Curse

Ehecatzin FlyingCrab · Nov 28, 2006, 06:01 AM // 06:01

/not signed

boost the counters, dont nerf the skills.

Qual · Nov 28, 2006, 06:04 AM // 06:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

Guild Wars is an evolving game. Adapt.

Ahh... So I shall adap. Funny, that's coming from the guy who are screaming for a nref.

Thallandor · Nov 28, 2006, 06:13 AM // 06:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

So your response is that Paragons shouldn't be nerfed is because it would affect them in PvE. Right. That's very persuasive. Do you have any tangible arguments against Paragon nerfing?

Statement(1) Your opinion and question.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

You do realize that Guild Wars is both a PvE and a PvP game?

Statement(2) Answering your own question in statement(1) and contradicting yourself.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

Also, I do use a Paragon on my Hero Squad in PvE. The only skills he uses which I mentioned in the OP are Watch Yourself and GTFE (only for damage aid/protection, the energy is unneeded). I don't use Incoming or Energizing Finale. And I've completed almost every Master quest. If you need either of those skills as a crutch, you truly suck at PvE.

Statement(3) No one really care if you got masters for all missions or your game expliots nor are we interested to make PvE component competitive at all. Make your point and move on without resorting to insulting other players.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

Guild Wars is an evolving game. Adapt.

Statement(4) Good job you answered your own thread.

_______________________
Just say NO to Nerfism

Uzul · Nov 28, 2006, 06:22 AM // 06:22

I played paragon in GvG, RA/TA and HA for the last 5 weeks...command, motivation and hybrids: And I agree that some skills like Energizing Finale need a little tweak (10e on it would do the job). But most of the skills are actually fine and can only work in synergy with other things in the team.
However, like posted by others, it's the counters that need to be buffed a bit. Vocal Minority is still viable - but you can't expect to to make it work without internal synergy within your team. We faced a good amount of anti-paragon builds, and only those that were able to identify our utility dehexer and shut him down while shutting down our paragons were a real threat. Covering VM and keeping the dehexer knocked down / blacked out for example...

The point I want to make: You can't expect to have the few counters that exist to work properly (and VM is really really nasty if used properly) if you don't make sure the counter to your counter is taken care of as well with your build.
Another example would be Aegis+anti-spear-kiting (twirly lines will dodge lots of spears thrown at you) This can seriously slow down adrena gain - up to the point where refrains and finales loose the effectiveness that is needed.

Conclusion - don't kill the paragon class because a lot of people are having trouble to use the counters in synergy with other skills.
The one change I am all for is giving EF a 10e cost... and of course make Roaring Winds drain more energy... as it is right now it only takes away leadership energy gain - which is still something, but not good enough to put the skill into serious play.

BahamutKaiser · Nov 28, 2006, 06:33 AM // 06:33

Assassin and Elementist do have some effective builds, and with the addition of new skills, they are becoming more powerful, but that doesn't change the fact that some of their key skills to success simply suck. A class with less builds to choose from than another class is weaker, every class has a few builds which work well, but having a fraction of the elite builds another class does makes them less useful, end of story. Less builds means easier your easier to identify, which makes you easier to counter, which makes you weaker, simply put. In a hardcore PvP match that is a very big difference.

Alot of work has been done on Assassin to balance out his weakness, but his primary function has always been the same, and most of the primary skills involved in that role are worthless, Deaths Charge and Dark Prison are crap, and the new Elite doesn't deliver justice either. For a Class that requires mobility, infrequent advances are not acceptable skills, and only being able to advance teleport half as much as you can escape is a weak combination.

Elementist DoTs do not hit enough space and are not frequent enough to be useful, The spells do not compare in competative scenarios.

And Ritualists immobility hampers any team, in which case Binding Rituals literally mean your team is "bound" to a location to benifit from their effects.

All of these are serious issues, and if you think they arn't than look at paragon one more time and recognize what a class should be. Furthermore, these issues deal directly with overcoming and balance with Paragon. A Paragon exponetially increases the power of a group, making it even more risky for an Assassin to advance into enemy lines an target the soft players, in this scenario, the Paragon himself. His ability to advance into combat and escape combat not only instantly with his shadowstep skills, but frequently, is an intregal part of being competative and balanced.

The Power of Paragon revolves around keeping most of your party within an area of effect radius, this is where area wide DoT spells are an interegal part of putting preasure on an entire area, damaging Paragons group advantage, and pushing the enemy around to secure a better possition. Because of such high defensive boosts on an entire area, the spells which target an entire area need to be effective too, as a counter. A poor nerf in the past which causes more nerfs in the future, DoT spells should never have been reduced to adjacent foes, they certainly hit you in the energy for an area wide effect. And the Frequency needs to be better too, since such minor damage needs to be frequent to make a continous impression on grouped enemies. DoT spells need to be location wide on all but perhaps Meteor Shower, and all of them need at least a 1/3rd reduction in recast time.

Ritualist doesn't fall behind Paragon because his effects arn't efficient, there is only one spirit which needs some redevelopment. His weakness lies in his immobility, drawing a single spirit isn't good enough, any Ritualist investing in attributes to improve spirits will bring at least 2, likely 4 spirits. Draw Spirit needs to draw at least 3, or all of your spirits from where ever they are to a nearby or adjacent circle around you. And a new Elite which did this, as well as refreshed all of your exsisting spirits would bring Ritualist back into the mobility game. Spirits are incredibly easy to kill, almost impossible to sustain, and cannot be stacked, so the one spirit you can have out at a time, which cannot be recast for a good 30 seconds to a minute, should at least be easily drug around if you bring a skill to do it.

The one spirit which doesn't work well is Displacement. It doesn't take a complete shutdown of melee attacks to stop an entire group of enemies from spiking an allie, it only takes 50%, maybe 75% at most, with that much miss ratio an assault is almost worthless, and using skills is more likely to fail than succeed. The only thing accomplished by blocking all attacks with Displacement is ensuring that it will be gone in 3 seconds, and your defensive support is gone so fast that it may as well not exsisted. For a spell which isn't available for another 45 seconds, this is unacceptable. 75% max, or even better, making it 25% or 50%, with a 100% chance to block attack skills. This way your defensive support will last long enough to actually keep allies alive for a duration instead of a moment, a spirit isn't for momentary defense.

Aside from that, If Paragon is outshining Ritualist so much, than the perfect solution is to add a counter for Paragon on Ritualist. A spirit which nullifies the effect of shouts and chants (not removes them, but nullifies their effect) is all that Ritualist needs to contend against Paragon. With this Ritualist will be accepted specifically as a counter to Paragon teams, and Paragon would have a counter equal to any other in the game.

If at any point you feel a class is too powerful and needs to be nerfed, look at it creatively and figure out why other classes arn't performing just as well. If you think about it, much which once was allowed previous classes to dish out just as well, but in the search for balance, nerfs were applied instead of remedies. Nerfs continue to make the game as a whole more mundain, they limit the proficiency of everything else when you try and break each build down one by one in order to keep them even. Nerfing is always a lazy way to balance the game, instead of creatively developing and improving other skills to overcome these features, you just reduce each feature til everything is boring.

Aside from that, skills which make killing an difficult to impossible belong in the game, combat is not all about killing your opponent. Great players recognize the value of staying alive over killing your opponent. If you don't die, than your enemy never scores, dieing is the highest penalty in the game, and this class obviously involves more survival support than spiking. The fact that there are ways to block even the toughest spikes and onslaughts is just a balanced feature, you will have to utilize alternative means to win.

As for Degen, there are several ways to apply degen to an entire group, and alot of it. Burning can be applied to entire groups liberally, if you think extinguish is the answer, think harder. With skills like Searing Flames, Rodgorts Invocation, and worst of all, Mark of Rodgort in combination with single or group effecting fire damage can put burn on enemies regularly, and there are even more burning abilities in Dervish and Paragon. Add that with hexes like Ulcerous lungs, dealing degen hex and bleeding to a group of units if the enemy uses shouts, and Suffering, and even combinations of fragility with any degen conditions, and you have an outstanding scatter of degen which will put alot of presure on grouped enemies. One of my favorite techniques is a Paragon with "Their on Fire" and a dedicated burning Elementist, the combination of group damage, group degen, and defensive increase make for a very worthwile addition to any party.

Nerfing is rarely an appropriate solution, it almost never is. Unless there are mistaken figures and unnoted applications which produce incredibly broken results, it isn't deserving of a nerf. The proper solution is to develope a proper selection of counters and advantages against enemies using or applying certain skills. All it takes is are some attacks which deal extra damage on a foe for every shout, chant and echo on them, and boom. 100 ways to fix the problem creatively, 1 crappy, lazy, shitless solution (nerf it), obviously getting a little bit creative and respecting the available counters is a much better solution.

Uzul · Nov 28, 2006, 06:43 AM // 06:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by BahamutKaiser

Assassin and Elementist do have some effective builds, and with the addition of new skills, they are becoming more powerful, but that doesn't change the fact that some of their key skills to success simply suck. A class with less builds to choose from than another class is weaker, every class has a few builds which work well, but having a fraction of the elite builds another class does makes them less useful, end of story. Less builds means easier your easier to identify, which makes you easier to counter, which makes you weaker, simply put. In a hardcore PvP match that is a very big difference.

Alot of work has been done on Assassin to balance out his weakness, but his primary function has always been the same, and most of the primary skills involved in that role are worthless, Deaths Charge and Dark Prison are crap, and the new Elite doesn't deliver justice either. For a Class that requires mobility, infrequent advances are not acceptable skills, and only being able to advance teleport half as much as you can escape is a weak combination.

Elementist DoTs do not hit enough space and are not frequent enough to be useful, The spells do not compare in competative scenarios.

And Ritualists immobility hampers any team, in which case Binding Rituals literally mean your team is "bound" to a location to benifit from their effects.

All of these are serious issues, and if you think they arn't than look at paragon one more time and recognize what a class should be. Furthermore, these issues deal directly with overcoming and balance with Paragon. A Paragon exponetially increases the power of a group, making it even more risky for an Assassin to advance into enemy lines an target the soft players, in this scenario, the Paragon himself. His ability to advance into combat and escape combat not only instantly with his shadowstep skills, but frequently, is an intregal part of being competative and balanced.

The Power of Paragon revolves around keeping most of your party within an area of effect radius, this is where area wide DoT spells are an interegal part of putting preasure on an entire area, damaging Paragons group advantage, and pushing the enemy around to secure a better possition. Because of such high defensive boosts on an entire area, the spells which target an entire area need to be effective too, as a counter. A poor nerf in the past which causes more nerfs in the future, DoT spells should never have been reduced to adjacent foes, they certainly hit you in the energy for an area wide effect. And the Frequency needs to be better too, since such minor damage needs to be frequent to make a continous impression on grouped enemies. DoT spells need to be location wide on all but perhaps Meteor Shower, and all of them need at least a 1/3rd reduction in recast time.

Ritualist doesn't fall behind Paragon because his effects arn't efficient, there is only one spirit which needs some redevelopment. His weakness lies in his immobility, drawing a single spirit isn't good enough, any Ritualist investing in attributes to improve spirits will bring at least 2, likely 4 spirits. Draw Spirit needs to draw at least 3, or all of your spirits from where ever they are to a nearby or adjacent circle around you. And a new Elite which did this, as well as refreshed all of your exsisting spirits would bring Ritualist back into the mobility game. Spirits are incredibly easy to kill, almost impossible to sustain, and cannot be stacked, so the one spirit you can have out at a time, which cannot be recast for a good 30 seconds to a minute, should at least be easily drug around if you bring a skill to do it.

The one spirit which doesn't work well is Displacement. It doesn't take a complete shutdown of melee attacks to stop an entire group of enemies from spiking an allie, it only takes 50%, maybe 75% at most, with that much miss ratio an assault is almost worthless, and using skills is more likely to fail than succeed. The only thing accomplished by blocking all attacks with Displacement is ensuring that it will be gone in 3 seconds, and your defensive support is gone so fast that it may as well not exsisted. For a spell which isn't available for another 45 seconds, this is unacceptable. 75% max, or even better, making it 25% or 50%, with a 100% chance to block attack skills. This way your defensive support will last long enough to actually keep allies alive for a duration instead of a moment, a spirit isn't for momentary defense.

Aside from that, If Paragon is outshining Ritualist so much, than the perfect solution is to add a counter for Paragon on Ritualist. A spirit which nullifies the effect of shouts and chants (not removes them, but nullifies their effect) is all that Ritualist needs to contend against Paragon. With this Ritualist will be accepted specifically as a counter to Paragon teams, and Paragon would have a counter equal to any other in the game.

If at any point you feel a class is too powerful and needs to be nerfed, look at it creatively and figure out why other classes arn't performing just as well. If you think about it, much which once was allowed previous classes to dish out just as well, but in the search for balance, nerfs were applied instead of remedies. Nerfs continue to make the game as a whole more mundain, they limit the proficiency of everything else when you try and break each build down one by one in order to keep them even. Nerfing is always a lazy way to balance the game, instead of creatively developing and improving other skills to overcome these features, you just reduce each feature til everything is boring.

Aside from that, skills which make killing an difficult to impossible belong in the game, combat is not all about killing your opponent. Great players recognize the value of staying alive over killing your opponent. If you don't die, than your enemy never scores, dieing is the highest penalty in the game, and this class obviously involves more survival support than spiking. The fact that there are ways to block even the toughest spikes and onslaughts is just a balanced feature, you will have to utilize alternative means to win.

As for Degen, there are several ways to apply degen to an entire group, and alot of it. Burning can be applied to entire groups liberally, if you think extinguish is the answer, think harder. With skills like Searing Flames, Rodgorts Invocation, and worst of all, Mark of Rodgort in combination with single or group effecting fire damage can put burn on enemies regularly, and there are even more burning abilities in Dervish and Paragon. Add that with hexes like Ulcerous lungs, dealing degen hex and bleeding to a group of units if the enemy uses shouts, and Suffering, and even combinations of fragility with any degen conditions, and you have an outstanding scatter of degen which will put alot of presure on grouped enemies. One of my favorite techniques is a Paragon with "Their on Fire" and a dedicated burning Elementist, the combination of group damage, group degen, and defensive increase make for a very worthwile addition to any party.

Nerfing is rarely an appropriate solution, it almost never is. Unless there are mistaken figures and unnoted applications which produce incredibly broken results, it isn't deserving of a nerf. The proper solution is to develope a proper selection of counters and advantages against enemies using or applying certain skills. All it takes is are some attacks which deal extra damage on a foe for every shout, chant and echo on them, and boom. 100 ways to fix the problem creatively, 1 crappy, lazy, shitless solution (nerf it), obviously getting a little bit creative and respecting the available counters is a much better solution.

qft... and I am off to catch some sleep. >_>

JoeKnowMo · Nov 28, 2006, 06:58 AM // 06:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

The best examples of this are two Paragon elites: [skill=text]"Incoming!"[/skill] and [skill=text]Angelic Bond[/skill]. "Incoming!" is designed to be an anti-spike skill. However, "Incoming" may have too much synergy, considering that many other Paragon skills can greatly fortify the party already. "Incoming" needs a duration nerf and a recharge nerf, so that it's use primarily for spikes only, and not for general protection. Angelic Bond is basically the same as Incoming, except it works on NPCs as well, such as the Guild Lord and Ghostly Hero, making them near indestructable as well. And unlike Life Bond, you can't easily kill the Bonder: That "Bonder" has an upwards of 96 AL. Angelic Bond needs to be less spammable: a 10e casting cost and a 10 second recharge should do it.

Now, for a few other problems:

Low Adrenal Shouts: [skill=text]"Watch Yourself!"[/skill] and [skill=text]"Go for the Eyes!"[/skill] can be spammed very constantly, giving the Paragon near unlimited Energy. I like the mechanic, but it's a tad abuseable. Upping both to 6 adrenaline should make both of those more reasonable. (and probably a recharge of 10ish seconds on "Watch Yourself!")

Finales: [skill=text]Energizing Finale[/skill] is famous for granting unlimited Energy. That's plainly unbalanced. The other 2 finales suffer from the same abuse. increasing the casting cost of the Finales to 10e (and increasing the recharge of Energizing Finale to 10 seconds, to keep in line witht he other 2 finales) should be quite fitting: Energy is the Paragon's biggest drawback: It's the cure to all its problems.

No Counters: Ritual Lords could be interrupted to hell. Paragons can't. There's only one skill: [skill=text]Vocal Minority[/skill]. But it's still a hex, and it's easily removed, especially since every damn team is running a Divert Hexes. Decreasing the recharge of Vocal Minority to 5 seconds can alleve the Hex Removal, but it's not a permanent fix.

What do you think? Do Paragons need a huge nerf?

Incoming lasts for 7s out of 20 which still leaves 13s for getting your spike on. In addition, a well-timed Blackout followed by a Signet of Humility will provide another 20s w/o Incoming. If Incoming being active for only 7s out of 40s is overpowered then everything needs a nerf. I could see increasing its cost to 10e, but the recharge is fine as it is.

If the para is using "Can't Touch This" then Blackout won't work, but a Mes w Sig of Humility and Mantra of Inscriptions can make it so the paragon never gets off a single Incoming. Seriously, if Incoming is so key, then a single Mes should be able to turn the battle in your favor.

Angelic Bond (although not removable) is far worse than Life Barrier or Life Bond. The 5s recharge is hardly a problem as a paragon that spreads it out on allies takes a lot of damage and will die pretty fast.

Diversion (can catch the odd chant/shout) and Vocal Minority are decent counters to the Paragon but prone to hex removal.

Energizing Finale needs a nerf to 10e and 10s recharge, but the other Finales are really not overpowered. Finales get most of their power from GFTE being spammed, but a monk being targeted would be pretty dumb to attack (to trigger GFTE) instead of kiting.

GFTE and WY don't need a nerf. Soothing Images, Spirit Shackles, and Roaring Winds should be decent counters for these.

Some suggestions other than the typical let's nerf paragons all to hell so no one ever plays them again:

1. Nerf hex removals like Divert Hexes (maybe a 15s recharge).

2. Reduce the recharge on Vocal Minority to 5s (already suggested).

3. Switch HA back to 8 players (which most HA'ers want anyway).

4. Have some environment effect (like Victory or Death) in HA to encourage offense over defense.

It appears that the current HA metagame encourages defense and that is the main problem. Instead of making the paragon go the way of the dodo, it would be better to promote offense in some way. (Maybe give morale boosts for the team doing more damage... idk).

Paragons are not overpowered in RA, TA, or GvG. In fact, in RA and TA shouts and chants are pretty bad due to the gimped energy gain with less than 6 allies around. I would hesitate to nerf them just because of HA.

DreadZero · Nov 28, 2006, 07:13 AM // 07:13

Why don't we just nerf everybody? Then we can all fail equally well?

ayame ftw · Nov 28, 2006, 07:16 AM // 07:16

maybe if they added a nother team to the HoH, it would be harder to hold with paraway, so they dont have to nerf all the paragon skills
and add 1 more minute to the HoH timer

Permasiel · Nov 28, 2006, 07:22 AM // 07:22

Always cracks me up when I see people telling others to use the well as a counter.

If you can't kill because of the paragon, how are you gonna get a corpse for your 25s well? Not to mention the paragon would have to be retarded to stay in it. Wells suck.

twicky_kid · Nov 28, 2006, 07:48 AM // 07:48

Some people have mentioned it but most of you have overlooked the underlining problem here (and yes I read the entire thread).

Leadership is what keeps the paragon going. Even when EF the paragon wouldn't be able to spam anything if it wasn't for leadership giving him free energy from watch yourself and go for the eyes.

Also remember that spears miss a lot. They move through the air very slowly. Many times if the target changes any direction from the time the spear leaves my hand it will miss. You do not want to increase the adrenaline on skills very much because of this.

Here's my suggestions and some responses to the OP:

Leadership should be changed to 1e for every 3 ranks. This does not kill anything for the paragon but does make the take a break from spamming shouts and chants everywhere all the time. Expertise is easily the best attribute on the game but it doesn't even come close to leadership. I gain 6e for using an adrenaline skill while also making my other shouts and chants free or 60% off the energy cost. Even expertise can't touch that.

Incoming is not overpowered. Short duration, long recharge, and in the command line which only has 1 other good skill. Moving on.

Angelic bond same as above but in a better attribute line. Don't see a need for nerf.

Watch yourself this is the work horse of the paragon. Increase the adrenaline to 6-7 and increase the duration at 0 tactics. It can still be used like it was intended on wars and may even me considered a buff to some users. This will slow the EF triggers down.

Go for the eyes is a great skill. Is it overpowered? Hard to say. In some ways I want to say yes but in others no. The only real reason its on the bar is because you already have an investment in command for incoming, 4 adrenaline, another EF trigger. The skills effect is not really why its taken even though its affect is very good. I don't know if I would change this yet. I'd wait to see how everything else pans out first.

Energizing finale gets my battery of the year award. But honestly its not the skill that overpowered. Its how many short duration triggers there are. Do not change the energy cost. 5e for a 20e pool is fine. The other skills that are 10e trigger leadership so you are not really paying that full 10e. Change the casting time to 2 seconds so it can be interrupted. Change the recharge to 8 seconds. Paragons have to be in the center of the team to be affective. Too much forward or backline and they simply do not work. In the mid-line ranger/mesmer interrupts could reach him very easily. Even at 10e EF would work just fine. 3e per trigger and 6e from WYS and GFTE would easily pay for it with just 1 use of either one of those skills. The only way to balance EF is there to be a way for it to be easily interrupted because it cannot be removed.

To the OP you are not going to change any ones mind by arguing with them. Just state your peace and watch other's respond. The more you fight the more people will disagree with. Such is the nature of forums.

Now for the paragon counters. Everyone is right by saying that the counters are not powerful enough. Its not per say the counters that are the problem. Its divert/expel hexes that is the main problem. Even back in factions with expel I knew from that day forth that hex builds would never be viable again. During the NF preview with divert hexes I thought, "wow now hexes are not even worth considering." I create build for the majority of guilds I've been in. Any hex I've ever placed in the build is a hex that doesn't need to be there very long to be effective. Back in when GW started the hex removal was seriously underpowered. Now its to a point where hexes are a liability. That is something Anet does need to change.

Paperfly · Nov 28, 2006, 08:12 AM // 08:12

Quote:

Oh, and I agree with Kang's point..
It just confuses me.. Why nerf Watch Yourself! when:
1) not every Paragon is a P/W
2) it's a warrior skill, not a paragon skill!

A quick point on this one -

Watch Yourself was balanced for the old "earshot" range, which was enormously increased for Nightfall - and it was a good, if unspectacular, skill even then. Honestly, I was suprised that the original release skill-rebalance didn't either increase the adren requirement or add a "this shout has half the normal range" clause to it (which would be a restoration of the original functionality, not really a nerf).

B Ephekt · Nov 28, 2006, 09:07 AM // 09:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by chicks boy

They shouldn't be nerfed lol. You sound too serius, they are good buffer for team but they sucked at 1 on 1. I see a lot of P/W on alliances battle using Incoming and Watchyourself Spamming but i killed them less than 10 seconds with assassin. See? they are balanced. Like lilnate said dont cry lol.

Your point is irrelevant since Guild Wars pvp isn't balanced around 1v1. An assassin can kill almost anything in a 1v1 fight, but you wouldn't do any damage to a dual paragon build with Incoming and Song of Resto + wards.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thallandor

I agree and ask why then perhaps the weakness of other classes exist? Due to threads like this that exist in the past where bunch of PvP QQers get their lot to make nerf threads all over forums. And instead of finding solutions, they and Anet choose the Lazy way and start nerfing classes. In the end we just end up with a bunch of dumb downed classes with dumbed downed skills, making playing GW feel like participating in the special Olympics.

I know this might be hard to grasp but pvp requires a certain balance to live up to the "skill vs. time" motto. Spamming non-removable defense doesn't exactly require any skill, and the current counters are horribly ineffective at shutting down these paragons. So much so that the counters are exponentially harder to pull off effectively than the shouts.

Quote:

Apprently the enjoyment factor of the game for those in PvE is moot for PvPers who only care about themselves and that the world evolve around them. This thread is perfect proof of this.

And your posts are perfect examples of angsty pvers crying when people are sensible enough to want actual balance in pvp. So to apply some of your own logic, pve isn't the only thing in this game - pvpers deserve balance in the game they paid for. We just got two new professions and a ton of new skills, the concept that some of these skills will need a bit of tweaking shouldn't be a foreign one at this point. Maybe you could take it a little less personal that people want actual balance in the game?

Anyway, I don't think anyone wants to see paragon go the way of ritualists, but they are slightly imbalanced in their current state. I would actually prefer to see more and better counters added rather than seeing skills nerfed, but Anet seems to always want to make do with what's already out there. That's not really in our hands though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shinto Sharingan

Uhhh....as for no counters...
Hello!? Mesmers can totally kill adrenaline and energy and shut down a paragon in no time.

Less than 1/4 of the commonly used shouts are adrenaline based, and energy denial simply doesn't work when they have Energizing Finale and a decent spec into Leadership.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Qual

And paragon isn't a problem in GvG(yet).

Do you actually GvG? Almost every single team in the 100-1 range is running dual paragons, incoming chains, or some form of paragon defense VoD build.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeKnowMo

1. Nerf hex removals like Divert Hexes (maybe a 15s recharge).

Which would only destroy a perfectly good monk skill, one monks have been needing for a while now. Nobody would even think about taking it with a 15 second recharge when Expel is 8.

Darkobra · Nov 28, 2006, 09:56 AM // 09:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by lilnate22

the mighty one says this my most insignificant subject.

mesmers have simpathetic visage...ADRN prob solved!
necro-VM and WOS

now what we need is a overall shout removal i.e sumthing like deafness-foes cant be target of shouts
amnesia-remove all shouts,chants from target foe and perhaps have weakness be unable to shout

are you abashed by my ignorance? or just baffled that i got a thing called a brain and actualy use it to do sumthing other than sit here and shout
oOMG ANET NERF PLZ NERF! im too stupid to think of counters for paragons so pllz nerf it to hell!

so which one is it chump?
p.s hawk u got sum good points there bub.
but id say more like have incoming at 10e and keep the duration.

Nice job! Add conditions to prevent shouts! I mean it's not like any one plays a Restore Condition monk or anything...

Darkobra · Nov 28, 2006, 10:30 AM // 10:30

I've seen a lot of people complaining about incoming. At 16 command, it barely lasts under half the recharge time. 6 seconds, 7 seconds... then a 20 second recharge. It seems fine to me. Now, the counters to a paragon shout are VERY few. Roaring winds? Leadership ALONE is the counter. Vocal Minority? Hex remover. Now the one thing that any good necro should do is make PLENTY of hexes to cover this up. Not on just one person. On ALL the team. Parasitic bond on every one. Vocal Minority on the paragon. Life Transfer on the melee. The massive degen will distract the monk's attention AWAY from the paragon's hexes just long enough to be effective. Well of Silence is an easy one. Just take two steps away.

Now this leaves only two problems. Angelic Bond and Energizing Finale. To the person that said that a paragon would die fast because they'd cast it on their whole team, no they wouldn't. They'd cast it on the ghostly hero and use Incoming for that. Energizing Finale can keep any monk's energy up nicely so Angelic Bond damage would be minimal. A raise of energy in the shouts would probably be necessary, as at a decent leadership level, around half the shouts would be entirely free. I mean, even a Ranger runs out of energy with a high expertise.

JoeKnowMo · Nov 28, 2006, 12:01 PM // 12:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by B Ephekt

Nobody would even think about taking it (Divert Hexes) with a 15 second recharge when Expel is 8.

There are a few solutions. You and the OP, among others favor the first:

1. Nerf the paragon in a major way.

Myself and a few others see a bigger problem which is that defense is overpowered compared to offense. As twicky_kid points out, hex removals are overpowered, which therefore all but eliminates hexes from the metagame. Our solution is:

2. Nerf the paragon a little.
3. Nert hex removals (Divert Hexes, Expel Hexes, and any others I might be missing).
4. Buff some counters like Vocal Minority in terms of recharge time.

Also, you didn't respond to the suggestion of bringing a Mesmer w Sig of Humility and Mantra of Inscriptions. Those two skills can completely shut down Incoming.

lilnate22 · Nov 28, 2006, 12:08 PM // 12:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

So your response is that Paragons shouldn't be nerfed is because it would affect them in PvE. Right. That's very persuasive. Do you have any tangible arguments against Paragon nerfing?

You do realize that Guild Wars is both a PvE and a PvP game?

Also, I do use a Paragon on my Hero Squad in PvE. The only skills he uses which I mentioned in the OP are Watch Yourself and GTFE (only for damage aid/protection, the energy is unneeded). I don't use Incoming or Energizing Finale. And I've completed almost every Master quest. If you need either of those skills as a crutch, you truly suck at PvE.

Guild Wars is an evolving game. Adapt.

omg zinger u just put the gun to ur head and pulled the trigger bub!

read ur last sentance..
GUIILD WARS IS AN EVOLVING GAME.ADAPT

just like you said bub ADAPT! and stop calling for nerfs

The Silver Star · Nov 28, 2006, 01:06 PM // 13:06

Dont flame me because i agree something needs to be done because there is no way to remove shouts and they have no cast time which is overpowered something has to be done because we have a long wait until a new chapter where new skills may come to counter shouts but i dont think we should have to wait 5 months or how ever long. I wouldnt really call it nerf that is needed but something needs to be done soon to balance it. Think of it as a balance no a nerf just like searing should be "balanced" compared to existing skills.

lyra_song · Nov 28, 2006, 02:09 PM // 14:09

For me its:

Adjust paragon Leadership a little.
Adjust paragon skills a little.
Buff paragon counters a little.

really and truly the counters suck.

yesitsrob · Nov 28, 2006, 03:31 PM // 15:31

I find it funny how people even considering Well of Silence a counter. If I played Paragon, my counter to well of silence would be "get out of the RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing well". That takes 1 second... so in fairness, I guess you could shut a paragon down for 1 second with well of silence. wowza

Vocal Minority is about the best, but it's not got the greatest of recharges and occasionally you'll find smart use of veil to win. Also the fact that everyone brings divert hexes. it needs to be a bit more spammable to be that good of a counter really. To even have a chance of shutting a paragon down with this skill you need to be running it in a pretty heavy hex build.

ulcerous lungs wouldn't make me stop shouting.

I guess there's Diversion, but what isn't diversion a solid answer too ^^. Paragons are really hurting the metagame right now. It's pretty darn dull at times, and I feel slightly gimped when not running one. Because the defense they offer is _that_ good....

Right now, this RaO, Searing Flame, Paragon stuff is about the most retard-friendly stuff gw has seen since necro and obsidian flame spike.

Before making changes to the paragon skills (with the exception of energizing finale which is just retarded) I'd like the route of more viable counters to be looked into. As is, they are very limited right now.