I kind of wish ANet would give up their slow and steady mentality, because that mentality really only works when you have a strong foundation. They should go for drastic and exciting until they build a better base game and then do minor changes to that every now and then to keep the game fresh.
That said, couple of thing’s I’d like to see in the near future.
The first is a total rework of thieves. Their class mechanics and individual abilities just aren’t fun, and they don’t contribute much at all to the game’s experience. Yeah they’re easy to kill and not overpowered, but their mechanics do nothing to challenge the user or the opponent. In fact I’d say that their one strength is to infuriate casuals. Major waste of a class slot.
Next I’d like to see ANet deal with overtuned builds. I’d like them tweak amulet stats. Make the stats more balanced so that players will see less fewer extreme burst and bunker builds. To take it a step further, they should make burst of all kinds more skills based. The current method of rubbing your face on the keyboard to execute burst gratifies poor play and does nothing to help improve players. On that note bunkering should be more about timely execution of heals and defensive skills, not just kiting and stacking regens/protection.
Finally I’d like to see Elites defining builds. In GW2 Elites are just another skill but stronger, with a few exceptions here and there. There’s very little depth to their use outside of doing more damage or efficiency of damage, and that makes them less exciting than they should be.
(edited by TwoBit.5903)
Elementalists are the type of class that requires players to use all abilities at their disposal for a greater effect than the sum of their individual abilities, and that by itself makes the class very engaging.
Out of the 5 professions I’ve played, the Elementalist has been my favorite. The only thing that would turn you off as a new Elementalist is the learning curve and the armor and health scaling in lower levels. Ranged enemies will eat you at low levels, so if you can find someone to level up with.
How does the Elementalist perform in Dungeons? Are they a highly sought after class? or are they the unwanted guest of a group?
Elementalist provides the best heals and cleansing of all classes, and the most diverse boon support. They also provide the most diverse amounts of combo fields. They can be tanky with the correct spec, so survivability shouldn’t be much of an issue when you’re at the level where you would run most dungeons. I wouldn’t say they’re highly sought after given the design of most of the dungeons but a competent Elementalist can be a boon to any party, moreso than a warrior or ranger.
Air
Incandescence
Range- Point Blank
Radius-300
Cast- 1 seconds
Duration- 3 seconds
Cooldown- 20
Field- Light
Damage- 1 Hit. Moderate damage comparable to Ice Spike.
Additional Effect- Blind
Description- Blinds and damage the area around the caster. A light field will persist for 3 seconds with no additional effect.
I wanted the torch to have some defense against direct melee. This move will function as sort of an anti-initiating skill to be used against the likes of warriors and thieves. The field allows for the player to stack retaliation with arcane wave should the opponent continue their pursuit.
Dancing Wisps
Chain Skill- Bonfire Dance
Range- 600-0
Radius- 120
Cast- .25 Seconds
Chain Cast- Instant
Duration- 5 seconds
Cooldown- 30 seconds
Finisher- Whirl
Damage- Stationary-2 hits per second. High potential damage if all 10 hits land.
When chain skill is active-2-3 hits per contact. High damage.
Description- Summons two wisps that chase eachother in a circle, damaging those in the immediate area. Activating the skill a second time will cause the wisps to fly towards the caster, damaging those along the way
Keeping with the theme of pressure and positioning, this move gives the Ele even more area control. The chain is a bit of a skillshot, but it can be used to punish opponents that aren’t careful with their positioning. Players may also utilize the whirl effect of the spell itself on a light field for random, ranged cleansing or on a water field for a similar healing effect.
Earth
Brimstone
Range- 600
Radius- 360 AoE, Projectiles have 120 AoE
Cast- Instant
Duration- 5 seconds
Cooldown- 20 seconds
Damage- 4 projectiles. Each projectile deals moderate damage in an AoE.
Additional Effects- 2 seconds burning and 3 seconds cripple per projectile.
Description- Hurls four molten boulders at the target area. After 3 seconds, these four boulders land randomly over 2 seconds.
This skill in itself sounds terrible, and it is, but when used to initiate your AoE combo, the skill adds a very necessary random factor to the fight in order to confuse and pressure your opponent. For example an opponent that is extremely proficient at kiting will kite his way through DT, Gout, Curselight, Bubble etc and will continue to do so, but if one of the boulders hits him by chance his chances of dodging other skills is reduced, making the fight much more interesting.
Collapse
Range- 600
Radius- 300-180 ring-type AoE
Cast- .5 second
Duration-3 seconds
Cooldown -30 seconds
Damage- 1 Hit. Moderate, similar to Earthquake.
Additional Effects- Knocks opponents into the center of the AoE. Blowout distance is 120.
Description- Summons a ring of earth that collapses inwards after a two second delay.
More area control! Unlike static field this skill is useful in that it groups up enemies rather than simply stunning them in in the AoE ring. As a trade-off the skill only does so after a short delay in order to compensate for the difference. In PvP it works well with signet of earth and your many cc abilities and presents a dilemma for your opponent. Will they attempt to walk out of it and risk getting immobilized or chilled on the ring, will they try to time their dodge only to all short, or will they stay inside and eat AoE? Works well with the many AoE abilities at your disposal, especially Brimstone and Bubble.
And because we need better fire traits-
Ruminations of Illumination
Fire Apprentice Trait
Torch skills have an additional 300 range.
Does not apply to Incandescence.
Torchurer (Or Torchmaster if you hate puns)
Fire Grandmaster trait
Increases the multi-hit effects of select torch skills.
Brimstone and Dancing Wisps have their duration increased by 2 second, dealing two extra hits. Boil ’n Bubbles lasts 3 seconds longer and is summoned with one extra bubble. Brimstone has one more projectile.
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Greetings fellow Elementalists of Tyria. I am very bored so here’s a concept I thought up for an off-hand torch weapon. The main focus of this weapon would be area control and slow damage over time abilities. This weapon would contrast with the off-hand dagger’s mobility and the focus’ focus on defense and, thereby, present a new and distinct playstyle for the elementalist. In PvP it would give Eles pressence as an AoE pressurer. In PvE it would serve as the the Ele’s highest, but also slowest damage weapon.
Fire
Fire Gout
Range-600
Radius-90-180-240
Cast- .75 second
Duration-3 seconds
Cooldown-6 seconds
Damage-3 hits. Direct Damage. All three hits do damage comparable to the explosion of Phoenix
Description- This ranged AoE has three stages. The first stage occurs instantly where fire bursts out of a 90 radius circle from the center of the AoE and hits once. The second stage occurs 1 second later, when the AoE spreads to 180 radius and hits a second time. The third stage happens 1 second later when the aoe spreads to 240 and hits for third time.
I wanted the weapon to have a reliable and potentially strong attack. A 3 stage AoE would allow it to achieve that potential but still give opponents a fair chance avoid all three hits. A low cooldown allows elementalists a very high degree of area control when used along with Dragon Tooth and Phoenix. The nature of the AoE gives it a lot of synergy with Dragon Tooth. For instance one could cast Fire Gout in the direction of the enemy after they run from Dragon’s Tooth.
Curselight
Range- 600
Radius- 50
Cast- .5 second
Duration- 5 seconds
Cooldown- 12 seconds
Damage- 5 hits. 1 hit per second. Direct Damage. Total damage is similar to the direct damage of Dragon’s Tooth.
Description- Summons a a flaming wisp above the opponent that drops embers in a 50 radius AoE every second for 5 seconds. The enemy can avoid all embers running with base running speed. Chilled and crippled enemies will need to dodge in order to avoid them.
This spell isn’t so much about damage as it is about pressure. By casting it frequently enough, the elementalist punishes enemies that rely on stationary channel abilities or melee enemies that need to stop and attack. It will also separate the targeted enemy from their group, lest they want to put their team at risk of damage.
Water
Vapor Cloud
Range- 600
Radius- 180
Cast- .5 second
Duration- 3 seconds
Cooldown- 20 seconds
Field- Water
Damage- 3 hits. Negligible direct damage, but it’s still there for on-hit effects.
Additional Effects- Removes Fury and Might from opponents. Cleanses poison and Bleeding on allies.
Description- Sprays a small cloud of steam directly ahead. The steam does negligible damage but removes Fury and Might from opponents with every tick. It will also cures poison and burn from allies.
I wanted to give the torch some support, but it had to be very situational given its other strengths. This spell is versatile because of it’s function as a water field, and functions as a secondary heal if the player is willing to invest their blast finishers. The combo field allows AoE healing if the user were to switch to fire and use Phoenix, or use Arcange Wave and/or Earth element Evasive Arcana. It will not stay up long enough for Dragon Tooth to take effect. Another spell located further down the list will be able to interact with it as well.
Boil ’n Bubbles
Range- 600
Radius-240 summon field. Bubbles have 90 radius.
Cast- 1.5 second
Duration- 5 seconds
Cooldown- 40 seconds
Damage- No damage
Additional Effects- Blowout
Description- Boils water on the ground at the oponent’s position, summoning three bubbles randomly in a 240 degree radius around them. These bubbles follow the opponent at 1/2 running speed, while maintaining their initial summoning distance. When the opponent touches one of these bubbles they are knocked back.
In keeping with the pressure and incremental damage theme of the torch, I wanted another position-based spell. This would contrast with the Fire’s theme of forcing the opponent to move, and when use with them presents an added challenge in avoiding those fire-based AoE attacks.
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Guild Wars 2’s combat system is already a massive leap ahead of other MMOs I have played, but this is still a very well thought-out suggestion and would help to make it even better – you have my support.
Also to a certain extent ranged projectiles do need to ‘lock on’ as otherwise they would probably never hit, unless ArenaNet can code in predictive trajectories for moving targets which would be awesome, but they certainly need to be made more visible so players can actually dodge them let alone see them coming.
Some projectiles, such as the ice worm boulder attack, do use predictive coding, so I don’t think it’s impossible for ANet to the same for normal projectiles. Even if it that’s not a feasible thing to do ANet could balance it by increasing the number of ranged enemies and also increase the number of directions the player could be shot from. At the very least making ranged attacks more visible would alone be a great improvement.
I like the idea behind this suggestion, but what’s to stop bots from moving around and avoiding DR altogether?
4) AoE’s should themselves be projected, and not red circles the rely on
This is a no brainer. Red circles are a workaround to animation and camera. In some cases, like with trebuchet shots in Malchor’s leap, there’s no way around them The thing about them in GW2 is every AoE relies on this lowest common denominator of attack. The game should give the player the tools to make decisions themselves and not do it for them, and red circles do this blatantly. It tells the player not to go somewhere rather than to let them figure it out on their own through their own attentiveness. This takes a way an important level of engagement in combat.
My solution is to take away red circles when the oportunity permits, and redesign attacks that previously relied on them. A simple way of fixing this is to turn many of these AoEs into projectiles that turn into AoEs when they land on the ground. If a projectile is out of the question an animation to warn players, giving them enough time to dodge before they go off would suffice.
An example of this done right is the mine field attack used the mining suit in the dredge fractals. The mines are clearly thrown at the player and when they hit the ground the coloration lets them stand out on the snow covered floor, sufficiently projecting areas that the playe should avoid. The red circle isn’t really needed for this attack but it does help if the player for whatever reason wants to stand right at the edge of the AoE.
5) Make enemies work together to achieve similar levels of difficulty
By removing much of the cheapness of enemy attacks, the game’s difficulty will no doubt decrease as a result. In order to boost difficulty back to a substantial level, I suggest giving enemies abilities that synergize with one another, increasing the chance of them hitting the player and also increase the challenge these enemies post. For instance AoE heavy enemies will sometimes be accompanied by melee pets that will relentlessly chase the player and inflict cripple, freeze, or immobilize. Players who fight this ensemble of enemies will be challenged to either kite the melee pet and kill the enemy firing the AoE, or they could kill the melee pet first. Different professions will be forced to handle the situation in different ways in accordance to their strengths and weaknesses, and this will greatly increase the replay value of the game through alts.
… and ways to remedy issues of cheapness within GW2’s combat (curse you, character limits).
One of the biggest issues that detriments GW2’s combat experience is with the game’s poor attack projection. It’s the frustration that occurs when players are instantly knocked back, immobilized or stunned by attacks they can barely see or hit by attacks that looks much smaller than their animations. When poorly projected attacks occur, players are not challenged to use their reflexes and attentiveness to avoid danger, but rather they’re frustrated because the game doesn’t give them the means. These kinds of attacks encourage a playstyle where players must often use their skills after being hit and this disallows them the benefit of clever and pre-emptive use of their abilities. The result of this design is an unpolished combat system that is often frustrating and unengaging to the player.
So, ANet, I come to you today with a list of issues regarding the combat system and suggestions on how you could fix these issues. These suggestions are focused on the PvE side of the game, but I’m sure the principle behind them can be applied to PvP as well.
1) For melee attacks, increase enemy weapon/character model to match the AoE hitboxes of their attacks.
In action oriented games it is a common convention that the hitboxes of attacks should rarely ever extend past their animation, and this convention is in place for good reason. If not for the actual visible attack itself what else is the player supposed to use in order to help them position their characters? This combat system was touted as one that required players to move around after all. There’s little point in moving around if the enemy’s attacks cheat their hitboxes and players will get hit anyway.
2) Ranged projectiles should never seek/lock-on to the player. Ever.
This is an incredibly cheap way of increasing the game’s difficulty. One that doesn’t increase the challenge, but does increase the level of frustration. Remove the lock-on capabilities of these attacks and make them fire less frequently, giving players a change to dodge them. To compensate make the animation, model and hitboxes of ranges attacks larger, and increase their damage to offset the fact that players will be able dodge many of them by strafing. If there must ever be a ranged lock-on attack, make the projectile slow to give players a change to dodge it using their precious dodge bar.
3) Make CC abilities more noticeable
One of the worst things that can be done to a player in an action game is for the game to take away control of their character. There’s nothing challenging about enemy abilities that make the player into an observer, especially when the attacks that do so are difficult to see. The main offenders here are the Krait, but there are many others spread throughout the game.
My suggestion in this area is to increase the windup of such abilities and give them more noticeable animations. For instance, the Risen Acolyte’s immobilize attack should use the Grasping Dead (necromancer scepter #2 ability) animation and give players about 1/2-1 second to move out of the AoE.
(edited by TwoBit.5903)
+1
I like this idea. It’ll help make the open world less redundant. When you think about it, there’s almost no difference between an encounter with say, a bandit and a skritt pistoler. You DPS them down all the same.
Additionally In the game’s current states enemies don’t offer much in the form of challenge, and any apparent attempt by the designers at mixing up encounters often ends poorly. I’m talking about the barely-telegraphed ccs and instagibs and the like.
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I think a lot of the issues with sPvP could be avoided with ANet balanced amulets such that players wouldn’t be able to spec into extremes.
For D/D eles I believe one of the biggest problems is that might stacking increases both direct damage and condition damage. Certain D/D skills that use both types of damage are easy to land so by playing defensively and building up might, D/D will be able to steamroll and burn down most any spec.
ANet could go about nerfing a couple of ways, but I think the the best possible solution is to reduce healing/nerf defensive boons. This will not only bring down the D/D problematic ele’s survivability, but also bring guardians in line with other classes. Additionaly, I think it’d be good for the metagame in general if classes couldn’t reset so easily mid-fight. It’d require players to be more clutch with their dodges and skill usage.
As for the topic, I don’t think RTL is at risk for a nerf. The problems are much deeper than a simple escape/initiation ability.
I’ve been using a similar build in WvW and PvE.
I run 0/10/10/20/30 in trait points
Traits are:
Air: Zephyr’s focus
Earth: Obsidian Focus
Water: Cleansing Wave, Cantrip Master
Arcana: Elemental Attunement, Renewing Samina, Evasive Arcana
Utility: Glyph of Elemental Power, Mist Form, Lightning Flash
Stats: Carrion/Rabid
Glyph of Elemental Power is nutters for stacking useful conditions with scepter. It’s far more efficient than elemental surge, IMO.
Afaik, destroyers are emulations of pre-existing beings, and interestingly enough those emulations can breed among themselves (as evident in skritt empathy quest). Destroyer quaggans are very much feasible if the primodius ever found a reason to copy them.
+1 Great idea. Current open world encounters are down right abysmal and that’s because the statistical scaling often subverts challenge. I think this proposed system will help maintain challenge.
Preaching to the choir, mate.
The combat’s design makes it hard to see who’s contributing what. Instead of having one class shift the momentum of one aspect of the fight (healing, DPS, defense, etc), everyone contributes to the momentum so individual contributions get drowned out. This the natural result of giving every profession access to everything without clear specialization paths. I’m personally beginning to miss specialized roles. But not the trinity though. That system can go die in a fire.
However this directly counters logic.
They don’t want us to stay in one place, yet we need 500 tokens to get a gift for our legendary. Logic dictates you do it all now in as quick a time as possible rather than stretching it out over weeks.
Having to get lodestones to crafts omething? Yup, sit and farm a specific part of the map to get them. Logic dictates that no DR should happen, if anything the droprate for lodestones should INCREASE the longer you stay there as you obviously are getting better at spotting them/finding themt he longer you do it.
If they don’t want us to grind they need to reduce craftign expenses for everything across the board to what you can get in 3 days of farming within DR windows. As most will admit that anything over 3 days is called grinding in a spot. Heck, fighting elementals for 3 hours is grinding in and of itself but it is needed to craft even non-legendary items.
I think the DR system has two purposes in that it 1) deters bots and 2) pace a player’s grinding for rare materials such as lodestones. The first can happen but it can not stop bots, just mitigate them. We’ve seen this happen and I think it’s working in that respect. The second works well, but only in dungeons and instances. In the open world, where the RNG for desirable items is so low, players will not be able to pace themselves because there’s a likelihood that they won’t be rewarded at all for their efforts even before DR kicks in. This is a fatal flaw but one that can’t be fixed in the open world without screwing up the economy for those items. I think being able to buy the items with tokens would rectify the problem at least a little bit. The decent rate at which fractals drops these stones certainly helps, but it doesn’t fix the open world farming issue.
When you change DR to “Bonus,” I think it’ll help designers dictate player behavior through positive reinforcement, and not anger them through the current system which feels downright oppressive. It helps to ensure that most players will farm X area X amount of times over a span of X days because they want to.
@Mystic
That’s never happened to me, so I didn’t know about that. I think it’ll still help to call it a bonus when there’s a difference involved. Players enjoy gaining more than losing. It’s all about psychology, you see.
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There’s been a lot of complaint about the DR system, and to be fair the system feels very oppressive. But this is only because of its presentation.
So, ANet, I think you should keep the system the same, but switch around the presentation. Make the DR rate baseline, but give players a telegraphed drop rate bonus whenever they do activities that otherwise wouldn’t trigger the DR system. For example, players who actively move around the map and hunt mobs will have a constant bonus. Players who run a path of Ascalonian Catacombs the first time after the daily reset will get 20 tokens plus a daily bonus of 40. With this mental trick in place players will know what kinds of behaviors are desired through rewards rather than penalties, and they won’t feel as though they’re losing by playing.
I have to agree with TC. I don’t mind leveling systems in and of themselves, but I do mind the way GW2 implemented it. As TC mentioned, leveling is a tutorial and one important aspect of it is that it paces the player by gating content. For the system to be effective, the each segment of content needs to relevant by priming players for the next, and this happens in a plethora of ways outside of a simple stat increase; often times it becomes even more effective when the player is able to choose how they are to deal with the next bit of content. In this way statistics act as a microcosm that defines the player experience.
GW2 uses it very haphazardly as a simple content gate that gives players a superficial sense of progression through numbers. Rather than having the more intricate mechanics of the game introduced to the player piecemeal in a meaningful digestible manner through content gating by the leveling system, everything is thrown at the player with the expectation that they’d automatically understand it. This is further exacerbated by the fact that they challenges posed in different maps are relatively the thing but with different number scaling. To go to Gendarran Fields, your number needs to be greater than or equal to the number listed on the map. It makes combat shallow and those enjoying the game only for the combat will find the game rather repetitive as a result.
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Dynamic Event, and referring only to their activation. Completing them requires very little of the player outside of skill spamming (especially in zergs), making the experience itself less than dynamic.
Given how ANet said they’re going to improve the core of the game, I’d like to know if it entails the revamping of some of these encounters.
The problem with bots is much deeper than you guys seem to think. Bots are far too resourceful and insidious to be stopped by an addition of one game mechanic. If a combat mechanic become a method of gating their actions they will find profit outside of the boundaries of combat.
In fact, the current method of botting involves teleporting around maps and gathering from nodes. These kinds of bots are very difficult to spot so they often go unreported. I’ve also heard of bots that exploit flipping goods on the TP for profit and to launder gold as well, but of course I haven’t seen them in action.
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Instead of punishing those players, why not reward players for playing? Give these players a glory buff for playing matches without leaving, glory buffs for playing different classes, and so forth. Make these rewards valuable enough for players continue playing even if they know they’ll lose.
s/d is the superior bunker, it has 250 more tougness and a beter heal on water + 2blinds and a cond remowal with pheonix and also 900 range. D/D eles play with valkryie which i dont consider a bunker and have their counters such as trap rangers, cond engis some dps guard builds….
Can also be 1shoted by thief if ur out of mistform….I think most ppl here dont even know the difrence between d/d and s/d as i see far more s/d in paids, op himself doesnt know the base HP for ele is 10,8k not 13k.
That’s cause eles have 25 in water as a baseline, obviously :P
@TC:
Great post. I 100% agree with your points, even as a bunker ele. My main issues with protection, regeneration are that they’re not used reactively to counter but for upkeep. When you’re able to stack those boons so frequently that aspect of gameplay quickly goes from strategy to spam. Of course if they tone that down they’ll also need to address glassy burst builds as well, perhaps even AoE burst as a result.
I like the idea for the aesthetics, but I think the torch/lantern mechanism would be a bit tedious.
+1 all the same.
While I am a little nervous there is no reason to freak out until we actually see what is going down. Preempted QQing only means you unnecessarily tired.
I think this is the final straw (anvil?) that broke the camel’s back. You can’t create a class with almost 100% AoE damage and then nerf AoE damage. They won’t be competitive.
ANet doesn’t know what they’re doing. If this goes through, it’s game over.
Threatening to quit a game w/o a sub, Good luck to you.
Just to add, people that usually pull stunt like these are 83% more likely to be a paying customer in the first place. So really nothing of value was lost.
Just to add, making up random statistics doesn’t help your argument.
The game’s long term monetization strategy is to sell gems, and eventually paid expansions. Guess how many gems and expansions people buy after they give up on a developer/publisher and blacklist their company forever. ANet/NCSoft is about to get lumped in with Blizzard and EA for me.
An MMO needs a stable population to stay alive. Outside of primetime, sPvP has a few hundred people playing out of over 2 million boxes sold . I haven’t been in overflow outside of LA in months. I haven’t waited in a WvW queue after the weekend rush since October.
“Nothing of value was lost” indeed. Who needs customers?
I agree with your points, but that chart’s misleading. Apple’s stocks follow the same exact trend. This is likely to be because they’re spending more during this period than any other in order to expand and innovate.
Great ideas. I especially love the earth attunement.
I agree encounters can be more engaging, but a simple weakness/resistance mechanic can become stagnant in and of itself and it adds another layer of difficulty in balancing mobs. What ANet should do is add interesting effects like “takes extra damage when knocked down” or “lose health when boons are stripped” to encourage different styles of play and to exploit existing mechanics.
@Modimor:
The problem’s recursive. There are few players in lower level areas because leveling alts is tedious and boring. Lower level maps will still be relevant because of scaled up rewards and downscaling of players. In fact one of the more popular methods of leveling in some servers is for players to go to Queensdale, and spam those events because they’re so easy for the exp they yield. I can name a few servers that do this methodically.
It’s better to encourage veteran players to explore the world than not at all, I’d say. Although more engaging content in lower zones can only help as well.
@Cake Monster:
The processis really meant for level 80 characters with no way to spend their SP and also lack the willpower to muster through the boring parts of the content again. ANet could always limit the process of converting SP to level 80 characters alone to prevent new players from blazing through the content, make the items account bound, etc. A high exchange rate ensures that players can’t constantly spam SP to level alts and a cap prevents them from not playing the content at all with their alts. Futhermore, leveling through crafting can be a very convoluted and esoteric process, making less attractive than a simple conversion. As an anecdote, I have a necromancer that I could simply buy to level 80 but doing so requires so much tedium that I’d prefer not to play him at all.
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Great stream. I’m a tad worried for my D/D ele, but I could see the reasoning behind a nerf for them. A good number of our AoEs are near instant attacks that deal decent damage. I could see them adding more windup or even an after cast.
+1
I especially like your first suggestion. It’s thematic and immersive, and I don’t think it’d take an incredible amount of effort to do. Possibly a lot of art resources though.
I don’t see why there couldn’t be a new mechanic – in which a necromancer could have direct control of his minions when not engaged in H2H combat. It makes little sense that a summoned (somewhat mindless) entity can’t be controlled at all.
Necromancers/Evil Clerics in pretty much any RPG I’ve ever played had the ability to control their minions.
I think the difference between Necro/Ranger should be:
- Ranger Pets: Intelligent AI
-> Flees (wimpy’s) when it is below a percentage of it’s HP that the ranger can set.
-> Defaults to attacking what the Ranger is attacking.
-> Can be directed/suggested/controlled to flee/change target/regroup/etc.
-> Will defend itself on the way to a different target.
- Necromancer Minions: Mindless, Little AI
-> Attack whatever aggressive mob is within range.
-> Can be called back to the Necromancer. (May fail if the Necro is too far away).
-> Can be directed to attack another target. (May fail if the target is too far away).
-> Does not defend itself when it is attacked on it’s way to a different target.
-> May randomly change targets. Regardless of Necro’s previous command.
+1
I like this idea. The distinction would be enough to make both class’ mechanics worth using in different situations. The Ranger’s pet for instance, would be more versatile and when traited function almost as a secondary player. Necromancer minions would specifically act as bodies that swarm and block, a simple dual offense defense mechanism.
I had a good time leveling alts on GW2 o.O. There’s so much to see. Of course, I didn’t do map completion on any character yet (saving legendaries and map completion for last).
I think 5ish skill points for a level is a bit too little? One level at level 10 is nothing like a level at level 70. Maybe XP jugs instead? But something that definitely costs a ton of points so like maybe 300+ points to even get a low level past the halfway point. It’s even more boring to level via clicking a bunch of jugs though than crafting lol.
Most of my guild members quit due to how abysmal the experience of the game is after getting 1 maxed out character. This included both the legendary grind and alt leveling. I only speak because of my experience with them.
SP isn’t a problem with fractals, but I can see your point if you’re a player that doesn’t run them often. I think XP jugs would work too, but there needs to be a limit in order to avoid abuse and bypassing the entire leveling experience.
Several problems with your argument.
1) It’s not max level. It’s up to a level where the game becomes engaging.
2) It’s not a cheat code. Players will still have to play the game in order to level alts. Doing so through high level characters is simply more engaging.
3) If players aren’t engaged enough to level alts, there’s less of a chance that they’ll keep playing the game. With their implementation of Ascended items, it has been made clear that players not being engaged enough to keep on playing is a problem for ANet.
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If transmuted items use codes to reference specific item data, and I think they do, there’s always the possibility of allowing players to reverse it for Legendary transmutations.
I’m with the TC on this one, since I’d also like to hear word of this from ANet themselves.
That is incredible backwards logic you’re using there. Developers need to create systems in order to enhance the overall experience. In both cases crafting and actually playing the game with an alt are both boring experiences. You can’t substitute something boring for something also boring. Actually playing the game with a maxed out character isn’t a dull experience, and using that to enhance alt leveling makes it all the better.
Furthermore, there are to many intermediary steps and decisions to earning gold with a higher level character, looking up crafting tables and guides, using gold to buy ingredients and then, finally, earning experience by leveling the craft. Most players won’t be tuned to following these steps. Couples with the the fact that leveling low level alts is likely to be an unengaging experience for them, they will be even less likely to keep on playing after they’ve reached their goal with their main character.
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Do they have to not be? AI is incredibly difficult to code for in dynamic environments and with the pets in their current state, players would rather not use them at all. This workaround would definitely be better than sticking to a compromised system.
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I already know the trick. In fact, that’s how I leveled my alts. The problem is that it’s an incredibly boring method, and players unaware of the crafting trick would be quick to turn away from leveling alts.
Disclaimer: This is not a fix, but a workaround to the poor AI in Necro pets.
Add commands F2, F3, and F4 to the Necromancer skill bar. These commands will work similar to Ranger pet commands in that they alter pet targeting, and therefor behavior. F2 will cause necro pets to focus the selected target. F3 will cause pets to disperse and attack random nearby targets. F4 will de-aggro the pets and call them back to the Necromancer.
With these added tools, the Necromancer may even do some nifty things with their pets. F2 can, for instance, body block certain enemies by swarming them with minions. The Necromancer may even use F3 to aggro enemies with their pet and then F4 to call the pets back, grouping up enemies.
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As an Elementalist, I approve of this suggestion!
The Problem:
One of the greatest weaknesses of the GW2 experience is leveling alts. I believe there are several reasons for this. The obvious one is that the exploration element of engagement in lower levels wears off quickly with subsequent playthroughs. By starting off at level 1 again, players who have had access to the entire map are once again locked into a few zones. It’s not surprising how detrimental it is for a player to lose this kind of freedom in an experience that focuses so much on exploration. Another reason is that GW2 uses many deck-building elements. If a player goes from 70 trait points to 0, that player loses all of their ability to decide what goes in their deck, and the process of regaining that ability is unsurprisingly sluggish.
Solution:
Allow players to convert surplus skill points into levels for alts. Something along the lines of 4-5 skill points to exchange for an item that grant 1 level. This item can only be used up to level 40 and outside of combat (in order to avoid abuse in WvW and PvE since leveling restores all health).
Reasoning:
By allowing this, players who wish to level an alt can do so in a more engaging manner through their maxed out characters. A cap of level 40 allows the player the freedom explore a good potion of the map and enough trait points with which they can build their character. It also ensures that the player must play through a good portion of the game to max out their character and, therefore, be better prepared for endgame content.
Do it, ANet.
Edit: An important point was brought up about new players using the systems to rush through levels. In order to avoid this, ANet could simply restrict the conversion to level 80 characters and make the items account bound.
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I haven’t tried lifesteal myself, so I can’t comment to much on it. The wiki states that it’s a base 450 heal on a 5 second ICD with terrible scaling, so I’d say no just from that.
Battle is pretty darn amazing if you’re the type to cycle attunments. You can have up to 6 stacks from the sigil alone without boon duration. Also note the the damage formula is (Weapon Damage * Power * Skill Coefficient)/(Target’s Armor), so the difference in damage from the might stacks is greater than it appears on the stat screen.
Hydromancy has a range of about 240. It’s decent for kiting enemies with D/D and I’ve used carry it myself, but I found that the effect often triggered at undesired times since I attunement dance. I don’t think that Ice will make much of a difference, to be honest. Players are likely to cleanse your chill or die before the full duration is over.
I think you guys are taking requirements of eSports for granted. For anything to be a sport, there needs to be a sort of engagement with the viewing of the game. This implies that the audience and their attention is what the developers need to design for, and that’s a totally different ballpark than game balance or mechanics.
I’d wager that first games that did succeed in becoming the golden geese of eSports did so because they had the benefit of luck. They came with the right things, at the right time and in the right conditions. Prospective game companies looking for a slice of the pie have to interpret preexisting conditions and create ones for themselves to succeed. That can be tough since, with design in general, the superficial can often masks underlying substance and you can end up looking at the wrong things.
It also doesn’t help that the relative number of people interested in any kind of eSport at all is small. In the US, eSports are having problems taking off at all. If ANet do decide to devote time to designing a working infrastructure, they’ll have to compete for an even smaller fraction of the little pie or pioneer it towards unclaimed masses.
Thinking back, the decision to go for eSports was a very ambitious one and I think there might be something to be said about how players are skeptical only now.
As for necessary eSport features… I think it’s been covered before, but the game needs a robust method for viewing games. The observer mode that people constantly bring up will certaintly help those already in-game, but for them I think there needs to be something as accessible as the replay system that Starcraft and most MOBAs use. It’d let players learn from this visual aid all the same, but at their own pace. But these only help people who already have the game. For viewers that don’t have the game installed, something along the lines of a built-in recorder to that uploads directly to youtube or a stream can only help to facilitate content sharing with them.
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Quickness, and all other forms of burst for the matter, needs to be better projected. If ANet decides to leave it in, they’ll need to give it some sort of visual cue.
Vitality would be redundant with healing, since healing acts as effective health. More stat combinations would always be nice though.
Curious to hear why you think it’s good in wvw? To me, fall damage is a non-factor, and the fall effect might be useful once in a play session at best.
You can jump down onto door bashers with earth attunement. With Swirling winds, the Ele becomes a one-man antisiege.
I meant their presence. The combo was changed slightly so there’s a chance you’re missing some stacks of vulnerability.
Are you factoring in multipliers like vulnerability from Rending Shatters, Illusion of Vulnerability and Staff/Sword Autoattack? It wouldn’t be surprising it the glitch accounted for most of the damage drop either. It’s hard to take this too seriously without a set of controlled data.
But in any case, I don’t think ANet would need to lie about ninja nerfs.
Damage done = (weapon damage) * Power * (skill-specific coefficient) / (target’s Armor)
Notice that it’s weapon damage multiplied by power. Since might adds directly to power, you need to use base power, rather than displayed weapon damage + power, to calculate the damage difference.
35 (Number Might stacks)/base power = % damage difference.
Where are you seeing this? If you mouse-over the “Attack” stat in your hero screen (my bad for calling it “damage” earlier), you can see it’s weapon damage + power, not multiplied.
In-game tooltips and descriptions are….lacking. This is the damage formula posted on the wiki. I’ve tested it with my Elementalist so I can vouch for its accuracy.
yeah they reverted shattered strength to its previous state which virtually makes you miss out on the free might. Mesmers could get 24 stacks of might because of the greatsword bouncing attack. Now they get 6 base so i think 9 now. Which is 35 power per stack so 840 power previously now toned back to between 210-315 power.
So basically what was happening was that mesmers would have 2200 base power from their shatter builds, 2450 power and add a 24 stack of might makes it 3290 POWER. so ya
Not only that but with 3290 power their shatters were doing 1 clones worth of damage. With a zerker amulet you do roughly twice the damage on mind wrack than you would with 3. You could essentially get 4 4k+ shatters off and just be one shotting people left and right. I forget what the exact co-efficients are on the # of clones but yeah
Everything you said there is true, but you’re talking in generalities. I’ll lay out some more math for ya here to show more clearly what I’m talking about.
Combo being used: Duelist, Leap, Dodge, Leap, Diversion, Mirror Images, Dodge, Mind Wrack.
So that’s a full diversion, followed by a full mind wrack about a third of a second later (need to give dodge a small amount of time to go off). Before the patch, each mind wrack was usually crit’ing for about 3.4k. Post-patch, the exact same combo, which is totally unaffected by the .25s cooldown, is having each mind wrack crit for about 2.2k. Pulling from the stuff I said in the first post, depending on how the might stack application is coded, the most might that combo would produce for the mind wracks pre-patch was 15. Now it’s 5. Difference of 10.
Each might stack gives 35 power (which is added towards total “damage”, as in the stat called damage).
35 * 10 = 350
Shatter build gives you a base damage stat of 3243, so now let’s look at the bonus that extra 10 might provides:
350 / 3243 = .108 = 10.8%.
If all that’s changed is the might stacks, then I should be seeing 10.8% less damage on my shatters.
3400 * x = 2200 (x is the % of 3400 that 2200 is)
x = 2200 / 3400 = 0.6471 – 0.647 = 0.353 = 35.3%
So, the DPS loss I’m seeing with numbers I was very careful when recording is over 3 times that which the math on might suggests I should be losing in the case (which I think is unlikely anyways) that might has the largest possible effect on the combo, i.e. where the mind wrack’s generated might all happen simultaneously and all apply to themselves and each other.
Again, my combo used for this test did not change at all in terms of order of execution or speed of execution, so the .25s cooldown is not a factor.
Where is this discrepancy coming from?
Damage done = (weapon damage) * Power * (skill-specific coefficient) / (target’s Armor)
Notice that it’s weapon damage multiplied by power. Since might adds directly to power, you need to use base power, rather than displayed weapon damage + power, to calculate the damage difference.
35 (Number Might stacks)/base power = % damage difference.
High power low skill tactics can be a good entry point for new players. In GW2 they end up being counter-intuitive and a crutch for various reasons. For one thing, GW2 is an MMO and players are not every player is going to start off as a faceroll profession as their character.
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Good to hear a staff response for this.
This ship is going down fast like Trion/Rift…Expecting staff cuts soon. How soon? I can’t tell you as I don’t want to ruin the surprise.
That’s a pretty serious thing to say and it doesn’t make a whole lotta logical sense. They’ll likely be seeing staff cuts/transfers if they either give up on sPvP or when development of sPvP is in a healthy and stable state. Right now, the game has far too much potential for them to give up on it.