Curse

Mar 29, 2005, 09:42 PM // 21:42

I totallyagreewith the fact that enchancment removal is totally weak now... but I'd like to show a lil combo I'll be testing as a debuffer... knowledge is power right?

inspired enchancement: Remove an Enchantment from target foe and gain 3-13 Energy. For 20 seconds, Inspired Enchantment is replaced with the Enchantment removed from target foe.
Energy Cost 10
Casting Time 1 second
Recharge Time 0 seconds

With the 0 cooldown it makes it worth using, not to mention your energy spent on it is virtually re-embursed with interest. Ok I know you are gonna jump on me (and I'll enjoy it

) and tellme "then your stuck with the enchancment" well this is going to be part of my archane echo combo. I'll be aiming to remove the more important enchancts will the first casting but if not echo will have a second ready. And hell I might even use the enchancment myself (even if its nerfed due to attr). I'm not saying this is the persfect solution... hell i wish there were better ones, but its what I'll be trying. What do you think?

Lazarous · Mar 29, 2005, 09:46 PM // 21:46

Interesting discussion.

Saus made a good point about how there are different 'classses' of enchantments so the one size fit all removal we have now seems to cause problems. By this i mean that enchantment removal works regardless of how much energy was put into casting the enchantment to begin with - stuff like IW is as easily dispelled as stuff like RoF.

So, why not add in some abilities that work based on the amount of energy it took to cast the enchantment in question. An example: Rend remains as it is, being able to remove any and all enchantments up to its current limit. You add in a new spell, lesser rend enchantments that has stats like (10, 2, 15) Target loses 1...4 enchantments, for each monk enchantment removed you take 30 damage. Only removes enchantments that cost 5 or less base energy.

Add in similar types of spells to the various existing enchantment lines. This way you keep the higher energy/return abilities somewhat difficult to counter while making the lesser abilities used as either chaff or just buffs that weren't worth removing before more risky.

Laz

KamiCrazy · Mar 30, 2005, 05:41 AM // 05:41

I feel compelled to write an answer to this thread mostly due to the sheer amount of misinformation in it. Normally I wouldn't bother but you can't have a worthwile discussion if everyone is talking on wrong assumptions.
Any points I write following will be based on my own high end GvG and tombs experiences.

Enchantment removal in general is weak but enchantments are a team improvement geared spell type. In very few cases does it have a game winning offensive characteristic and most enchantments are primarily from monk spell lines. Also AOE enchantments are extra-ordinarily rare.
While enchantment removal could do with a buff I doubt that it will receive much of a buff. Since the primary enchantment removal class is the necromancer, it already has the best enchantment removals in the game. All the necro lines have some form of enchantment removal as well. If you are to incorporate a necro primary or secondary into your team make sure it carries an enchantment removal spell.
The secondary enchantment removal class is the mesmer and 2 mesmer lines have some form of enchantment removal. They are all single strip removals though which is what limits the mesmer in enchantment removal, however compared to the necromancer the mesmer has far better secondary effects.
The best enchantments have to be cross casted (because they are target other ally), which means you cast it on other players, and if they have it, they cast it back onto you as well. This is why enchantments are powerful through team synergies, take down that synergy and the whole process breaks down. Smart tactics on the fly can also negate enchantments as most enchantments are on a medium recharge timer. Its only really on very enchantment heavy builds where every character has cross casted with another one which enchantments really start to become unbearable, but even in a such a case its not impossible to work around.

On the contrary hexs are very common compared to enchantments, you have 2 primary hexing classes and 1 secondary hexing class of which are the necro, mesmer and elementalist. Again only two classes in the game are capable of taking hex removal which are the mesmer and monk. Monk being primary hex removal and mesmer with secondary single hex removal abilities. Hexes are also very offensive in nature and can sometimes cripple a character to being completely ineffective. AOE hexes are also very common. Hex removal has to be good in this case mainly because of the ability to stack multiple powerful hexes on many characters simultaneously, unlike enchantments if you don't remove the enchantments your team can still function at 100%, if you don't remove key hexes you may as well be playing with 6 or 7 vs 8.

Now high end GvG has evolved over the months, previously we saw a trend in large hex dependent builds, many top teams were running extremely powerful hexes then covering them up with spammable hexes to thwart simple removal. This wastes convert hexes/purge signets. Once these key removal spells are on recharge, any other hexes have free rein on the oppossing team. The metagame for this period was based entirely on character shutdown, specifically DPS shutdown, throwing hexes to make warriors, rangers, elementalists inert. This metagame was a key reason for the change to "Remove Hex" back to a 5 second recharge.
However teams adapt to survive in guild wars and what happened was that teams took massive hex removal to compensate for the metagame. My own guild n0 had 3 monks who all took at least 2 hex removal spells each, sometimes 3 (this was in addition to condition removal and healing/protection). Other teams took other preventative measures, by using mesmer hex removal or whatnot but in a general sense the game shifted to hex removal on a grand scale to compensate for the mass hexing going on.
KIN's build during the last BWE involved 2 primary monks and 3 other secondary monks. They had hex removal on at least 4 of those characters (prob all of them), and they were playing together in the same room too so they had good co-ordination to back it up.

So its not that hex removal is too powerful at the moment, but really that people are overcompensating for hexes in the current metagame. Its something I like about guild wars the dynamism requires you to design builds not just based on what you think will be uber in the current environment but based on what other people are running.
Now this is only one part of the metagame and there are other things to consider as well, but thats beyond the scope of this thread.

On the topic about mesmers and shutdown there is no completely "right" way of playing a mesmer. It really depends on your build and the enemies teams build. Devoting yourself to monk shutdown when there is only 1 monk on the oppossing team for instance is a waste of your own resources (anyone who has fought Club G will understand). The only rule which truly applies to mesmers is to take advantage of any opportunities you can get. If you can deny a warrior casting life barrier on a monk through energy denial, and that's the most important thing to do at the time then go for it.

Sausaletus Rex · Mar 30, 2005, 06:11 AM // 06:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Greentongue

I was thinking that with the environment where stacked enchantments were common, it would go from a "No Way" to a "Maybe".

The fact that it DIDN'T remove them was to be a plus (providing reusability) but, it is true that some of the ones not removed could be an issue.

Oh, Desecrate isn't a bad skill, really. It's a far better way to spend your energy than, say, Strip Enchantments or Mind Wrack or something like that. It's not a trash skill and I'd probably put it in the Maybe pile already. If you're an Elementalist/Necromancer or something like that there are worse things you could do. Especially if you're already spending points in Curses for Rend or something else.

It's just not a *great* skill. And it doesn't matter how many enchantments people are running. It just doesn't punish them harshly enough to make them pay for using those enchantments. It doesn't do enough damage to be threatening, even if they're covered with enchantments. And damage isn't really all that good a deterant in the first place.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Saus made a good point about how there are different 'classses' of enchantments so the one size fit all removal we have now seems to cause problems. By this i mean that enchantment removal works regardless of how much energy was put into casting the enchantment to begin with - stuff like IW is as easily dispelled as stuff like RoF.

So, why not add in some abilities that work based on the amount of energy it took to cast the enchantment in question.

Hmm, it's interesting. And a bit different then what's being done now. I assume, in your examples you'd have safeguards against abuses like Expertise like cost reductions or things like GLE? Basically that it's the actual, listed price of a skill not the actual energy cost that determines things?

Still, I'm not sure I like it. It would be a drastic change to the way things work. It's adding another layer, another route of removal. The three tiered way of looking at things means there's only one real balance point - where removal interacts with those middle tier skills. What you'd suggest would create new balance points and new tiers. It's adding in, what's to me, unnecessary complexity. Some hexes/enchantments/stances/conditions/whatever are hard or pointless to remove. That's fine as long as they're not too powerful. It's when you can actually get a strong skill to fly under the radar, so to speak, that you can get to abusive situations. Malaise, Healing Breeze, On Fire are annoying but they're not game-deciding. Not the way a Healing Seed or a Dazed is. That's the problem with enchantment removal, really, the balance point's too high and there are too many good spells that are "lightweights". It's pointless to use your removal on anything but the most critical of enchantments - those on the focused target - because otherwise you can't keep up. So stuff like IW and Conjures and even Healing Breeze get to thrive. If there were something as efficient as Remove Hex for enchantments then that wouldn't be so much of an issue.

Mar 30, 2005, 06:40 AM // 06:40

The practice of mass hexing people was one of the worst degenerations of skill so far in the community. I have no idea what sparked it but I hope its going to stop.

Lazarous · Mar 30, 2005, 07:32 AM // 07:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sausaletus Rex

Hmm, it's interesting. And a bit different then what's being done now. I assume, in your examples you'd have safeguards against abuses like Expertise like cost reductions or things like GLE? Basically that it's the actual, listed price of a skill not the actual energy cost that determines things?

Indeed. I should've been more specific about it, but i meant the base cost for a given enchantment in my example.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sausaletus Rex

Still, I'm not sure I like it. It would be a drastic change to the way things work. It's adding another layer, another route of removal. The three tiered way of looking at things means there's only one real balance point - where removal interacts with those middle tier skills. What you'd suggest would create new balance points and new tiers. It's adding in, what's to me, unnecessary complexity. Some hexes/enchantments/stances/conditions/whatever are hard or pointless to remove. That's fine as long as they're not too powerful. It's when you can actually get a strong skill to fly under the radar, so to speak, that you can get to abusive situations. Malaise, Healing Breeze, On Fire are annoying but they're not game-deciding. Not the way a Healing Seed or a Dazed is. That's the problem with enchantment removal, really, the balance point's too high and there are too many good spells that are "lightweights". It's pointless to use your removal on anything but the most critical of enchantments - those on the focused target - because otherwise you can't keep up. So stuff like IW and Conjures and even Healing Breeze get to thrive. If there were something as efficient as Remove Hex for enchantments then that wouldn't be so much of an issue.

The thing with balancing around the middle point is that i can see some problems arising in the high end and low end skills. Assume for the moment that you balance the middle level enchantments and their removal options around a very slight defender advantage paradigm - enchantments are just slightly less expensive, shorter cooldown than their removal counterparts.

Now, take the high end enchantments into this equation. To make them even remotely palatable options they're either going to have to be heavily frontloaded or so earthshattering that the chance of their surviving for any length of time is enough to take the risk of it being removed. Now consider what this means - you're either making the enchantment into what is essentially a fire and forget spell with a small added effect over time, or you're making it game breakingly powerful should enchantment removal options not be available. Neither of these seems like a good decision.

On the other side, any 'low end' enchantment that has a meaningful effect gets lumped in with the middle (balanced) grouping leaving only those skills which give very minor bonuses; otherwise stated, chaff. These skills would probably be considered a waste of a skill slot should enchantment remove not be a worry, so once again you have something working as its intended only when its counter is available in ready supply.

Should you try to balance each tier with its own specific counter, however, you can keep them all within some reasonable level of power and their balancing actually becomes easier (within a given tier at least). Also, having multiple skills to deal with different types of enchantment seems to allow for a greater variety of builds and more meaningful choices in a build - mesmers wouldn't just be 'anti enchantment', they'd be anti-heavy enchantment or anti-light, or if they were generalists they'd have a more limited skill selection for other jobs they wish to undertake. Granted this makes the game more complicated, but its not a really overwhelming level of complexity.

It does seem like simply improving the removal options available right now would make things a great deal better, but my alternative was trying to find an 'ideal' solution to the problem.

Another possibility to balance the situation would be the complete removal of enchantment stripping effects and hex stripping effects, then balancing the enchantments against the hexes...though this would require essentially a complete redesign of the game and is not exactly an optimal solution

.

Laz

Ensign · Mar 30, 2005, 08:14 AM // 08:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Assume for the moment that you balance the middle level enchantments and their removal options around a very slight defender advantage paradigm - enchantments are just slightly less expensive, shorter cooldown than their removal counterparts.

Why am I playing removal if I can't get an advantage from it?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Now, take the high end enchantments into this equation. To make them even remotely palatable options they're either going to have to be heavily frontloaded or so earthshattering that the chance of their surviving for any length of time is enough to take the risk of it being removed.

Sounds good. But this perhaps is looking at things from the wrong angle - why am I running extremely expensive enchantments that aren't earth shattering, when I can be running reasonably priced ones? Expensive enchantments already have to be frontloaded or earth shattering, otherwise they just lose out to faster, quicker counterparts.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

On the other side, any 'low end' enchantment that has a meaningful effect gets lumped in with the middle (balanced) grouping leaving only those skills which give very minor bonuses; otherwise stated, chaff.

Again, you're looking at it from the wrong angle. If a skill has a meaningful, removal worthy effect, but is priced like a chaff enchantment, isn't that enchantment overpowered? The effects can be whatever you want them to be, you just have to price them accordingly - cheap, spammy effects get priced like cheap, spammy effects. Significant but not gamebreaking effects get priced in the middle. Devastating effects have the 25 energy cost and absurd cast times.

Removal is pegged for the midrange effects, not cast/energy costs.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

These skills would probably be considered a waste of a skill slot should enchantment remove not be a worry

That's not true - 'chaff' enchantments and hexes aren't run just as chaff. They're worthwhile in their own right - the effect they have on removal is just a nice bonus.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Should you try to balance each tier with its own specific counter, however, you can keep them all within some reasonable level of power and their balancing actually becomes easier (within a given tier at least).

The balancing mechanisms are how much you have to pay for a given skill in terms of time and energy. Skills that are under the removal curve are priced a bit higher because they can't be removed - skills with big effects that are vulnerable to removal are priced aggressively to encourage usage. If the other team isn't running removal, you want to be able to punish them with aggressively priced big effects. That's the whole point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Also, having multiple skills to deal with different types of enchantment seems to allow for a greater variety of builds and more meaningful choices in a build

Er, no it wouldn't it would just push enchantment removal further to the fringes of usefulness. Teams aren't exactly bleeding slots for narrow removal options - all you'd be doing is encouraging people to not bother. Counters have to be much better than what they're countering, not just to give an advantage for casting a counter, but to make up for all the times a specific counter isn't useful and something useful could be run instead. Narrowing down your counters would be making things worse, not better.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

It does seem like simply improving the removal options available right now would make things a great deal better, but my alternative was trying to find an 'ideal' solution to the problem.

Re-evaluating why you're doing something is always worthwhile, both as a check on what you're doing, and to understand why things work a bit better. In this case, you're dealing with a classical, tried and true problem - you figure out threat-answer for what you want to be the baseline, and price everything around that point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarous

Another possibility to balance the situation would be the complete removal of enchantment stripping effects and hex stripping effects, then balancing the enchantments against the hexes

How do you balance the two against each other? Basically all you'd be doing in this sort of scenario is making a bunch of expensive, uncounterable effects and hoping like mad that you didn't miss anything, because without counters a system isn't self-correcting.

Peace,
-CxE

Scaphism · Mar 30, 2005, 10:01 AM // 10:01

KamiCrazy- while I think you make a lot of good points about metagame strategy, and the current obsession with hex removal, I think you trivialize the importance of enchantment removal.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

Since the primary enchantment removal class is the necromancer, it already has the best enchantment removals in the game.

That's like saying there's high level PvP in the game at the moment- when you're not competing against anyone it's easy to be the "best."

Quote:

Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

All the necro lines have some form of enchantment removal as well. If you are to incorporate a necro primary or secondary into your team make sure it carries an enchantment removal spell.

This really trivializes the issue. It sounds like if enchantment-heavy teams really bother me, then bringing 1 or 2 necros along is the answer. Yet I see plenty of necros around, and they can't do much about the rampant spamming of enchantments.

Necros have the "best" enchantment-removal tool available: Rend Enchantments. I know people are ga-ga over Rend, but Rend is not spectacular. It's like choosing a team in baseball- do you pick the kid with one eye or do you pick one of the blind kids? The kid with one eye may have messed up depth perception, but at least he can see a little bit.
Rend enchantments comes with heavy costs: A 3 second cast time, 30 second recycle, and if you nail a target with a bunch of cheap monk enchants on them, you can kill yourself easily.
So yes, it's the "best option" but it doesn't mean we can't and shouldn't demand more options, and better options.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

While enchantment removal could do with a buff I doubt that it will receive much of a buff.

Again, I think this just dismisses the issue. We're playing in an enchantment-heavy field without enough effective counters. 2 necros with rend might be enough to punch through enchantments on called targets, but they can hardly deal with the rest of the enchantments that are flying around. You just have to ignore those and adapt, for the time being. That doesn't mean it should remain that way.
Good, effective counters help balance the system. We'll know when enchantment removal gets too good- then we'll see a bunch of necros running around and no one using enchantments anymore. Right now, we're at the complete opposite end of the spectrum, and we need to make a fuss so that the situation improves. If you're an alpha tester, then I hope you and your guild have been pushing for it. If not, I hope you do so soon.

KamiCrazy · Mar 30, 2005, 04:04 PM // 16:04

It seems to me that your main problem is your perception that enchantment removal is so far behind enchantments in terms of effectiveness.

However although I did admit that enchantment removal is weak but I do not believe that it is terribly unbalanced.

Firstly how much enchantment removal is enough? That is the very first question you should ask yourself. The answer lies in the metagame and also how good your teams battle tactics are (I will elaborate on this later), also it depends on your build's character composition.

Thats the self reflective part, and although it is the first question, the following points all form up to support an answer.

Enchantments in general are considered very defensive in nature. Yes I know there are offensive style enchantments, so really we can define enchantments at a concept level as something which provides protection or an increase in one's abilities in game.
Now the main way to deal with defensive enchantments is to not deal with them at all. Learning this is an important part of any teams tactics. If someone throws up say Shield of Deflection on your target, your best course of action is to switch to another target. This does several things, firstly it puts the skill in question on timer, secondly it effectively wastes their energy, lastly you are now not being affected by said enchantment.
Do this enough times, with quick decisive target switching and you will end up finding a break in either the enchanters mana pool, timers or just plain confusing them. Save your removals for when you need to force a break. There are some truly enchantment heavy builds which are not affected by this (life barrier etc). but you can still cause havoc, and then decisively remove enchants while things are confusing.

Offensive enchants are harder to deal with normally because you can't tell what they are running if they are pre-casted, or they don't have too much of a huge effect to waste a removal on. It is probably the only type of enchantment I believe removal is weak against, especially when it is used to cover against stronger defensive enchants.

So really in the current game even with a mass removal spell like rend or lingering, you need to pick and choose your enchant removals very carefully, with the problem of enemy recasts on your mind as you do so. However properly timed enchant removals can be devastating as most builds which rely on enchants protecting them, drop very fast as their ordered plan falls apart.

mostro · Mar 30, 2005, 05:10 PM // 17:10

I think the fact that most people only use Rend would indicate that in general the enchantment removal skills are somewhat weak. The only other removal that I may consider taking is inspired enchantment from the mesmer line.

The other skills either take too long to recharge (shatter, drain, strip enchantment) or too expensive (lingering curse). Yes these skills come with extras, but most of the time you are probably only concerned with removing the enchantments and not worry about the secondary effects.

Mar 30, 2005, 05:36 PM // 17:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

However although I did admit that enchantment removal is weak but I do not believe that it is terribly unbalanced.

It is terribly unbalanced. When we have the desired counter sitting in front of us but no one can reasonably use every other option besides one or two spells, there is a huge imbalance.

Quote:

Firstly how much enchantment removal is enough? That is the very first question you should ask yourself. The answer lies in the metagame and also how good your teams battle tactics are (I will elaborate on this later), also it depends on your build's character composition.

no matter how much enchantment removal you carry, there wont be enough of it to punch through enchantment loaded builds without gimping your character. What battle tactics are you using that overpower enchantments so well?

Quote:

Now the main way to deal with defensive enchantments is to not deal with them at all. Learning this is an important part of any teams tactics. If someone throws up say Shield of Deflection on your target, your best course of action is to switch to another target.

This is extremely bad for gameplay on several levels and pretty much shows why enchantment removal is weak. If you're idea for dealing with enchantments is just to switch targets-then what is the point of enchantment removal in the game? So instead of using the desired counter the best bet is to waste time on the first guy and once you see a SoD switch? Thats pretty bad strategy in the first place(to an extent), and if enchantments are making you do it then you wont get far. We know enchantments are overpowered, but target switching multiple times makes the situation worse.

Quote:

This does several things, firstly it puts the skill in question on timer, secondly it effectively wastes their energy, lastly you are now not being affected by said enchantment.

I'd say it wastes much more energy and time on your side of things depending on how much you threw onto that initial target. I dont think target switching is bad, but switching because of enchantments? If you cant punch through SoD on the first target, you wont have much better luck vs the second target until you switch so many times you get lucky.

Quote:

Do this enough times, with quick decisive target switching and you will end up finding a break in either the enchanters mana pool, timers or just plain confusing them. Save your removals for when you need to force a break. There are some truly enchantment heavy builds which are not affected by this (life barrier etc). but you can still cause havoc, and then decisively remove enchants while things are confusing.

Any decent enchantment loaded build will put this strategy to shame. You WILL break before they do. While I would agree that you need to use your removals wisely, there is no point in beating around the bush when time is definetly not on your side.

Quote:

Offensive enchants are harder to deal with normally because you can't tell what they are running if they are pre-casted, or they don't have too much of a huge effect to waste a removal on. It is probably the only type of enchantment I believe removal is weak against, especially when it is used to cover against stronger defensive enchants.

Until offensive enchantments can mess enchantment removal up entirely like Reversal of Fortune, Gaurdian, or even the old SoD then I doubt that is a major problem. Enchantment removal was underused back in November and it was "ok" but needed a tweak. What did Arenanet do? Nerf every single one of them and increased their recharges and costs. Yay, RoF and simple chaff enchantments get a huge boost in play. Offensive enchantments are easier to deal with in general since most of those builds arent enchantment heavy and are self-cast enchantments. But if those are also supposedly kicking enchantment removal in the nuts, then doesn't that even show a bigger problem?

Quote:

So really in the current game even with a mass removal spell like rend or lingering, you need to pick and choose your enchant removals very carefully, with the problem of enemy recasts on your mind as you do so. However properly timed enchant removals can be devastating as most builds which rely on enchants protecting them, drop very fast as their ordered plan falls apart.

RE and LC already have big drawbacks. But ok, assuming you time your enchantment removal properly-you die. Really, how long can you wait to punch through a focused target? Once you Rend or LC, in a few secs Rof and Sod are popped back on to protect something bigger. Great, you cant Rend for 30 seconds without multiple copies of it, and I'll be damned if anyone wants to cast LC again in 10 secs.

KamiCrazy · Mar 30, 2005, 05:38 PM // 17:38

Shatter enchantment is a very good skill and combined with energy surge and backfire, it makes a very nasty fast casting combo.

You need not spec in blood for strip enchantment. So in reality with only curses on a necro you could have rend + strip + lingering.

The best way to handle enchantment removal is to have 2 classes bring one removal each, or 2. That way recharge timers become less of an issue and interuptions are harder as well

Mar 30, 2005, 05:41 PM // 17:41

Shatter enchantment isn't really that good. What grounds are you basing it on that makes it seem great? It gets beat out by other enchantment removal spells easily, and paying 15 energy for that much damage isn't even reliable.

Lazarous · Mar 30, 2005, 05:49 PM // 17:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by ensign

Why am I playing removal if I can't get an advantage from it?

Guild wars seems balanced around a defense > offense paradigm, so i was trying to keep that spirit in my examples. Hex removal (defense) beats hexes if you run a removal heavy build; enchantments (defensive in nature as they're mostly protection or buffing) beat their counters, even if you run a removal heavy build.

Besides, you do get something from the above example...windows of opportunity - its just that these aren't sustainable long term.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ensign

The balancing mechanisms are how much you have to pay for a given skill in terms of time and energy. Skills that are under the removal curve are priced a bit higher because they can't be removed - skills with big effects that are vulnerable to removal are priced aggressively to encourage usage. If the other team isn't running removal, you want to be able to punish them with aggressively priced big effects. That's the whole point.

Punish, yes...obliterate, no. The fear i'd have is that earthshattering power levels demand a direct counter in order for a team to remain effective. By this i mean that it seems right now there are a couple paths to go in strategies when dealing with something like hexes or enchantments...you can either remove the offending effect outright, bypass it through targetting/tactics, use a different skill set which ignores the effect, etc. When something has a power level that requires a specific counter is where the problem would lie.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ensign

Er, no it wouldn't it would just push enchantment removal further to the fringes of usefulness. Teams aren't exactly bleeding slots for narrow removal options - all you'd be doing is encouraging people to not bother. Counters have to be much better than what they're countering, not just to give an advantage for casting a counter, but to make up for all the times a specific counter isn't useful and something useful could be run instead. Narrowing down your counters would be making things worse, not better.

This i think is open for debate. While remove hex and a (proposed) remove enchant are functionally similar, they're conceptually different. Hex removal is defensive in nature, while enchant removal is offensive in nature. Thus, enchant removal is proactive more than reactive. You'll really only wipe someones enchantments when you plan on focus firing them, as an opening salvo of debuffs (and then of course keep them enchantment clear until they die).

As such, the enchant counters really should be inferior to enchantments in terms of mana effeciency, cooldown or possibly some other ancillary effect.

In regards to narrowing down the counters, narrower focus allows for greater effects. The more situational a spell is, the more powerful it should be - if you had a choice between a single enchant remove that worked against everything slowly or one that wiped 3 light enchantments quickly, which would you choose?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ensign

How do you balance the two against each other? Basically all you'd be doing in this sort of scenario is making a bunch of expensive, uncounterable effects and hoping like mad that you didn't miss anything, because without counters a system isn't self-correcting.

In this option, hexes and enchantments become direct counters to each other. An example - you'd have one enchantment which gave +3 health regen and added damage, while a hex would give -3 health regen and lowered damage. Spell costs would be identical. Basically set it so that if the team is evenly matched with enchants/hexes they'll completely cancel each other in that respect.

Laz

KamiCrazy · Mar 30, 2005, 06:16 PM // 18:16

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This is extremely bad for gameplay on several levels and pretty much shows why enchantment removal is weak. If you're idea for dealing with enchantments is just to switch targets-then what is the point of enchantment removal in the game? So instead of using the desired counter the best bet is to waste time on the first guy and once you see a SoD switch? Thats pretty bad strategy in the first place(to an extent), and if enchantments are making you do it then you wont get far. We know enchantments are overpowered, but target switching multiple times makes the situation worse.

Actually this is a very good strategy despite what you say. It is in fact one of the key things we learnt during the dec BWE, when we had a pretty random build, with no necro and nobody remembered to bring enchantment removal. In fact the only enchantment removal we ended up taking was on the war/mes. This forced us initially to look for alternative means of getting around enchantments and funny enough this tactic still continues to work in the current metagame. Enchantment removals is NOT the only way to deal with enchantments. If you switch targets the defensive enchantment becomes a non-issue. Sure you lost time killing someone, but you have to realise that most defensive enchants come from monks. Time spent enchanting people means less mana for heals, less mana for hex/condition removal and in the end less mana for more enchantments. Switching targets is a key skill which all target callers have to develop and frankly when my guild sees enchantments going up on someone normally we just switch.
Enchantment removals to us are now like surgical strikes, using them at exactly the right moment, can be super effective especially if you combine target switching.

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I'd say it wastes much more energy and time on your side of things depending on how much you threw onto that initial target. I dont think target switching is bad, but switching because of enchantments? If you cant punch through SoD on the first target, you wont have much better luck vs the second target until you switch so many times you get lucky.

This statement largely ignores the factor of skill. If your team is well co-ordinated, your flow in combat should be better then the opposing team's healing. By switching targets you are directing the action in battle, you are dictacting who they heal, and who they enchant. Monks are reactive spell casters and even though protection monks have a very pro-active style if you start switching things up, they become reactive as normally they can't keep up with you.

Vs even good guilds who are desperately trying to keep up one of their monks, switching quickly and unloading spike dps on a fresh target will kill them very fast and sometimes before the other team even gets aware to save them.
The main skill required to pull this off is a good target caller who realises opportunities and when monks become too focused on one ally.

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Any decent enchantment loaded build will put this strategy to shame. You WILL break before they do. While I would agree that you need to use your removals wisely, there is no point in beating around the bush when time is definetly not on your side.

Again, I speak from experience when I note that even fighting LOTD/SOW's enchantment heavy builds is not impossible. We only take 2 enchantment removals as well. I haven't come across any completely broken enchantment builds, maybe difficult to beat ones, but not game breaking.

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RE and LC already have big drawbacks. But ok, assuming you time your enchantment removal properly-you die. Really, how long can you wait to punch through a focused target? Once you Rend or LC, in a few secs Rof and Sod are popped back on to protect something bigger. Great, you cant Rend for 30 seconds without multiple copies of it, and I'll be damned if anyone wants to cast LC again in 10 secs.

You make it sound like you are 1 person vs an entire group. Last I checked there other members of you group which are fighting as well.
If you are to rend you need to do it in co-ordination with other members of your group. Not only is rending a long casting time with a damage drawback its long timer prevents it re-use, but you know that. So don't rend if you can't afford the HP loss, or if you are under focus. When you rend, call it, after rending a target, it takes about 3 seconds for the enchants to pop back on at least. Even if they are self casted the person has to realise that they have been stripped and need recasting. When you finish rending your DPS should unload their damage, your interruption (be it ranger or mesmer) should be ready to interrupt recastings if possible. Rendings should also be used at a carefully chosen moment, use it when they most depend on it.

My position is that enchantment removal is weak in some situations, however I believe this was an intended design decision. What I don't understand is the perception that because enchantment removal have no easy options, it must be very weak, however are enchantments overpowered? and if they are not then how are enchantment removals weak? Also it seems that you have not explored alternative methods of dealing with enchantments like target switching. Something like target switching does not work vs hexes obviously and so this is why hexes required a very strong counter towards it.

Mar 30, 2005, 07:21 PM // 19:21

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Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

Actually this is a very good strategy despite what you say. It is in fact one of the key things we learnt during the dec BWE, when we had a pretty random build, with no necro and nobody remembered to bring enchantment removal. In fact the only enchantment removal we ended up taking was on the war/mes. This forced us initially to look for alternative means of getting around enchantments and funny enough this tactic still continues to work in the current metagame. Enchantment removals is NOT the only way to deal with enchantments.

Of course it's not the only way to deal with enchantments, but if its not even an option when it must be then why is it in the game?

Working on the metagame vs alpha players proves nothing. Working on people that actually know what they are doing? Thats another story. Like I said I have no problems with target switching vs enchantment loaded builds, but you can only target switch so many times before you put yourself in a hole. your answer seems to be that you must always target switch under any circumstances and I definetly cant agree with that.

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If you switch targets the defensive enchantment becomes a non-issue. Sure you lost time killing someone, but you have to realise that most defensive enchants come from monks. Time spent enchanting people means less mana for heals, less mana for hex/condition removal and in the end less mana for more enchantments. Switching targets is a key skill which all target callers have to develop and frankly when my guild sees enchantments going up on someone normally we just switch.

You're team also lost time and energy on the initial tagret(s). You pretty much just pushed the match into a state of exhaustion for the first kill. I wouldnt be willing to take that trade, but if n0 is using some super exclusive build that no one else knows about then have fun till it dies. Switching targets is definetly a key skill, but switching targets continuously because of enchantments is a fundamental problem with the system and doesnt show good tactics.

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Enchantment removals to us are now like surgical strikes, using them at exactly the right moment, can be super effective especially if you combine target switching.

Being that enchantment removal is so reactive in nature I doubt using them at surgical times is the always the best bet.

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This statement largely ignores the factor of skill. If your team is well co-ordinated, your flow in combat should be better then the opposing team's healing. By switching targets you are directing the action in battle, you are dictacting who they heal, and who they enchant. Monks are reactive spell casters and even though protection monks have a very pro-active style if you start switching things up, they become reactive as normally they can't keep up with you.

So what happens when you run up against an opposing team with great healing? I actually factored skill into my thinking. No matter what, your key players will run out of energy at some point and break. The objective is to make the point come as late as possible. If you're just switching targets every time some enchantments go up then are you not just making that point come sooner? Monks are reactive and even though you end up dictating battle, if their enchantments start to tell you who to attack, then who is dictating who?

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Vs even good guilds who are desperately trying to keep up one of their monks, switching quickly and unloading spike dps on a fresh target will kill them very fast and sometimes before the other team even gets aware to save them.

Thats a whole different issue than just multiple target switching though. We all know spike damage comes with downtime drawbacks(in most cases). I was thinking you guys set off you're initial volley, saw an enchantment web, switched and repeated. If thats what happens then after a while you will hit downtime.

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The main skill required to pull this off is a good target caller who realises opportunities and when monks become too focused on one ally.

I'm not debating the target caller, I'm debating the validity of the tactic and how it applies to enchantment removal. If this is what you must resort to instead of being able to fight enchantments, then enchantment removal is bad right?

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Again, I speak from experience when I note that even fighting LOTD/SOW's enchantment heavy builds is not impossible. We only take 2 enchantment removals as well. I haven't come across any completely broken enchantment builds, maybe difficult to beat ones, but not game breaking.

Who cares about LOTD? They arent even good aside from maybe 1 or 2 guys that dont have their heads up their ass. Playing against a subpar team like that can make anything look good. I speak from experience of playing IVEX, you guys, and KOR. I've had good matches against other teams and I play with random guilds or friends. I know of ways to make completely broken enchantment builds and so do a few people. One of the thankfully good things that was done was a nerf to Shield of Deflection. We all remember how much havoc that caused in the Alpha. Right now you can still get away with RoF and Guardian chaff to protect some bad boys out there.

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You make it sound like you are 1 person vs an entire group. Last I checked there other members of you group which are fighting as well.
If you are to rend you need to do it in co-ordination with other members of your group. Not only is rending a long casting time with a damage drawback its long timer prevents it re-use, but you know that. So don't rend if you can't afford the HP loss, or if you are under focus. When you rend, call it, after rending a target, it takes about 3 seconds for the enchants to pop back on at least. Even if they are self casted the person has to realise that they have been stripped and need recasting. When you finish rending your DPS should unload their damage, your interruption (be it ranger or mesmer) should be ready to interrupt recastings if possible. Rendings should also be used at a carefully chosen moment, use it when they most depend on it.

The fact that you must Rend someone with a coordinated effort is not the issue here. It's the fact that once you do it, you cant for another 30 seconds without multiple copies while those enchantments just slip back on the target. If your guild switches targets alot then how does this even make the situation better? It also does not take 3 seconds for enchantments to pop back on a focused target. If it takes that long their monks have really bad reflexes or your mesmer is doing an incredible job. I'd hope it's the latter you're basing that statement off of.

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My position is that enchantment removal is weak in some situations, however I believe this was an intended design decision. What I don't understand is the perception that because enchantment removal have no easy options, it must be very weak, however are enchantments overpowered? and if they are not then how are enchantment removals weak? Also it seems that you have not explored alternative methods of dealing with enchantments like target switching. Something like target switching does not work vs hexes obviously and so this is why hexes required a very strong counter towards it.

I dont think you understand the position here. All enchantments arent strictly overpowered because of their attributes. They are made to look better because without the threat of being removed they see the light of day. Seriously, you can pretty much run any risky enchantment and expect it to see full duration right now.

The alternative options to enchantment removal are NOT the issue. The problem is that if the hard, direct counter to enchantments cant even be used and even subpar methods must be taken to fight it-then why is enchantment removal in the game? Doesn't that show that is weak?

KamiCrazy · Mar 30, 2005, 09:13 PM // 21:13

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Working on the metagame vs alpha players proves nothing. Working on people that actually know what they are doing? Thats another story. Like I said I have no problems with target switching vs enchantment loaded builds, but you can only target switch so many times before you put yourself in a hole. your answer seems to be that you must always target switch under any circumstances and I definetly cant agree with that.

Have you ever tried this tactic? As long as you are inflicting worthwhile damage before a target gets enchanted and then switching once enchanted you are doing something which is affecting the game in your favour. Few builds now have infinite mana for their monks. Monks do run out of mana, once they do they have a very hard time sustaining a chain of spells. I am not advocating that you switch until they run out of mana, however I do not want anyone reading this to get the impression that by switching you are doing nothing when in fact you are still contributing to the battle.

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You're team also lost time and energy on the initial tagret(s). You pretty much just pushed the match into a state of exhaustion for the first kill. I wouldnt be willing to take that trade, but if n0 is using some super exclusive build that no one else knows about then have fun till it dies. Switching targets is definetly a key skill, but switching targets continuously because of enchantments is a fundamental problem with the system and doesnt show good tactics.

Our builds are well publicised on many forums, our lastest build available for public viewing is posted on tentonhammer forums, you are free to view it at your leisure. How can you be pushing yourself to a state of exhaustion for the first kill? Enchantments work best when they are applied early or midway through health. To enchant someone who is almost dead rarely does anything because balanced builds will have a variety of different damage attacks which will push the target to die. Even if they manage to save the initial target from the brink of death, I fail to see how you would have completely depleted resources either.

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Being that enchantment removal is so reactive in nature I doubt using them at surgical times is the always the best bet.

Thats a way of thinking which i definitely do not believe to be true. Enchantment removal is both reactive and proactive in nature depending on the enchant put up. If you see some one getting veagenced it is very reactive, while timing the removal of something like shield of regeneration with your DPS team is pro-active. However more often then not due to the value of enchantment removal you have to be pro-active with it to gain the maximum benefit of removing an enchant.

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So what happens when you run up against an opposing team with great healing? I actually factored skill into my thinking. No matter what, your key players will run out of energy at some point and break. The objective is to make the point come as late as possible.

Teams who have great healing are defeated by interruption/energy denial/hexing, not through sheer DPS (unless you have AOE). A team with great healing and good enchantments is not likely to have good DPS (although this could be true if other factors are sacrificed like interruption, hexing etc).
We have quite a lot of first hand experience in this as we play what we call a "taskmage" build in tombs during BWE quiet times which includes 5 monks stacked with enchants and heals. If you don't utiltise AOE properly or if you don't have AOE, then you must do everything you can to drain their monks mana and then once they are worn, simultaneously punch through with enchantment removal and damage.

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If you're just switching targets every time some enchantments go up then are you not just making that point come sooner? Monks are reactive and even though you end up dictating battle, if their enchantments start to tell you who to attack, then who is dictating who?

What choices in the current game do you have? Either continue wailing on the enchanted invidual which normally benefits their team, or switch to a softer less protected target? I mean the choice is obvious. If you cannot overcome an obstacle during a fight then avoid it at all costs. Unless you are confident that ignoring the enchantment is the best approach, you should switch.
A smart target caller realises who is directing who and will attempt to throw the monk offguard by doing something unexpected. Nevertheless, if you switch you have 7 potential targets, of those 7 I am confident at least 2 of them are casters of some sort. Its not like target switching is going from 1 to the other down a line or something.

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I'm not debating the target caller, I'm debating the validity of the tactic and how it applies to enchantment removal. If this is what you must resort to instead of being able to fight enchantments, then enchantment removal is bad right?

We learnt this through our mistakes of ignoring enchantment removal in the past. What is surprising is that it works. If we had not learnt this, we would have never finished in the top 5 of the ladder back then and would have never gotten into alpha. It really was one of the critical skills we learnt. The hard way. However everyone learns from their mistakes and we do take enchantment removal now. Switching targets is not a substitute for enchantment removal at a critical time. There is no substitute for that sort of counter however, it is possible to give enchantments are hard time by circumventing them. Now if enchantment removal was as strong as hex removal, we could combine this with our current skills to devastating effect. Not only could we remove them easily, but in case we couldn't remove them we can just ignore them temporarily while a myriad of enchantment removals were being prepared. Why bring enchants at all?

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I speak from experience of playing IVEX, you guys, and KOR. I've had good matches against other teams and I play with random guilds or friends. I know of ways to make completely broken enchantment builds and so do a few people. One of the thankfully good things that was done was a nerf to Shield of Deflection. We all remember how much havoc that caused in the Alpha. Right now you can still get away with RoF and Guardian chaff to protect some bad boys out there.

I think you need to understand that I am not here to "pimp my uberness" but stating a tactic high tier pvpers use to deal with enchantments. Its another tool you can use in your repetoire, you don't have to use it but don't dismiss it as something unthinkable or unusable.
I would be interested in what you consider a completely broken enchantment build, it would really help me understand your way of thinking.
We still use shield of deflection, despite its nerf, it is still a very good spell. Other then its spamability nothing has changed really, funny enough by making it cost more in mana, it makes target switching all that much more effective.

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The fact that you must Rend someone with a coordinated effort is not the issue here. It's the fact that once you do it, you cant for another 30 seconds without multiple copies while those enchantments just slip back on the target. If your guild switches targets alot then how does this even make the situation better? It also does not take 3 seconds for enchantments to pop back on a focused target. If it takes that long their monks have really bad reflexes or your mesmer is doing an incredible job. I'd hope it's the latter you're basing that statement off of.

There should be a price for failing an attack of opportunity and in terms of rend enchantments that price is its recharge timer. I am the primary enchantment remover in my GvG group, as I am the one carrying rend, (its not even specced high, just 5 enchants), I know how frustrating it is to remove a bunch of enchants and then see it all come back on. However I blame that on the execution of my team over rend sucking cause of its recharge. It does take about 3 seconds. Even if you have methamphetamine enhanced co-ordination and reaction it takes 2 seconds. Most enchants are 1 second cast time at least, how can it be 1 second?

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I dont think you understand the position here. All enchantments arent strictly overpowered because of their attributes. They are made to look better because without the threat of being removed they see the light of day. Seriously, you can pretty much run any risky enchantment and expect it to see full duration right now. The alternative options to enchantment removal are NOT the issue. The problem is that if the hard, direct counter to enchantments cant even be used and even subpar methods must be taken to fight it-then why is enchantment removal in the game? Doesn't that show that is weak?

Actually because most enchants are monk attributed they are overpowered in a sense, however this overpoweredness is intentional. Most monk spells are overpowered, they generally have short recharge timers, low costs and low casting times normally. The only exception is the smite line which has to be inferior to other classes damage lines, however that line has effects not available to other lines and those effects are very powerful. Divine Favour isn't too hot of a line either it has some underpowered skills but its main problem is trying to be unique against both protection and healing.
Back to the point, monk spells are just better, hex removal is better then hexes, healing is better then damage, condition removal is better then conditions, and because enchantments are such a critical part of protection prayers, defensive enchantments are better then enchantment removal.
Enchantment removal is a counter but since it is used as an offensive counter normally and to conform with the ideals that defence is more efficient then offense, it is intentionally weaker.

Ensign · Mar 30, 2005, 09:48 PM // 21:48

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Originally Posted by Blackace

Really, how long can you wait to punch through a focused target? Once you Rend or LC, in a few secs Rof and Sod are popped back on to protect something bigger.

In my experience during the last BWE, I'd say that one Rend is usually enough if you have a coordinated team. If your Warriors are already in place and you have your ranged attackers on a target, you can drop a naked Monk in 3-4 seconds easily. One Rend typically buys you that much time - reaction times being what they are, and casting times on the real shutdown being non-trivial. You're Rending to punch through a preexisting enchantment or two, plus a shutdown enchant like SoD or Seed, plus a spam enchant or two. Pure spam enchants are easy enough to go through - Guardian is the only one that's really a speed bump - it's getting the important enchants off that's a problem.

I thought Shield of Deflection was perfectly reasonable at 10 energy / 2 second cast time. Adding that extra second to the cast time did wonders for shutting down the abusiveness of that skill - if you knocked it out, they weren't going to get it back up in time.

Also, I noticed that you really don't want more than two Rends on a team. The cooldown is long, but it recycles quickly enough that two people alternating ends up giving you as much as you need. You have to consider target switching time, reaction times of Monks stacking enchantments in the first place, time when someone runs and you decide to hit someone else instead of Rending - the cooldown is long but it isn't something that you want to use frequently enough to really need the short cooldown. Having three Rends doesn't really add much in terms of needed Rending power, and it makes things a bit harder to coordinate. Basically there just isn't a need to gorge.

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Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

Shatter enchantment is a very good skill and combined with energy surge and backfire, it makes a very nasty fast casting combo.

I'd like to point out that this particular combo relies heavily upon the target casting through Backfire multiple times to effectively kill themselves for you - Shatter and Energy Surge are just there to finish them off. I will grant you that such a strategy is an excellent n00b-devouring machine, but I wouldn't take any particular pride in devouring n00bs. Given the current non-level of competition, however, counting on such things is a perfectly reasonable assumption.

Also, Shatter Enchantment is clearly not being used as enchantment removal - it is being used as a direct damage finisher. I'm much more willing to discuss that skill's power as a nuke than as enchantment removal.

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Originally Posted by Lazarous

Guild wars seems balanced around a defense > offense paradigm

The balancing paradigm is pretty similar to that - it's that answers have to be more efficient than what they're answering. So healing trumps damage, hex removal trumps hexes. That's a requirement for a playable counter. Enchantment removal, by extension, has to be more efficient than what it's removing, otherwise it isn't worth running. When it isn't, it doesn't get run, which is pretty much what you see.

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Originally Posted by Lazarous

The fear i'd have is that earthshattering power levels demand a direct counter in order for a team to remain effective.

I agree with this, but not on the grounds of competitive balance - I agree with this because of how hard it punishes pick up or casual teams. While the better teams are naturally going to gravitate to quicker, more efficient threats to break up an opposing defense, a less organized team will have a less organized defense that likely has holes in it. Basically when people are unprepared, threats have a natural edge, since there aren't wrong threats but there are plenty of wrong answers.

That's an important, additional factor that tends to result in 'big spells' being unplayable in high level competition - even in a weakened state, they are more than playable in casual competition, to the point of dominating. If 'big spells' were viable in competitive play, they'd absolutely dominate the casual circuit. So they're a casualty of having to make a game that appeals to everyone, not just the very top.

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Originally Posted by Lazarous

You'll really only wipe someones enchantments when you plan on focus firing them, as an opening salvo of debuffs (and then of course keep them enchantment clear until they die).

This is a great example of why enchantment removal has to be better than enchantments. If enchantments are better than enchantment removal, then in a race to debuff someone, enchantment removal is always going to lose - the buffs will keep on popping more quickly and cheaply than they can be pulled off.

If you're going to try and fight anything, you have to be able to win. Otherwise, you don't get into the fight in the first place. This is precisely why Rend Enchantments is the only piece of enchantment removal seeing wide play - it lets you punch through a wall of enchantments singlehandedly, where other pieces of enchantment removal fail.

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Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

What I don't understand is the perception that because enchantment removal have no easy options, it must be very weak, however are enchantments overpowered?

Hex removal doesn't have any easy options either - Remove Hex is slow and easy to counter, Inspired Hex can be cast quickly but the cooldown is killer - Convert Hexes is neccessary but the energy cost keeps it from being used outside of hex spam situations. None of them are great solutions, but they're good enough to act as counters, and it's an important enough aspect of the game that people pay attention to good solutions.

Contrast that with the current enchantment removal situation. I agree with you that techniques for working around enchantments, such as quickly switching targets and wearing down an opponent trying to keep up, are underutilized and should be given more attention. But that doesn't change the fact that fighting the enchantment war with the supposed counters is a losing battle - anything you're trying to hit is cheaper, faster, and recycles more quickly.

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Originally Posted by Blackace

The alternative options to enchantment removal are NOT the issue. The problem is that if the hard, direct counter to enchantments cant even be used and even subpar methods must be taken to fight it-then why is enchantment removal in the game? Doesn't that show that is weak?

I don't think that enchantment removal needs a huge buff. Single target removal is never going to effectively punch through spam enchantments, so Rend / switching targets is going to have to remain the status quo there. That isn't any different from the Convert Hexes / hex spam paradigm. What needs a bit of a boost are the single target removals - Shatter is just being used as a weak nuke, Drain is strictly inferior to Inspired, and Strip is a joke. I'd knock 10 seconds off each of their cooldowns, and perhaps add an energy or two to Drain's effect, and be done with it. The goal is not to fight through those enchantment blitzes on Monks, but to make enchantment removal appealing enough to pick off random enchantments, to strip off unprotected defensive buffs. To put a little fear into those IW players who run around just begging for a Strip, but never getting it because Strip is barely even a counter to IW.

Basically I want single target removal to be a bit better so that a comprehensive enchantment removal solution will be called for - you'll need some combination of Rends to punch through the stacks, target switching to dodge around chaff, and single target removal to keep people from getting too comfortable. We're closer to that than I let on. Rend is a fine skill as is - sure the damage hurts, but the raw power of the skill justifies it. Switching targets is something that has to be taught. All that's lacking is the single target removal, and the standard for that isn't Reversal of Fortune - it's maintenence enchants and Conjures. Those skills are naturally slower and more expensive, so enchantment removal doesn't have to be at hex removal power levels - the Inspired Enchantment power level is about where you want to be. The only change that needs to be made, to flesh things out, is to bring the other single target removal options up to Inspired Enchantment levels.

Peace,
-CxE

Scaphism · Mar 31, 2005, 01:18 AM // 01:18

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Originally Posted by KamiCrazy

What choices in the current game do you have? Either continue wailing on the enchanted invidual which normally benefits their team, or switch to a softer less protected target? I mean the choice is obvious.

This is the crux of my argument. You are absolutely right in your analysis: The choice is obvious, if you can't remove enchantments, you need to switch targets. It's also obvious that your team has had a fair bit of success doing it as well.

However, it speaks volumes about the inherent problem with enchantment removal: It simply isn't a viable answer to enchantment stacking. When enchantments dominate the playing field the way they currently do, then the answer is obvious: Enchantment removal is ineffective.

Your team has adapted to the situation by adopting a different tactic: Switching targets. That doesn't mean enchantment removal got any better, or doesn't need to be boosted. Enchantment removal is still largely unplayable. You should be applauded for adapting, but that doesn't mean we should be happy with the current state of enchantment removal.

If and when it does recieve a boost, target switching will still be a necessary skill for teams to learn, but it should be one of many choices- not simply the case where in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king.

Mar 31, 2005, 03:14 AM // 03:14

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Originally Posted by Ensign

I don't think that enchantment removal needs a huge buff. Single target removal is never going to effectively punch through spam enchantments, so Rend / switching targets is going to have to remain the status quo there.
That isn't any different from the Convert Hexes / hex spam paradigm. What needs a bit of a boost are the single target removals - Shatter is just being used as a weak nuke, Drain is strictly inferior to Inspired, and Strip is a joke. I'd knock 10 seconds off each of their cooldowns, and perhaps add an energy or two to Drain's effect, and be done with it.

Thats pretty much the kind of boost it needs. Nothing spectacular. Shorten the recharges so that they can realistically be plugged into builds. We just have to accept the fact that some spam enchantments are not going to be able to be fought with single target enchantment removal. That's still no excuse for the absurd balance changes and nerfs they caught. When things like Channeling or a Conjure can run it's full duration without fear, we are in a pretty bad situation.

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Basically I want single target removal to be a bit better so that a comprehensive enchantment removal solution will be called for - you'll need some combination of Rends to punch through the stacks, target switching to dodge around chaff, and single target removal to keep people from getting too comfortable.

I'd be happy with this also. Kami already showed that target switching is a somewhat valid and much needed tactic. But I dont think it should be the only solution to enchantments. I'd love if you could reasonably come into a match and have multiple options for dealing with enchantments.