Curse

Aksharack · Oct 05, 2008, 02:59 AM // 02:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clarissa F

A thread on the recent "nerf" of shadow stepping brought to light, for me, the true flaw in the Assassin, Paragon, Ritualist, and Dervish from a PvP aspect.

The core professions were designed with Guild Wars PvP in mind, where positioning, balance and skill were the keys to success. Their skills and attributes reflect this aspect of the game. The design of Prophecies was set up for this, as well, giving skills necessary for an area and helping the player to develop themselves over the course of the storyline.

You lost me in that paragraph. When I think of all the awfully unbalanced things in the core professions I just laugh.

You want to talk about boring static play from Rt spirits? How about the original Ranger Spirit Spam? How about Minion Masters? On the rare occasions that minions are seen in GvG the wailing and knashing of teeth they cause is just.. minions may not be static but they pretty much define boring/overpowered. ( to play against. Being the MM isn't soo bad...)

In fact, all of the game mechanics that summon NPC allies (minions, spirits, pets) appear to just not work well in PvP. Apparently, adding an extra health bar to the team just breaks the game.

Both Necros and Rangers have whole skill lines that verge on being irreparably broken in PvP. Don't wax on about the core classes like they are perfect.

Personally, I hope that Anet overhauls the skills of alot of the Classes for GW2.

Martin Alvito · Oct 05, 2008, 04:00 AM // 04:00

Look, if there's one thing we've learned over the three campaigns, it's this:

Energy management primary attributes are bad.

Rangers make the game EXTREMELY difficult to balance because they can easily exploit energy mechanics not available to primaries in that profession. Lotta overpowered stuff has exploited Expertise and a secondary.

Soul Reaping has been nerfed more times than I care to count.

Leadership forced a LOT of nerfs on Paragon chants early in Nightfall.

Admittedly, Critical Strikes and Mysticism haven't been as bad because they are narrower skills. That said, Mysticism and the huge Scythe damage range pretty much compelled nerfing balanced smiting bars into oblivion.

Combine bad primary attribute mechanics with overpowered elites and overpowered energy regain mechanisms for Eles, and you've got a real mess on your hands.

Sometimes I look at the skill list and marvel that it isn't worse than it is; other times I wonder how in the world the devs could have thought some of the versions of these skills were a good idea on release.

Clarissa F · Oct 05, 2008, 06:22 AM // 06:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aksharack

You lost me in that paragraph. When I think of all the awfully unbalanced things in the core professions I just laugh.

You want to talk about boring static play from Rt spirits? How about the original Ranger Spirit Spam? How about Minion Masters? On the rare occasions that minions are seen in GvG the wailing and knashing of teeth they cause is just.. minions may not be static but they pretty much define boring/overpowered. ( to play against. Being the MM isn't soo bad...)

In fact, all of the game mechanics that summon NPC allies (minions, spirits, pets) appear to just not work well in PvP. Apparently, adding an extra health bar to the team just breaks the game.

Both Necros and Rangers have whole skill lines that verge on being irreparably broken in PvP. Don't wax on about the core classes like they are perfect.

As for Ranger's energy exploits, my mesmer never has an issue dealing with those. Learn to play one.

Personally, I hope that Anet overhauls the skills of alot of the Classes for GW2.

The difference with the core classes is you can balance them well, without breaking the profession itself, and the job it was created to do. They killed IWAY, but that didn't stop Warriors from being the damage dealers they are. Soul Reaping was nerfed, but it didn't eliminate the Necro's abilities with hexes and minions. Monks got LoD killed, at one point, but it didn't break the profession. You can adjust the skills of each of these, even alter their primaries, and not affect their primary job. What the core was created for doesn't change. The mesmer's skills were nerfed a ton, because of other professions abusing them, and they are still more than effective in PvP.

The four newer professions walk such a razor, that to change anything such as their primary or an elite can send them into a tailspin. Other professions can adjust better than these. PERSONALLY, I think they have done a good job with what they have. They don't fire off a nerf every time some 'tard on the forums whines about an imbalance. They wait and see for themselves.

Numa Pompilius · Oct 05, 2008, 11:22 AM // 11:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Martin Alvito

Energy management primary attributes are bad.
---
Soul Reaping has been nerfed more times than I care to count.

I agree that energy management attributes are problematic (not necessarily just primary ones - you can pretty much add mesmer inspiration to that list), but I wanted to respond about Soul Reaping.

For all the complaining from necros, what the soul reaping nerf did was put a cap to energy gain equal to constant 10 pip regen. It amuses me to no end to hear necros complain that this is not enough and their class now "unplayable".