Guild Wars 2

Skritt! I’m hit!

Now seriously speaking, nothing is more frustrating to someone who intends to use a bad word, than having it replaced by a cute word.
Kitten is probably the best word for the job.

Even assuming it is very hard to animated the whole whip polygon, Whips can be awesomely animated by creating a predetermined “whiplash” visual effect, without actually moving the polygon itself.

Imagine the hilt+guard remain visible, while the whip length is replaced by the above visual effect.

Wow, I think you’re missing alot of what makes GW1 gear and economy work.

What makes hunting weapons somewhat interesting in GW1, is the fact you aren’t so easily going to get the perfect affixes.

When you get +X% Enchantment Duration, it isn’t guaranteed to be a perfect 20%.
Wich means when you DO get a perfect 20%, it’s worth ALOT.
More than twice the worth of 19%.

Making everything always drop perfect is alot less fun.

GW2 can track individual instances of items, because we’re only talking about equipment and upgrades.

They could change something from GW1 to GW2 to make it easy to handle in terms of information.

Instead of drops generating each property individually, potentially generating an item with 1 perfect suffix and 1 weak prefix, ANet could make it so that a dropped item’s “perfection” affects the whole item.
So if you get a “perfect” Penetrating Staff of Enchantment, both the Penetrating and Enchantment properties are perfect.
If you get a 95% item, all variable properties are 95%.

This only needs to apply to dropped items (and crafted), because the ones you modify become soulbound.

The degree of perfection of an affix could be represented by a color.
100% = red
95% = orange
90% = yellow
85% = green
80% = blue
75% = white

I think environmental weapons should be easier to use – faster response.

They should feel like a 3rd weapon set.

They should have a visible Durability, rather than breaking based on chance.

Lastly, they should not be overpowered at all.

It’s not fun at all to be able to pwn nearly every boss in AC Story with stone throw spam, for example, keeping the boss knocked down 90% of the time.

The idea behind this may be pure and awesome.
But when it gets down to how players use information, it doesn’t work.

Most players overlook the mentality changes that come with “simple, convenient” tools such as Armory.

I, for example, don’t like my character information available to the public.
My character isn’t special or anything – but I just don’t like sharing its information.
Likewise, I don’t care about other characters’ information either.

Then you say “oh, well then there would just be the option to refuse access to your character information in the Options”.
It’s not that simple.

Players become truly addicted to information.
They start making rules – allow access to your character’s information or you can’t join Group/Guild.
And it’s downhill from there, all the way to obnoxious elitism.

In the end, you start seeing players asking Exotic gear and specific builds to faceroll something that can be done with any build in Fine gear.

I suppose a Greek/Roman-oriented region/faction/group could be introduced eventually.

I think Gear took a step in the wrong direction between GW1 and GW2.

GW1 has a really fun and interesting gear model.
Below are key elements of the GW1 system that are worth preserving:

1. It’s fairly easy to obtain the best “base items”
2. Item properties are randomly generated
3. The properties themselves have randomly generated numbers. So you can get a Suffix with 12-15% chance to lifesteal. 15% will sell ten times higher than 14% because it’s perfect.
4. You can salvage any and all item properties, to then apply the ones you want to your favorite item.

Example:

• You want to make your dream Sword.
• You obtained your dream Sword skin, but it has the wrong stats.
• You got several weapons across your gameplay, and managed to salvage one or more Perfect properties among them
• You may farm to make gold to buy the missing Perfect properties
• You give the Perfect properties to your favorite Skin and voila, your perfect item (for that specific item, a least)
  —-

That is how GW2 should have turned out.

Sure we have Runes/Sigils, but that’s equivalent to Inscriptions from GW1.
That’s 2 variables less than in GW1.
GW2 should actually have more variables in gear customizability, not less.

So how to apply this to GW2?

1. Make Salvage Kits work like in GW1, with Basic and above allowing you to choose between salvaging upgrade with a chance to keep the rest of the item, or destroy the item to salvage the raw materials.
2. Make Stats in gear salvageable somehow, perhaps associating them to the gear components, like Mighty Jute Epaulet Padding, Malign Iron Sword Hilt, Precise Steel Axe Blade.
3. Make Stats in gear slightly random (the properties, not the raw defense/damage). For an item that has a flat 100 bonus to Toughness, it would instead randomly generate a value (hypotetically) between 75% and 100% of the current value.
4. While in GW1 you had 3 customizable components per item, in GW2 you should have at least 3, preferrably 4 or 5.
5. Make the degree of perfection generated on drops and crafted items apply to the whole item in order to make listing them in BLTP viable (modified items become soulbound so they’re not an issue).
6. Make the degree of perfection of an affix represented by a color in its text:
   100% = red
   95% = orange
   90% = yellow
   85% = green
   80% = blue
   75% = white
   So a “Ravaging Beautiful Staff of Bloodlust” with blue “Ravaging”, green “Beautiful Staff” and orange “of Bloodlust” would be a Masterwork item with 80% perfection on “Ravaging” and 95% perfection on “of Bloodlust”.
7. Upgrade BLTP display of items to show equipment in a more organized manner, such as:
   - Name – Property #1, Property #2, Property #3, Property #4, Property #5
   Example:
   - Ravaging Beautiful Staff of Bloodlust – Ravaging – N/A – N/A – N/A – of Bloodlust

Result
This would make collecting gear more exciting, a true item hunt, not for the items themselves, but for the potential Perfect properties you can salvage, and make all the random loot you get have better potential to earn you something worthwhile (perfect properties).

I completely disagree with the Loot System Tips part.

Compare GW1 gear system, with WoW gear system.
WoW just keeps chugging better “tiers” of gear at you, wich trivializes older content.
This makes it better to just rush to improve your gear to the max, and then you can go to lower “tier” dungeons and zerg them effortlessly.
The gear has predetermined stats too and is obtained with tokens or by chance.

It’s boring and not really fun at all. You don’t feel stronger because you’re thrown stronger enemies at you that make you feel exactly the same.
You just see bigger numbers on screen. Is that really what you want?

GW1 is different – and in my opinion, way better.

1. You not only hunt for Gear throughout the game, but for Skills as well
2. Gear has randomly generated, customizable prefixes, inscriptions and suffixes.
3. You can salvage any and all of the 3, to then apply the ones you want to your favorite item.
4. Prefix and Suffix strength is random too, so you can get “perfect” strength, but it is rare. So you can get a Suffix with 10-15% chance to lifesteal. 15% will sell for ten or hundred times higher because it’s perfect.
   Example:
   You want to make your dream Sword.
   You obtained your dream Sword skin, but it has the wrong stats.
   You got several weapons across your gameplay, and managed to get an Axe with the perfect Inscription
   You may farm to make gold to buy your perfect suffix and prefix.
   You mix them together and voila, your perfect item.

This is how it should be in GW2, but with MORE stuff to hunt for.

I agree with 1 point from the OP.
Fights shouldn’t be balanced around being able to rez, run back, and continue fighting.

The fights should be balanced around NOT being able to use the waypoint until the fight ends.
Essentially, you shouldn’t want to die, but if you die you must be rezzed or you won’t contribute anymore to that particular fight.

You can’t really change the duration of Retaliation on SoW without making it incoherent, because it applies 1s of Retaliation every tick, and ticks 5 times.

I agree Daze may be OP, so I have withdrawn my suggestion to change Light Field Projectiles.
But adding Daze to a Chain skill and requiring Burning targets isn’t OP at all.
You’ll need to use Wrathful Verdict immediately after a 4-5th attack, Judge’s Intervention or VoJ (traited for AoE if you want AoE Daze) – all for a 1s Daze.

I disagree with point one.
The story doesn’t need to be linear like that.

They can reach Cantha in search of allies to defeat the dragons in Tyria, and at the same time discovering new dangers in Cantha.
Same deal with Elona.

This will make players less likely to get “saturated” with the same art all the time, by having mid and end game objectives in every region in each expansion.

Also, Tengu belong to both Tyria and Cantha, so introducing them with Cantha is ideal from a story perspective, as it provides plenty plot hooks.
—-

I somewhat agree with point Two.

My intention with Weapon Subtypes is variety and flavor. I don’t mean to imply anything, but I use their differences as an excuse to make different skills.

But it could be implemented differently. Equipping a Katana for the first time might give you access to new skills – Katana specific.
Same for Scimitar.
And once those are unlocked, you are able to customize your Weapon Slots by choosing between all your unlocked Sword + Katana + Scimitar skills – but this customization would only be available when wielding a Weapon for wich you have unlocked all skills.

(Speaking of Main Hand only) let’s say you unlocked all 3 sword skills, but only 2 Katana and 1 Scimitar.
When wielding a Katana or Scimitar, you cannot customize the weapon slots, and only see the currently unlocked skills of that particular weapon subtype.
When wielding a Sword, you can customize the weapon slots and choose from your unlocked 3 sword, 2 katana and 1 scimitar skills.

Plenty alternatives on how to mix flavor with variety.

What about… comments on the topic?

First of all, let me say that splitting skills for PvP and PvE, is neither the easiest nor the best sollution, and below I will provide an alternative that does not cause its kind of side effects.
Secondly, this also addresses numerous issues with current PvE content, regarding both challenge and fun.

TL;DR

Balance PCs for PvP.
Balance PvE for PvP-balanced-PCs.

It is pretty obvious that balancing skills for both PvP and PvE is impractical for various reasons.
This is only true, because the differences between the 2 game modes make you use different tactics and thus value skill effects differently.

Before balancing PvP vs PvE, it is necessary to establish the fundamental differences between them.
Why do you use different tactics?
The fact an AI will never act like a player because it can’t think like a player is not the main reason, because if that was the case, you could say NPCs are like easy-mode PvP – but you can’t.
The real reason is simpler than that – players can do things NPCs cannot and vice-versa.

Let me reiterate – to make PvE similar to PvP, you do not need to make NPCs act like players.
You just them to make use of the same mechanics, instead of resorting to huge health pools, insane damage spikes, immunities and insane control abilities (3 second knockdowns, 6 second fears)

[Differences PvE enemies have from PvP]

1. Survival based mostly on Health pool size
2. Few skills (2-3)
3. Mostly telegraphed skills
4. Nearly inexistant defensive skills
5. Nearly inexistant Healing or condition removal
6. Nearly inexistant boon removal
7. Few punishing skills (retaliation, confusion)
8. Cannot attack while moving nor kite
9. Permanent or gradual Immunities

When speaking of bosses, all of these problems are amplified:
Monstrous health pools, and few, mostly damage-oriented skills, including a few telegraphed insta-down skills.

Players in PvE fight by spamming damage, with occasional dodge away -> heal/etc -> go back in.
Bosses are more of the same, sometimes in a more phased manner.

This is more than simply a problem between PvP and PvE – it is a problem within PvE itself, as seasoned players become bored with the simple PvE mechanics.

[Sollutions]

1. Lower enemy health (at least champion and bosses)
2. Give enemies more skills
3. Give enemies combos like breathe poison field then spit projectiles over the field
4. Give more enemies defensive skills (Evasion, Aegis, Protection, Blind, Daze, Stun)
5. Give more enemies Healing and Condition Removal, convert Conditions to Boons
6. Give more enemies Boon removal, convert Boons to Conditions
7. Give more enemies punishing skills (Confusion, Retaliation, projectile reflection, fire armor)
8. Allow enemies to use (some) skills while moving (even if at reduced speed)
9. Remove immunities from the game and add more interesting mechanics that reward player skill.
   - Replace immunity to certain conditions with effects triggered when affected by those conditions. Examples being Imps gaining Might few a few seconds when Burned, or Hylek gaining regeneration for a few seconds when Poisoned.
   - Unshakable no longer grants Defiance, and simply reduces the duration of certain conditions by 66%.
   - Certain skills used by Champions and Bosses grant them X stacks of Defiance, as a buffer against interruption.
   - Veterans are given the Hardy passive, a weaker version of Unshakable, reducing the duration of certain conditions by 33%.
10. Make some enemies able to spot you from far away and actually try to pre-empt you

Any and all of the above will:

• help make PvE more fun
• help players become better at the game
• make the game harder for bots
• allow ANet to improve the drop quality/quantity as enemies will be less facerolled
• make it alot easier to balance skills in a way that actually works for both PvE and PvP.

Any further comments?

Any further comments?

I agree with alot of what was said.

But the easiest sollution, in my opinion, is just giving mobs more player skills and a slightly more PvP-style fighting strategy.

Give them access to the boons and conditions we have access.
Lower Boss/Champion Health but give them abilities that apply Weakness or Blind.
Give them abilities that apply Regeneration, Aegis or Protection, that must be removed or converted to conditions or the fight will last forever.
Give them “do = die” skills like Wall of Reflection (reflects projectiles), Confusion or Retaliation (reflects some damage).

With all that, you will be worried about dealing damage when it matters, worried about making sure you aren’t blinded nor the boss has Aegis when attempting to use your main attack.

If you do this, ANet will even have a MUCH easier time balancing PvP vs PvE

API opens room for some good things, but also to ALOT of bad things.

Nah. That’s a typical misunderstanding. Cause-and-effect is upside down.

It’s not because of players engraving Devs words in stone that Devs only communicate when they are certain.
It’s because of Devs only communicating when they are certain that players engrave their words in stone.

Essentially, there could certainly be a small transition phase, but quickly the players would become accostumed to having some interesting insight into what the devs are cooking in their heads.

It’d be refreshing, satisfying, and just make the devs let us know how awesome they are.

Guanglai, of all I wrote that’s all you have to say?

I agree with you maybe the Daze on Projectile Combo wasn’t such a good idea.
Editing original post to reflect that.

What about the rest?

@Ganzo
Daze on Light Field Projectile may be OP.
But what about Wrathful Verdict?
It has melee range and not a very big radius, and only Dazes enemies that are already Burning.

@mulch
Yes, the snipers are a good example of something that should be more frequent in GW2.
I also mean enemies using stuff like Wall of Reflection (reflects projectiles), causing Ranged to be a bad thing for a little while.

I think my suggestion to make all damaging Charge/Teleport/Jump attacks hit harder the further you travel.
Even the side effects like Warrior’s Hammer Burst skill Earthshaker (600 range) could add 1/4 second stun if you travel at least 300, or another 1/2 second if you travel at least 500.

@Mog
Good for you.
Now tell me, when was the last time you solved a problem by swapping from a Ranged Weapon to Melee Weapon?
Did you ever think “Ranged isn’t working. I’ll just swap to melee!”

And I’m not talking of 1 specific skill the weapon may have that helps your Ranged rotation.
I’m talking of swapping to a Melee weapon in order to go Melee.

I mean actively communicating what they’re thinking.

Stuff that ANet isn’t necessarily planning to do, but is being brainstorming.

No. They’re Legendaries. Get it? Legen – wait for it – daries.

You’re suggesting to make the most sought-after thing in the game accessible through spamming something players already spam their eyes out…
Legendaries aren’t even mandatory.

If you want to make Legendaries accessible through different means, make it replace Luck with SKILL.

Some kind of solo trials that are insane, professions-specific skill-checks that reward you with an item (not the precursor itself) that helps craft the precursor.

Aedan Xaelan.2174, you seem to be too used to Lv80, Rare and Exotic gear.
A few things you may need reminded:
- You wear common, fine and masterwork gear throughout the majority of the game, even a little into level 80
- You wear some pieces of gear 5-10 levels below throughout the majority of the game.

1 creature is often too easy.
Even 2.
But start thinking about Respawns in areas with plenty of creatures, and it’s a different situation.

The issue with this game’s PvE is not the creature stats.
Creatures and bosses hitting harder only leads to more problems.
Players with some latency = defeated.
One unlucky synchronized attack from 2-3 enemies = defeated.

I’d say bosses and champions have far too much health.
The problem is the lack of defensive maneuvers used by enemies, wich is also one of the reasons some skills work so well/bad in PvP vs PvE

Give more creatures Aegis, Blinding, Dazing or Confusion
Give more creatures Immobilize, Cripple or Chill
Give more creatures Pulls or Charges
Make those that already have it use it a little more often

This way players will need to use their damage well, rather than spamming.

I think there should be a section of the forum, or stickies within each appropriate section, where ANet keeps the players informed of:
- Features they are working on (already decided to go ahead)
- Features they are thinking/considering about (not yet decided to go ahead)
- Bugs they are working on

I’m not talking about threads of promises.
Just honest communication that makes the Community feel more on the inside than the outside.

Well I made an adjustment to my suggestion.

First off, all charge attacks should hit harder the further away your target is.
This won’t make a difference in melee vs melee, or melee vs crippled ranged.
It will make a difference in PvE encounters where ranged can just run in circles dishing their damage, but melee must go in and out all the time.
It will make a difference in PvP situations where ranged kites all the time – melee doesn’t do damage while kited.

Melee can’t just deal alot more damage.
A little is okay.
I would even be okay with ranged dealing more damage than melee if more of their skills required them to STAND STILL.

So it really isn’t about damage.
It’s about what sacrifices do Melee and Ranged make to deal their damage.
Melee makes alot more sacrifices, without visible compensation.

So increase Ranged sacrifices and/or Melee damage.

I think some of you don’t get my point.

This has nothing to do with how much damage melee does, or how much skill it takes to play.

This is about how there are no situations where Ranged is unviable or heavily penalized, and plenty of them where Melee is.

There are encounter mechanics in PvE and all kinds of “terrain characteristics” in both PvP and PvE where Melee is screwed.
And I’m not even talking about bugs.

How to make it fair?
Ranged can deal damage in melee and in range.
Melee can only deal damage in melee.

- Make gap closers deal more damage the further you travel before hitting your target.
- Add to PvE encounters mechanics such as skills that only hit targets beyond a certain range, or hit harder the further away you are, or block/reflect projectiles.

Incurafy.6329:

I’m sorry, but please, if you’re going to make suggestions, then use actusl GW2 terms. I didn’t understand a word of this.

I am suggesting that, for example, Spider Venom, wich lasts 30 seconds or 5 Attacks and causes Attacks to apply a 6 second Poison, would also gain 1 “Attack” every 6 seconds or so.

So if you cast Spider Venom and start attacking right away, you will be able to apply poison up to 10 times – 5 initial, plus 1 every 6 seconds of the 30 second duration.

I think venoms feel a little lackluster.

Outright improving their effect or number of charges doesn’t work, as it might cause problems – specifically since players pre-cast the Venom in order to cast it again mid-fight, much like Traps are used – resulting in excessive effect.

A way to improve them without causing issues, is:
- Keep the current number of charges
- Make that the charge Cap
- Add 1 charge every X seconds, up the the cap.
Example:
- You cast Spider Venom (5 charges, lasts 30 seconds, 45 seconds recharge, gains 1 charge every 6 seconds, but never goes above 5 charges)
- You start attacking 10 seconds later.
- Since it adds 1 charge every 6 seconds, you gain a charge at the seconds 12, 18, 24 and 30 as long as you keep under 5 charges.

I hope this is clear.
This means casting beforehand doesn’t bring issues since charges can’t go over the cap.
Casting in the heat of the moment won’t make it feel lackluster either.

Mulch, I made 2 suggestions, not one.

Currently you have alot of false choices.

I want them to be true choices, either by a) making it so you can effectively use 2 sets of melee weapons with any profession without being kittened, or b) force us to use 1 melee and 1 ranged set

Just equality, that’s all.
Either ANet can make it fair for everyone to use any combination of melee+ranged, ranged+ranged and melee+melee, or they need to make it so players stop finding themselves in a situation where the weapons they want to use, are not the weapons they should be using.

The goal of my 2 suggestions is the same.
Obviously I prefer all weapon combinations to be allowed, and balanced.

Unless ANet gives us the option to play Nightmare Court and other “evil” factions, it makes no sense whatsoever for a profession to feel “evil”.

Ruthless? Sure.
Evil? No.

I do miss the GW1 Necromancer animations, in particular the long cast animation (hovering in the air arched back)

Amonde Daneren.2380:

Very much in line with the sounds people make when they are actually fighting for their lives, and stop diving a kitten about what others might think of them.

I’m sorry, but I have to reply to this:

• clearly you do not know what someone sounds like when fighting for their lives…
  It’s not shrieking and pulling hairs.
  It’s using more strength than you are used to because you are not worried about pain, and most sounds you produce will come straight from the gut and sound more beast than man (or woman).
• a girl trying to honestly swing something big like a log, baseball bat (assuming a small girl) – or, in GW2’s case, a huge Greatsword – does not make a remotely similar sound

I’ll make it easy for you – even though it’s not the same as someone fighting for their life, just try watching a female martial art matches like kickboxing, jiujitsu, or even something as simple as tennis.

I think the game is overtuned as far as periodic animations and sounds go.

It’s not homossexuality that’s being forced at you.
Sylvari disregard gender entirely.

There’s this Sylvari girl alone that is annoyed at a male Sylvari not noticing her.

All Sylvari relationships are thrown at you.
Sylvari is essentially a bunch of young people discovering life and not caring about gender.

I’m just saying you have issues with being pure melee in several aspects of the game, with many champions or situations clearly benefitting ranged, and none really benefitting melee in a comparable manner.

Er, Healing Power isn’t restricted to Guardians, so no, this thread doesn’t belong there.
Thanks for all the well thought feedback, everyone.

Any further feedback is appreciated.
Updated initial post to deal with 2 distinct suggestions.

Any further comments?

Animus, I agree with you on many of your points, but making a thread with the sole purpose of identifying a problem, without truly attempting to provide a sollution, doesn’t reach far.

I think posting on existing threads with quality sollutions, and helping them stay in the front page with quality replies that keep the discussions alive in a healthy way, will make it alot easier to get noticed.

The game needs to have restrictions, to prevent players from stacking 1 type of skills – to prevent players from going into the Holy kitten Trinity of glass cannons, brick tanks and… sponge healers.

You are meant to have at least 1 healing skill.

I could agree with you that skills should be given distinct categories, and be interchangeable in their slot positioning as long as they meet the criteria.

Example: Slot #6 is Healing, Slot 7, 8 and 9 are Utility.
Some skills might be categorized as both Utility and Heal, and thus fit any of those 4 slots.

But being able to have something other than a Heal in slot #6 is a no-no.

Just add +2 Utility skill slots to the game.
So you’d have 5 weapon, 1 healing, 5 utility and 1 elite skills.

I like this idea because it does not benefit farming/grinding and instead encourages you to travel, and populate the less populated areas.

Don’t make GW2 a second Erotera Online.

Alot of players seem to have the wrong notion of what armor is for.
It’s not meant to adorn – it’s meant to protect.

Comparing to what real armor looks like, Guild Wars 2 has a very appealing alternative.

That said, everyone wants more variety for all types of armor, and I agree it would be nice to have a thief’ish armor style for Rangers, since thieves have ranger’ish armor too.

So let’s go through some facts:
- We are given the ability to use 2 sets of weapons.
- We are given the ability to use 2 melee sets, 2 ranged sets, or 1 of each

Yet, when it comes down to business:
- If you have 2 ranged sets, you’re fine
- If you have 2 melee sets, you’re screwed

Is this the intended design?
What about those who only want to play melee?

I propose one of the below:

1. Give Melee some situational advantages and Ranged situational disadvantages, both in PvP and PvE
   - Make all melee gap closers such as Swoop , Rush or Leap of Faith deal more damage the further you travel before hitting your target.
   This will only increase damage dealt to targets that can maintain distance from you.
   - Add to PvE encounters mechanics such as skills that only hit targets beyond a certain range, or hit harder the further away you are, or block/reflect projectiles.
   - Add more areas in PvP and PvE with pillars and whatnot that allow melee to more effectively avoid damage. Essentially, melee kiting ranged.
2. The alternative, wich I don’t like, is forcing players to have 1 melee set + 1 ranged set

@GSSBlunaspike

I understand, but it’s not just about numbers. It’s about mentality too.
You’ve shown me some, and I’ve shown you some as well.

The only quantifiable supportive or defensive effect that scales with gear is Healing.

If I can focus on P/Pr/CD plus T/V and use Aegis, Protection, Blind, Daze and whatnot to reduce/prevent damage taken while occasionally using my small heal, why does Healing require me to sacrifice an offensive or defensive stat, either:
- dealing less damage to heal better – making the fight last longer,
- or dying faster to heal better, risking getting killed by damage that often comes in irregular bursts

…all the while Healing isn’t that much stronger than the other defensive or supportive effects?
- Stacking Toughness reduces damage taken to the point that your weak heal is quite effective at keeping you alive.
- Stacking Healing may make your heal Strong, but this game isn’t based on 1v1, and against multiple enemies this quickly loses effectiveness against Toughness as Toughness scales with incoming damage, and Healing doesn’t.

Healing as a stat causes problems, and if removed would make the game feel better for everyone, even those who wish to focus on healing, as they would still heal well based on their targets’ Vitality and their own offensive stats.

Yes, Mulch, it’s impractical mid-launch. But quite practical for an expansion if it proves to be a sollution to alot of problems.
Even now, some of the team is fixing bugs, others are thinking on how to balance the game.
And here I am, suggesting one potential sollution to more than one problem.

The unbalance in the game comes from how alot of gear, skills and traits interact inefficiently.
If my sollution solves some of such inefficiencies, it will also naturally alleviate some of the unbalance.

Well my point being that since healing is quantifiable like damage, it needs to scale somehow.
I would like it to be as intuitive as effects like Protection or Aegis – effects that do not require you to build specific gear in order to use optimally.

If you know that more of the stat you use for damage is going to make your healing stronger, and the more health your target has, the more healing he will receive, it doesn’t require you to build gear specifically towards healing – you’ll build gear for damage and healing will come naturally.
That’s the thing – you wouldn’t need to think about it at all.

Well, you would need to consider your gear when thinking of using Heal over Time effects versus Direct Heals, unless Power and Condition Damage both affected all type of healing.

@ Iron Wolf
Mm, I didn’t say Power x Vitality. I said Power + Vitality.
If you want self-direct healing, Vitality + Power would be best.
If you want self-periodic healing, Vitality + Condition Damage would be best.
If you just want to heal others, you can focus on Toughness or Vitality as it won’t matter and just get Power or Condition Damage depending on the kind of Healing you want to use.

@Phy
Indeed it would take restructuring, but not as much as it may seem at first glance, specially when talking about something to be introduced with an expansion.
There would be no need for Dual Trait, either, and there would no longer be hated builds or roles.

@GSSBlunaspike

No, I don’t want glass cannon builds.
But healing builds are not just a “non-glass cannon” build. They sacrifice alot of damage.
Trading 1 damage stat for 1 defensive stat makes alot of difference, due to the multiplicative interaction between them.
When it comes to Precision, it affects damage itself, then affects effects that trigger on crits and whatnot.

It’s not me making a classic mistake or wishing for homogenized professions.
It’s me wanting builds less about specific, prohibitive gear.

I can use gear and traits focused on damage, and use defensive utility skills focused on protection, Aegis, removing conditions, converting conditions into boons, Wall of Reflection and whatnot as needed without needing to swap gear.
But when it comes to Healing, it’s a different story.

I shouldn’t need to hit like a wet noodle in order to be supportive, because focusing on being supportive is already taking its toll in my character’s activity, before stats are even considered.

Hmm. A melee fighter in light armor. Could work.
But what kind of unique mechanics, fighting style and F1-F4 skills would it have, in order to feel a legitimate profession?

Here’s my try on the concept:
- Primary Mechanic (F1, F2 and F3) – “Way of the Three Paths”: Tiger, Dragon and Phoenix
- Each “Way” provides a unique set of skills.
- Some skills build Yin, and some build Yang (two separate gauges next to each other that grow in opposite ways, like a dual Life Force).
- You begin in Way of the Tiger by default and when you are defeated.
- Way of the Tiger (F1) requires 50% Yin and 50% Yang gives access to Way of the Dragon (F2) and Way of the Phoenix (F3)
- Way of the Dragon (F2) requires 100% Yang and gives access to Way of the Tiger (F1) and Way of the Phoenix (F3)
- Way of the Phoenix (F3) requires 100% Yin and gives access to Way of the Tiger (F1) and Way of the Dragon (F2)

• Can only use 1 set of weapons like Elementalists
• The auto-attack skill, as well as some other weapon skills, change their effects and generate Yin or Yang based on wich Weapon skill you perform before it.

• Weapons (One handed) – Fist (either hand), Claw (either hand), Sword (mainhand)
• Weapons (Two handed) – Staff
• Weapons (Aquatic) – Spear

The gameplay could be somewhere between the supportiveness of the Guardian, and the squishy aggressiveness of the Thief – but even squishier.

Ofcourse I’m not expecting ANet to do such a huge change mid-release.
It’d be something for an expansion indeed.

@Phy
The reason you want dual trait builds, is the reason I’m making this suggestion.

You are constantly being held back by gear, attributes and traits when attempting to adapt your skills to the situation.
My suggestion is one step towards fixing that problem.

You would be able to use the weapons, traits and gear you like, and swap utility skills between offensive, control, support or healing without feeling kittened by your gear/trait choices.

@Iron Wolf

The choice of whether to focus on healing or not, should rest on the choice of skills, traits, runes and sigils.

Even though I suggest reducing the power to healing ratio, I suggest putting some vitality to incoming healing to compensate.
The fact I suggest the sum of X Vitality + X Power should result in lower healing than X Healing Power, is due to the fact that focusing on healing will not result in such a damage loss, and slightly more healing will be available to everyone.

With my suggestion you can still focus on healing through your build.
Glass Cannons will lack either self-heal or survivability (or both), as they will not invest much into Toughness or Vitality in order to boast great amounts of Power + Precision + Critical Damage.

@Phy

I am precicely suggesting that becoming a dedicated healer would be less necessary AND simpler (not requiring gear swaps).
Traits will always have an impact on the skills you use.
The trees that currently give Healing Power would have to give something else instead, so you would not likely be having to change traits to heal.

@Archer
Dungeons can be run without dedicated healers, but having someone focus on healing and defense greatly improves your success.
If ANet makes harder dungeons you will see more and more players adapting by focusing on key roles.

Focusing on healing should rest on the skill and trait choices, as well as the players receiving the heals, rather than greatly affecting your choice of gear in a way that severely reduces your ability to deal damage.

@Phy
Becoming better at healing others, instead of yourself, kind of encourages dedicated healing.

Vitality increasing incoming heals, and attributes having less effect on outgoing heals would “abolish” dedicated healing mentality, without affecting teamwork mentality – as far as gear goes.

Healing skills would still be just as useful, but focusing on using them would be less punitive towards your damage.