Guild Wars 2

@Phaeris, That is a very good point and could very well explain why it was implemented in the first place. Without the holy trinity, you can say that there is less point in base stat differences. I think that the holy trinity is a logical growth from stat differentiation, that originally served to allow for ranged attacks to exist, particularly magic attacks that created class diversity in many games. In Guild Wars 2 this is a relic from an old model that lead to the very system they were trying to leave.

Down with the trinity, down with the base stat differences

@Lalangamena, What you say is true, and you can see it working in many games. But the problem is that in this game every class has melee/range options, and everyone has active defenses. Bombs made a good point with the amount of gap closers vs escapes and the presence of dodges. Realizing this, I think we should move away from that method of doing things, towards a new method based on player choice and character specific abilities (I’m starting to sound like a broken record here I think, sorry) that is no longer hindered by stat differences.

@Bombs Excellent points that match what I was thinking ^^ I highlighted your name in my response because of this, you definitely deserve the credit for the answer.

@Terminatorkobold You win the thread, for now… (twitchy eyes). Bravo! Player skill creates too much variability which forces the game designers to choose whether they want the game/class to be hard core entry or casual friendly. If these are balanced, they can draw the line wherever they want, but the last thing they should do is include a static something like base stats. Again, bravo!

@All.. Hahahaha I caught up!! My conclusion at this point is that we definitely are on the right track looking at Base Stats, but we must be wary of the pitfalls mentioned! We don’t want to kill class variety, nor can we ignore what we are looking at here. I can say at this point, I still feel that stats should be balanced with stats and actives with actives. I further am convinced that pursuing this line of balance and thought will lead to a much brighter future for the game as a whole. However, I also believe that the fix for armor could use some review, as my power solution (and other solutions that increase damage) will not be balanced in pve until they correct the way bosses fight. If we assume that they will correct this for the healthiness of the game, then I have much less problems with these solutions. Thank you all, and I look forward to any and all replies in the future.

EDIT: I managed to change the OP by adding small parts at a time. I ran out of room though. Hopefully the new style brings a better overview to the topic

@Axialbloom, Thanks for posting =) It indeed seems to be that way to me and several others, and hopefully we can bring the issue into a full light scrutiny.

@Bombs Thanks for helping keep my thread alive Bombs =) If you don’t mind, could you elaborate on why you think the middle is the best option?

@Killahmayne, It is definitely a simplification, perhaps it would be better to say the less defense you have, the more offense you should have. Armor is in my mind not the most important factor, actives are. But armor does complicate things, so I would hope to balance the passives in order to better tackle the actives. Warriors were screwed, then got a buff because armor doesn’t make the difference in a fight in several aspects of the game. Now they have too much. The static stats should not be balanced with actives, but with each other to avoid this kind of problem.

[When I say actives I usually also mean things like traits, etc even if they arn’t technically active. Stats versus no stats might be more accurate]

@ Shadowfall, I should probably quote you as the thread’s tl,dr XD You explain it easier and simplier than I do ^^

@Tactu, Who knows, the awesome effects might have been considered part of the balance at some point =P

@All I’m starting to catch up! ^^ I’m gonna actually play the game for a bit XD I’ll be back in a bit to try to finish responding. Thanks for all your input, and I hope the discussion continues so I have more good stuff to read (I am always caught up with reading the thread before posting btw)

@Chaosky, The balancing, or rather the choice between being evasion or damaging is a good example of what I would hope to achieve as an end product. These are both active effects and the choices and the balancing should be based there, not off of stats that cost build variety. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself XD

I think that armor choices would be a cool idea too, I remember playing a rogue-like and learning how to use heavy armor for s&gs on a dwarven mage fondly. I think that the armor type does play a role in the recognizing the class though, in a game that is very dependent on visual tells. To be honest, it isn’t a very necessary one imo, but it is something to think about. In a power/toughness situation under the current pve set up would mean everyone wears light. In wvw zergs everyone would wear heavy, and in small scale pvp condition builds would definitely use heavy, while power builds are forced to choose.

Based off the c.damage/power type issues with having armors that have only power/toughness choice, I would have to disagree with this approach. This is what the stats on armor are for. Maybe it would be better to simply baseline health and armor then. Particularly in pve where damage is king.

@Bombs, On the topic of armor choices, that is my thought exactly. =)

@Tim, I’m gunna start with the short and easy to answer last part first if you don’t mind. Indeed that’s why we have those limits to slots/traits to make the choice, I just want to move the focus even further towards them in balance, especially since they are the only things that get targeted for changes.

Which brings me to the difficult part, one I didn’t address properly last time, so I’m going to try again. Your examples definitely clarify the issue even further, so thank you for taking the time to present them.

The issue is basically, if skills are balanced against each other solely, it would cost class variety. My idea for the skill modifier would be a good example of what we should not do if we take this problem into account. My method of solving the balance issue would probably lead down the road of making even(er) layers of effects and the like. This could very well have the result you predict. A problem indeed, but I’m not sure if we should look at base stat differences as the solution.

Each class has many skills, can do different conditions ,gain different boons, have unique f skills, can gain different things with traits and have different ranges, effect areas. Why can’t we balance unique with unique, and don’t give certain effects too much bonus so that everyone has to make trade offs. Guardians get more boons, but less conditions, necromancers the opposite. Their base stats are the opposite. Removing the base stats would not take away that variety in this case.

The balance doesn’t mean everyone will suddenly get access to everything, or even that anyone should get new access to something. The values simply change. Maybe some skills will be brought more into line with other skills, and some will become much more similar between two or three classes in certain specific cases. But these skills are often skills that are the target of complaints right now.

I think that the sheer amount of things that have to be balanced for right now can miss one or two static stat differences. List all the conditions, then all the boons, then look at the availability to each class on what cooldowns on what durations, then add all the skills that are unique to the class, including weapon skills, heals, utilities etc (you can probably leave out most signets for exmple). List all the traits that are unique to one or two classes with a note of what stats come with it. List all the heals and their sources, their cool downs. List all the tells, the casting times, the chance of it being interrupted. List all the interrupts, what time, how long, is it blockable, can you cast it when knocked down? Pay attention to the range and cool downs. Hell include the range to everything I mentioned, and include the aoe form. Then add combo feilds and finishers.
I probably missed a bunch, but the point remains. Base stats are a small part of a whole, uniqueness and balance can probably be found together without them. If it is easier to find the balance while retaining the uniqueness without two factors in the large list of factors, why not do it? (besides the fact its a large undertaking).

The skill modifier should be a way of trying to incorporate all these crazy variables (many are yes/no luckily), but could easily be over simplified and result in your worries, so I now have doubts about it myself.

I hope I came closer to the real issue this time. Thanks for your patience and persistence!

I am unable to edit the OP. Is there a timer for this?
Oh well, good thing I always keep a copy before I post something, maybe I can change things in a bit.

A lot of people have posted since I last checked, and I’m just falling more behind. So I want to start with the customary, and well-deserved “Thank You!” for all the input. I will continue to attempt to respond to everyone.

@Stx, I think it would cost the same amounts of time and resources in pve. In fact, it might cost that time and resources for both pve and pvp each, as they need completely different balances. It would probably be best to do the one at the time, leaving one for a later date. If we assume, however, that they plan to increase the challenge of pve by adding more pressure (and perhaps a bit less spike) the difference would be a lot less dangerous then I see it now.

I would personally think that doing the change in pvp first, where the stat differences are more significant would be a good way to go, and then adjust the pvp model for pve at a later date after balancing, it would be a lot less to chew. But to be fair, the other way would work just as well I’m sure. I think you are right in that only one should be the target of the change, but I believe the other should follow (and use this chance to fully seperate the two forms please!) in time. Which goes when is something I think is more an opinion, with good arguments on both sides.

@Lalangamena Energy is hard to balance, particularly with stats. It is very active. Of course, that is why you mention the free choice. It sounds good in theory, but unless they give ridiculously low bonuses on light armor, I think it will be lopsided. Everyone would migrate toward light, because if you can dodge and use defensive skills more often, why bother bringing boring stats to do the work inefficiently for you.

I think this is a cool concept, and it could very well work if they focused the balancing on the armor so it ended up perfect, but it would still require a skill/trait balance on top of the armor balancing itself and thus cost even more effort.

@Carighan, I play D&D 3.5, where heavy armor maxes your ability to “dodge” by capping your dex bonus to defense, which sounds comparable. But I don’t think it will work in Guild Wars 2. It worked in P&P because that was all math, if one of your players could do a push up once every few turns (based on how much dex bonus to defense they have[in your case, how much P.def they have]) and get an automatic win on their defensive roll (on multiple targets potentially), then light armor has an advantage that heavy wouldn’t (unless you couldn’t do a push up [= less skilled])
For those who don’t get the metaphor, Dodge is an extremely powerful active whose potential is a variable based on twitch skill, enemy attacks and knowledge of the game, thus cannot be put against stats.

@ Jihm, Yes, and this is a good example of the things that happen due to the difficulty tracking the balance in the overly complex system.

@ All, time to run again, but this time I know I’ll be back. I’ll be back at it soon

Hey guys, thanks for posting =)
I’ll try to reply to everyone, I hope I have enough time ^^
First I’ll start by catching up though.

@Shadowfall, Guild Wars is a definitely a good example of armor being the sole determining factor. I personally think it would work in the sequel as well, but that’s just speculation.

I do admit, I’ve always been a tank/bunker personality myself, so it is good to hear the glass cannon side of things. Class variety is definitely a touchy subject, but I think its important to think how much a role the base stats really play. They might be more important than I first thought, seeing as there is strong arguments against changing it. But, I think with the available choices you can make a glass cannon out of any class without forcing a class that to either waste stats to be normal, or in other words forcing some classes to be glassy.

If your stats were a bit equalized, with just the armor difference giving a slight (300ish stats 20ish %) push towards being glassy, you can still choose to go full zerker (etc), and take offensive traits and utilities. You’ll get your cannon, and earth elementalists who like to pretend they are mountains can be bunker by taking other stats. There would be choice.

Changes like making certain attacks more powerful, particularly on weaker classes base stat wise have been the sign of hope I have been waiting for, but it isn’t happening and by all signs it isn’t going to happen. If they want to balance so everyone comes similar damage wise, an understandable concept based on the current state of pve, then this system is a relic that needs to be addressed. If they don’t want to do that, then why don’t they just balance so classes have to make choices between offense and defensive abilities, without forcing some classes to take more defense! (inherent defense might work, but some classes defenses are simply better than others. If they had a level field, then maybe they could balance it out..)

Ranged vs melee is its own beast in itself. I think, if you don’t mind, that I’m going to leave it right now for what it is. I already have gotten two posts about it now, so it is an important aspect. Maybe, if we get our thoughts together into an agreeable base stat setup, we can look at the skills a bit and see how balancing might work with certain examples including range/melee aspects.

Thanks for your patience, and I look forward to your future insights.

@Tim, First off, thanks for clearing up what you meant. I think I get it now, and it is an excellent point. These stats can certainly act as a ballast to allow for enabling certain skills. While my first thought when I read this was “Why not remove the ballast and simply strengthen and weaken the different sides of the equation until it is balanced?” But you pointed out exactly why its not so simple. Too much weakening and it becomes pointless or worthless. Too much strengthening and there will be a power creep threatening to consume the world. Or something.

But after weighing it a bit, I don’t think it will be so drastic. If the stealth is over performing, lessen the stealth heal relationship (currently stealth can heal and can be activated at a heal) or lessen the stealth damage relationship. Same thing is already done in some invulnerability scenario’s (stealth =/= invulnerability), their ability to attack is removed, thus the damage invulnerability relationship is altered. These are of course not all balanced that way, but thats an active balance issue, so I’ll leave it for now.

If a thief choses the stealth route, it could cost him either his sustain or his damage. Which should be his choice, in the form of utilities and traits. Not saying you have stealth, so we’re taking a large chunk of your sustain, even if you weren’t planning on building around it. (evasion rears its ugly head here as well, but I’d rather see it standardized and allowing for traiting/choosing for extras [eg sword dagger get evasions + stealth, should have lower dps kind of idea (combo moves make this balancing harder than by other classes)

@ All the new posts, thank you for posting, I hope I can get back in time tonight to respond to you guys and change the OP.
And to everyone, if it seems like I’m defending my point stubbornly, I am doing this for the sake of furthering the discussion, not to be difficult. My point of view is probably very clear by now, but posts with suggestions, disagreements and agreements all help to formulate an idea, which after I change the OP I won’t be able to call solely my own anymore =). Thank you, and I look forward to answering/discussing everyone’s thoughts!

@ Stalima, I could still kill mages with my paladin a year or two ago =P But there is so much whack-a-mole in WoW, I do not doubt that you are correct. The problem you illustrate shows that a statistic change like this must be paired with skill changes.

However, looking at your example specifically, I haven’t felt that an ele has hit like train in a while, and mana sheild just isn’t present. Mana sheild in itself was pretty imbalanced, if you played warcraft 3 custom maps, level cap changes made that evident.

Your other example, Guardian, has low health. But it is not toughness that makes up for it (300 toughness =/= 700 vitality), but like you said its other special abilities. Why bother with the difference at all when the abilities are what (should) define the class in a game with a diverse skill set per class? A latter post answered this question (Tim), so I think you might also be on to something here when looking at both arguments.

Before going onto the next post, I’d like to point out that there also seems to be a demand for the same DPS, when certain classes should obviously have higher currently. This could be because warrior is out of whack in the scheme. But if one class does amazing dps, the current system also makes it so that class is more prominent. The game would need to be balanced to fix that, however the thread that basically said “Fix the AI before balancing pve” (albeit in a very beat around the bush manner) has faded as well.
In short current PvE would require a more level playing field in dps in order to make classes equal, which people see. What they forget is that the damage is supposed to be balanced against other things that just happen to not matter as much when all you have to do is dodge telegraphs.

Thanks for your post btw =)

@Shadowfall or Tim if they get back before I do, I have run out of time but you both bring up excellent points and I will respond tonight. You both have got me thinking, and make me want to review my idea tonight as well. So, after responding to you guys, the OP might get changed if I have time. Particularly my poor usage of passive and what my then seemed logical skill function will be targets of a change, but also any new conclusions drawn from the discussion thus far will be added. Hopefully I can format the OP better as well.

Thank you all once again

@ Bhawb, Thanks for the reply =)
The problem is not the idea behind balancing passives with actives, which is solid theoretically, the problem is it cost so much effort to bring into practice! Let’s be honest here, if you return to something you built/wrote after a year or two, you have trouble remembering what everything was for exactly. The bigger the project, the more likely you won’t remember some reasoning. If the project has a transparent layer build, a later date tweaking would have less effect (and be more predictable) on the whole than a complex network system.

The thing is, they don’t need the stat difference of 50ish % of max addable vitality to differentiate classes. Guild Wars 2 said once upon a time to be breaking conventions, so why not here. You can balance around abilities and player choices, without flat stat differences. The effects that are unique to the class become the focus of balancing.

In this sense, its a “fix” that focuses on enabling changes in the future and creating a clearer system for a large project. I definitely can see that the time cost may be too high in many people’s eyes, which was one of my worries when thinking this up. But this whack a mole band-aid/surgery could use a streamliner to focus it

@Tim, this is a view that I certainly can sympathize with. It isn’t wrong to see stats as a way of differentiating classes, however why not let the player choices and profession unique abilities be the shining light instead of just a flat stat raise.

I agree completely that the current state would be devastating if only this statistic change were to pass, but I’d like to pose you a question. Where would thief be right now without stealth/permabblinds/evasion? Like you stated, dead. But looking from the other way around, if the actives were gone but thieves had warrior stats, they’d still be dead. What’s that got to do with anything? Well doesn’t that just mean that base stats are an unnecessary complication?

A thief’s stealth was meant to be short from the beginning, it is too long now. And all the healing, etc in stealth would definitely be worth looking at, but this is true for all classes. However, reducing the parameters reduces complexity of the network, making it simpler to balance.

@ No one in particular, I’d like to touch on my short thing about that skill modifier function thingy. This streamlines balancing attack skills. Now let’s consider making another for utilities. Unfortunately, this is complex because of synergy, but ignoring that until after an equalizing wave, then applying it on a case to case basis on exceptional skills that become wtf good would probably be easier to manage then treating every skill as an outlier and attempting to balance it with every other skill.

Please note I am responding for the sake of developing the idea, please don’t feel like it is a personal attack or that I am dismissing your input. On the contrary, I consider the flaws you guys find in my reasoning and try expand my reasoning to see if the flaws are still there. I can’t do this alone, so any and all input is very welcome

Thank you all for posting!

@Bombs, I personally lean more towards War/necro health to lengthen fights, but this a very personal thing I think. Thanks =)

@Chaos, I hoped more people would poke holes in my thoughts, it can’t grow without that. I’m not sure if the lack of response is due to me being unclear/post being too long. I might just sound too ignorant to be worthy a post to some people. Hopefully, the former is not the case =)

@Tsubasa, Thanks for the vote of confidence XD I was getting worried that I just completely missed the margin. I do hope that if the lack of posts is due to your idea, that people will realize that an agree comment helps as well in building the idea, especially if they note what parts in particular they support!

@Thighum, I haven’t even thought about the pve consquences yet, but I bet you’re right! Thanks for your insight. Indeed, a simplification of something as critical as how fast you get killed under baseline circumstances could help in far more balancing then my “Let’s just look at passives” approach.

@Cygnus, Thank you for expressing your concerns. The point I was trying to make is exactly the black and whiteness you pointed out. Currently, everything needs to be balanced with everything. If we were to take this part, base stats, and equalize them to a black and white situation that is numerically balanced, it is one less parameter that needs to be accounted for in the complex process of balancing.

The problem is, melee is not a class, its a weapon set. And ranged weapons already come with lower weapon damage if I’m not mistaken, which is where the balance you seek should be. Melee simply does more damage. If the problem really was that say warriors (or in my case melee only ranger as I always bring ranged on warrior) couldn’t connect because of kiting, why are they a top tier class ? The hp and toughness difference arn’t what save them, their active/traited abilities are. If they had ranger base stats but kept everything else, they’d still be a solid character class.

I didn’t stress this in my post but actives should balance actives. I guess my use of “passives” really confounded the post because when I say passives, I’m talking about base stats. This is completely my fault and I probably will fix it soon™. But I do want to be clear that I agree with you that this doesn’t magically solve everything, it is a step to creating a truly balanced environment. All the things you mentioned (I can name even more!) need to be balanced, but why balance around an unequal base when that costs more time and effort, and has a higher fail rate?

Guys, I fixed ranger a while ago..

I rolled a sword/dagger sb thief that never stealths and doesn’t use blinds, shadow steps I pretend are jumps and I recruit new guys to be my pet for a day.

Try it!

But in all seriousness, all I need is pet to be gone. I don’t know if someone posted this already, but why is pet not the first minor trait in beastmastery with major nerfs and make bm trait points scale it to where it is nowish with a 25/30 investment. This is a bandage I would support, despite it being that.

Or they could actually make the AI challenging…

Hey Bombs,

While I agree with the thought of creating more class diversity in all aspects of the game, this approach does not target the actual problem, which is the core class differences making them specialized for different game modes, and balancing is quite lopsided.

That being said, if the game modes are truly split, and all the professions balanced, but the problem still persists, then this might be a solution. I don’t think this is likely however.

A better solution would be (at the point of balanced profession) to add/expand content so more roles are available. Who knows, maybe some classes will shine in capture the flag content where they suck in point possession. Or maybe there well be a gathering mini game and Rangers will have their niche =P

Everyone loves a good hangin’..

The issue with the main hand sword to me is that it is not quite 100% sure what it wants to be. The auto attack chain is a delight for condition damage, as is the f1. It is also great at holding people down (which is also condition but duration so moot). However, the final thrust feels very power based. I would rather see it go the other way actually, and making number 3 more conditiony.
I personally think the condition route is better simply because it expands the options for warrior. Do you really needs another power based weapon at the cost of one of the few condition based ones of the warrior?

The reasoning behind its current state is from the sword in gw1, so I don’t think changes are very likely either way.

I love this idea. From my current view, the religion and the character choices lack any lasting effects on your character itself. Personally, I love how the sylvari look, and could spend all day creating them. However, my norn mesmer put it all into perspective for me with Become the Wolf, my all time favorite elite skill. In classes that do not have an elite skill that I enjoy, I turn to the racial elites. Being able to become a crazed wolfman with several interrupts, heals and general awesomeness makes growing a few plants seem lackluster..

To be fair though, I’m a sucker for any kind of increased character customization. Five branches of six options each with a total of fourteen choices just doesn’t cut it for me. I understand the idea that simpler = easier to balance, but I think that this religion idea has merits. Especially if we leave it out of sPvP, the situation would be more or less unchanged in balance, while making character choices even more aesthetic ones.