Guild Wars 2

double the attack rate of bosses and half their damage with each attack could help. So not every attack can be dodged and you have to take some damage. This would make the life for non defensive builds harder, but not impossible.

On the other hand, with such a change, support builds, with healingpower and regeneration could start to shine aswell. (but i think for this the boon duration on most skills should be halfed)

Why not double the stack limit per enemy tier?
player and normal mobs 25
veterans 50
silver ones 75
Champions 100
bosses 125 (5*25 would make a condition bases group possible)
Worldbosses 150

And if this calculation is true for every tick, than ofcourse calculate the damage onse.

A condition is a normal attack, that deals damage over time, I see no point, why it should be calculated every tick of the condition.

1. I Don’t think this is needed, It would be enough to show them they dont have any defense. Just some damage that they can’t dodge. i.e. faster attacks with lower doamage of the boss instead of one every 5 seconds.

2. With this change you will increase the overall effectiveness of Zerker. Because they have tons of precision and crit damage. Making their heals stronger and compensate the lack of defense even more.
Those two stats are offensive stats and don’t match well with a defensive one like healing power. Because the most healing in GW2 comes from regeneration a combination of boon duration and healing power would synergies but the only one we have is givers and that one is bad.

3. We dont need a doubled duration for CC, we have enough CC to deal easily with trashmobs i.e. AoE blind, icefields, cripple…. , but the defiant buff of bosses makes CC worthless, a well timed interrupt on a boss should be worth more than any dodge but too many interrupts should penalize the group (rage mode of the boss, making the boss stronger an CC immune for a short time). This interrupted skill could either be a strong AoE dmg of the boss or a heal.
I dont understand your armor idea, condi-duration, condi-dmg and precision would be an equivalent to zerker armor. Because all three stats synergies with each other.

4. Conditions synergies very well with precision, 60% chance on crit to bleed your foe (sigil of earth and traits) they dont need to crit. lets compare condition damage to direct damage:
Conditiondamage works like Power its your base damage
Precision increases your ammont of conditions → increases your overall damage (luck bases and caped at 100%)
Condition duration multiplies your damage done, the more precision you have, the more conditions you stack, the more damage you do.
Bringin in more stats, that would effect conditiondamage, would make it imbalanced, why should i need 4 stats to max my conditions, but only 3 to increase my direct damage? To increase the conditiondamage, you can just change some numbers in the formulas, but I dont think its needed, conditiondamage is fine at the moment, the big problem is the cap. reducing this to 10 per player would cause more problems, than it should solve. Many classes even in zerker gear is able to put 10+ stacks bleed and vulnerablility on an enemy. with your idea, conditionclasses would get their damage halved and we still have the problem, that we cant use 2+ conditionbuilds in a group of five.

5. Yes, mobs need to be more intelligent when it comes to a fight, but they should not change their skills, hp and toughness depending on the group facing them. The interesting part would be finding the best group constelation, to beat dungeon X with different boss strategies needed, the most efficient way.

Tradewind.6913:

Thought I had with a buddy of mine, who is a condition necro, if the current caps can’t be changed for “reasons.” Condition classes should be able to charge up a power bar, relative to the condition damage that would normally be inflicted. This charged ability can then be discharged for direct damage. Whether it’s just a utility skill, or something granted by a minor trait bonus etc, idk.

No that’s garbage in my opinion. We play condition Builds because we want that damage over time and no burst damage or any other mechanics.

They just have to use some kind of floating average for every player. So that there is only one number that ticks per player and condition. The problem is this works well if all conditions are equally long, but not if one is much times longer in duration (i.e Blood is Power)

E:
In every content a Condition Build is useless, when 2 of them hit the same monster, because every build I know get easily 15 Stacks of bleeding and some get even the 25 stacks by their own. And what is even worth every Power build gets minor traits that apply bleeds as well and therefore block more of our bleeds.

Good news in GW2 you shouldn’t stand still and you can’t really heal your team
But anyway some more “roles” would be nice for more depth in the game. I think bosses can be designed the way that you can still kill all by pure DPS-warriors (or what ever class you prefer with Zerker gear) but some will die faster or easier with special mechanics:
- kiting, holding in AoE fields, … (CC)
- Blind, Vuln. stacks, … (debuffs)
- Const. regen/protection, might, … (group Buffs)
- High toughness, low hp bosses (weak vs conditions)
- and many more

Then the first question should be “do you like participating in a survey making gw2 even better?” Yes, no

a few questions per week would be OK, but a question every step you walk would be too much.

Sylentir.8913:

Blind:
This includes the ability to apply blind to a target. Every profession except the Warrior has the ability to on-demand apply a blind.

dodge or if the boss is melee then slow him down that he cant hit you.

Sylentir.8913:

Blocks/Invulnerability:
This includes abilities to render the user impervious to attack. Only Guardians, Engineers, Elementalists, and Mesmers have access to this without traits or weapons. As a result, it should not be the focus of an encounter.

You forgot the warrior here with 4 sec invu. And for those who dont have a invulnerability or block need to dodge at the right time. And if they need it more often, they need vigor or a heal to compensate the damage they get. Or a “rusty shield”

Sylentir.8913:

Projectile Reflection:
This includes any ability to reflect projectile attacks. Only Guardians, Engineers, Thieves, and Mesmers have access to this without traits or weapons. As a result, it should not be the focus of an encounter.

If the boss only gets damage by reflected projectiles, than there need to be some environmental weapons. If not, heal, dodge, run…..

Sylentir.8913:

Stability:
This includes any ability to apply stability. Only the Elementalist is without this.

A knockdown can be handled with a stunbreaker or a dodge, block,….

Sylentir.8913:

Stealth:
This includes the ability to enter stealth. Only the Mesmer and Thief have guaranteed access to this, so it should not be the focus of an encounter.

At the moment is only used to skip some content. But this can also be done with swiftness of environmental weapons or smokefield+explo finishers.

I think the problem is that people think their class needs to be the best in everything and for this we dont need 8 different classes. Maybe there would be class X is better for dungeon Y, but this doesnt mean, the rest is useless and the dungeon cant be done. I know we have the same “issue” right now with dps warriors. To do all the pve content the easiest and fastest way. The suggestion of the OP goes another way. dps classes shine in dungeon A, condi classes ind dungeon B, guardians ins dungeon C….

Sylentir.8913:

First off, with the GW2 team saying that they have some version of raids coming, I hope that they can address the issue of encounter design in those. Casual players won’t set foot in raids, and therefore hardcore players could have as much difficulty as the devs can design.

Are you talking about tequatl and other worldbosses? The last thing I heared by collin was that groups of 5 are fine.

Sylentir.8913:

Here is what I won’t assume:
—I will not assume any access to weapon skills. Players are extremely varied in what weapons they prefer, and most people won’t be willing to carry a copy of each weapon available in their backpack.
—I will not assume any specific traits. While I am of the school of thought that tailoring a build to a fight is completely fair to assume, many people would disagree. Plus, it would be difficult to account for the build diversity of this game.

Why not place environmental weapons around the bosses, that are really weak compared to real weapons, but will give you acces to a stun, snare,…. what ever.

For excample a “rusty shield” that will replace skill 4 and 5 wit a block and shielbash and will get destroyed after 5 uses and have high CDs.

Sylentir.8913:

Interrupts:
Interrupts include any daze, stun, knockback, knockdown, launch, pull, or fear. With this criteria, every profession has at least one non-weapon and non-trait dependent interrupt. Rangers have the least, while Warriors and Necromancers have the most.

Forced Movement:
Forced movement includes any knockback, launch, or pull. Neither Rangers nor Mesmers have any access without weapons or traits, while all other classes have some access.

But everyone hase one, so why dont we use them?

Sylentir.8913:

Movement Hampering:
Movement hampering includes any form of inhibiting a CC-immune target’s movement. This includes immobilizes, cripples, and chills. Mesmers have no access to this outside of weapon skills and traits.

Is this a real problem? As you said, a group has at least 3 different classes, what a mesmer cant do, the rest of the group has to do more. On the other hand there are two sided of the coin. If you cant slow your enemy move faster

Sylentir.8913:

Condition Removal:
This includes the ability to remove, transfer, or convert conditions on one’s self or an ally. Every profession has personal condition removal, while every profession but the elementalist may remove conditions from an ally.

You forgot the combo fields, the elementalist can place combofields, that can be used for condi remove or trait that every heal he applies removes a condition. But again, noone said that all the bosses cant be done without condiremove or CC. It would only make them easier.

Sylentir.8913:

Boon Removal:
This includes the ability to remove, steal, or corrupt the boons on an enemy. Only Engineers, Mesmers, and Necromancers have guaranteed access to this mechanic, so it would be ill-advised to design an encounter around it.

What boons are we talking about? I think all can be countered
might with more defense and heals
Regen with poison
Swiftness with slows/CCs
Retelation with controlled dmg and heals.
Protection with more dmg.
Stability with movement

Sylentir.8913:

Healing:
This includes the ability to heal another player. Only Warriors and Mesmers lack the ability to directly heal an ally. Furthermore, Guardians, Warriors, Engineers, and Rangers are capable of applying regeneration to allies.

Thats why every class has his own healing ablility. Maybe there is a class weaker at some points which is good. With every class beeing able to do everything equally good we dont need 8 different classes.

Sylentir.8913:

Protection:
This includes the ability to apply protection to allied players. Only Guardians, Rangers, and Elementalists can apply protection on-demand to allies. As such, encounters should not be designed around this.

If we have no protection we need more heal or dodges to prevent some damage. This doesnt mean class X or Y is useless.

The Lost Witch.7601:

whyme.3281:

I have a boss idea too. Like the icicles in the guildpuzzle. You need to pull a boss under some rocks, amboses, pianos or whatever. This would require CC on the floor to pull the boss to specific locations and controlled damage on the top to cut some ropes/chains…. And maybe the boss gets some sort of heal that need to be interrupted or reduced by poison

I’ll have to do that guild puzzle, sounds interesting.

No, in the puzzle you dont have to kill someone, but shoot icicles and put the shards in holes to make a way for the rest of your guild. But the mechanic would be cool for a boss.

Downscaling needs a change, because it scales all 3 stats of the armor down, but low level content is designed for armor with 1 or 2 stats, not 3. So cut down one or two stats or decrease them a bit more would put a high level char on the same level as a low level char. Which then means low level chars wouldnt be useless in dungeons, the only difference would be less trait points and a few less stat points because of missing traits.

What about autoattacking? or stacking before the fight starts?

And a final one for now.

As I said in the dungeon forum about support:
We need to get away from boons, CC, heals and support conditions on our autoattacks.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Useless-supports/first#post2816835

You cant call stacking might and vulnerbility with every Autoattack support. Only if you have to invest traits/sigil/runes… for support we have the skills 2-0 and F1-4 and on 1 only damage no bonus effects only finisher.

In my oppinion, all the autoattacks needs to be reworked and get rid of conditions, CC, boons and heals. except of bleeds and burns, because these are needed for Conditionbuilds and dont play a support role. When this change is made, then we can start talking about support.
I would go a step further and give the banners a health bar, making them a tactical element and not “fire and forget”.

Noboby here wants the trinity back, we just want more variaty in combat.

Look at AC the boss with the traps, here is no dmg needed, timing is important and a bit groupplay.
The Arena in flame and frost where you have to survive for X minutes (it was a bit too easy, but different, than stack, dodge and dps).
Fireshamane in grawl fractal. But here it is in my opinion still too much dps depending.
The dredge fractal endboss, you need coordination, to get him to specific points and then activate a switch. At the end its still pure dps (conditions dont work here) but its not pure dps, dodge and stack.

I have a boss idea too. Like the icicles in the guildpuzzle. You need to pull a boss under some rocks, amboses, pianos or whatever. This would require CC on the floor to pull the boss to specific locations and controlled damage on the top to cut some ropes/chains…. And maybe the boss gets some sort of heal that need to be interrupted or reduced by poison.

Another one would be, place time bombs and then kite/CC the boss into them. Im not sure if something like this already is in post 1.

You cant call stacking might and vulnerbility with every Autoattack support. Only if you have to invest traits/sigil/runes… for support we have the skills 2-0 and F1-4 and on 1 only damage no bonus effects only finisher.

In my oppinion, all the autoattacks needs to be reworked and get rid of conditions, CC, boons and heals. except of bleeds and burns, because these are needed for Conditionbuilds and dont play a support role. When this change is made, then we can start talking about support.
I would go a step further and give the banners a health bar, making them a tactical element and not “fire and forget”.

So 95% of the Armorsets we have were designed for WvW and PVP?

@Nikaido
Why do we have 30 Utilityskills, 5 Traitlines with different stats and traits and 5+ weapon sets per class then? Only for running Build X, pressing 1,1,1,1,1,1,V,….. and doing the same kitten over and over again. Reading in Patchnote, “for buildvariaty” and laugh.

@Harper:

And AGAIN…. No one here says, that running Zerker gear wouldn’t be the most effective way to completet the content. But we want some challange to players running with berserker gear. Or reward for group play not for pure dmg. Ok maybe there would be some Bosses that cant be defeated with full Zerker gear, who cares? Thats life. At the moment every boss gets harder for not running Zerker gear.

If you run a full soldier set at the moment, you only get disadvantages in current meta. Only at trashmobs (that are skipped anyways) you would see a difference. Bosses still oneshot you, the fights takes at least two times longer. Which means more room for mistakes and get whiped.

If you want a challange, try killing Lupicus (for example) with a tanky, or healing orientated group and without reflecting

ascended gear is not needed to be good, you get what? 5% more stats? They are not needed to “win or lose” a dungeon.

For most of the example bosses it would be enough to change some utility skills. With a special armor set it would be of course easier but impossible without it. We have the same system right now, with berserker+dodge is everything in every dungeon. You can still beat them with conditionbuilds, tankybuilds or healing builds, but it makes it harder and takes much longer. So why not turn this arround to conditions would be better at boss1, healing helps at boss2,…. Just focus some other mechanics at boss/dungeon design. Thats all the op wants. Nothing more.

The Lost Witch.7601:

whyme.3281:

Nice post, but you forgot the condition damage stack limit. Which makes no sense at all, while the devs talk about “build-variety” all the time.

This is a problem I don’t have a solution for. If conditions were to last shorter but be more powerful, this would cause significant issues in PvP and WvW where people are already rapidly dying to conditions. If adding more time to a stack would deal damage, this would feel like condition damage turning into normal damage.

Maybe doubling the Stacklimit the higher the mobtier is. Veterans have 50bleed, 2 burns,… Elites(?) 75,3,….Champions 100,4,…. and so on. This would give some more space for Conditionsbuilds. Its is not perfekt, but it could work. So human player would not be effected.

Another way but more complex could be one slot per stack per player. Conditions like bleeds will have an average damage, that is increased by every new bleed. two 5sec bleeds with 100dmg would than be one 5sec bleed with 200dmg. A 3sec bleed on top of it would than mean 300dmg for 3sec and 200dmg for 2sec.

The Lost Witch.7601:

whyme.3281:

In my opinion with the actual content Zerker gear has to be drastically nerfed because there is disadvantage for not picking any defense.

So just making it less effective? Like say: critical damage as the primary stat, power and precision secondary? The new assassins gear would then be the go-to set.

You got me wrong here, I meant in the current system, where dmg>all. If you are forced to pick some defense, than Zerker gear can stay at it is. because you lose surviveability.

The Lost Witch.7601:

whyme.3281:

Now to the bosses. If you want to control them, something has to be done to Defiant. I think Anet doesn’t have to remove it, but the stack has to be reduced (lets say max. 5) for World bosses a higher limit is ok (i.e. one per player).
BUT with this change the auto attacks have to be modified to do no stuns, knockdown, … . Because 4 Mace warriors would probably permastun every boss.

Well, bosses could be sturdy enough to shake off stuns much quicker than a normal foe.

They allready are, its called “unshakable” which reduce CC-duration on them. Defiant is in the game to prevent players from stunlocking a boss.

For a heavy CC build unshakable is no problem. it is possible to interrupt every attack the enemy would do. But with a stack of Defiant of sometimes over 30 it is not possible to interrupt a certain spell when its needed.

On the other hand you can make the boss go enrage after 5 stuns in a certain amount of time, getting stability, swiftness and 25stacks might for 10sec.

Nice post, but you forgot the Conditiondamage stack limit. which makes no sense at all, while the deffs talk about “build-variety” all the time.

Everyone is running around with Zerkergear because when a boss hits you with 50k damage it doesn’t matter how much defense you have. I don’t want to say that every onekitten has to be removed, but does this have to be the only way bosses deal damage?

In my opinion with the actual content Zerker gear has to be drastically nerfed because there is disadvantage for not picking any defense.

Now to the bosses. If you want to control them, something has to be done to Defiant. I think Anet doesn’t have to remove it, but the stack has to be reduced (lets say max. 5) for World bosses a higher limit is ok (i.e. one per player).
BUT with this change the auto attacks have to be modified to do no stuns, knockdown, … . Because 4 Mace warriors would probably permastun every boss.

Last but not least one post of ArenaNet explaining how they think the whole no Trinity should work: http://gw2101.gtm.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/combat/healing-death/
I think nothing of it is implemented right now except of damage .

Its normal, because NPCs have no downstate. Warrior-banner revives them too and every other rez skill too.

you forgot the point with: dmg>all in PVE no tactic is needed

And Condition dmg is only usefull in solo play.

I think level 80s are still too strong in low level areas. If you look at the world bosses, that die within seconds (sometimes even before they get visible). Down scaled you have more stats, due to traits, Armor (3 instead of one stat), runes etc. The difference is so huge, even a blind will see that…

Btw. My level 26 power Necro was able to one shot lvl 4 enemies and your ranger isn’t? sounds strange to me.

@Nretep:
1. yes you feel the difference in dealing more or less damage, but one dodge-roll is more effective than every defensive attribute you have.
3. Mallice is the power of the conditionbuilds. You still need precision to increase your stacks (on hit effects). Now the zerker has crit-dmg which boosts the two other offensive stats. The more crit-chance you have the more impact crit-dmg has and the more power you have the more impact crit-dmg has. Condition-duration would have the same effect to conditions. Yes as zerker you sacrifice defense but its effective to do so in pve. Why are condition builds not allowed to do so?
4. is 1-hitting enemies balanced? The level 1-25 mobs are not designed to face players with more than 1 stat per armorpiece. At low level you can either go on power or pecision or anything else, but not get both stats. You still have the benefit of Exotic armor, which should be enough to feel stronger. Downscaling is described to be still chalanging for high-lvl players and this is not true.

everything you point out sounds logical. Buildvariaty and PvE dont fit at the moment.

In my oppinion the LB should be an AoE CC weapon and the SB a fast shooting condition weapon.

I would swap “volley” and “rapid fire” and change the poison to chill or cripple.

And for the SB, make the bleeding chance 100% from everywhere.

I dont understand the immobilize at the end, a 3sec fear would fit better to torment..

Shadow.3475:

Step 1 Teleport only work for your group.
Step 2 Fix so it dont work over walls on Keeps/Towers.

Can you all pls stop writing about porting into keeps? In an interview the developers said, it is designed to backdoor keeps, if you didnt search for mesmers.

The Problem with the stacks is based on the rank of the monster, the higher his Hp are and the more people come to fight against it.

So why not say:
normal mobs, enemy players, veterans: 25 stacks
champions: 50 stacks
Bosses: 75 stacks (but maybe with shorter duration)