Curse

InfernalSuffering · Jan 17, 2009, 04:21 PM // 16:21

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

I am one of the people from rawr who have tried to give izzy (anet) the most input on the game and skill balance

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

We do not care too much about the actual balance of the game

Just the kind of people I like with the most input on game balance - the ones who don't give a shit about it and just want

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

the best chance to beat our opponent

Teh Leet Skeet · Jan 17, 2009, 04:37 PM // 16:37

Ladies Ladies Ladies... enough with this nonsense... It sounds to me like everyone but polly is simply not going to be satisfied with the skill updates until there are skills in this game to overpower rawr spike... Imo people who dont know how to play the game or play it very well are looking for an easy way out... They are looking for a "God-like" bar in which rawr cant beat while playing "rawrspike" Like chop chop said, People are complaining about skills which have a counter... Just shut up and play, use the counters to your advantage... Izzy and others who have the power to balance skills have a hard job. Its literally like being a president... No one person can represent the views of an entire population... The the creators a break, stop complaining, and play the frickin game.

Bobby2 · Jan 17, 2009, 04:50 PM // 16:50

I'm with whoever has the balls to adapt...

rohara · Jan 17, 2009, 05:02 PM // 17:02

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

So, on one hand you complain about a template (lingering) which cannot split, stall, heal, interrupt, spike, snare and has very little defense, its just a pressure gamble.
While in the same breath you complain that matches last too long.

thanks for your attention, chop chop. i'm not complaining about the lingering template as a whole - quite the contrary, i think pressure builds should indeed be viable, even hex based ones - however, lingering curse, as a single skill and in its current form, is quite overpowered. that is where my complaint lies. and with all due respect, i don't see this template as more of a gamble than any other, and this complaint is in no way related to my opinion on match length. i simply think waiting 28 minutes to break a stalemate is far too long and wastes everyone's time. pressure builds do not require 28 minute matches to be effective.

Greedy Gus · Jan 17, 2009, 06:06 PM // 18:06

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

We do not care too much about the actual balance of the game, outside of the fact that we/I prefer seeing powerful pressure oriented skills with viable counters to them, to allow for more 'mind gaming' and a less stale game.
all I want is to be rewarded to out thinking my opponent, if I know what he is going to do then I want to have a way of taking advantage of it.

There's not really a whole lot to be accomplished by discussions or arguments at this point; this quoted sentiment is the heart of the issue, and your direct unapologetic statements at least make it clear where you firmly stand to any who didn't know.

"Build wars" used to be considered by the competitive community overwhelmingly (vocal majority at least)as a necessary evil to be minimized, cautioned against & complained about in nearly every discussion. There may have been multiple posts by now if this were 1-2 years earlier, thanking that this method of thinking didn't go into the evolution of chess, starcraft, or counter-strike (successful, lasting, competitive games). And now the top guild(s) left in the game, in league with the game's skill balancer, openly prefer & profess pushing the game further toward pure build wars.

I don't blame the players, because everyone has their own preferences for style of fun & competition, but I will say that the current crop of top contenders and the similar style of those who have quit the game are direct results of the style taken to developing the game.

FoxBat · Jan 17, 2009, 08:40 PM // 20:40

Starcraft implements builds in a better and more flexible way, but it's pretty funny to think that it doesn't involve build wars, or that there isn't some gamble when you start build orders when you haven't fully scouted your opponent. And let's ignore M:TG while we're at it, where build wars is at least 33% and luck the other 33%.

ChopChop · Jan 17, 2009, 09:30 PM // 21:30

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Originally Posted by Greedy Gus

openly prefer & profess pushing the game further toward pure build wars.

I'll let you in on a secret, over the past year the many nerfs to various midline templates have pushed the game far far away from 'buildwars'.
In the 'old days' you used to say that a good guild should be competent at playing 2-3different builds to surprise the opponent and keep them guessing what they might do.
Today almost every single top guild, with very few exceptions runs just 1 build, depending on the map, there is no 'buildwars', so to speak, left.

So what your saying is dead wrong, the old game had much more 'buildwars' the game now is very easy to approach with just 1 build.

But people complain about rawr/other guilds 'just running the same shit', thus I am giving my input as to how to make the game more than 1 build fits all.

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Originally Posted by InfernalSuffering

Just the kind of people I like with the most input on game balance - the ones who don't give a shit about it and just want

I know your just trying to look clever, but I will reply anyway.
You may find that Izzy uses everyones input as you are doing here on the guru forum, as in not a whole lot.
So what I want and argue for is, correctly observed, quite far from what I am playing in game, this is because the game is, as I explained to gus, far from what I personally would like it to be.
But that does not mean I take the route other people do and complain about it or play less effective builds because I think they are 'more fun' or something like that, I play guildwars to win, and thus I will play the build I believe have the highest chance of winning, uncorrelated to how I think the game balance should be.

The fact that I am arguing for a radically different game, and you guys are complaining about the current game, should make you think more about what I am saying instead of trying to box me in with the idea that what the game is now is what I want, but to each his own ideas

valence · Jan 18, 2009, 12:46 AM // 00:46

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

And likewise reducing offense makes said builds harder to kill, what is your point?
You can probably argue that if certain skills allow people to guarantee a 'decent' chance at spike kills, and said skills are hard to counter then people may opts to run only those skills, thus if you buff skills so that the given number of skills needed to achieve this gets lower, then there will be more skills that can potentially provide defense.
However your statement does not hold when it comes to applying pressure, a build that attempts to win the game based on 'pressure' is prone to countering and thus cannot afford to just bring 'more defense' but must invest in skills to apply said pressure vs. more types of builds, a buff to non spike pressure skills allows pressure builds ot take more spike defense or more pressure thus more easily kill spike / defensive builds, sorry but your logic is wrong.

I'm not sure how you look at pressure builds, but our views are certainly not the same. Mainly because you think it is defense that win you the game, while it is your offense.

Rawr does not win their game because a stand rit with weapon of warding. Nor does that Expell Hexes win anything. Snares don't win and Enfeeble never killed me. What does kill me are omega spikes that in the current state with Rend and MoI can't even be protted (but even if they can be protted, it is fundemental flaw in the game).

When offense is limited and especially that comming from the midline, you will not be able to 3-2-1 to victory. Yes you might not die, but you will not win. Your puny damage simply won't do anything, while the other team that brings a bit more can run around the map to stall (your words on split builds :P).

That said. BA win games for Rawr. Paras win games for rawr. Arage win games for rawr (remember the 1/4th cast arage, please dont tell me that was not the most OP spike skill ever). Those skills define rawr way. Those skills make rawr way (fortress way) viable to be played. Especially in the current non-vod world.

Funny enough my view on a balanced build is very wide. I consider every build capable of splitting offensively, defensively, pressure and spiking while standing up to most things thrown at you as a balanced build. Rawr build fullfill all these things, through my view rawr build fullfill all the balanced rolls. Yet this build is capable of taking 5 defensive characters. Thats not really balanced.. :P

Often I hear people saying when proph only and during factions the game as it is now are kinda the same, including people from rawr. First of, a game defined by VoD is never the same as the game we have right now. First defensive builds had an insane buff due the VoD spike element and the npc's doing the damage for you. This has been removed, now you, the team has to bring the damage. Skills like A-Rage allow you to bring insane damage together with a lolilol ranger ^^. Again Lightning Orb should have been, and always been the epitome of any spike skill. Never ever should a skill that does more damage in 1/4th cast time do more damage then Orb. That skill is for a reason 9 nrg, 2 sec cast.

edit: just to make the obvious obvious. i do not blame rawr for running their build, i agree that their build has the best chance of winning anything in the current state of the game. Tho i highly disagree in your circle of creeps.

gfullgrates · Jan 18, 2009, 07:47 AM // 07:47

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

You may find that Izzy uses everyones input as you are doing here on the guru forum, as in not a whole lot.

Then why is new map rotation for Janurary the same map rotation that rawr suggest on balance forum??

Because ISLE OF WURMS as the first map means [rawr] doesnt have to play Wurms in the SINGLE ELIMINATION because [rawr] knows Wurms is their worst map. By the time they get to Frozen in final, they will be playing against 8v8 build since all the other maps are 8v8 builds.

scruffy · Jan 18, 2009, 08:31 AM // 08:31

if it was just some massive conspiracy by rawr, dont you think they would just leave the map out altogether?

wurms is a terrible map anyways

ChopChop · Jan 18, 2009, 08:37 AM // 08:37

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Originally Posted by gfullgrates

Then why is new map rotation for Janurary the same map rotation that rawr suggest on balance forum??

Because ISLE OF WURMS as the first map means [rawr] doesnt have to play Wurms in the SINGLE ELIMINATION because [rawr] knows Wurms is their worst map. By the time they get to Frozen in final, they will be playing against 8v8 build since all the other maps are 8v8 builds.

This rotation is mainly made up by izzy and ackmed, the only influence anyone from rawr seemed to have was pushing frozen the final map instead of uncharted.

Personally I like playing on wurms, in the last 7-8 months we have only lost 2 games on wurms as far as I can remember.
Well done by sup to pick a good build against us, but we can't win all games, and spec our build for all situations

Apok Omen · Jan 18, 2009, 08:58 AM // 08:58

Complaining about rawr's view, power, and build is like yelling at a stick for being a stick.

It's still going to be a stick, and will remain a stick until you manage to quit yelling at it and decide to find a way to break it.

Thus, it won't matter how much you point out their contradictions or unveil their secret guildwars-domination plot or denounce their build, because they see this as a competitive game where, instead of making petitioning for changes and screaming "izzy is an f***ing moronic skill balancer" for the upteenth time, they are utilizing what works for them and winning with it.

Face it, shouting for honor and fairness will not make you a better player. Playing will.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Jan 18, 2009, 11:15 AM // 11:15

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Originally Posted by ChopChop

It is a a gamble in the sense that if applying pressure does not work for you then the template provides you with very few alternatives.

This is more or less the nature of pressure, you don't have the room to slot in a lot of utility and defense, the problem about this Lingering Me/N though, is that it's not really a gamble as pressure WILL happen against any build that doesnt have insane party healing and hex removal (i.e. against any build that isn't a spike build.)

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And likewise reducing offense makes said builds harder to kill, what is your point?

My point is that there should be a balance, where kills happen, but not exclusively through spikes, in fact, I'd go as far as to say, spiking shouldn't be the easiest way to get kills, as it's also the easiest way to not die.

Back when LoD was the only party heal people would bring, it was actually possible to pressure someone as it wasn't incredibly difficult to shut it down (especially not vs people that don't weapon swap)

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However your statement does not hold when it comes to applying pressure, a build that attempts to win the game based on 'pressure' is prone to countering and thus cannot afford to just bring 'more defense' but must invest in skills to apply said pressure vs. more types of builds, a buff to non spike pressure skills allows pressure builds ot take more spike defense or more pressure thus more easily kill spike / defensive builds, sorry but your logic is wrong.

The only 'pressure skill' that's currently problematic is Lingering Curse, I don't really see your point here, perhaps you missed the builds people were running with 4 monks a rit and a me/n? I would argue that these builds are more defensive than 'pressure builds' people ran previously, and that Lingering Curse gettinf buffed is the main reason such builds are viable atm.

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Says you, sorry your not designing this game.

You're* And you're right, I'm not, it is my opinion, the game has been severely dumbed down, people achieve pressure by putting a 5e 10r 30d nearby area hex on some people and run 1-2 copies of a 5e 10r ~20d skill that allows you to ignore stances and prots pretty much altogether, I can't imagine I'm the only one that prefers a game where one has to actually think about using skills, swap targets to draw prot, shut down key parts of the other teams defense etc. over a game where any retard can put a hex on someone and train that target till it either dies, the hex gets removed or it gets weapon of warding'd.

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the build we (rawr) chose to play is based on what we believe will give us (based on our player types) the best chance to beat our opponent (based on their play style), thus our build is defined by the balance of the skills in the game as well as the mechanics of the game combined with the 16 players in the match.

If by that you mean, run just enough offense to get kills (through spiking) and enough defense to make dying pretty much impossible and previously stall to get to VoD by running flags with warriors and such then sure, the truth is rawr's playstyle has been more or less exactly the same since you guys stopped running hexes, the only change is that there's no more VoD to stall to and the overload of defense has become harder to shutdown (LoD, Aegis, Wards replaced by PwK, Stances and Weapon of warding).

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Changing any factors means that our build may likely change, this has been the case for over 2 years now, I am surprised you still don't get it.
Changing any few skills in our build does very little to alter the play style needed to win, it just deprives the game of options.

I have no doubts that rawr will never change their playstyle, the problem I have with the game right now, is that there is no kind of balance whatsoever between 'spike builds', 'pressure builds' and 'split builds', spike builds were pretty much always the easier/better style, but at least other builds were viable.

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I am sorry that you still do not have a firmer grasp on how GW really works, one day you might work it out, but if you truly wanted the game to conform to a different play style then the key is buffing other skills, changing mechanics

Sure, we all know how eager Izzy is to change game mechanics, the VoD removal is pretty much the only mechanic change that happened 'recently' and it actually took rawr a lot longer to adapt to it (read, find a way to slot a shit ton of defense into a build and still allow for scoring spike kills) than a lot of other guilds.

Anyway since getting Izzy to change game mechanics seems unlikely, changing skills is the only way to get any change at all. Instead of buffing skills, nerfing stuff like damage compression and several sources of stackable party healing will actually bring back some of the balance between spike, pressure and split.

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Sorry but, you must have ignored the post out of general principle then, both Jaden AND Jatt have on several occasions posted a complete list of suggested nerfs to ALL party healing skills, backed by other rawr members, I'm sure you know how to find them if you care.

The only instance I can think of was when Jatt suggested an insignificant nerf to Recuperation and a change to PwK that pretty much everyone agreed on months before that, but for some odd reason never happened, coincidentally in the same post he also suggested to buff motivation party heals. Jaden's posts in general are very good, it almost seems like he's not in rawr some times.

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I refer you to my last point, our build is a reflection of the balance and mechanics of the game and the people playing it, we play what we believe can best win, we plan to win, and we execute to win.

Lots of defense + spike, I know.

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We do not care too much about the actual balance of the game, outside of the fact that we/I prefer seeing powerful pressure oriented skills with viable counters to them, to allow for more 'mind gaming' and a less stale game.
all I want is to be rewarded to out thinking my opponent, if I know what he is going to do then I want to have a way of taking advantage of it.

If you want build wars to be viable, I'm personally not a fan of it as it turns the game into a bit of a gamble, consider that you only ever run 1 build, now I know at least Jatt argued on several occassions that there should not be a build that's can beat every other build, ironically enough rawr build has become said build, the only difference is that the philosophy behind such a build, is not how can we kill/win, but rather how can we prevent dying/losing.

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Defend them? well I wont cry a tear if they get nerfed, I am merely pointing out that people like you should be defending them, they are skills which allow pressure a chance to work, more similar buffs are needed to apply pressure from other angles as well.

A single elite hex that's cheap, spammable, has an insane duration and is AoE should not be the gateway to pressure in my opinion, it actually forces most guilds to either run a lot more defense (in the forms of party healing and hex removal) or run a similar build and get a more or less random wipe race going on.

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For example I would love to see more skills apply degen conditions, such as bleeding from various warrior attacks, I have posted many ideas on how pressure can function, other people from rawr have put more time into it than I, but I am hardly defending any skills I only defend diversity.

Nerf current sources of party healing, buff LoD to it's old stats (except make it earshot range), this alone would make pressure a lot better and it doesn't require any game mechanic changes.

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I blame pounds for harrasing me on msn!
Assuming you are referring to the only match available on observer mode I guess we have a different opinion about laughable.
from my perspective we dominated nH and only lost becuase our flag runner lagged out multiple times, one time holding the flag on ice.
Sorry did I say dominated? I meant utterly destroyed, as far as my own play goes, I generally do not really pay attention when we are winning like that.

Well you lost half your base and got some DP on the other team, I would hardly say 'utterly destroyed', basically you were running around aimlessly for 80% of the match, using enraging when you had full adrenaline (and actually had rush on your bar) magehunter'd people that were already knocked down, etc.

From what I heard the flagger didn't lag out, he merely pretended to to piss you off (don't ask me why, this is what I was told).

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More importantly though, I consider the job of a warrior to be making sure the combined offense functions

I'm pretty sure as a warrior, you were part of said offense, now without being offensive here, I wouldn't say you 'functioned'.

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But since you started, a free hint for you, rangers shouldn't be played like they are mesmers

Oh, so I shouldn't bring Diversion on my ranger then? In all seriousness though, when aegises get up vs a 2 ranger build it severely hinders what you can accomplish both pressure and defense wise, so I generally spend some time getting aegises down rather than spamming my skills on weak armored mesmers.

TheHaxor · Jan 18, 2009, 02:20 PM // 14:20

Why is no one bitching about how defense can be layered in this game?

pah01 · Jan 19, 2009, 01:34 AM // 01:34

All you top players left are playing a game that is arguably worse than it was at release. This game is broken in every single format. Everyone and their mother should remember that it was the power creep of nightfall coupled with no competitive play that emptied the playerbase. Now the power creep is twice as bad.

@CHOPPANDACHOPSOMEONE. You said in one of your posts that the solution is to buff other skills. What is wrong with you? The solution is to nerf almost all of the stupidly broken stuff in the game starting with every elite that Izzy buffed like an idiot in the last big update.

When the problems in the game are entirely due to power creep the solution is not to buff more stuff.

Joe

Jeydra · Jan 19, 2009, 02:43 AM // 02:43

@Mitch and Chop Chop - I think we really need less theory and more concrete stuff. What you've written thus far are very abstract and difficult to understand (I definitely don't get what the point is). So instead of 'buffing offense leads to ...' and 'pressure wins games because ...' why not post concrete buffs and nerfs, and answer questions like if you were in charge of balance, which five skills would you change? If you write something concrete, it would be a lot easier to follow.

For example:

Lingering Curse change 33% reduced healing -> 25%.
Intended effect: allow pressure to still work, but no longer make it possible for a single character to be responsible for half a team's pressure output.

Concepts like the 'rawr build' are relatively hard to grasp, but everyone should understand the above.

Mr Emu · Jan 19, 2009, 03:07 AM // 03:07

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Originally Posted by Jeydra

Concepts like the 'rawr build' are relatively hard to grasp, but everyone should understand the above.

TBH, I think that anyone with a worthwhile opinion should at least be able to fully comprehend the subject matter, thus referring to commonly known principles such as the 'rawr build' is completely acceptable

valence · Jan 19, 2009, 05:21 AM // 05:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

@Mitch and Chop Chop - I think we really need less theory and more concrete stuff. What you've written thus far are very abstract and difficult to understand (I definitely don't get what the point is). So instead of 'buffing offense leads to ...' and 'pressure wins games because ...' why not post concrete buffs and nerfs, and answer questions like if you were in charge of balance, which five skills would you change? If you write something concrete, it would be a lot easier to follow.

whats there to not understand.

OP said a single build that dishes out so much damage, should not be able to pressure as well (doing huge amounts of dps over time while still being available to give the spike damage when needed)

Then the discussion drifted away that the more compressed spike damage can be put into a build means you can take more defense.

Also I've never really considered pressure build as a pressure build. Usually pressure builds are just a type of build like hexway - condiover etc. Basically going over the top with a single element and hoping the few removals cant cope with it. I see pressure as a playstyle, not just a build. You can 3-2-1 all day or you can try and burn energy from the defensive side of the opponents team. Getting interrupt on key skills to increase pressure. Most balanced builds should be able to pressure a team to death, assuming the team plays in that style.

But why pressure if you only need 1war and 1ranger to kill stuff.

Jeydra · Jan 19, 2009, 05:54 AM // 05:54

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Originally Posted by Mr Emu

TBH, I think that anyone with a worthwhile opinion should at least be able to fully comprehend the subject matter, thus referring to commonly known principles such as the 'rawr build' is completely acceptable

It's not obvious to me what party heals have got to do with the 'rawr build', for example.

dies like fish · Jan 19, 2009, 06:20 AM // 06:20

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Originally Posted by Jeydra

It's not obvious to me what party heals have got to do with the 'rawr build', for example.

[Expel Hexes][Spotless Mind][Weapon of Warding][Weapon of Warding][Protective was Kaolai][Protective was Kaolai][Recovery][Recuperation]

Goodbye pressure