Smite’s system is awesome too. There are a few prerecorded voice-messages that can be played by typing specific keys in your keyboard.
SMITE’s Voice Guided System (VGS) is by far the easiest, and most efficient way that I’ve seen to streamline communication in non-voip pickup game situations.. this is the future in solo-queue MOBA or any conquest style PvP, in my opinion.
Load all the ‘calls’ that players have to make on teamspeak typically, as pre-recorded voice recordings.
“Attack Middle/Far/Home”
“X Incoming Middle/Far/Home”
“Be careful Middle/Far/Home”
“Defend Middle/Far/Home”
“Gank Middle/Far/Home”
“Retreat Middle/Far/Home”
“Elite is ready”
“It’s a trap!”
“Group up!”And of course small talk would be fun, too. IE: Sorry, Thanks, Wait, Cancel That, Yes, No, Be Right Back, Bye, Good Game, ETC.
This is interesting .
Could there be basic commands attached to the mini-map that you drag towards each objective with the mouse?
Maybe you could have player names here too and be able to drag a player name onto one of the basic set of commands, then drag that onto the object and an audio string could be parsed together like the following “[Profession:optional] [Profession Number:optional] [Command] [Objective]”
In game voip would be better, but this could be used by people with broken microphones or by people that don’t want to talk.
It would be nice if ANet could communicate a short list of Horn/Halo fixes they plan on fixing in the future so that people know if they want to spend the heirlooms and 10 gold on them before the tuesday patch.
What kind of communication are you trying to improve via the UI?
Is the context Solo Queue?
Is the context Team Queue?
In general Mesmer Illusions are not helpful with the UI and understanding how many players one is up against. This is exclusively from a UI perspective. Players using voip applications can communicate this. They can also communicate more rapidly than any most means available via the UI. The mesmer illusion feature is was obviously a design decision, and can’t be changed because it’d be fairly simple to use the minimap to find where the real mesmer is.
In my opinion you’ll never have a high enough quality of communication via a UI that is available via voip. No matter what you add to the UI, voip will always be better or the additions will supplement voip and make it that much more important to have.
I personally have no issues finding the real mesmer in a group, there are plenty of tells, such as buffs, auras, movement, etc. This really comes down to a keen eye.
I must not have given the correct context. You can’t tell via the minimap on the UI how many players are present because of mesmer illusions. The post was not supposed to be about non-UI parts of distinguishing how many players are present, or how to identify a mesmer in combat via tells.
One question I have for you as a discussion topic, if the system did better at matching similar sized teams with each other, would there be a need for SA at all? We couldn’t guarantee perfect matchups all the time so let’s also say that if it was detected that the matchup wasn’t good enough that the team at a disadvantage got a bonus for trying or at the very least was not penalized for trying? Keep in mind that we are just kicking around ideas here.
There was also some really great feedback on the topic of communication in the game. This discussion is big enough that it deserves its own thread. I’ll start that up shortly so we can brainstorm on that for a bit. Thanks to you guys who provided such great feedback on the topic of communication.
Part of the need for each of these different pvp environments (Hotjoin, SoloQ, TeamQ) is that the complexities of a competitive require a huge time investment to fully understand. I’m 99% sure that you’ll see coorelations and tendencies between the time played of players in Hotjoin, the time played of players in SoloQ, and the time played of players in TeamQ.
The assumption I’m making is that you’ll see players with less pvp time played most often in hotjoin, more often in SoloQ, and least often in TeamQ. Conversely I’m assuming you’ll see players with the most pvp time played most frequently in TeamQ, more frequently in SoloQ, and least frequently in Hotjoin.
What this shows, assuming it’s true, is that the pvp environments are largely divided by player skill (because pvp rating noticeably correllates to time played and we’re assuming that pvp ratings are an indicator of player skill), even though it’s all the same PvP and all the same game mode. Part of the problem, in my opinion is that there are too many 8 slot team servers in hotjoin. This isn’t really what you wanted to design pvp around, yet it’s what happens most often in hotjoin (from my experience). There should be significantly fewer of these 8 slot team servers so that players are more frequently experiencing pvp in hotjoin as the devs intended it to be experienced.
However, as previously pointed out by John C. there are other reasons these pvp environments exist. The biggest reason SoloQ needs to exist is because the most successful TeamQ players will always be on a voip application. Players that don’t want to talk/communicate will always tend to be playing in SoloQ. IF you were to add in game voip so that players can always listen to communication that is there you could potentially get rid of SoloQ and TeamQ and just have 1 Q. Even if players don’t want to add value to the team by communicating themselves, they can add value to the team by responding to communication that is happening.
When voip exists in game the pvp rating system will take over for putting players in the correct matchups that are competitive. As competitve casuals improve they won’t be moving between as drastic of change in skill between PvP environements with what currently exists (because everyone would be in the same PvP environment). I know the communication part was broken off into a separate thread, but really it’s all supposed to be part of the same system that we’re all talking about.
tl;dr
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
What kind of communication are you trying to improve via the UI?
Is the context Solo Queue?
Is the context Team Queue?
In general Mesmer Illusions are not helpful with the UI and understanding how many players one is up against. This is exclusively from a UI perspective. Players using voip applications can communicate this. They can also communicate more rapidly than any most means available via the UI. The mesmer illusion feature is was obviously a design decision, and can’t be changed because it’d be fairly simple to use the minimap to find where the real mesmer is.
In my opinion you’ll never have a high enough quality of communication via a UI that is available via voip. No matter what you add to the UI, voip will always be better or the additions will supplement voip and make it that much more important to have.
Treb on Kyhlo is a decent point, though a portal mesmer can have it immediately back up on half the recharge of FGS.
Gates on Foefire aren’t that big a deal, when a team does a lord rush a gate goes down incredibly fast anyways.
That’s why maybe…
Were you running glass, were you upleveled, were you tanky, etc. These are important questions man, very important.
Dude, you can answer to all these 3 questions only looking at deffensive stats I posted. (no-no-yes if you can’t figure it out).
You posted armor rating, vitality, boon duration, and healing power. 3/4 of that tells me nothing. If I saw Toughness instead of armor rating, it would tell me everything. Somebody said it earlier up, why were you using just pistol and bomb? Throw grenades, use Elixir S, Supply Crate his kitten .
Also was this in WvW? Did the thief have might stacks?
Killing a treb with a 3 minute CD elite is fine.
As for one-shotting players…sorry what? If you’re referring to Rush + Lightning Flash trick, the AoE is absolutely tiny. If the target even moves a few inches they will be out of it, moving targets are out of the question (and everyone is always moving). Whoever dies to FGS should feel bad.You are missing a few key facts about GW2 PvP.
#1.
Downed Bodies don’t move that much. Neither do the people reviving them until it’s too late. When someone dunks a downed body with the PISTOL WHIP, there are going to be tons of frustrated players. This is a fact. Thank god there are so many THIEVES that are coordinated (lol) enough to do this, it is quite common. It pretty much took THIEVES becoming a FOTM profession where there are 2 per team in order to recognize that this is a VERY dangerous mechanic and should be tweaked.
am i doing it right?
Did you seriously compare pistol whip damage to a blinked fiery rush?
FGS should be fixed before they fix elementalist as a whole. The class is currently in a bad state but if it ever became stronger in TPVP you’d see more FGS abuse on downed bodies and that one particular skill could turn out to be as much cancer as any of the other terribads things about this game PVP.
The FGS is used as part of Dungeon speed runs and destroying objects quickly in WvW and sPvP. They are significant parts of the game, and would have been dealt with if it were a bug. While you claim it’s a bug, other people claim it’s a feature.
FGS is the single most overpowered skill in PVE. If you’re going to mention PVE there’s even more reason there to nerf it than in PVP. Literally the corner stone of any speedrun is stacking ele with FGS and pressing 4 in corners. So great, much gameplay, wow. This isn’t to say I never used FGS in PVE, I did, but it’s not my job to balance the game, it’s anet’s. I’ll play whatever is most efficient, it’s not the player’s job to kitten himself with subpar specs or group compositions, it’s anet’s job to do something about overpowered skills. FGS deals absolutely abnormal damage and you’d have to be seriously blind to think fiery rush has any place in a balanced game. This game PVE is a serious joke when literally any dungeon boss (fractals not included) melts in under 3 seconds from a party’s worth of FGS spam.
Speed runs will happen with or without FGS. FGS shaves some time off of speed runs, but isn’t the cornerstone of making them viable.
As far as PvP goes it’s a 1-2 time small area spike over the course of able to be done on 3 minute intervals. It’s not a staple throughout combat. The most viable use of the combo is vs someone who is downed, which isn’t even always possible because LF isn’t always off CD.
Regardless of how abnormal it’s damage, that combo isn’t pulled off very often in PvP. When it is pulled off, it can be a big momentum swing like a safety or blocked kick returned for a touchdown in american football or a grand slam in baseball or a hole in one in golf. Those events are abnormal in their respective sports, yet they’re exciting to watch. From an esports perspective something like the FGS and LF combo as it currently behaves is important.
kk, let’s give every class every 3 min chance to hit 1-2 times for unstoppable 20k+ dmg… justified by CD yo
as far as treb goes, once again it does matter if one team can treb at begin of the match and other can’t… even if i see FGS comming i can’t stop ele from insta destroying treb
eles indeed could use help but it shouldn’t justify such bs
Other classes already can do the spike. It’s called FGS + Blink/Shadowstep/Judges Intervention. They just need an ele to conjure the sword. Other classes could have other powerful effects instead of what the ele does. The necro for example has Lich Form where they can spam one for 30 seconds and do loads of damage. It’s pretty incredible point denial.
Can’t counter stealth …. didn’t actually read the previous post.
That is correct, there are no direct counters to stealth (or true counters as mentioned in the previous post). Once the person is in stealth there is nothing you can do but wait for it to end or for them to attack and land a hit.
I don’t understand why you thieves have such a hard time understanding the simplest of things. Everything else in this game can be interrupted or dodged before and then have another option for you to handle it after the fact.
If someone stuns you, you have a stun breaker.
Some one puts a condition on you, you have condition removal.
Someone blocks, you can use unblock-able skills.
Someone heals, you can put poison on them and keep it on them.
Someone stealths…. well then you just have to wait for it to wear off or be hit.
There is only one other state in this game that doesn’t have a “direct” counter. That would be invulnerability, but no class can access this state every 4 seconds.
Interrupting is a soft counter to many things. But interrupts are no where near as available as stealth is to a Thief.
Being a better player and dodging the CnD isn’t a direct counter. A direct counter is like the list of things above. I can easily dodge most of these horrible thieves CnD and backstabs but the very nature of the stealth in this game is so forgiving it doesn’t matter if I dodge 5 of them. They will always be off cooldown and ready to go. You have 0 draw backs for using stealth, but you have a ridiculously huge amount of payoffs for using this cheap system. It takes 0 skill to stealth around and have 100% of the control of the fight in his game.
Only the ones who are to bad to understand that this stealth is hurting this game and lowering the skill bar like it this way. You are not being skillful when you vanish in thin air every 4 seconds and run away.
It’s noted in here that the counter to stealth is invulnerability, but you can’t go invulnerable every 4 seconds.
If a hammer warrior CCs you, you can’t use your stun breaker/stability every 8 seconds.
If a necro puts a condition on you, you can’t use your condition removal every 2 seconds.
If a guardian is blocking, you can’t use unblockable attacks every 5 seconds
etc…
Killing a treb with a 3 minute CD elite is fine.
As for one-shotting players…sorry what? If you’re referring to Rush + Lightning Flash trick, the AoE is absolutely tiny. If the target even moves a few inches they will be out of it, moving targets are out of the question (and everyone is always moving). Whoever dies to FGS should feel bad.You are missing a few key facts about GW2 PvP.
#1.
Downed Bodies don’t move that much. Neither do the people reviving them until it’s too late. When someone dunks a downed body with the PISTOL WHIP, there are going to be tons of frustrated players. This is a fact. Thank god there are so many THIEVES that are coordinated (lol) enough to do this, it is quite common. It pretty much took THIEVES becoming a FOTM profession where there are 2 per team in order to recognize that this is a VERY dangerous mechanic and should be tweaked.
am i doing it right?
Did you seriously compare pistol whip damage to a blinked fiery rush?
FGS should be fixed before they fix elementalist as a whole. The class is currently in a bad state but if it ever became stronger in TPVP you’d see more FGS abuse on downed bodies and that one particular skill could turn out to be as much cancer as any of the other terribads things about this game PVP.
The FGS is used as part of Dungeon speed runs and destroying objects quickly in WvW and sPvP. They are significant parts of the game, and would have been dealt with if it were a bug. While you claim it’s a bug, other people claim it’s a feature.
FGS is the single most overpowered skill in PVE. If you’re going to mention PVE there’s even more reason there to nerf it than in PVP. Literally the corner stone of any speedrun is stacking ele with FGS and pressing 4 in corners. So great, much gameplay, wow. This isn’t to say I never used FGS in PVE, I did, but it’s not my job to balance the game, it’s anet’s. I’ll play whatever is most efficient, it’s not the player’s job to kitten himself with subpar specs or group compositions, it’s anet’s job to do something about overpowered skills. FGS deals absolutely abnormal damage and you’d have to be seriously blind to think fiery rush has any place in a balanced game. This game PVE is a serious joke when literally any dungeon boss (fractals not included) melts in under 3 seconds from a party’s worth of FGS spam.
Speed runs will happen with or without FGS. FGS shaves some time off of speed runs, but isn’t the cornerstone of making them viable.
As far as PvP goes it’s a 1-2 time small area spike over the course of able to be done on 3 minute intervals. It’s not a staple throughout combat. The most viable use of the combo is vs someone who is downed, which isn’t even always possible because LF isn’t always off CD.
Regardless of how abnormal it’s damage, that combo isn’t pulled off very often in PvP. When it is pulled off, it can be a big momentum swing like a safety or blocked kick returned for a touchdown in american football or a grand slam in baseball or a hole in one in golf. Those events are abnormal in their respective sports, yet they’re exciting to watch. From an esports perspective something like the FGS and LF combo as it currently behaves is important.
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
Communication is pretty Key in GW2 pvp. It’d be nice if we had in game voip for PvP at the very least.
FGS exploiters insta one shotting trebs, players etc.
Pretty sure it’s a legitimate strategy or it’d be nerfed by now. When someone pulls it off on me, I have to give them kudos because it’s not easy to do.
Also there’s burning speed, burning retreat (staff), and burning retreat (lava axe) that do the same thing.
they didn’t fix stuck /dance bug and its been around forever… so i wouldn’t rely on “what is not fixed is fine”
The FGS is used as part of Dungeon speed runs and destroying objects quickly in WvW and sPvP. They are significant parts of the game, and would have been dealt with if it were a bug. While you claim it’s a bug, other people claim it’s a feature.
I’m of the mindset that it’s a feature, because it’s something that takes skill and/or coordination to pull off, and I’m all for giving high reward to skillful and coordinated play.
I think the OP’s point is that he isn’t happy about being in a position where there are potentially cool items, but because of the current implementation and the unknown factor of whether they will be fixed or not he doesn’t know whether he should buy them or not.
If they will be fixed it’s likely he wants them, if they won’t be fixed it’s likely he doesn’t want them.
I’m going to take a stab here and guess that we’ll get the release date for the feature patch during the ready-up?
It’s all but certain Powerr knows the current target date, and since it’s his last day you probably don’t want to put him in a position where he would have to stay quiet when he’s not working there anymore.
I’m not sure Anet would care much. NDA is NDA.
Yep. Remember back in the early betas where if you disclosed anything about the game from that period, even after the game’s release, you’d be banned from ANet games for life? At least that’s how I remember it… Could be wrong.
I wonder if thier contracted or full time employees have thier NDAs expire when thier employment ends. And I wonder if a build release date would fall under the language for the NDA. Actually I wonder if an NDA is even legally enforceable after employment ends.
I’m going to take a stab here and guess that we’ll get the release date for the feature patch during the ready-up?
It’s all but certain Powerr knows the current target date, and since it’s his last day you probably don’t want to put him in a position where he would have to stay quiet when he’s not working there anymore.
FGS exploiters insta one shotting trebs, players etc.
Pretty sure it’s a legitimate strategy or it’d be nerfed by now. When someone pulls it off on me, I have to give them kudos because it’s not easy to do.
Also there’s burning speed, burning retreat (staff), and burning retreat (lava axe) that do the same thing.
The issues
There’s a lot of effects to keep track of both on yourself and on your opponents.
Effects like Burning, Torment, Bleeding, Regeneration, Agony, Terror, Troll Unguent, Heal Signet, Adrenal Health, Signet of Illusions, Virtue of Resolve, Spirit of Nature, Soothing Mist, etc… have only one purpose. That purpose is health impacts over time or Health Degen/Regen.
It’s hard to quantify where your overal health degen/regen is at with all these different kinds of effects. A simplified indicator of some kind would help solve this problem, and could help down the road with organizing some of the effect icon clutter long term (but this is a separate issue).
Solution
There’s multiple ways to solve this. So my suggestion isn’t to be implemented as is, and feedback as well as other suggestions should be considered and implemented.
Show UI elements that display:
Other suggestions
In this meta the old prenerf D/D bunker ele doesn’t seem like an OP build. I’m not worried about the buffs if they’re going to bring the ele back to a level it was at previously, since that’s still not as effective as a decap engi or warrior with a 10% weaker heal sig.
I doubt any elder dragon would take a humonoid form. The lore is such that a dragon’s view the races of tyria is like they’re insects, so it’s unlikely they would want to take the form on an insect.
Oh nice so i have to make 150k rank points 2 times (And then 450k..) in order to have a chest that a r30 is going to get every 15k….god you’re awesome…since when, if i can ask, r30+ is considered as “high rank”? 50+ maybe..but 30+…are you kidding me?
Yeah this seems like the opposite of what a reward system should be. Why are we getting rewarded less the higher rank we are? Shouldn’t the reward be based on what rank you are AND a flat amount of rank points you acquire?
I really can’t understand it.
Assuming similar dedication levels between PvP and PvE, and givent that you only need around 4000 achievement points to be in the 90th percentile or top 10%… I’m guessing players with a rank of 30+ are probably in the 90% percentile, so basically 10% or less of the playerbase even has rank 30 or higher.
There’s a lot of assumptions there, but I’m guessing logic along those lines are why they made that decision.
Added
And who knows? Maybe they’ll retroactively grant all players rank chests up to their current rank.
I haven’t read the the whole thread so I hope I’m not repeating this but these people make it easier for YOU to get those skins from the trading post. If they weren’t doing this those skins would be worth thousands of gold because the cost to get a full ticket by buying black lion keys outweighs the cost of just buying gold from gems by thousands. You should be thankful to say the least.
I like your point of view but what happens when/if the tradeable items from the chests become so low in value that they become just commodities?
There’s an equilibrium that will be reached. There are people doing this because it’s profitable, currently slightly more profitable than most other things in the game. As soon as this becomes less profitable than champ trains, these people will go back to doing champ trains. When key farming becomes more profitable than champ trains they will go back to that. An equilibrium will be reached, and the easy ways to farm will become about equal in value. However since you must do key farming over a longer term to get that value key farming will always be slightly more profitable than champ trains, so we may already be at the equilibrium.
For those who are under a time crunch, and are having trouble achieving the things they want here’s some things I’ve picked up on.
Leveling
Dailies rewards
Dailies doesn’t refer to just Daily achievements, but Dulfy has a great guide for Daily Achievemnts.
For those who can’t get on daily, you can get on every other day and still never miss daily rewards. The trick is to know how long you plan on playing, cut that time in half we’ll call this “HalfTime”. Then identify the server reset time in your timezone, this is the time when dailies reset, in the US East coast this is currently 8:00 PM EDT / 7:00 PM EST. You should start playing a “HalfTime” before the server reset time and get your dailies done. Then continue playing another “HalfTime” after server reset to get your dailies again. It’s kind of a life hack for those familar with lifehacker.com.
There are some dungeons that can be cleared extremely quickly, but the rewards are only once per day. There’s a really good site that tracks the fastest runs of dungeons. Currently it’s pretty feasible to get 300 various tokens and 5 gold in an hour just from 5 dungeon completion chests, plus the gold from drops along the way.
Gold
The most efficient way to get gold is to be a master economist as the trading post provides the best opportunity to gain gold. I don’t play the trading post much or have a guide but I’m sure someone has a good guide somewhere.
Champion Train runs are probably the most efficient way to get gold for the solo player. Following the Frostgorge train for an hour will gain you 6+ gold given current market prices. If a champ train isn’t running in your server look for a full server and guest to it. Full servers usually have a perma champ train.
Dungeon running is mentioned above and with a bit of practice/experience can feasibly get you 5+ gold per hour plus tokens. Optimally you’re looking at over 10 gold an hour, but you can only do this once per day. Twice if you play on both ends of the server reset as suggested for those who can only play limited days.
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
What will happen to people with win boxes that don’t have enough salvage kits?
I disagree with your graphical opinion of an OP spec.
In my opinion an OP spec has a curve, as do balanced specs. In both the curve tappers off. The difference being that the OP spec’s curve achieve’s it’s plateau early and has it’s plateau noticeably higher than a balanced spec.
As far as food goes, it’d be nice if ANet introduced a togglable feature that while in dungoens if you had no nourishment buffs, you would automatically consume whatever potion in your inventory that matched the type of enemies you get into combat with.
Is it me or does the OP message sound like "I don’t like being a special snowflake, I want to be an unrecognized cog in the machine! "
That’s the undertone I’m picking up. Not that it’s necessarily bad, but in a video game where the story is interactive with the player I feel it is.
When I want a story that doesn’t give me credit I’ll watch a show, a movie, or read a story. I’m not taking part in those stories so I shouldn’t get any credit.
Yes, you are a special snowflake (clapclap). But so am I, and every other player in this game. So you are just one of many “special snowflakes”. In this terms, it would be better if we were some guy in the backline rather than beeing the “hero”. The story wouldn’t be that flawed. It’s like “Hey, I’ve stombed scarlet!”, “Hey, I stombet her too”, “You know what, Player XY stombet her too! Man I fell so special right now.”
Every player in GW1 did all the same story and it was told as if the player was the hero, except when Kormir becomes a god, but honestly the player couldn’t unless GW1 were to end with Nightfall .
Every player in any game does the same long term story. The different opinion is you don’t want your credit acknowledged and / or don’t want to be part of the most important symbolic moments? There’s no problem with getting the credit where it’s deserved. It’s better to make your player base feel good than slighted after all.
I’m curious as to what the connection is between the Dream of Dreams and the Eternal Alchemy.
From an Asuran perspective the Dream might be encompassed within the Eternal Alchemy.
From a Sylvari perspective the Eternal Alchemy might be encompassed within the Dream.
This thought came up, because ANet created a link between the two cultures in the form of Scarlet Briar.
In the Short Story “What Scarlet Saw” we are given a great deal of information as to what happened to Scarlet. Since this was a short story posted on the official Guild Wars 2 site, I feel it is extremely likely ANet wants this to be taken at face value as what actually happened, and not some crazy plant’s interpretation of what happened.
In Scarlet’s experience during Omadd’s experiment, she is believed to be exploring the Eternal Alchemy through an expansion of her senses and mind. During this experience the Pale Tree is able to communicate with her, and it is explicitly stated she hadn’t heard the Pale Tree’s voice in years. I have been looking for evidence that the Pale Tree can communicate telepathically or in a non-physical way outside the Dream, but I can’t find it. This leads me to believe that Scarlet was in the Dream/Eternal Alchemy otherwise the Pale Tree wouldn’t have been able to communicate with her.
So Omadd’s experiment was supposed to allow Scarlet to experience the Eternal Alchemy, but somehow it put Scarlet in a state where she was able to see and observe the cosmos and communicate with the Pale Tree in a way that seems to only normally be possible within the Dream.
Whatever state and knowledge Scarlet was experiencing, it seems the Pale Tree tree already understood as the tree warned Scarlet:
“Please: go no further. In seeking to comprehend the forces that shape us, you will unleash them. Society cannot withstand that.”
This warning is likely not a reference to Elder Dragons as “Forces that shape us” implies that more than one force, so even if the Sylvari were born from Mordremoth, they would not have been born from multiple dragons. This shows that the Pale Tree still has an even greater understanding of the these shaping forces, potentially a greater understanding than what Scarlet obtained in her short time being connected with the experimental state she was in. This would make sense because the Pale Tree seems to always be connected to the Dream.
All this leads me to believe that there is some kind of direct connection between the Dream of Dreams and the Eternal Alchemy, but there is still much that is unexplained about both of them.
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
This has really been bothering me as a plot gap. The only 2 things I can think of that she could offer are the Pale Tree or a way to turn the Dream of Dreams to Nightmare without the Pale Tree.
Is it me or does the OP message sound like "I don’t like being a special snowflake, I want to be an unrecognized cog in the machine! "
That’s the undertone I’m picking up. Not that it’s necessarily bad, but in a video game where the story is interactive with the player I feel it is.
When I want a story that doesn’t give me credit I’ll watch a show, a movie, or read a story. I’m not taking part in those stories so I shouldn’t get any credit.
This is interesting speculation. I think Marjory would would point it out as just that though, and say we need to gather more evidence.
I haven’t seen any tid-bits about the mantle in the Gw2 lore until you just pointed it out, so thank you. I’ll keep an eye out for references to it in the future.
Thief is the easiest to do map completion on due to the combination of perma speed buffs, heartseeker, and stealth. Warrior is also solid. Mesmer can be if you have superior centaur, speed, or traveler runes.
Warrior is easier to play for it’s effectiveness, but I’ve seen threads where people have calculated an S/P thief has the highest sustained DPS of any class.
You should be able to find them with the forum search feature
Lightning flash doesn’t help Churning earth vs people who know the dodge timing. If I ever see an ele doing churning earth I always dodge before it hits even if they are too far out because I know they will lightning flash.
Churning earth has too much risk for it’s incredibly high potential of getting no reward.
Ooh, fun thread.
Anyone get their free gold for downs?
I did the numbers on this and the conclusion is that Pistol Whip’s DPS is about 28% more than the Sword Autoattack chain for thief.
I spammed the sword auto attack chain 20 times non-stop and found that I was able to land those in almost exactly 49 seconds.
I spammed Pistol Whip 7 times in a row (because that was the most I could build for) and found I could do this in about 15.8 seconds.
Cast Time of an entire cycle
Time to complete an entire sword auto attack chain is about 2.45 seconds.
The time to complete a pistol whip is about 2.25 seconds.Damage Coefficients
The total damage coefficient of the auto attack chain is 2.9
Pistol Whip’s damage coefficient = 3.14Coefficient Per Cycle
Definition: The average damage coefficient throughout an entire skill cycle
Auto attack chain = 1.183673469
Pistol whip = 1.395555556Coefficient Per Cycle Per Second
Definition: The average damage coefficient inflicted from a skill cycle in 1 second
Auto attack chain = 0.483132028
Pistol whip = .620246914Coefficient Per Cycle Per Second Percentage
Auto attack chain = 100%
Pistol whip = 128%I have some margin for error given how I had to collect the data for the Cycle cast times, but it’s unlikely I was off so much that pistol whip would be calculated to be less than 20% more dps than the sword auto attack chain. I hope people find this information helpful.
What ?? AA chain has 2.02 and PW has 2.1 i test this 20x = AA has same attack speed as PW
I have no idea where you took 2.25 and 2.45 lolPW base DMG 1062 + 3.14*AP = 8861 DMG vs 0 armor
AA base DMG 269+269+437=975 + 2,9*AP 8178 DMG vs o armorPW make 8,5% more DMG, with Trait 12,5% more DMG. If not count base DMG, PW make 0.82% more DMG, and 5.82% more DMG with trait.
Glass cannon Thief in sPvP 2484 a_power
All the numbers are there, the cycle time for the skills is calculated by dividing the time it takes to complete them by the number of attack cycles.
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
^ Also the basic utility from having Cripple/Weakness on the final hit of the AA chain. There’s a reason why the really skilled S/P players use AA a lot.
Pistol Whip does have some decent burst capability when you combine it with Might and Haste, though.
I just want to highlight that I laughed out loud when I read “That’s why the really skilled S/P players use AA a lot.” Not because it’s not true, but because it’s super funny to have skill associated with auto attacking.
I did the numbers on this and the conclusion is that Pistol Whip’s DPS is about 28% more than the Sword Autoattack chain for thief.
I spammed the sword auto attack chain 20 times non-stop and found that I was able to land those in almost exactly 49 seconds.
I spammed Pistol Whip 7 times in a row (because that was the most I could build for) and found I could do this in about 15.8 seconds.
Cast Time of an entire cycle
Time to complete an entire sword auto attack chain is about 2.45 seconds.
The time to complete a pistol whip is about 2.25 seconds.
Damage Coefficients
The total damage coefficient of the auto attack chain is 2.9
Pistol Whip’s damage coefficient = 3.14
Coefficient Per Cycle
Definition: The average damage coefficient throughout an entire skill cycle
Auto attack chain = 1.183673469
Pistol whip = 1.395555556
Coefficient Per Cycle Per Second
Definition: The average damage coefficient inflicted from a skill cycle in 1 second
Auto attack chain = 0.483132028
Pistol whip = .620246914
Coefficient Per Cycle Per Second Percentage
Auto attack chain = 100%
Pistol whip = 128%
I have some margin for error given how I had to collect the data for the Cycle cast times, but it’s unlikely I was off so much that pistol whip would be calculated to be less than 20% more dps than the sword auto attack chain. I hope people find this information helpful.
I’m surprised how easily convinced people are about these (imo obviously) fake accounts. These things have been done since at least Corporal Bane.
Makes me tempted to troll with a fake Twitter account myself…
I’ve read these account have posted pictures of things in game pre-release, that’s pretty convincing.
Those Twitter accounts are not run by ArenaNet.
Are they run in collaboration with ANet?
And if people QQ about PW and auto attack chain not having much DPS difference then the auto attack should be nerfed because that is also too strong. Auto attacks shouldn’t do massive damage
Yeah, thieves shouldn’t do damage at all in fact.
They shouldn’t do absurd damage if they are also:
1, By far the most mobile
2, More survivable than bunker guardians when wearing zerker amuet (lol)That is the issue. Fine if you want them to do massive damage. But then at least make them killable ever. Which they aren’t currently. You can’t have a class doing the most damage and then make it impossible to focus that class. It is ludicrous.
Thieves do lots of damage regardless of the build. This is not pistol whip specific.
Pistol Whip dps is slightly more to on per with the auto attack chain damage. The differences are:
Well they are followed by several ArenaNet employees accounts, and they do seem to post stuff before available to the public (in case of Scarlets account).
That definitely supports that it could be ANet but doesn’t necessarily confirm its them. It could be someone who they collaborate with that has early access like dulfy
Yes.
Proof?
If you look at the ones done for other game characters (From other games), most of them are individually done. Hence why you have 6 or so Character Tumblrs for Ahri from LoL, five Character Twitters for Thrall (WoW) and countless others from various franchises. I doubt there’s only one doing it, and I doubt it would be ANet would be doing it save that it’s an ANet employee but he’s doing it separately, not so much as an “ArenaNet” thing.
Agreed proof please, and did the ‘yes’ mean it’s ANet? Or perhaps someone collaborating with ANet?
For starters I feel pistol whip is in a good state overall right now, and doesn’t necessarily need changed, but I offer a suggestion below to improve risk/reward.
Do you main a thief
Yes – I have 2 mains (ele is the other)
When do you feel pistol whip is unbalanced
When people don’t know how initiative works and how Pistol whip works. If you don’t know…
If you don’t know those things, then you’ll potentially struggle. Given that countering pistol whip is independent of class, and class specific counters are just icing on the cake.
There is one scenario where Pistol seems too good, and that’s when Quickness is involved. The universal counters go away and you have to rely on teleports, invulnerability, or stun break + evades.
What would you do to change Pistol Whip to better fit the class/game?
I feel pistol whip is in a solid place. S/P & SB is like a simpler way to play the thief. It seems kind of like what Hambow is for the warrior imo, but obviously the thief doesn’t have as much area control, sustain, or CC.
If there were going to be a change to pistol whip, I would like to see the Pistol Whip and flurry split. Potentially splitting the cost to be 3/3 initiative, while still allowing for double tapping S/P 3 to get the existing effect. I’d like to see the flurry be queued regardless of whether contact is made or not.
There’s a couple of implications this would have.
1) Thieves would lose X initiative (my suggestion is 3 for the first half of the skill) when winding up the pistol whip, instead of losing 5 only after the stun hits. I like this because the skill could use a tad more risk reward, so that interrupts mean something and dodge cancelling/skill cancelling doesn’t save the initiative.
2) Being able to queue up the flurry has some major benefits. The major value given to the thief by splitting the skill is that the Pistol Whip stun can be followed by the auto attack chain which allows for kiting after the interrupt. The other major benefit is that the flurry can be saved for Infiltrator’s strike, which will root the enemy for a full second instead of half a second from the stun.
These changes are more of an overall win than a straight nerf, straight buff, or complete revamp of the skill.
The end result of splitting the skill into a chain is that you create more risk reward. More risk in that initiative is used immediately preventing you from dodge cancelling to save the initiative and allowing interrupts to be meaningful against Pistol Whip.
I still would recommend increasing the net cost to 6 initiative with a 3/3 split. More reward in that if you a smart about using pistol whip and don’t just spam it, you can get more benefit from the skill by using its chain out of sequence.
I’d recommend against a complete overhaul of the skill, because it’s solid, a staple skill in all formats I feel, and can be countered via positioning (as mentioned above), conditions, or other means specific to classes.
(edited by Shockwave.1230)
Are these twitter accounts managed by ANet or in collaboration with ANet?
https://twitter.com/ScarletBriar/following
https://twitter.com/Mordremoth
I have had the same issue. I noticed when I ranged I rarely get them, but when I melee I get them more often. Not sure if it’s a dps thing and maybe they have a cap on the amount of chests that drop or what.
The thief plays very similar to most other RPGs from a combat resource perspective, I’m very comfortable with the classic resource systems of RPGs where you have to manage energy or mana.
That resource system and having the option to manage my tools in that way is why it’s one of my favorite classes. I hope they introduce more resource systems when they add new classes to the game.
To compensate, a thief’s skills are not as powerful(by themselves)as other class skills.
12-16k Damage in one hit begs to differ.
Initiative was a failed experiment. However – this is Anet and we all know that they REFUSE to accept taking blame when they have done something SO stupid or SO broken and would rather just force EVERYONE to live with it.Dhuumfire is an example before its release Necromancers were ALL saying that they didnt need or want it and what do you know…It was too powerful so rather than say “kitten we made a mistake, sorry” they just went ahead and kept nerfing it and everything else they could get there hands on….
I like the line initiative was a failed experiment. It’s very funny.
Initiative is the same concept as mana or energy, that’s what makes it so humorous.
To add to the list of major changes since release, there was also:
Edge of the Mist
Fractals of the MistThis is what happens when someone only reads the first post of a thread.
The comedy rules of three don’t apply?
It’s too bad that new players will never be able to experience the Guild Wars 2 story and lore like people who have been around longer. That said, the story telling and characters have been lacking until recently. Kudos to ANet for seeing this major weakness and taking action on it. Hopefully this continues so that it won’t be a weakness of the game at some point.
To add to the list of major changes since release, there was also:
Edge of the Mist
Fractals of the Mist
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