s armor increased Boon duration, etc.”

I do think even minor bonuses to the armor would be nice. A 4th stat may complicate things though when thinking of how it would need to be implemented and then all of the new stat combos that may arise from there on. This is why I leaned more toward what you had slightly mentioned which was some effect tied to the gear itself.

What I’m taking your thoughts as (forgive me if I misrepresent) is essentially Zerker stays as it is, but if you wear 6 pieces of zerker armor, you get (as an example) 12% chance to apply vuln on hit. What I’m thinking of, instead, is each piece of zerker armor provides 2% chance to apply vuln on hit.

The primary reason I’m leaning towards the latter is that your idea removes any incentive to mix your gear stats. With the examples I gave, it would be viable to wear a zerker/zealot armor mix so that you get the damage from the extra vuln stacks and additional lifesteal (I’m thinking the lifesteal would be really low, like .5% per piece, to keep it from being overpowered), but less lifesteal than full zealots and less damage from additional vuln stacks than full zerker. You could even see really funky sets that nobody would think of now like Dire/Zerker if people want to add some longevity to their vuln stacks (assuming Dire gets condi duration).

As for increased complexity, I don’t know if that’s necessarily a bad thing. They already have to balance a lot of these mechanics as far as trait stats and runes go, and I think that it would be less difficult to implement than set bonuses from a programming perspective. As for complicating future stat set releases, I don’t think it would be any different than a set bonus—either way they would have to come up with a new bonus for each stat set. It would just be a matter of dividing that bonus by 6.

DieselFueled.3257:

$10 for an expansion to an mmo that has been around for almost 3 years with no subscription fee or pay to win features. More than $10 is not worth it to you? Poor Anet. There is no satisfying some of you people.

The full game was literally $10 multiple times very recenently. That’s less than I pay for 2 pints, or a weeks worth of coffee, or lunch at Subway.

/shrug

You pay $10 for lunch at Subway? What do you eat?!

Don’t Punish Berzerker gear, but it would be good to make other sets more interesting.

Similar to the lines of the Gear Set Modifications (which I do think would be redundant with runes and punish mixed gear sets), I think that it would be interesting to have a 4th attribute on level 80 gear that could make more gear sets more interesting.

The idea is to give each stat combination (for armor, at least) additional utility that still ties in to the “feel” of the prefix. Zealot’s Armor, as an example, is a higher dps stat combo that provides some sustain, so it fits that it would get a stat such as “Steal x% of damage dealt as life” to give a sustain mechanic that is dependent on damage. Dire is a very high-sustain condition set, so it would make sense to give it “+x% Condition Duration” to allow Dire armor wearers to further benefit from long fights.

Other examples include giving Berzerker’s Armor a chance to apply vuln on hit, Knight’s Armor a chance to gain retaliation when struck, Cleric’s armor increased Boon duration, etc.

ANet could even get really creative with the effects like giving Apothocary’s a chance to convert a boon to a condition on hit, Settler’s a chance to convert a condition to a boon on being hit.

The difficulty would be finding the right values to add on these, particularly where “Chance to apply” is involved so that they are attractive but not unbalanced, but it does give us the chance to recoup some of the effects we are set to lose with the new trait system.

This, along with restructuring fights, would bring real diversity into the game without gimping zerker.

• WvWvW
• SilverWastes
• Occasional spvp
• Occasional Map Completion
• Making sure all of my level 80s have 65 skill points
• Leveling Alts (working on a necro)

Jerus.4350:

I know, hehe I probably should ahve left that part out, but I was just saying that you could even have the trinity aspects in this game, you can make tanks and healers, they just aren’t very good.

But you could do entire raids without devoted tanks you just take out the general health loss and only leave in the special attacks… which is basically what they’ve done with all of PVE in this game. Less attacks and meant to be avoided.

And MattyP, it’s actually pretty surprising how much healing is actually possible, I imagine an Engi + Ele team after these trait updates will be pretty amazing in their potential (staff ele, Alchemy+Explosion Engi).

It depends on the fight mechanics. With the absence of targeted healing, parties will have to stay together to benefit from AoE Healing. If the encounter forces you to separate in some way, then it becomes a lot more difficult to act as a healer.

That being said, I think most of the healing traits on the new engi line are in the Inventions tree :-)

Jerus.4350:

Windsagio.1340:

Jerus.4350:

Windsagio.1340:

Jerus.4350:

The problem is getting the details right. Having those jabs take off 25% of your health, well, suddenly they’re not really jabs, they’re on the level that you want to avoid them if at all possible. So it’d take some math to figure out how hard they want them to be based on mitigation available, heals available and the amount of damage over time that the jabs will do. Make it so much pressure that I’m just gonna back out to range and take the potential damage loss because in the end having to heal and do all that stuff is pushing me below ranging would be bad, it’s complicated, takes some figuring out.

This is where gear can become an interesting question again though.

If say taking a 2+1 stat set makes it so that you can take a few more jabs while staying in your preferred damage range, it makes it a viable choice vs an all-offense stat set.

The balance on this is very tight, as you say, but the model really solves a very large number of problems.

2+1 stat set, or ranged combat? which is better?

Depends on the encounter, class and build, yes? That’s where the potential for more varied party comps/strategies comes in.

Ranged might be better for a ranger (no pun intended) but a PS warrior would probably want 2+1 to get the benefit of forceful greatsword for the party.

This does have the effect of “forcing” true optimizers to carry multiple gear sets, but a lot of people won’t (need to) bother.

Absolutely.

I know know some of the more attrition type fights right now are just… well, not what I picture when I talk about this jab type thing. The first boss in CoF1 for example, once he starts throwing that whip out, I either have to back out, or spend the entire time blocking/dodging. If I put on Valkyrie or Knights gear, I wouldn’t be able to just stand toe to toe with him suddenly, no it’d just take me longer and I’d actually lose efficiency in the “kill him before he kills me” race, so yeah, fine line of balance to make this whole idea actually work.

A lot of my issue with Dungeons as they currently stand stems from exactly this: difficulty is based entirely on huge hits that require you to disengage or constantly dodge/block attacks. What I was getting to with my example was the idea that if there are a variety of types of attacks so you could optimize which you had to mitigate, which you could take, and which you might take for your friends, it would make them more engaging and fun while encouraging some build diversity.

Kamikazi.5380:

Warrior’s are most likely getting off-hand pistol, since Rytlock had an offhand pistol and Anet told us that NPC’s with weapons outside their class was a hint on what their spec was, such as Trahearne and Majory using GS.

For utilities, the one that seems the most plausible is gadgets. It ties in with the whole Charr thing after all.

In this case, we could very well see pistol in the main hand (NPC Lord in Red Rock Bastion)

Jerus.4350:

Nuzt.7894:

TheRandomGuy.7246:

Nuzt.7894:

You will NEVER have a WoW like raid in GW2 without the Holy Trinity, not a complaint, just stating facts. WoW raids are designed for the Trinity, I am having a really rough time envisioning how they (Anet) could make enjoyable raid content (on WoW’s level) without any form of Trinity.

It will never be close to a WoW raid standard …

No one is asking anet to copy paste wow raids in gw2 lol.

Read the OP post. He insinuates (he’s not wrong) that WoW does raids very well and he would like to see something along those lines here, in GW2. While he may not be asking for carbon copies of WoW raids, he would like something “like” WoW raids which won’t happen without a trinity.

You very well could make something to that regard. Advanced mechanics with more sustained fights. Environmental mechanics. Really the only things you wouldn’t have is a tank, I men you even could potentially have people relegated to healing duties, and even then you could have mechanics that allow people to act as tanks even if only temporarily. (I suggest you look up Skady’s Clerics gear Fractals).

A sustained healer is something that would be very difficult to be given the mechanics of GW2. Honestly, there are more ways to tank than ways to consistently heal parties.

Jerus.4350:

To add, Tim I think you’re spot on.

I wanted to elaborate on it a little. If you ever watch Boxing (no not that mayweather crap), you’ll notice that the jabs often get through without even an attempt to dodge. Why? Because they really aren’t hurting anything, and dodging takes energy which you don’t want to waste. So take the jab, take the jab, take the jab, avoid the cross, take the jab, counter the hook, take the jab, blah blah, you get it. But, then it even gets more advanced in how you take the jab, move an inch to the left and it glances across your skin rather than getting you with full force, mitigating the blow. There’s a reason it’s called the sweet science.

The problem is getting the details right. Having those jabs take off 25% of your health, well, suddenly they’re not really jabs, they’re on the level that you want to avoid them if at all possible. So it’d take some math to figure out how hard they want them to be based on mitigation available, heals available and the amount of damage over time that the jabs will do. Make it so much pressure that I’m just gonna back out to range and take the potential damage loss because in the end having to heal and do all that stuff is pushing me below ranging would be bad, it’s complicated, takes some figuring out.

Using your boxing metaphor. It would be interesting if the jabs applied vuln, the cross stunned or immobilized (pulsing immob), and the hook packed a big (unblockable, directional) punch.

Then a mob that combos with jab, jab, jab, cross, hook would be incredibly punishing and provides opportunity for both active defense (dodging or blocking the cross and running around the hook, cleansing the vuln) and passive defense (soaking or body-blocking the directional damage for a downed or rooted ally). Essentially, you could have multiple was of dealing with the mob and rewards a variety of stat combinations.

It takes some tweaking, but there can be ways of creating encounters that are dynamic and have multiple solutions for completion.

My guess is still that they’re aiming for the Launch Anniversary. This seems to back that up, unofficial as it may be.