Curse

Rebel Zero · Feb 13, 2009, 01:52 AM // 01:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Still Number One

Nor should you be able to. It is called smiting for a reason. Being able to remove a condition or hex, deal damage to all adjacent foes, and heal your ally for 60+ health is retarded. Smiter's Boon being nerfed to hell was great because the skill simply should not have existed in the first place.

Smiting is a damage concept, not a healing one. You wanna heal people, be a heal monk, not a smiter.

I'll probably be flammed for this but I even think It should be implemented that divine favor doesn't even effect smiting skills period. A team of smiters should not be able to keep people alive. They should be able to do damage and that is it.

Taking Divine Favor away from smiting prayers is a little extreme since every other profession's attributes benefit from their class based one in some way, but I agree that smiter's boon should have never existed in the first place.

In concept it might have sounded like a good idea to give smiting monks the power to heal a split *Which I think is what it's original intention was*, but it just wasn't adapted that way.

Chocobo1 · Feb 13, 2009, 03:15 AM // 03:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rebel Zero

Taking Divine Favor away from smiting prayers is a little extreme since every other profession's attributes benefit from their class based one in some way, but I agree that smiter's boon should have never existed in the first place.

In concept it might have sounded like a good idea to give smiting monks the power to heal a split *Which I think is what it's original intention was*, but it just wasn't adapted that way.

Rits are really feeling those benifits of spawning power.

moriz · Feb 13, 2009, 03:19 AM // 03:19

1 extra second on weapon of warding really helps!

anyways, smiting was originally created with divine favor in mind, so if you remove it from smiting skills, you'll need to buff the entire lineup to balance them out.

Reverend Dr · Feb 13, 2009, 03:37 AM // 03:37

I hardly think the skill balance is perfect and like others I could write volumes on what I feel is wrong and what should be changed. Of course that has been done and no one really wants to listen to another take on skill balance.

So instead I'm going to talk about the dwindling playerbase. With a larger more active playerbase (like the one we had during prophecies) the mistakes, imbalances, and gimmicks would not seem like as much of a problem (as they didn't seem to be as big of problems back during prophecies).

PvP needs an injection of a large number of players. I see two large problems. 1: hurdles for entering. 2: disallowing existing customers from participating

1: Just unlock all skills/mods/runes. At one time it may have had a point (did it?), right now it only serves as a hurdle. You don't have these skills? Get out. There really is no reason to require PvE play before going to PvP. Lower arenas (RA/AB/FA) really share little in common with higher arenas (HA/GA, which those also share little in common with each other). Requiring play (or grinding) in lower arenas for access to higher arenas makes as much sense as Counter-Strike requiring that a player log so many hours on public servers before they have the option to join a private server. UAX everyone and just be done with it.

Skill requirements are another large hurdle, but little can be done about this. Current players aren't going to play at a lower level. However a large infusion of players would, on average, lower the bar alleviating a bit of this stress. This really doesn't help, the solution to the problem usually is solving the problem, but it would be nice to see a large community compensating for problems rather than the lack of a community exacerbating them.

2: I'm probably going to catch flack for this, but hear me out; UAX for every expansion a player owns, allow balth faction to buy pvp-unlocks for unowned expansions.

Some would say that owning all expansions would just be another hurdle to overcome. I chose my words carefully, I feel that it is a disallowing of existing customers to be able to participate in content for which they have already paid. Incomplete accounts (missing one of the GW games) are not excluded on an absolute level, true. However someone wheelchair bound is not excluded from playing basketball on an absolute level. They can have fun with their friends, they can even play in their own leagues (prophecies-only), but realistically they are going to be excluded from the NBA, college teams, high-school teams, and street pick up games, basically excluded from playing basketball.

If that analogy leaves you unsettled consider this one, Magic: The Gathering (GW has never been compared to this before). You do not have to have access to every card or every expansion to compete and have fun at a casual level. Friends, clubs, comic-book stores all have such atmospheres with regular games. Of course to compete or even not lose horribly at the tournament level, you must have that kind of card access. This works for magic because there is a casual level. GW is just not structured as such and there exists no casual level. Playing GW on an incomplete account is just not possible.

The obvious example that proves I am a moron is the PvP-access account. Just buy this and one has access to everything! The PvP-access was a great idea, unfortunately it was about three years late and ultimately is sub-par (the unlocks for it do not go very far at all). Furthermore I am not talking about opening up PvP free to anyone, I'm talking about opening it up to current customers. Anyone that bought Prophecies, Nightfall, or Factions already bought access to PvP; I am not proposing giving something for free, I am proposing giving something that was already paid for.

We've made a nice segway into something that is at the heart of the issue. I have no illusions otherwise, GW is a game that was created to turn a profit and the method of turning a profit is selling expansions. This is not something that I would have seriously proposed back during Factions, or for a while after Nightfall. Requiring payment for access to a game is perfectly fine. However an unspoken rule is that there must be a game worth paying for. I am afraid that the PvP community is reaching to such an all time low that it is just going to collapse into nothing. If the community ceases to exist making the game (which relies upon a community) non-existent, then there is no possibility at all of making money from the PvP game.

This game desperately needs an infusion of players. The only place I can really think to find such a group are the old players that, for whatever reason, did not buy all of the expansions. Of course this is not something to simply implement, this must also be advertised. Really should not be that difficult. Not too hard to get coverage from gaming blogs and sites and they already have an active e-mail for every account (I still get e-mails from Blizzard, but not a one from Anet). Implementing something like this and properly advertising it is just about the only way I can conceive to refill this dwindling population.

tl;dr: UAX everyone, allow unlocks for unbought expansions, advertise this to the old population

Aside from this, I am really hoping to see a major PvP update this April. Skill balance is nice and all, there is certainly room for work, but I hope that the update will be large without considering skill balance.

warrior running · Feb 13, 2009, 04:34 AM // 04:34

The hb morale

tigros · Feb 13, 2009, 10:12 AM // 10:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jatt

This depends on how you want to approach the balance of 1,235 skills.

Yes, you can make 1100 of them irrelevant and people can play with the remaining 135 (which seems to be what people want)

For some reason I don't think that's what Arena Net is/was going for.

whether that's a "problem" or not is a completely subjective view which can't really be solved within the context of a forum debate

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

Yet that's exactly what they achieved by brute-forcing skills into play with ridiculous buffs.

Yet, looking back at the MAT's from the last 1-2 years, there weren't many of them that had identical set of skills used (except rawr in the past year or so, who seems to have found the most adaptable build for them to win - with minor changes - regardless of the meta as perceived by the others).

Please note that it's not about the best who survives, but rather the most adaptable one... (or at least that's what Darwin says).

What Anet is doing is changing the rules of the game every now and then to keep the whole thing fresh (shaking the meta game here and there). Yet, most people would like to remain in their comfort zone because otherwise their "skills" would not be so visible anymore.

So you need to adapt in order to survive... don't fool yourself that you can actually really influence your environment (as an individual, or even small community), unless you manage to kill yourself and the entire environment in the process... (slowly or quickly, doesn't matter much, but that would be really stupid, wouldn't it?)

Oh, and btw, I am also looking eagerly for more elite buffs and other meta changes that will change the standard/balanced templates that are currently running, simply because of boredom and the desire to try something new.

t00115577 · Feb 13, 2009, 10:23 AM // 10:23

I want Palm Strike to be Smiter's Booned.

Or at least an increased recharge

Killed u man · Feb 13, 2009, 12:39 PM // 12:39

I don't give a shit about balance anymore. After have uninstalled GW 4 days ago, and realised on how much fun it USED to be ca. '05-'06, I would like AN UPDATE, for once.

I actually laughed so hard when I noticed the ONLY skill he changed was Palm Strike. (NOT even effectivly nerfing it)

Then this month, Nick (Guildie), was oh-so excited about the "big update" comming.

4 skills orso got changed lol... Izzy is a lazy RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO, and I don't expect anything from anymore. He's too busy working on GW2, and by GW2 I mean royaly taking the intire NCSoft crew up his ass.

Dead game is dead. Cliche, but the truth. Izzy managed to single-handledly (That how U spell it? o.0) take down an intire game.

Anyways, what I expect from April Updates:

-Primal Rage: This skill now causes exhaustion.

Reverend Dr · Feb 13, 2009, 03:20 PM // 15:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

I don't give a shit about balance anymore. I would like AN UPDATE, for once.

This is the overwhelming feeling held by myself and everyone I play with.

Lusciious · Feb 13, 2009, 03:37 PM // 15:37

NERF IN BA TURRETS. Damn turrets make it so hard to monk ..

Mr Emu · Feb 13, 2009, 07:25 PM // 19:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reverend Dr

I hardly think the skill balance is perfect and like others I could write volumes on what I feel is wrong and what should be changed. Of course that has been done and no one really wants to listen to another take on skill balance.

So instead I'm going to talk about the dwindling playerbase. With a larger more active playerbase (like the one we had during prophecies) the mistakes, imbalances, and gimmicks would not seem like as much of a problem (as they didn't seem to be as big of problems back during prophecies).

PvP needs an injection of a large number of players. I see two large problems. 1: hurdles for entering. 2: disallowing existing customers from participating

1: Just unlock all skills/mods/runes. At one time it may have had a point (did it?), right now it only serves as a hurdle. You don't have these skills? Get out. There really is no reason to require PvE play before going to PvP. Lower arenas (RA/AB/FA) really share little in common with higher arenas (HA/GA, which those also share little in common with each other). Requiring play (or grinding) in lower arenas for access to higher arenas makes as much sense as Counter-Strike requiring that a player log so many hours on public servers before they have the option to join a private server. UAX everyone and just be done with it.

Skill requirements are another large hurdle, but little can be done about this. Current players aren't going to play at a lower level. However a large infusion of players would, on average, lower the bar alleviating a bit of this stress. This really doesn't help, the solution to the problem usually is solving the problem, but it would be nice to see a large community compensating for problems rather than the lack of a community exacerbating them.

2: I'm probably going to catch flack for this, but hear me out; UAX for every expansion a player owns, allow balth faction to buy pvp-unlocks for unowned expansions.

Some would say that owning all expansions would just be another hurdle to overcome. I chose my words carefully, I feel that it is a disallowing of existing customers to be able to participate in content for which they have already paid. Incomplete accounts (missing one of the GW games) are not excluded on an absolute level, true. However someone wheelchair bound is not excluded from playing basketball on an absolute level. They can have fun with their friends, they can even play in their own leagues (prophecies-only), but realistically they are going to be excluded from the NBA, college teams, high-school teams, and street pick up games, basically excluded from playing basketball.

If that analogy leaves you unsettled consider this one, Magic: The Gathering (GW has never been compared to this before). You do not have to have access to every card or every expansion to compete and have fun at a casual level. Friends, clubs, comic-book stores all have such atmospheres with regular games. Of course to compete or even not lose horribly at the tournament level, you must have that kind of card access. This works for magic because there is a casual level. GW is just not structured as such and there exists no casual level. Playing GW on an incomplete account is just not possible.

The obvious example that proves I am a moron is the PvP-access account. Just buy this and one has access to everything! The PvP-access was a great idea, unfortunately it was about three years late and ultimately is sub-par (the unlocks for it do not go very far at all). Furthermore I am not talking about opening up PvP free to anyone, I'm talking about opening it up to current customers. Anyone that bought Prophecies, Nightfall, or Factions already bought access to PvP; I am not proposing giving something for free, I am proposing giving something that was already paid for.

We've made a nice segway into something that is at the heart of the issue. I have no illusions otherwise, GW is a game that was created to turn a profit and the method of turning a profit is selling expansions. This is not something that I would have seriously proposed back during Factions, or for a while after Nightfall. Requiring payment for access to a game is perfectly fine. However an unspoken rule is that there must be a game worth paying for. I am afraid that the PvP community is reaching to such an all time low that it is just going to collapse into nothing. If the community ceases to exist making the game (which relies upon a community) non-existent, then there is no possibility at all of making money from the PvP game.

This game desperately needs an infusion of players. The only place I can really think to find such a group are the old players that, for whatever reason, did not buy all of the expansions. Of course this is not something to simply implement, this must also be advertised. Really should not be that difficult. Not too hard to get coverage from gaming blogs and sites and they already have an active e-mail for every account (I still get e-mails from Blizzard, but not a one from Anet). Implementing something like this and properly advertising it is just about the only way I can conceive to refill this dwindling population.

tl;dr: UAX everyone, allow unlocks for unbought expansions, advertise this to the old population

Aside from this, I am really hoping to see a major PvP update this April. Skill balance is nice and all, there is certainly room for work, but I hope that the update will be large without considering skill balance.

I applaud this concept, playerbase issues are even more important than balance (to an extent)

Apok Omen · Feb 14, 2009, 05:46 AM // 05:46

I concur with Rev's post; getting rid of a time-expensive obstacle will help bring in the newbs. The only discrimination left would be title/experience based. However, HA discrimination has only brought us so far, and GvG discrimination is next to worthless.

Also, we shouldn't be looking for ways to balance balanced groups. Spikes and hex teams have been around since the dawn. Rspike, Bspike, Airspike, FCAirspike, FoCspike (thriller video put a nostalgic tear in my eye), OBsFlamespike, and others have been ran constantly and with success.

Balanced was just another build, one with honor.

Now, all that is being played is balanced and spilt builds. It has gotten stale. And why? Because everyone wanted spikes and hexes to go away because of honor. Well, maybe I am being a little biased, but that is because I miss the variety this game has seemed to have lost.

These are my new ideas on skill updates.

Assassin:

Black Lotus Strike: Change to Offhand Attack. Increase energy gain to 4...15. Increase energy cost to 15.
This has been nerfed due to SP Sins and deadly chains that followed it. Now that SP has an aftercast, any decent player can see this coming a mile away. Also, with the 15 energy cost, it will make it a bit more difficult to execute in succession.

Mark of Insecurity: Lose the Disabling clause.
The effect being scaled was all that was needed. Now that people have to invest into the skill to get the most out of it, they will not have much room left to invest in more.

Locust Fury: Move to Dagger Mastery. Increase recharge to 15seconds. Functionally change to: For 1...9...10 seconds, whenever you attack with daggers, all adjacent foes take 11...19...21 piercing damage.
Basically, I got the idea from Hundred Blades. Also, I am taking the name of the skill into context (swarm of locust...get it?)

Palm Strike: Increase recharge to 6 seconds.
It will still be ran, just not abused.

Elementalist:

Mind Burn: Increase Burning duration to 1...12...15 seconds.
Burning doesn't seem as threatening as a degen condition option, especially with all the condi removal in the game now. Should be fun to see.

See first post for other Ele changes

Mesmer:

Signet of Illusions: Add: This signet also increases Illusion magic by 0...2 for all Illusion magic skills.
Double Dragon and Aura of the Lich gave me ideas...

Monk:

Peace and Harmony: Increase cast time to 1 second.
Honestly, this skill rapes hexes and conditions. At least Divert Hexes and Blessed Light has restrictions. (Disable cause was nice touch, but still doesn't fully justify the skill)

Amity: Decrease recharge to 20 seconds, change to half-range hex. Functionally change to: For 5...15...16 seconds, target foe and foes adjacent to target cannot be affected by weapon spells. Ends when foes do not attack for 3...5...5 seconds.
There needs to be something to counter weapon spells besides limitations. (I.E., one cannot be in 2 stances at once, conditions cannot stack on themselves...) Also, the end clause is easily met and weapons can still be casted on foes, just not recieve the benefits until this hex is removed.

Light of Deliverence: See other posters posts

Necromancer:

Life Siphon: Decrease cast time to 1 second, decrease regen/degen to 0...2...3.
Now that Masochism is back in the picture, this should be an interesting skill to see play

Feast of Corruption: Decrease Energy cost to 10 energy, decrease recharge to 10 seconds.
I miss FoCspike, and there are far more worse/better spikes out there than this now...

Lingering Curse: Increase recharge to 15 seconds, decrease duration to 3...5...5 seconds, add renewal clause: whenever foe is healed, this hex is reapplied on that foe. (keep aoe effect)
Putting the 'lingering' into Lingering Curse. Instead of fire and forget, it now demands tactical placement.

Paragon:

Cruel Spear: Increase damage to 10...34...40 damage.
People are used to big damage now, and damagons are fun to watch.

Incoming: add: Allies within earshot recieve 20% less damage. end clause: when they attack or use a skill that targets a foe.
this was meant to be an elite fall back, yet I feel compelled to use fall back rather than this.

Ranger:

Hunters Shot: Decrease recharge to 3 seconds, remove +3...13...15 damage clause.
I always saw this skill more as a bleeding-causing attack, not a spike skill. If I wanted a bleeding attack that did +damage, I would use Screaming Shot

Incendiary Arrows: Decrease recharge to 4 seconds
I miss it, but don't want it to be abused like last time.

Melandru's Arrows: Reduce recharge to 5 seconds, decrease cast time to regular attack speed. Functionally change to: Hits up to two additional targets adjacent to target foe. Causes bleeding(5...17...20 seconds) on hit
Meh, might be fun for condition pressure. Might outclass poison arrow+barbed arrows combo.

Ritualist:

Ancestor's Rage: Decrease recharge to 5 seconds. Increase duration to 5 seconds. Pulse damage: 3...15...18 lightning damage.
Promotes steamrolling instead of spike assists.

Warrior:

Flail: Only affects melee weapons
In the dictionary, flail means to swing arms and thrash around. Do not see how ranged attackers would benefit from that...

Cleave: Increase adrenaline cost to 6 strikes, inflict cracked armor condition (5...17...20 seconds) on hit.
I always saw warriors being able to crack their enemies armor...Also, could lead to interesting builds

Disciplined Stance: Decrease recharge to 10 seconds, remove 75% block effect
Shield Stance needs to see some lovin', too. Seriously, though, never understood how someone can block attacks just be standing still without barriers surrounding them.

Div · Feb 14, 2009, 08:45 AM // 08:45

What's so special about April that they can't do it in March. April is the month for big PvE updates, and the PvP stuff should be the same month to month I thought.

Anyway, no skill balance can be discussed when rend is still in the game. So I'll just talk about a new mode of play: team FA/JQ! Make it so you can go in teams of 4 with team mode!

Celeborn10 · Feb 14, 2009, 01:20 PM // 13:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

What's so special about April that they can't do it in March. April is the month for big PvE updates, and the PvP stuff should be the same month to month I thought.

Anyway, no skill balance can be discussed when rend is still in the game. So I'll just talk about a new mode of play: team FA/JQ! Make it so you can go in teams of 4 with team mode!

Personally I'd rather have 8v8 organized teams with a max of 2-3 for each class. If all the Kurzick were to play in gimmick teams there might be an imbalance when 8 prot/heal monks get on one side.

Animate · Feb 18, 2009, 09:36 PM // 21:36

I would like to see FF, PnH, Rend, BA, Rip Ench, Defile Defense, WoD and Palm Strike getting nerfed the way Smiter's Boon was.

And I would like each single person who ever synched in RA to be banned for 1 month per synched game.

majestikk · Feb 19, 2009, 03:15 AM // 03:15

buff primal rage
buff woh
nerf diversion
nerf shame
nerf pblock
buff read the wind

Edwards · Feb 19, 2009, 05:20 AM // 05:20

Nerfs to Rend, Lingering, Hunter's, Flail, Palm Strike, and Peace and Harmony.

That's enough to make me happy.

erk · Feb 19, 2009, 09:04 PM // 21:04

Peace and Harmony
Most over powered skill in the game atm. totally obsoleted RC and Divert Hexes in one swoop.

P&H needs a savage nerf. recharge time needs to double. Or it shouldn't be able to be used on the caster.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Feb 20, 2009, 07:15 AM // 07:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by majestikk

buff primal rage
buff woh
nerf diversion
nerf shame
nerf pblock
buff read the wind

I agree, those dom mesmers are ruining the game! They're everywhere!

(For those unfamiliar with the concept: This post is sarcastic)

TheHaxor · Feb 20, 2009, 07:33 AM // 07:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

I agree, those dom mesmers are ruining the game! They're everywhere!

(For those unfamiliar with the concept: This post is sarcastic)

Mesmers should also only be allowed to ping 500 or higher.