Curse

Chthon · Aug 11, 2007, 08:11 PM // 20:11

It seems that all the feedback threads have managed to get themselves closed. So it looks like we need a new one. Let's hope it can manage to stay open....

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My thoughts:

Most of the buffs seem to improve skills that certainly need it, but not to the degree that they really become alternatives worth looking at.
Most of the nerfs don't bother me so much, except for a few:
- Pretty much ALL of the melee shutdown took a big hit at the same time - blurred vision, aegis, spirit of failure, price of failure, meekness, faintheartedness, reckless haste, shadow of fear. From a PvP standpoint, I have a bad feeling that we're going to see a lot of unchecked warriors rampaging through helpless backlines. The bigger problem, in my eyes, is what it does to Hard Mode in PvE; there's a ton of HM zones that absolutely require very strong melee shutdown to stay alive, and I'm not sure this nerf leaves enough viable options for that task.
- The exhaustion on channeling. OK, newsflash: ritualists aren't elementalists; they don't have a very deep energy pool; exhaustion basically tacks a minimum recharge of 30sec on a skill for them. It's fine on the spirits, since they don't get cast very often. But it just completely destroys the channeling direct damage skills it got stuck on. They just aren't usable in this state.
- From a PvE standpoint, it really hurt channeling rits to lose both of their AoE attacks in one update - Ancestor's Rage got exhaustion and spirit rift got even harder to aim.
- Also from a PvE standpoint, with so much messing with the ritualist skills, why the heck wasn't vampirism fixed? It still doesn't trigger painful bond properly.
As for the change to the favor system: Well, I agree that a change was needed (since tying access to PvE zones to PvP outcomes was just foolish from day 1), but I'm not sure the new system is terribly much better.
- First, I think Zengeri makes a strong argument for why we don't need a favor system at all.
- Second, I recognize that this system is simply not sustainable. For the short term, it may work, maybe even well. For the long term, it will not. The number of new players coming into the game is just going to decrease from here on out, and the number of new characters made by old players is also going to just decrease from here on out. Sooner or later, we're going to run out of players willing to grind that much who have characters without the titles/free character slots, and then periods of favor are going to get unacceptably infrequent, then disappear altogether. Possible solutions to this:
  - Scrap the favor system altogether.
  - Completely rework the favor system altogether.
  - Add a bunch of maxable titles in GWEN (enough to keep people busy till GW2), AND tie favor in GW and GW2 together so that GW2's players can drive favor for both games.
  - Make some easier-to-achieve titles count towards favor (possibly as half-points) - if Cartographer and Protector counted (even if only as half-points), a small number of dedicated players could keep favor happening on a regular basis for the indefinite future. And that's ultimately what we need -- something that a small group of dedicated players can do repeatedly with a reasonable time investment.

Age · Aug 11, 2007, 10:04 PM // 22:04

It is always the same with every balance update.

Melee class /Buffed

Castor class/Nerfed

This is the very predictable way of skill balances to be expected in the future.

I really wouldn't hold skill responsible for the what goes in PvP .I would hold the players or guild accountable like in all Professional sports.There are no rules in PvP as to suspensions game misconducts as the same thing tat happens in pro. sports.I will make a separate thread on this later but I would blame the skills more so the players or guild that cheat yes that is right cheat.I have never seen a list of rules governing the competitiveness of PvP for GW.We on our Star Trek Gaming servers have more rules than what pvp does and I am talking old game.I guess we are better sportspersons about it.

There is and was no over powered skill in this game however there is the overpowered player.

Miral · Aug 11, 2007, 10:11 PM // 22:11

well there have been overpowered skills in the past, but those that were nerfed this week were not overpowered.

Sum Gai · Aug 11, 2007, 11:07 PM // 23:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

It is always the same with every balance update.

Melee class /Buffed

Castor class/Nerfed

This is the very predictable way of skill balances to be expected in the future.

I really wouldn't hold skill responsible for the what goes in PvP .I would hold the players or guild accountable like in all Professional sports.There are no rules in PvP as to suspensions game misconducts as the same thing tat happens in pro. sports.I will make a separate thread on this later but I would blame the skills more so the players or guild that cheat yes that is right cheat.I have never seen a list of rules governing the competitiveness of PvP for GW.We on our Star Trek Gaming servers have more rules than what pvp does and I am talking old game.I guess we are better sportspersons about it.

There is and was no over powered skill in this game however there is the overpowered player.

Are you suggesting that GW should be considered a prosport, or that guilds were cheating for using overpowered skills that ANet failed to balance before?

prism2525 · Aug 11, 2007, 11:20 PM // 23:20

In principle, almost any skill you set your eyes on can become overpowered if you build a 8 man build around it.

For instance, by having, say, 3-4 warriors with adren increasing skills etc ([skill]"for great justice!"[/skill] just got a good boost) and then spamming away [skill]"Fear Me!"[/skill] would terrify any caster nearby. (4 x 3 war) = 12 energy drained every few seconds. Result: monks have no energy, party collapses. Sure they have weapon sets, but their performance is still severly diminished.

Miral · Aug 11, 2007, 11:23 PM // 23:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sum Gai

Are you suggesting that GW should be considered a prosport, or that guilds were cheating for using overpowered skills that ANet failed to balance before?

sounds somewhat like a suggestion that pvp should be limited to a sort of sealed play, something I would agree with (like, given a number of skills that are deemed balanced previously, and come up with good builds on the spot, never knowing beforehand which skills you will have to work with); now that would be more of a test of player skill, ya? could also include specialty tournaments, like "only factions and core skills" or "no hexes"

Miral · Aug 11, 2007, 11:28 PM // 23:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by prism2525

In principle, almost any skill you set your eyes on can become overpowered if you build a 8 man build around it.

For instance, by having, say, 3-4 warriors with adren increasing skills etc ([skill]"for great justice!"[/skill] just got a good boost) and then spamming away [skill]"Fear Me!"[/skill] would terrify any caster nearby. (4 x 3 war) = 12 energy drained every few seconds. Result: monks have no energy, party collapses. Sure they have weapon sets, but their performance is still severly diminished.

very true. and arenanet's stance is to nerf used skills, instead of fixing that fundamental problem.

but then, all builds are also couterable nowdays. soothing images or vocal minority would tear that build apart. just like ritspike was couterable, people just choose not to do it

makosi · Aug 11, 2007, 11:48 PM // 23:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

It is always the same with every balance update.

Melee class /Buffed

Castor class/Nerfed

This is the very predictable way of skill balances to be expected in the future.
.

I agree. The reason why people in GvG used such heavy anti-melee measures was because melee is such a great threat and 95%+ of top GvG matches had 2 or more melee players. It was almost guaranteed that opponents would have them so people would bring hex RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOs and blind bots to counter them.

Instead of being somewhat radical and not being so melee-dependent, stubborn people came to the forums to moan and moan then the development team see this discontentedness and nerf the counters so melee can reign at the top again.

If people chose an all caster team, it would mean that the sheep that play the metagame would have a whole load of hexes and enchantmets (Reckless Haste, Aegis, Shield of Deflection, Price of Failure) that wouldn't mean a thing. But, like I said, it all comes down to stubborness and playing whatever's 'in' (i.e. Conjure warrior, SP assassin, Melandru dervish).

The necro and mesmer skills were fine the way they were.

Racthoh · Aug 11, 2007, 11:52 PM // 23:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Miral

very true. and arenanet's stance is to nerf used skills, instead of fixing that fundamental problem.

They nerf that skills that promote skill-less play.

Quote:

but then, all builds are also couterable nowdays. soothing images or vocal minority would tear that build apart. just like ritspike was couterable, people just choose not to do it

Doesn't matter if a build is counterable, it's a matter of whether there are practical means of defeating it. Go ahead and build yourself to counter ritspike, and then lose to everything else because the tools you brought can't handle anything else. Personally I didn't spend $150 to play rock-paper-scissors with pretty graphics.

makosi · Aug 11, 2007, 11:56 PM // 23:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Racthoh

Doesn't matter if a build is counterable, it's a matter of whether there are practical means of defeating it. Go ahead and build yourself to counter ritspike, and then lose to everything else because the tools you brought can't handle anything else.

Yeah, rit-spike is definitely counterable but you'd need a build dedicated to defeating a rit spike team. Your build would be so specific that you'd probably get pounded by Zergway or ranger spike because you aren't prepared for anything else.

Miral · Aug 11, 2007, 11:58 PM // 23:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Racthoh

They nerf that skills that promote skill-less play.

Doesn't matter if a build is counterable, it's a matter of whether there are practical means of defeating it. Go ahead and build yourself to counter ritspike, and then lose to everything else because the tools you brought can't handle anything else.

actually (and i wish these forums had a working search so I could find the exact quotes) there are people that had normal HA builds and wiped out ritspikers before they could get a spike off.

And the skills don't promote skill-less play. quite the opposite, actually. the skills are fairly useless if not played right. played right, thats skill aint it? I'm still waiting for people against ritualists to post what they think skill is.

Sarevok Thordin · Aug 12, 2007, 12:16 AM // 00:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by makosi

Yeah, rit-spike is definitely counterable but you'd need a build dedicated to defeating a rit spike team. Your build would be so specific that you'd probably get pounded by Zergway or ranger spike because you aren't prepared for anything else.

No you don't, a balanced team can destroy rit spike, just smack down one of their spikers fast and their whole team will CRUMBLE.

manitoba1073 · Aug 12, 2007, 12:42 AM // 00:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sarevok Thordin

No you don't, a balanced team can destroy rit spike, just smack down one of their spikers fast and their whole team will CRUMBLE.

Yeap its the same with all caster spikes. You stop that initial phase and its bye bye history with them, but try to explian that to a few around, and well you see what happens. Brain dead sheep is what we have now in PvP.

englitdaudelin · Aug 12, 2007, 02:33 AM // 02:33

From the OP:

Pretty much ALL of the melee shutdown took a big hit at the same time - blurred vision, aegis, spirit of failure, price of failure, meekness, faintheartedness, reckless haste, shadow of fear. From a PvP standpoint, I have a bad feeling that we're going to see a lot of unchecked warriors rampaging through helpless backlines. The bigger problem, in my eyes, is what it does to Hard Mode in PvE; there's a ton of HM zones that absolutely require very strong melee shutdown to stay alive, and I'm not sure this nerf leaves enough viable options for that task.
The exhaustion on channeling. OK, newsflash: ritualists aren't elementalists; they don't have a very deep energy pool; exhaustion basically tacks a minimum recharge of 30sec on a skill for them. It's fine on the spirits, since they don't get cast very often. But it just completely destroys the channeling direct damage skills it got stuck on. They just aren't usable in this state.
From a PvE standpoint, it really hurt channeling rits to lose both of their AoE attacks in one update - Ancestor's Rage got exhaustion and spirit rift got even harder to aim

Yeeks. This bit concerns me for several reasons: First, the potential anti-melee in HM... It was already hard enough, right? Interestingly, HM play is affected somewhat by the rit nerf, too--I've been out vanquishing, and now several key skills for the rit are dented, if not flat out wrecked.
Dissonance, Displacement, Ancestor's Rage all exhausting, and a longer cast on Spirit Rift. Harder to vanquish, that's for sure.

So, my feedback on the Skill updates--
I understand the desire to hamper overpowered PvP teams--I really do. But dropping the help on anti-melee skills only serves to make melee classes marginally more overpowered. Notice that assassin skills got small buffs--why? Warrior Skills got small buffs--why?

I think the alternative that might be better would be some marginal defensive buffs to elemental defenses (i.e. ward against elements, elemental resistance, some of the paragon shouts, etc...) to counter rit spikes (and HM ele spikes too?), and nerfs to the damage that the spirits do, rather than what I'm feeling is a FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE to how rits and their spells behave.

For the moment, I'll tolerate these...I'll swap in glyphs, or not spam Ancestor's rage, or simply change my skillbar entirely to avoid exhaustion. I think, however, these changes might not be for the best.

I now return this thread to the inevitable flame wars.

Vermilion · Aug 12, 2007, 02:44 AM // 02:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by englitdaudelin

I understand the desire to hamper overpowered PvP teams--I really do. But dropping the help on anti-melee skills only serves to make melee classes marginally more overpowered. Notice that assassin skills got small buffs--why? Warrior Skills got small buffs--why?

Its not a huge deal:

1.The changes to anti-melee hexes were lonnnnng overdue.
2. Shield of deflection and Ward against melee weren't touched afaik.
3. Aegis + blinding surge are still perfectly viable.

So no worries. The Assassin/Warrior buffs are mostly inconsequential anyway, so its all good.

PvE is not my style so I won't go into that.

Blurred was a buff btw.

yeye

Avarre · Aug 12, 2007, 02:54 AM // 02:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by makosi

If people chose an all caster team, it would mean that the sheep that play the metagame would have a whole load of hexes and enchantmets (Reckless Haste, Aegis, Shield of Deflection, Price of Failure) that wouldn't mean a thing. But, like I said, it all comes down to stubborness and playing whatever's 'in' (i.e. Conjure warrior, SP assassin, Melandru dervish).

People run melees not because they're stubborn, or because they're 'in'. They run melees because they work, they have the highest DPS, and because they kill things.

How exactly are you going to kill people with casters? Oh, countdown spike and repeat.

GloryFox · Aug 12, 2007, 03:21 AM // 03:21

Quote:

posted by Chthon
# The exhaustion on channeling. OK, newsflash: ritualists aren't elementalists; they don't have a very deep energy pool; exhaustion basically tacks a minimum recharge of 30sec on a skill for them. It's fine on the spirits, since they don't get cast very often. But it just completely destroys the channeling direct damage skills it got stuck on. They just aren't usable in this state.
# From a PvE standpoint, it really hurt channeling rits to lose both of their AoE attacks in one update - Ancestor's Rage got exhaustion and spirit rift got even harder to aim.

There is something else to consider, Before there was an unspoken rule to all spell casting changes. Exhaustion only happens to Elementalists spells if at all. Why you ask? because the class was designed to handle it plain and simple. I can almost live with some Ritualist "spells" getting exaustion because there was a way to handle the exhaustion through Glyphs, however Binding Rituals have no protection from exhaustion and many people run builds that include the three spirits now affected by exhaustion with no way of dealing with it.

Now that exhaustion is open game for any spell casters and non spell "skills" who will be next I wonder? Necromancers, and Mesmers to keep them from running Hexay? Paragons from running shouts too much? Warrior when they use certain stances? Monks when they use certain divine favor Signets or passive healing spells or enchants? Anything and everything is now fair game for a passive effect meant to regulate the elementalist. That seriously concerns me.

Shadowspawn X · Aug 12, 2007, 03:36 AM // 03:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Racthoh

They nerf that skills that promote skill-less play.

Why would they want to do that? 90% of the pvp population is skill less, so what are they going to play? I don't mean that in a bad way but most pvp people are not on a very high lvl. They need their cookie cutter FoTM builds and they deserve to have some fun skills or no, why do you think IWAY was so popular, because the common pvp'r could run it with some moderate success.
Why are these mindless fun builds such a threat?
[/QUOTE]

traiur · Aug 12, 2007, 03:41 AM // 03:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by GloryFox

There is something else to consider, Before there was an unspoken rule to all spell casting changes. Exhaustion only happens to Elementalists spells if at all. Why you ask? because the class was designed to handle it plain and simple.

I would say that this is not quite correct. The exhaustion on the ele spells was there so that the OTHER classes couldn't run skills like meteor without thinking twice about it. Exhaustion(to me) seems to have been a way to make classes double think about slammoing their bars full of powerfull spells. And if this is the case then why cant the other classes have exhaustion causing spells? Also. The Rt's chanelling spells are basically just an attempt to create another ele class.....so there is absolutely no reason why they can't have the same "lets make them ponder about their build" modifications that the ele's have.
The exhaustion on the spirits barely effects the rt (yes I play rt and have played spirit spammer) the exhaustion from a spell is over before the spell recharges in the case of binding rituals. So that is just to (once again) make classes ponder their build instead of just packing it full of all these skills and not learning how to manage energy.

Im not trying to flame. This is truly how the exhaustion mechanic seems to me and I recognize that it is my opinion, however I have yet to see anything to make me think otherwise.

Riotgear · Aug 12, 2007, 03:51 AM // 03:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

The bigger problem, in my eyes, is what it does to Hard Mode in PvE; there's a ton of HM zones that absolutely require very strong melee shutdown to stay alive, and I'm not sure this nerf leaves enough viable options for that task.

Shadow of Fear still outlasts its recharge by a huge margin. It doesn't stack with other speed reducers anyway. Wards are untouched. Aegis is cheaper to cast and you can still use GoC or SoC to prevent interrupts if needed.

Quote:

[*]The exhaustion on channeling. OK, newsflash: ritualists aren't elementalists; they don't have a very deep energy pool;

The depth of your energy pool over the course of time has minimal impact on the pacing of exhaustion abilities. Exhaustion is designed to deliberately limit oversaturation of a skillbar with abilities that cause it, while allowing a great deal of flexibility and low cost on each one. Except for some quirky ones like MS. If you think elementalists can build a strategy around spamming Obsidian Flame back-to-back because energy storage will eat the exhaustion, you're wrong: EVERY build dealing with exhaustion has to pace it the same, the only difference is the amount of time it takes for your energy bar to get flooded with gray and be worthless.

Quote:

exhaustion basically tacks a minimum recharge of 30sec on a skill for them.

Not exactly. The only thing necessary is that the skills are only used on average once every 30, but not only can you still power AR with the newly buffed GoE, but the whole point is that exhaustion clears even if you're not using the skill. You can use AR and get exhausted twice, and pay for the exhaustion while you wait for the next pull.

Quote:

[*]From a PvE standpoint, it really hurt channeling rits to lose both of their AoE attacks in one update - Ancestor's Rage got exhaustion and spirit rift got even harder to aim.

Spirit Rift does more DPS now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

It is always the same with every balance update.

Melee class /Buffed

Castor class/Nerfed

Hello?? GoLE buff was probably the best thing to happen to casters since launch. Channeling's huge damage was only possible BECAUSE of buffs. Restoration is significantly better than it used to be.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Miral

well there have been overpowered skills in the past, but those that were nerfed this week were not overpowered.

Fast-cast Lightning Hammer for 5 energy was obviously fine. 1395 AOE lightning damage spike on a 3/4 sec cast was obviously balanced too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by manitoba1073

Yeap its the same with all caster spikes. You stop that initial phase and its bye bye history with them, but try to explian that to a few around, and well you see what happens. Brain dead sheep is what we have now in PvP.

That's because you don't have a button labelled "kill player" that removes one of the spikers. Ritspike in particular has powerful healing on SEVEN PLAYERS, and a hard rez on FIVE. This is not PvE where you can just pile your whole team on the monk or whoever and expect a kill. Especially when they've all got Vital Weapon on.

Quote:

however Binding Rituals have no protection from exhaustion and many people run builds that include the three spirits now affected by exhaustion with no way of dealing with it.

You mean the overpowered "hi, we're going to wait here and you're going to get KDed, interrupt, and prot-stripped if you attempt to attack us" build? Uh.... good riddance?