Curse

upier · Apr 18, 2008, 09:01 AM // 09:01

Warning:
This ISN'T the thread to discuss specific skill changes.
This is meant to discuss ONE very specific idea (the bolded part).
I am also aware the the title is the biggest drama-queen title ever in Riverside. Well ... in the last 15 minutes at least ... Or maybe 5 ...
Please differentiate between the terms PvE/PvP AND PvE/PvE PLAYERS! I would seriously hate to see something this important (important because of the idea it discusses and NOT because it's MY thread

)! to be closed because players are unable to keep their egos in check.

Quote:

Update - Thursday, April 17, 2008

Game Update Notes - 17 April 2008

This month's update is unique. It is a "temporary tournament update" targeted at the final cash-prize tournament, which will take place at the end of April. The skill changes are temporary and will be in effect for only two weeks. They are all geared toward addressing the most immediate issues with Guild Battles.

In order to reduce the possible negative impact on PvE play, we will be reverting the changes on May 1st. For future tournaments, we aim to focus on changes that will not impact PvE play at all.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Devel...dates/20080417

I feel that the statement above is one of the most interesting (and before anyone starts making a big deal out of the word "interesting" - it was chosen because I consider it a neutral word!) ideas EVER in GW. And that is why I feel it warrants a discussion.
I will also refrain from giving an opening statement about this subject because it might influence this is seems to be something that might shape the game as we know it - and it's seriously not worth bringing any kind of egos into this and possibly endangering the discussion.

Longasc · Apr 18, 2008, 09:15 AM // 09:15

It is nice to see they seem to realize PvE needs some more quality and care in both skill balancing and overall. It is where the largest part of the GW populations plays, after all.

So far it is only a lip confession, sounds good to appease the crowd that gets upset when PvP stuff related balancing affects PvE, too.

Now let's see if they take some time to think about Ursan stuff in future, the extremely uninspiried very basic faction farming grind and how all this is implemented. And much more.

Awareness is there, now let's see how much will happen till GW2. One could say it does not matter that much anymore in GW1.

Lordhelmos · Apr 18, 2008, 09:33 AM // 09:33

As spoken from before in the PvP update thread in gladiator's arena, I think that this above statement is probably the worst, most incompetent, and striking announcements ever to come from Anet for awhile.

Why? It doesn't make any sense to me that Anet has resorted to making temporary changes to PvP and then reverting them while using PvE balance as an excuse. They are claiming their concern for PvE balance without even addressing one of the largest problems to ever exist in Guildwars PvE balance: Ursan Blessing.

The bottom line is that the backbone of PvE play revolves around one singular PvE skill that pretty much grants a party godmode and an easy hardmode zone wipe in less than an hour (42 min FoW run anyone?). As PvE is concerned, because of the existence of Ursan Blessing, any claims towards balance in PvE make NO SENSE, because there is no balance in PvE, everyone is a overpowered and a god.

Now what pisses me and many other players off about this statement, is that we get a half-assed skill balance that completely flips the meta, ruins a whole crapload of builds, pretty much destroys ritualists, etc... and Anet claims on reverting it on May 1st without giving us a permanent fix on many serious ongoing issues that have been plaguing PvP for the longest time.

The worst part is they are using PVE BALANCE (which is non existent because of Ursan) as an excuse not to give us skill balances with substance or to take serious effort in balancing the game (Dark Pact, what the hell?).

The truth of the matter is that these skill balances, the lost of real rewards in pvp, and the ongoing problems in GvG/HA/TA/RA are real problems that need attention. On top of that Anet is claiming to care about PvE balance, yet they make no effort to change the single biggest problem in PvE: which is Ursan.

Right now the big question is, what the heck is Anet thinking? Why is Guildwars being ruined by half-assed balances, and why is the above statement being used as a lame excuse with no substance to back it up for these proclamations and changes?

PvP balance needs help, classes are getting knocked out of the meta, and instead of getting balances with real substance, Izzy instead overbuffs skills and makes bad decisions that push entire classes out of the metagame; or promotes defensive play that results in long and boring matches that drag into VoD.

Balances that are going to be reverted May 1st because... oh boo hoo, PvE balance is suddenly so important and fragile....

And with all these claims and the above statement, no effort is being made to clear up the bullshit that is Ursan Blessing, the single factor that has been ruining the game since the release of EoTN...

Just... so much fail in that above statement. What ANET is doing is making no sense whatsoever, and it really feels like Guildwars is being abandoned. They are just tossing us a rain check and saying, oops sorry for screwing you all but we promise things will be better in Guildwars 2.

Well newsflash, Guildwars 2, according to you guys is a pretty long ways away. People are still playing THIS GAME, and now we feel as if alot of the serious work improve balances and the mechanics in this game are being abandoned. People are starting to feel like they are lacking downright serious effort from Anet into keeping this game fresh and interesting.

And to no surprise, people feel like they are getting half-assed and losing interest in Guildwars. Whats the point of putting so much emphasis in Gw2, if things in this game are going to be screwed up and ignored to the point where no one is going to have faith that Guildwars 2 is going to be worth their time anymore?

Sure Guildwars 2 might be great, but your community and player base is HERE in this game. They deserve some attention as far as keeping interest goes, or Gw2 is going to be a massive failure.

Balancers have been hiding under the Ursan rug in PvE for way to long now, allowing the game to stagnate. PvP players are breaking guilds and losing interest because of these temporary fixes, waiting for a great update with substance to freshen the game and remove alot of the turtle play in griefing thats been going on.

People are starting lose faith in Anet's ability to provide a fun atmosphere anymore. Not saying all the updates are bad, but there has been an increasing amount of neglect being shown to major issues that are downright pissing players off, like Ursan.

That above statement; throwing a sudden concern for PvE at us as an excuse to impose temporary half assed skill balance out to appease us, to lose PvP rewards, and to claim PvE balance is sooo important without even addressing Ursan Blessing and continuing to neglect and run away from the problem.

Just what the heck happened to this game?

pumpkin pie · Apr 18, 2008, 09:38 AM // 09:38

Lordhelmos, its not for PvE balance at all, the temporary "balance to PvP" is so that it will not impact the "PvE game play"

distilledwill · Apr 18, 2008, 09:41 AM // 09:41

Wow, I didnt see that statement. I was like.. nooooooooooooooooooo when i saw how thye hit Ancestors' Rage, Splinter, Ballad of Restoration etc as Id just got a good FoW build set up and it was using a lot of the skills that were hit.

Ah well, I dont mind too much, as always you just have to adapt. I wouldnt mind that much if they were permanent, as it keeps the PvE build makers on their toes.

Numa Pompilius · Apr 18, 2008, 09:41 AM // 09:41

PvE balance to ANet simply means supplying overpowered skills which make farming easy.

Unfortunately that's what PvE balance means to the most vocal members of the PvE community too.

I still think the worst idea in GW history was the PvE only skills. They broke the game.
I also still think uncoupling PvE and PvP is a fundamentally idiotic idea.

The writing is on the wall, though - PvE and PvP will be separated, fundamentally idiotic though it is. I don't see what the OP's point is, this is well known since a long time.

gremlin · Apr 18, 2008, 09:42 AM // 09:42

Its a controversial subject and probably difficult to achieve a result that would please both sides of the equation.

I admit to being a pve only player that part of the game satisfies me and I can get my player v player fix in other games.
That said pvp is where the need to rebalance skills comes from it will always happen and its great because it means that part of the game is very active.

I considered that the way forward was for the rebalancing to be done by altering the pvp environment, so that skills work one way in the pve environment and a different way in pvp rooms.

The problem then would be people learning and remembering skills with the same name working differently, it would be like the snowball skills of winterfest but covering hundreds more skills.

I don't know the balance of players between pvp and pve but pvp certainly means more to anet because pvp has contests and contests means publicity in the real world, and helps sell the game.
Its only common sense that this would continue into gw2.

upier · Apr 18, 2008, 09:42 AM // 09:42

Oki - I PvE pretty much exclusively.
The only PvP I do is the PvP that doesn't matter.
Having said that - I can now continue by saying that PvE and PvP are two completely different games.
And - at this point in time - "balance" is a PvP EXCLUSIVE term. Or better yet - the search for balance is.
So - if PvE is to be considered in ANY way when it comes to balance - there are pretty much only two options:
1. the complete destruction and the subsequent rebuilding of PvE so that it fits the PvP rules
2. the end of the search for balance in PvP

And out of those two options - I feel that one is much more realistic then the other.

Or what my interpretation of the word "interesting" is ...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lordhelmos

As spoken from before in the PvP update thread in gladiator's arena, I think that this above statement is probably the worst, most incompetent, and striking announcements ever to come from Anet for awhile.

Arduin · Apr 18, 2008, 09:42 AM // 09:42

I'm intrigued by this sentence: "For future tournaments, we aim to focus on changes that will not impact PvE play at all".

So Anet's is going to introduce PvP-only skills or what?

Lordhelmos · Apr 18, 2008, 09:43 AM // 09:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by pumpkin pie

Lordhelmos, its not for PvE balance at all, the temporary "balance to PvP" is so that it will not impact the "PvE game play"

That is the heart of the stupidity... it doesn't matter what they do to PvE skills, as long as Ursan Blessing is left untouched "PvE Game Play" WILL NOT CHANGE. I'm saying it's a freaking retarded statement.

They are not giving us any real PvP updates, fixing major issues like Shadowform or Escape, N/rt spiritway, Mo/A spikes, etc. And what do they use as an excuse?

"We are concerned about PvE gameplay?"

What the heck? Ursan Blessing IS pve gameplay. PvE gameplay in the high end areas, is not the least bit affected by skillbalances because Ursan Blessing is so freaking stupid.

Yet they throw us this excuse, and claim their concern about PvE balance... but what have they done about PvE balance to make it batter? Did they even look at Ursan? Hell no... this is just a full of crap statement.

jayson · Apr 18, 2008, 09:50 AM // 09:50

Lordhelmos I'm curious, is your frustration aimed at the lack of pvp balance, the fact that the changes being made are only temporary or that you hate Ursan Blessing and that it's ruined the game for you?

Sleeper Service · Apr 18, 2008, 09:50 AM // 09:50

Does anyone not find it strange that they simply dont separate the skillset into 2 (pve/pvp) for good?

One of the main arguments against that was the fact that people would have difficulty remembering what particular skills would do in each format. Not that i agree with that, one does not need to be a genius to differentiate between say "blue", "dark blue" or even "red"...but this is GW after all so huh...we shall see.

Perhaps the rollback method makes it easier on the balance team however.
They at least get a stable base upon which to build on, it becomes simpler to inject a particular flavour into PVP meta this way, they will no longer find themselves reacting to the meta machine but will in fact recover absolute control over it (its already artificial meta anyways...just poorly tweaked and always in a panicky way).

Now this has me wondering if there will be any permanent changes to certain skills in an attempt to bring back build diversity in pve, such diversity has steadily been reduced since the first pvp influenced skill change with the killer blow being ursan.

Yes this is certainly an interesting turn of events.

and oh yeah. i was right what....2 years ago? shame most of the flamers, insulting jerks and others have left the game...victims of their own elitist attitudes.

DDL · Apr 18, 2008, 09:50 AM // 09:50

Besides, it's not like EVERYONE uses Ursan, there are a ton of people who don't even HAVE it.

You don't have to use it, and you don't have to play with others who do.

Complaints about godmode always make it seem like it's compulsory, which is stupid: the fact that there IS an overpowered skill that makes others irrelevant IN NO WAY forces you to use it, and similarly IN NO WAY makes a balance of all the non-ursan skills less necessary or desirable. (Note, "PvE balance", for the most part, would be a state where any character class was equally desirable in PvE play).

upier · Apr 18, 2008, 09:54 AM // 09:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lordhelmos

That is the heart of the stupidity... it doesn't matter what they do to PvE skills, as long as Ursan Blessing is left untouched "PvE Game Play" WILL NOT CHANGE. I'm saying it's a freaking retarded statement.

Btw - just to go on the record - as long as we have PvE in it's current form - I don't have the slightest issue with Ursan.
The PvE game is so broken that something like Ursan isn't even an issue.
The issue here is EVERYTHING that enabled the existence of Ursan.

(Plus the point isn't to make this into an Ursan - love/hate thread. There is enough of those already.)

pumpkin pie · Apr 18, 2008, 09:55 AM // 09:55

Lordhelmos
I don't believe they say anything about balancing PvE. How do you balance PvE, please tell me, monitor how (insert numbers of players here) players play and what they do daily and how it affect each other's faming outcome?

I do not think they desire to control how PvE players play the game as long as copies of Guild Wars keep selling, and players abide by the rules of not buying in game gold with real money bla bla (read the term and conditions).

Lordhelmos · Apr 18, 2008, 10:02 AM // 10:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by jayson

Lordhelmos I'm curious, is your frustration aimed at the lack of pvp balance, the fact that the changes being made are only temporary or that you hate Ursan Blessing and that it's ruined the game for you?

My 2 cents on this are the 2 things go hand in hand. Ursan is a definite problem, because it removes variation from the game. You see, what Ursan Blessing really is, is the answer to PvE balance. Its the universal entry card that allows any class, regardless of how much it sucks in PvE, to join a party and have a godmode button. The problem with Ursan is that in hard mode areas, you pretty much HAVE to play ursan to get in a pick up group or get anything done, because the community is so slanted towards abusing it.

From this viewpoint, I believe is sort of like this. Say you have a first person shooter that has a selection of 12 guns, each with their own functions. Yet the game designers decide to make one gun so powerful that it totally dwarfs the other guns.

So what happens is the game turns into the kind of shooting spree where everyone uses the same gun, thus making the game stagnant and boring. Thats the exact effect Ursan has had on Guildwars. We create unique classes in order to differentiate our characters, to have our own unique abilities we can lend to the party.

Ursan destroys all of that by forcing everyone to run the same set of superior skills. Thus PvE has turned into a one gun crock of crap.

However, ArenaNet, since the outing of Eye of the North, has refused to see Ursan as a problem in game diversity. Instead they seem to be hiding under the skill, using it as an excuse to ignore inter-class imbalances that plague PvE.

Now, with this latest skill update. We all know there have been major issues in PvP, and Anet has proclaimed the lost of real world rewards in PvP. There have been numerous problems concerning griefer builds in arenas, like escape rangers; class imbalances in PvP such as Ranger superiority in interrupting in comparison to Mesmers, who are dangling on to the metagame by the thin strands of diversion, shatter enchantment, and shame. The retardedness of Paragon leadership mechanics, Ritualists now getting booted out of the meta because of recent nerfs....

We all know both fields, PvE and PvP need help. But with this recent skill balance, Anet throws us a TEMPORARY fix. Saying oh, just for the MAT's we are going to shuffle up the skills, intentionally overpower skills like dark pact, and ultimately fail to give you all a skill balance of true substance.

And so people are left scratching their heads, wondering why their favorite skill bars are going from golden to suck every month. And ArenaNet's official reply is.

Oh we are doing this, and ruining PvP balance because we care about PvE and don't want PvP balance to interfere with PvE. So im sitting there listening to this trash and going...

...Ok so your telling me you going to gimp my favorite builds every month, and the excuse your going to give me for this crap is that because it ruins PvE balance?

Well how the hell can you claim that these balances are ruining PvE balance, when the one true thing ruining PvE isn't PvP shuffles, but Ursan Blessing?

How the hell are you going to tell me that you care so much about PvE and that PvE balance is so fragile, yet you completely turn a blind eye to the crock of bullcrap that is Ursan Blessing, and instead blame all the problems of PvE on PvP balances.

Now not just PvE gets crapped on, both PvE and PvP are getting shanked. Because serious skill balances in PvP are being ignored, and the Ursan Blessing is being ignored....

What the hell? Doesn't anyone else see a problem with this?

keli · Apr 18, 2008, 10:02 AM // 10:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by upier

Btw - just to go on the record - as long as we have PvE in it's current form - I don't have the slightest issue with Ursan.
The PvE game is so broken that something like Ursan isn't even an issue.
The issue here is EVERYTHING that enabled the existence of Ursan.

(Plus the point isn't to make this into an Ursan - love/hate thread. There is enough of those already.)

Sadly, then this thread fails, because this is the biggest problem of PVE "balance"...

DreamWind · Apr 18, 2008, 10:07 AM // 10:07

Settle down a bit Lordhelmos. I agree with what everything you are saying, but let me sum up everything quickly.

Anet is doing this because they don't want to make the PvE players angry in any way. We all know Ursan is overpowered, but if they nerfed it there would be a PvE backlash beyond anything we can possibly imagine.

On the other hand, they have decided they can sacrifice PvP to avoid these backlashes in the future, which is in my mind, the sickest thing they've ever done.

upier · Apr 18, 2008, 10:09 AM // 10:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by keli

Sadly, then this thread fails, because this is the biggest problem of PVE "balance"...

No - the issue are monster skills, the bad monster formations and their builds, double damage, half activation time, natural resistance, silly AI, ....
And it's because of those rules - that PvE is so fundamentally different to PvP.
PvE only skills were added much later and to think that PvE was even remotely balanced before them is just lunacy!

Lordhelmos · Apr 18, 2008, 10:12 AM // 10:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamWind

Settle down a bit Lordhelmos. I agree with what everything you are saying, but let me sum up everything quickly.

Anet is doing this because they don't want to make the PvE players angry in any way. We all know Ursan is overpowered, but if they nerfed it there would be a PvE backlash beyond anything we can possibly imagine.

On the other hand, they have decided they can sacrifice PvP to avoid these backlashes in the future, which is in my mind, the sickest thing they've ever done.

Actually it seems to me that they sacrificed PvE to Ursan Blessing, and used PvP as a scapegoat to take the fall of PvE's problems.