Curse

FoxBat · Jan 30, 2007, 06:55 PM // 18:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by moriz

also, gone were the days where a monk can heal 100+ hp every time they twitch. monk builds nowadays are slower, and heal for less; yet they are still as effective as ever while being played. the only logical assumption to this is that the average skill level of monk players has gone up.

Maybe a little, but largely because they are more and more prot-heavy. SoA is an elite that isn't elite, Aegis got a lot cheaper with GoLE, and gift of health plus all the choice elites (ZB, Divert, RC) lets you heal quite a bit from within a high prot spec. There used to be a time when a heal-specced monk was a standard player alongside your prots outside of arena, but it's not such a given anymore.

Mitchel · Jan 30, 2007, 07:06 PM // 19:06

Quote:

I must say the average lvl of skill in GW is mediocre. After seeing echoing mending, wammos with mending and healing hands, warriors with life transfer, monks tanking with daggers skills, this is the conclusion I take from this.
Today 07:13 PM

Either that, or the fact that good players dont do PUG's says enough.

CagedinSanity · Jan 30, 2007, 07:53 PM // 19:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tiyuri

But in pve prot isn't much of a concern, and looking after yourself requires a little more focus than a warrior. Perhaps the niche for the new professions in PVP is too small?

I kind of figured Factions was based around PvP. Ritualists and assassins rock in PvP if you haven't noticed. And obviously all the core classes are common. I don't think there's a shortage of skill in PvP. There is an abundance of morons and disrespect, but that's another topic altogether. Even the biggest of idiots can have skill.

Symbol · Jan 30, 2007, 09:31 PM // 21:31

I actually think dervishes are ultimately easier to play than warriors in a PvP setting. Warriors have a number of mechanics that require a fair amount of skill:

a) Adrenaline-do I build on a hard target and spike or do I try and pressure squishies but at the cost of slower adrenaline gain?

b) Proper use of frenzy

c) Bull's strike/prot strike. Bull's strike in particular requires a fair bit of thought to use-quite often you'll have to predict when someone is going to move to score that KD since it's a regular speed attack.

d) Interrupts

and finally

e) Proper use of healsig/healsig cancelling

Dervishes don't have to worry about any of these things. They do have to worry about being spiked since they're soft(er) targets, but there's nothing you can do about that personally, you don't have room to take defensive skills on your bar, so basically it's up to your team to make the save.

There is enchant management to worry about, but effective derv builds do not stack tons of enchants because you want to minimize time spent having to recast them in combat.

Warriors are a class with surprising depth.

Jecht Scye · Jan 30, 2007, 09:46 PM // 21:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tiyuri

This is an interesting point. What makes a skill overpowered? Is it simply the POTENTIAL for the skill to be effective? Does the ease of use come into it at all?

Searing flames is a skill that can be played to high effect with very very very low skill input required. Does that in itself make it overpowered? I'd suggest it doesn't, however it DOES lead to a stale metagame where mid level players are only playing the skills that require nothing of them but still get results.

What do you think?

To me it's just the raw power of this skill when combined with the burning aspect and a 1 second cast time and 2 second recharge makes it a very spammable skill. But I digress, as I said before these are subjective. How do I know for sure this skill is overpowered? The truth is I don't, I only speak from experience when going against it as an Ele and Necromancer.

Wilhelm · Jan 31, 2007, 08:41 PM // 20:41

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?
Very Low

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?
Probebly a good thing, as many of the lower skilled players still find mid level PvE missions/quests difficult.

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?
Combination of a low average age of gamers (Maturity), low knowledge of the game/build/and experience in general. It's simple to be active on forums, in order to understand what you don't know.

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?
Well above average.

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?
Just leave it as it is. If everyone played at high level, 99% of the game would be empty, and these forums would overrun with e-peen braggin.

Are new professions too easy to play?
Nope. Just too many brainless people playing them in an incorrect way.

Winstar · Jan 31, 2007, 09:56 PM // 21:56

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?

PvE: Better than it used to be but still not great. I can't count the number of times in nightfall that I've given a pug a try only to be dissapointed in the utter lack of coherance and ability and then simply gone and hero'd through the mission without a death. One thing I hate is when I monk and my partner is a hero monk someone else is controlling and they pick the worst possible monk bar I've ever seen. I cry at that point.

PvP: In some sense better, most teams in GvG at least try running sensible builds. But at the top I've noticed a lot of the old strong guilds playing less which is unfortunate. No Evil, No WM, Not much IQ. There are good teams up there of course, but I feel like the quality at the top has diminished.

RA Is a crapfest as always. I know its a time for people to screw around and try stuff, but really if I see someone using another warrior trying to do blood magic/healing/prot/illusion/nuking I'm going to scream. Roll a pvp necro/monk/mesmer/ele and do those things rather than trying to cram them on you pve warrior. HA is meh, TA meh, HB sucks. The factions PvP is bottom of the barrell.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?

Bad. Especially in the top end of GvG. Keeping good players interested is important for the growth of the competetive aspect of this game.

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?

Well above average

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?

In PvP proper fixes are needed for Tombs and GvG in order keep top players playing this game. More candycane fun seasons, no tournaments, and skill imbalance are killing things. In PvE, I dunno, get rid of heros and force people to learn to work together in pugs again.

Have we begun to reach the upper level for the amount of skills the game is capable of working with?

I'm not sure. If you look at magic, they are able to keep things fresh by implimenting new mechanics. If something analogous can be done in GW then I think we're aren't near the end.

Are new professions too easy to play?

Dervishes are stupid easy. Paragons are pretty easy, though there isn't much to do with them really.

DreamWind · Feb 01, 2007, 12:00 AM // 00:00

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?

Very very low. I judge skill level based on PvP play which is the height of skill and strategy in Guild Wars in my opinion. It is the measuring stick of skill in a player because lets face it, PvE is FAR easier in comparison. I don't hate PvE, but I think most people can agree PvP is much more challenging. The reason the skill level is very low is because most players are PvE players who have no sense of how to play PvP properly.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?

Horrible. PvE can be a lot of fun at times, but it will eventually die...the unique PvP is what is going to keep GW alive in the long haul. If the competition and skill level of the game dies, so does PvP right along with it.

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?

Because PvP is not promoted heavily enough and is made FAR too difficult to get in to for the average player. Anet does not do nearly enough to promote GW as a fun competitive game where skill matters. Instead most players just go through a heavily promoted PvE campaign and never play again nor care about their skill.

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?

Far above average.

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?

There are so many ways I can't even think of them all right now. Promote GW more as a game of skill. Promote PvP more. Make it easier to get in to just like just about every other good PvP game (no unlocks or having to grind to play). Much more frequent updates. Just overall taking the damn thing more seriously instead of the sad and confusing state the game is in now. This is just my opinion on things at the moment.

Have we begun to reach the upper level for the amount of skills the game is capable of working with?

No, just as in Magic the Gathering, Guild Wars potentially can handle tens of thousands of skills. The problem is that we only have hundreds of skills right now and they aren't properly balanced AT ALL. In order for more skills to be introduced, there needs to be a large TEAM of people working on updating them regularly so they are all decent. That is not a bash against Izzy, but you have to look at Magic again...they have large teams of people working on any given set which is what GW should have.

Are new professions too easy to play?

I don't really understand the question, but I'll try to answer anyways. Going back to assassins and ritualists...Rits are ridiculously easy to play. Their best builds all consist of sitting and spamming spirits. Assassins are more difficult because they are usually played as solo characters who need to be self dependent. Paragons are easy to play, they just use shouts mostly. Dervishes are easy to play because they are overpowered. I don't have a problem with any of these classes though as long as they don't screw the game up.

A discussion about what makes an overpowered skill also came up in this thread. An overpowered skill is anything that screws up the metagame or makes the game unfun because almost everybody plays it. A good metagame is one that has a LOT of viable builds in the field. When you have a field of Searing Flame spammers, Grenth dervishes, and teleporting Warriors backed up by machine gun Mesmers, you have a crap metagame full of OP skills. Go back to pre-factions metagame I say.

nytestalker · Feb 01, 2007, 01:11 AM // 01:11

The average skill level can be found by going to

www.gwonline.net.

going to the general forums.

And reading through the 14 PAGE THREAD on stances and if they are interuptable.

14 PAGES. MODS EVEN RESPONDED.

Seriously. If you dont know. It takes 1 friend, 2 heroes and 30 seconds of your time.

tacitus · Feb 01, 2007, 02:46 AM // 02:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Winstar

PvE: Better than it used to be but still not great. I can't count the number of times in nightfall that I've given a pug a try only to be dissapointed in the utter lack of coherance and ability and then simply gone and hero'd through the mission without a death. One thing I hate is when I monk and my partner is a hero monk someone else is controlling and they pick the worst possible monk bar I've ever seen. I cry at that point.

So true the I recently went through nightfall again with just heros all the way to torment then guildies on last 2 missions. I had one attempt at pugging and the monks did not think prot spirit was worth taking at all and the healing monk had conjure phantasm and vital blessing! I really wonder how these people progress through the game at all.

People suggest heros have ruined the game in some way but they are a sheild to the horror of such bad players. With heros you never need to know those players exist

PvP is different. GvG is still competitive possible more than it used to be for most mid to high ranked guilds. However HA is a joke and has been for some time the skill level decreased because of the low amount of teams actually playing after 6v6 being introduced.

Overall people tend to find players about the same skill level and once they do they are fine from then on.

Apple · Feb 01, 2007, 06:15 AM // 06:15

Someone earlier made a point about Monk skill level being higher than it used to be. I thoroughly, THOROUGHLY disagree with this, and here's why :
All concept of pre-prot has gone out of the window because of two skills : shadow prison and avatar of grenth.
Shadow Prison first : it basically means you cant presume spike targets due to warriors approaching, due to the fact that they can fake you out by running towards one guy, then shadow prisoning another. It means monking is a lot harder, and your only option is to pre-prot dped/60AL targets, rather than the target being converged upon.
Secondly, Avatar of Grenth rips apart enchantments, and means that monking is more based on twitch heals than protection, and damage mitigation.
These two skills have made monking a lot, lot less skilled, and if you hope to have a chance, you have to abandon the concept of pre-prot

JoeKnowMo · Feb 01, 2007, 06:30 AM // 06:30

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?
PvE: Very low. Bad players used to learn pve builds from grouping with someone else with a good build. Now they good players go w heroes and the bad players are left to figure things out on their own.

PvP: Lower than before. Innovation in team builds seems to have gone down too. A lot of good players seem to have moved on.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?
Bad for PvP. Even worse for PvE b/c the social aspects of the game are dwindling. Good players use heroes mostly and the bad players group with one another and think, "Hey, I'm just as good as that other guy. We must be failing the mission b/c it's just too hard."

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?
For PvP: Less interest in coming up with builds and more interest in just winning using standard builds.

For PvE: GW has incredibly poor training built in. They need to include some pre-made builds for pve so players can try them out and see what a coordinated skill bar looks like.

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?
A few standard deviations above the mean.

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?
Give PvP players what they want in HA. Improve training for PvE players.

Are new professions too easy to play?
No. They take as much skill as the other professions. For eg, playing a resto rit requires similar skill as a monk. A SS or MM necro or a GoR/MS Ele or a stance tank are not harder to play than the new professions. Your first professions will always appear more difficult. Just like pre-searing was harder than the noob islands in factions or NF.

Amity and Truth · Feb 01, 2007, 08:49 AM // 08:49

Quote:

Some questions to consider:
Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?
Skill Level? I don't exactly know what you are referring to here when talking about the "average" Skill Level as there is no such thing. The average player is as dumb as a brick, or even dumber.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?
This is actually bad for the game. It promotes elitism and doing things AI Style (because the AI is lots better than the average player)

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?
Something the current education causes in the society. You are taught to be the toughest, meanest and most badass person. You are taught to ignore other peoples opinions. Not because they are right or wrong but simply because those are the opinions of infidels.
This leads to a habit of defying logic for the sake of playing egomaniac. Thus denying learning and thus staying stupid.

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?
I don't know :P

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?
Insert roadblocks. Missions like Vizunah Square or Thunderhead Keep that prevent the bad player from advancing. Force him to learn something to advance.

Have we begun to reach the upper level for the amount of skills the game is capable of working with?
Will never happen. The good player can look at a skill and immediately know it is crap while the average player would even be overwhelmed by 100 total skills.

Are new professions too easy to play?
Not too easy. It takes a bit of getting used to, to understand how the new professions work. Sadly though that is often not necessary as the new classes are often downright overpowered. Remember the old ritual lord? That was ugly and boring. Remember the Paragons? Still seeing the Avatars there?

Et voilá. My opinion has been "italiced" in. Coming from a mixed view on the game.

Asplode · Feb 01, 2007, 05:36 PM // 17:36

Quote:

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?

Well that entirely depends on your scale, in my opinion. What is the minimum/maximum here? Are we going straight from Farm Bot to Last of Master (before Factions :P), or are we being more specific, like, for example:

WoW player >_>
FarmBot
Harold J. Chow
Mending Warrior
SS/AV LF 55 Monk
Rit in RA
Thumper in TA
SS Warder in HA
GlyphSac MetShower in GvG
Spike in GvG
"Euro"spike in GvG (that includes blindbots and diversion spammers)
Core Front/Midline in upper tier gvg
Core Split in upper tier gvg
Core Monk in upper tier gvg :P
Last of fkn Master Chuck Norris himself pre-factions ^.^

in this kind of scale I'd make a wild, uneducated guess (weighted by the crazy number of farmbots of course :P) and put the average gw player (that actually plays pvp) at the "Thumper in TA" level.

Quote:

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?

I don't think the current skill level of any player is a good/bad thing for the game, but rather an indication of the requisite for winning.

What do you need to win? If you need less to get by, and the incentive to win isn't hard enough for you to play more complicated but potentially more rewarding builds/environments/positions, then you stay there and refuse to move on because it's easy this way.

Quote:

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?

I think the average level is there for the same exact reason you think it's there; the game is slowly being dumbed down, and I agree with you a second time in that I believe it's being dumbed down because the devs are doing one of two things. They're either A) Not stepping out of their comfort zone and including wild new game mechanics that adds a whole new dimension to the game, or B) not creative enough to think of wild new game mechanics to the game. Thus, the safe road makes itself apparent: Let's take game mechanics and skill synergies (that were uncovered by players, mind you) and water them down into one skill, as you pointed out. What's the big idea, then? Are they trying to phase out old skills and make them redundant by making them into new, more appealing skills? Here are some examples:

Ether Prodigy Blindbot -> Blinding Surge
Ether Prodigy Heal Party -> Light of Deliverance
Guardian Healing Breeze -> Weapon of Warding

Or, let's take an existing skill and change the numbers (or format). This is clearly just a way to fill up the requisite hundreds of skills per chapter, and I don't blame them. That's a BIG quota to fill, and these skills don't take away from the game, for the most part. Examples:
Eviscerate -> Decapitate
Lightning Orb -> Lightning Hammer
Ice Prison -> Freezing Gust
Endure Pain -> Signet of Stamina
Protective Spirit -> Shelter
Aura of Restoration -> Glyph of Restoration
Crippling Shot -> Crippling Slash, Crippling Anthem :P

and finally let's add more versions of Otyguh's Cry into the game. Examples (there's a ton out there, these are just 1 elite from each class):
Rage of the Ntouka
Lacerate
Balthazar's Pendulum
Soul Bind
Tease
Energy Boon
Wastrel's Collapse
Xinrae's Weapon
Grenth's Grasp
Focused Anger

So anyway since I've went on this tangent, the reason I believe the skill level of GW is descending dangerously towards Harold J Chow level is because the skills in this game are slowly becoming, for lack of better terms, dumber.

Quote:

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?

I honestly wouldn't put myself beyond "Rit in RA" level, because as I've been playing more WoW I find myself attempting to jump when I'm in danger. Trust me the last thing you wanna do when in danger is space-bar whatever you currently have targetted.

Quote:

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?

I think the solution to the skill balance / variety problem that GW suffers is quite simple: Hire more people. It's clear that the number of people writing and balancing skills is lacking. If it's true that Izzy's the only person responsible for balancing skills, that's quite sad. He needs more opinions. He needs more opinions that matter, and more opinions that when faced with failure are also there, with him, to be blamed. :P

Sorry Izzy <3

Also, a brief alpha rant. What's with the secrecy? As much as I understand GW doesn't want to take after WoW, you have to consider that open alpha testing with open alpha forums and discussion, and open book development is a very good way to get a very broad perspective on what skills or mechanics in the game are working, what are not, and what are almost there but need some tweaks. If it's bad, the customers won't know until they've already made the purchase!

Quote:

Have we begun to reach the upper level for the amount of skills the game is capable of working with?

Begun to reach? I think we've went beyond it by a couple leagues myself, in terms of sheer number. If we take out the redundancies (For the love of god, what's with the duplicate skills? There are no competitive pvp players that don't have Factions AND Prophecies.) and the space-filler skills that I've pointed out, and replaced them with really innovative skills that recieve proper community input

Quote:

Are new professions too easy to play?

I wouldn't say that anything about a profession or class independant of skillbar is easy or hard to play. It's what you bring. It's harder to play a ganking ele than a flagstand blindbot. It's harder to backline monk than LoD flagrun, and so on.

So in terms of the new professions, nothing about them makes them easier or harder to play than the existing ones, other than what skills are available to them.

Quote:

I've mainly spoken about PVP here because it's what I know, feel free to discuss the PVE side of this. I'm interested in where the game is going as a whole and I'd like to hear how its evolving in terms of PVE also.

Shut up.

Phaern Majes · Feb 01, 2007, 05:42 PM // 17:42

I think that the point of being skilled is your ability to stay on top.

Asplode · Feb 01, 2007, 06:06 PM // 18:06

I dunno about that, Phaern. Ability to stay on the top appears to be more about how committed you are to the farming of the ladder. Maybe this will change with the new way GvG will work, who knows.

Moa Bird Cultist · Feb 01, 2007, 09:06 PM // 21:06

Where do you think the average skill level in Guild Wars is right now?

Mediocre to reasonable. It's very situational though.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing for the game?

Again, situational. you can choose your party, but you can't choose your opponents.

Why do you think it's at the level it's at?

Admin's Bane is spot on about this... FtP...

How do you think you rate personally in relation to the average player?

I'm a hardcore player, so obviously I'm going to have the practice it takes to be above the average level - I'd say fairly skilled, but not game breakingly good, not by a long shot. I only want to have fun, after all. Don't take this the wrong way tho, I don't think that highly of myself, it's just I've seen 'mediocre' first hand.

How would you remedy the problem (if you think there is one)?

There is no remedy - Guild Wars is a game designed to appeal to a wide variety of people - the player demographic is typically much wider than in most other MMOs. As such, you'll never be able to please everyone.

Have we begun to reach the upper level for the amount of skills the game is capable of working with?

Not at all. If the game were to stop expanding in this respect, gameplay would become stale very quickly. The trouble is that there are various skills that already exist which are ether useless or far too powerful. The pvp metagame should not be about 20 skills from each profession, every skill should count in some way.

PvE is a different ballgame, as you don't need a perfect stratagem to win even at the highest levels, but then again, skillbalances need to take into account the effects they have on PvE more.

(Aside from the obvious 'farming nerfs' )

Are new professions too easy to play?

YesNoYesNo - Rt, A, D, P. There's your answer. But frankly I'd be more interested in;

Are new professions fun to play?

Yes on all counts. Frankly thats the most important thing, as if the new professions were staid and boring, it would put people off of playing guild wars altogether.

I'd rather have an imbalanced, imperfect game that people play than a balanced, perfect game that nobody bothers with because everything is too similar. Anyone agree with me on that?

Asplode · Feb 01, 2007, 09:13 PM // 21:13

On your last statement, Moa Bird Cultist I'd have to disagree. Think of Counter-Strike :P

Mystic- · Feb 01, 2007, 09:18 PM // 21:18

Quote:
I've mainly spoken about PVP here because it's what I know, feel free to discuss the PVE side of this. I'm interested in where the game is going as a whole and I'd like to hear how its evolving in terms of PVE also.

Shut up.

So true..

Josh · Feb 01, 2007, 09:27 PM // 21:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Admins Bane

Riverside geeks feel free to get out your dictionary/Thesaurus etc to rip it apart and start your 1000 word essay on why my opinion isn't valid.

Lmao...it's funny because it's true.