Curse

erk · Feb 06, 2008, 11:28 PM // 23:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by HolyHawk

I get the impression that gvg is getting really one-dimensional; it's true the only one objective of it is to kill the guild lord, but you could do it in several ways; now there's no reason not to do it just by dedicate splits. The skill updates can always get an wtf from me ... power leak ether renewed, GoE even better (but why exactly?), mending refrain made garbage while it could be just changed to non-endless. Trebuchets not working on vod .. just so your ultra-npcs do make it to the stand, oh yeah, vod still at 18 min.

GvG gets one dimensional often, that's why they do skill updates to get some change back into the meta, there are too many skills to fine tune a perfect balance without some serious maths and research, so the next best thing is to create some variation from time to time.

I see opportunities for 4 + 4 purpose build split teams with essentially nobody left at the flag stand, not common in the past. Or more solo ganks across a wider number of professions as a result of the improved self heals.

Rebel Zero · Feb 06, 2008, 11:31 PM // 23:31

Pleak was killed why?

SoR buff = Epic Fail

Legally · Feb 06, 2008, 11:37 PM // 23:37

random nerf

VoD at 25 mins please, or something..

Kanishka · Feb 06, 2008, 11:41 PM // 23:41

Well I feel quite depressed...

Please tell me why, oh WHY, every single patch must nerf the Mesmer??? Ok Pleak was unbalanced; but going from -19 energy to -5 is... overkill. Isn't it?

Next, the new VoD...
Ok you want us to split. It's quite clear. The point is, where's the choice? Is it now really viable to NOT to split to kill NPCs? Will that improve the current meta? I can't imagine how.

SoR buffed. Did it need to? I'm not the only one to think it didn't. More the contrary, in fact... Or is it to compensate the big nerf to Mrefrain?

And nothing on Splinter Weapon and Anc's Rage. I'm puzzled... (and depressed, as I said)

Zuranthium · Feb 06, 2008, 11:51 PM // 23:51

What I Like:

* The change to archers at VoD (will need to see how this actually plays, though).

* 1 energy skills. They've finally broken out of the 5, 10, 15, 25 energy constraints on skills. I hope to see more variation on skill costs in the future.

* Deep Freeze buff. It just might see play again.

* Protective Was Kaolai buff.

Both Good and Bad:

* Glyph of Energy buff. A viable Elite for Elems now, but it gives Mesmers such easy access to 25-energy spells and they shouldn't have that. This needs to be tied to Energy Storage and not reduce spells by 25 energy until Attribute Rank 9.

* Avatar of Grenth. Nice that it finally got changed, but I'm not sure if this incarnation is totally solid yet.

* Divine Healing/Heaven's Delight. Going in the right direction, but the heal right now is probably too small for this to be worth a slot on a Monk's bar.

* Healing Signet. Good that it was looked at for a buff, but this isn't the correct one. The activation time and not the healing amount is what needed to be changed.

WTF:

* The total raping of Power Leak. It was too good, but this is ridiculous.

* People in this thread saying that Whirlwind is going to be on Monk bars now. It has a bad aftercast...it's still not going to be on ANY (good) bar.

* The Motigon change. All this did was make it so that they can now run less Restoration and more Spear Mastery. Paragons need quite a bit of work. All Echoes should just be turned into Chants and all those skills with a "never-ending" duration should have their functionality changed. After that, fix the Leadership attribute so Paragon energy management isn't dependent on constantly hitting 5 party members with your shouts/chants.

* The new VoD shout. Why place even MORE dependence upon NPCs???

~Z

X Black Chaos X · Feb 06, 2008, 11:51 PM // 23:51

I like this change to grenth and MR but i still think something should be done about monks who spam guardian and smoke powder

Riotgear · Feb 06, 2008, 11:53 PM // 23:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

Victory or Death
• Victory or Death: increased the damage to 25%.
• NPCs receive an additional 5% damage bonus each minute after Victory or Death.

Ugh.

Quote:

• Power Leak: decreased target foe's Energy loss to 1..5.

Holy shit, it's not going to be able to sit down for weeks after what the nerfbat did to it there.

Quote:

• Plague Touch: increased number of conditions transferred to 1..3.

Just change it to 2.

Nice that they've overall improved the self-heal toolbox. Glyph of Resto in particular looks a LOT more attractive now. A couple misfires, especially Healing Signet.

Splinter and A. Rage untouched. /facepalm

Andrew Patrick · Feb 06, 2008, 11:56 PM // 23:56

NPCs spreading out should effectively nerf Splinter, don't you think?

Riotgear · Feb 06, 2008, 11:59 PM // 23:59

We'll see. I have a feeling people are going to find a way to make them cluster together again, GW's AI is phenomenally dumb. A. Rage has other issues.

Kaon · Feb 07, 2008, 12:02 AM // 00:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

We'll see. I have a feeling people are going to find a way to make them cluster together again, GW's AI is phenomenally dumb. A. Rage has other issues.

The Hero AI when it comes to skill usage is amazing. Smarter and better than 90% of the players.

TheOneMephisto · Feb 07, 2008, 12:04 AM // 00:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by X Black Chaos X

I like this change to grenth and MR but i still think something should be done about monks who spam guardian and smoke powder

Monks don't use smoke powder, and guardian is a fine skill.

There are a lot of parts about this update that make no sense, but most of them have already been covered. Overall, I'm interested in seeing what happens next mainly, the effects of increased party-healing and the new VoD (again) will be interesting to watch at the least and hopefully will be in the right direction. And killing ineptitude/clumsiness was good, though I think sins still might need a hit.

And I wonder how effective the spreading out actually is, as most people will probably still find a way to exploit it as always.

Riotgear · Feb 07, 2008, 12:07 AM // 00:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaon

The Hero AI when it comes to skill usage is amazing. Smarter and better than 90% of the players.

"OMG I'M GONNA DIE!!!! TROOOOOOOOL UNGUEEEEEEEE----"

*splat!*

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOneMephisto

Monks don't use smoke powder, and guardian is a fine skill.

HB.

TheOneMephisto · Feb 07, 2008, 12:18 AM // 00:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

HB.

Are you joking, or what?

If not, HB has so many other bigger problems that absolutely destroy the entire gametype already that it definitely shouldn't ruin perfectly fine skills (guardian, no one cares about smoke powder) that play good roles in other gametypes. If all the other major degrading problems in HB were first fixed and it turned out that guardian was creating major imbalances it might be a different story.

Either way, doesn't everyone and their mother carry around at least a rend, probably a corrupt, and many times a warmongers in order to prevent stuff like guardian?

Draikin · Feb 07, 2008, 12:37 AM // 00:37

Speaking of which, it would be nice to see Anet doing something about the problems in HB for a change. It's by far the worst PvP format in GW now and it's been almost a year since Anet released an update for it. Even the skill balance updates ignore the format completely.

FoxBat · Feb 07, 2008, 12:50 AM // 00:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Draikin

It's by far the worst PvP format in GW now and it's been almost a year since Anet released an update for it.

Izzy stopped playing it?

Although I would tend to think the infrequent AI buffs are related to it.

Skye Marin · Feb 07, 2008, 12:58 AM // 00:58

Random "Victory is Ours!" idea tweak: Add 5% damage for each morale boost to each team (maximum 3 boosts), and an additional 10% to the team with more NPCs.

Example at VoD:
Red Team: 1 morale, 7 NPCs = 15%
Blue Team: 2 morale, 6 NPCs = 10%

This way victory is split (pun intended) between splits and holding the flagstand.

Really good round of buffs here. Blood is kind of in an odd place, and pleak got hit really hard, but I'm looking forward to the next round.

I'd like to see Shadow Form remove a stance from the user, so it can't be used with Deadly Paradox to resign-grief. Maybe some more common zergway counters? Something crazy like: foes suffering from weakness have only 'area' listening range for shouts and chants. That could lead the way to more utility paragon buffs.

And, of course, Hero Battles love in the form of:
-nerfing recall / shadow steps to a net distance traveled of earshot
-reducing the morale rate again, to about 180 seconds per point per shrine
-increasing the effective single-cap rate for a shrine, or removing it

Riotgear · Feb 07, 2008, 01:13 AM // 01:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOneMephisto

Are you joking, or what?

No, I'm saying that's where the complaints stem from. They're both fine, the button-mashing Assassins cry about them though because it means they have to actually make their heroes cast things and stop after 123 instead of going right to 4567.

undeadgun · Feb 07, 2008, 01:16 AM // 01:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Legally

random nerf

VoD at 25 mins please, or something..

seriously? give more time to let em take down NPCs one by one? no uh ah

Draikin · Feb 07, 2008, 01:23 AM // 01:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by FoxBat

Although I would tend to think the infrequent AI buffs are related to it.

That's because QA is going through the bug reports on the official wiki, which is also why there have been several bugfixes for quests and armor glitches recently. I appreciate the fact the devs are solving some of the AI problems now but that alone won't repair HB.

Anet has ignored the format completely when it comes to updating the broken morale meter mechanics. At least with GvG they balance skills and update the VoD mechanics after evaluating every MaT. When it comes to Hero Battles, spiritway wins the MaT and Anet simply does nothing about it.

Mysterial · Feb 07, 2008, 01:31 AM // 01:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zuranthium

* 1 energy skills. They've finally broken out of the 5, 10, 15, 25 energy constraints on skills. I hope to see more variation on skill costs in the future.

The only thing I ever thought was particularly wrong with the energy costs was that they chose 25 instead of 20 when they have been consistently unwilling/unable to give skills the appropriate power level for 25. I'm not sure there's much to be gained in increasing the granularity - it's simply a neutral design choice that needs to be considered when creating the skills, not something that's inherently good or bad in itself.

Quote:

* Glyph of Energy buff. A viable Elite for Elems now, but it gives Mesmers such easy access to 25-energy spells and they shouldn't have that. This needs to be tied to Energy Storage and not reduce spells by 25 energy until Attribute Rank 9.

The only thing that can possibly come out of Glyph of Energy being buffed is abuse of the Exhaustion spells people were using already (likely Gale). Nobody uses Glyph of Energy for the energy mangement; Elementalists have better choices if you need the energy and you usually don't. It's not going to promote anything positive - the 25e and/or Exhaustion skills people didn't use before will continue to not be used because they are bad skills.

Quote:

* The total raping of Power Leak. It was too good, but this is ridiculous.

I still haven't figured out why they buffed it all those times in the first place, let alone why they obliterated it now.

Quote:

* People in this thread saying that Whirlwind is going to be on Monk bars now. It has a bad aftercast...it's still not going to be on ANY (good) bar.

Last I checked, Whirlwind has the normal aftercast, not the PBAoE aftercast of suck.

Also, LOL at the Mystic Regeneration change. Is it so important that it be a fast cast always available cover enchantment or is someone over there just unable to see what's actually wrong with it?