Curse

Athrun Feya · Dec 25, 2008, 03:30 AM // 03:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by A11Eur0

You hear about all these 10 minute UW clears, but what you don't hear about are the runs with noobs taking 45 minutes to an hour with multiple consets, or not being completed at all because of noobs not knowing wtf they're supposed to do with their PVX build.

I agree with this. GWGuru only see the success stories in elite areas so those not willing to try the build (because its deemed gimmicky) get a seriously skewed view on the builds effectiveness in PuG groups.

I still stand by the opinion that SF should never have been maintainable in the first place. As it stands though, anet have got themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place - they can't take away the maintainability without upsetting a lot of people and they can't leave it alone without a lot of others moaning.

Crom The Pale · Dec 25, 2008, 03:33 AM // 03:33

The problem with GW right now is that people are doing quests/missions/dungeons that they have already done 1000+ times. So they have turned to the quickest/easiest way to get through them.

Until we have some new content you shouldn't expect to see much more than wiki/farm builds in play. It is just the nature of gaming really.

A11Eur0 · Dec 25, 2008, 03:39 AM // 03:39

Double-edged sword there too...if they introduce new content, people will attempt to use their gimmick builds in these areas. Therefore, any new content needs to be created specifically to counter these gimmick builds without gimping balanced play at the same time.

I can see why they just decided to give up on GW1 altogether, give us EOTN with dedicated farming mobs, new monster skills to counter the builds, and dedicate their time to starting over with GW2. Also the shared explorables kinda promise to remove most desire to farm, because who wants some newbie to walk in on your farming session stealing your drops? Anet is making the vocal minority happy by starting over fresh but keeping perma available in GW1 for the silent majority.

MisterT69 · Dec 25, 2008, 03:39 AM // 03:39

Well when you think about it why nerf SF? They made sins ub3r popular and PVE and if they got rid of it many will just log back on their monks and 600 everything. 600's can do a lot of stuff that permas can do albeit slower, but they also can do things permas can't like many dungeons, missions, and even some vanquishes. So then people are gonna bitch "NERF PROT SPIRIT!!!!!". And when you consider that when skills like [protective spirit] and [spirit bond] are combined, they form a similarly imba combo to SF.

Need proof? Send any other character running a standard tanking bar of choice, (OB tank, defy pain war, w/e) through cathedral of flames, yes cathedral of flames, while bonded with the 4 standard skills on the smiter bar: [life attunement][vital blessing][retribution][holy wrath]. See how long the tank can last compared to a 600 bonded with those same 4 skills. Every time the exp. 600 wins in this situation...even in CoF.

So it's not that SF is the most imba thing in game, it's just imba in certain situations like DoA. SF can still be beaten in the elite areas, it's just harder. Although when you bring it to the dungeon situation, SF is worthless except for running from point A to B or running from Floor 1 to Floor 2.

[DE] · Dec 25, 2008, 03:48 AM // 03:48

PS and SB are good, not imba.

MisterT69 · Dec 25, 2008, 03:57 AM // 03:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by [DE]

PS and SB are good, not imba.

They're not imba unless synergized like on a 600 monk.

Shadow form is crap as well without [glyph of swiftness][deadly paradox] or an essence. Take the paradox, and you lost your imbaness.

[DE] · Dec 25, 2008, 04:04 AM // 04:04

A 600 monk is not nearly as imba as an SF sin.

Each build has their own positives, and negatives. SF has much more positives when it comes to tanking. However PS and SB are actually useful outside of gimmicks, which is something SF will never have.

ajc2123 · Dec 25, 2008, 04:30 AM // 04:30

I'm sorry but SF is just another form of Tank n spank which some of you hate also.

Personally, solo SF farms arent that profitable, the real profit lies within team builds. SF promotes team play, and ALSO gives a whole class a damn good reason to play. Let's face it, before SF no one wanted sins in their 'elite areas'. Before Cryway, no one would even take mesmers. Mesmers arent bad, they just don't do things as well as some other classes.

The fact that Cryway/imbagons/and SF sins will be wanted now, and people will still take every other class (cept maybe rits....they need something too now) Promotes playing other classes. Also your never forced to SF, as most 'gimmicks' allow for various versions of a build.

Also, anything that promotes easy team play is +1 in my book. I don't mind elite areas NOT being elite. I find playing low level areas with friends a lot more fun then hard areas requiring skill. If you are new to the elite areas, it is hard to find groups that will let you come, but with the builds we have now, a new player isn't intimidated and gets to enjoy being able to play in these areas.

GW is a people game, hence the CORPG, and is free to play, and actually allows EVERYONE to get whatever item they want with little grind compared to other games. Keep taking these 'OP' builds away and many will run away to a different game. GW challenge has and is always from PvP as that was the final goal in early stages. Monsters are predictable and people will always find 'OP' builds to counter them.

If you want challenging pve, go to WoW or something else.

And for reference, my Main is Warrior and Mesmer. I RARELY EVER SF. But I am extremely Happy My Mesmer is invited into groups because of Cryway, and I don't want all the sins out there to be sad that they aren't useful anymore except for when partying with friends, who have different schedule's then you and is hard to get together. THIS is why I stand up for SF

However, I know that both the original posters post and my post is just...

IXI Nine IXI · Dec 25, 2008, 04:45 AM // 04:45

Do I actually have to say something or can I just say +1 in another SF thread?

A11Eur0 · Dec 25, 2008, 04:52 AM // 04:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by [DE]

A 600 monk is not nearly as imba as an SF sin.

Each build has their own positives, and negatives. SF has much more positives when it comes to tanking. However PS and SB are actually useful outside of gimmicks, which is something SF will never have.

So because ps and sb are useful elsewhere, the build which has been proven to be much more overpowered than SF perma when it comes to farming shouldn't be nerfed? And because Shadow Form has no use other than farming, it should be removed altogether? Name me one non-farming build that uses essence bond and balth spirit, or Blessed Aura, or Holy Wrath, or Retribution, or Life Attunement, or...you get my drift? You don't have to nerf ps or sb to nerf 600/smite. You can nerf/change the other skills that are required for it to be at all useful in farming. Nobody's asking for that, although 600/smite and 55/ss are still prevalent in ecto farming in UW. SF gets the short end of the stick because of the numbers people were claiming from Chaos Plains runs, and its use in speed clears of the elite areas. Oh well. Physicalway in Urgoz is only a few minutes slower than perma/cryway with a good team. You don't need cryway/sf perma to complete an area fast, but it's easier to put a team together because there are fewer individual builds that are used.

Put PS and SB on a high-health low-armor monk and it's imba. Each skill alone is useful elsewhere.

Take the skill recharge buffs away from SF and it fails hard. You need the combo to be imba. How is a SF sin better when it comes to tanking? Put one enemy in there with a touch skill or trap, and you're dead. 600 monks can tank out all damage with ps, sb and SoA. They don't have the energy problems of a SF perma, because of essence bond and balth spirit. Lifesteal can be balanced out by sb's healing. Spells can be blocked with spellbreaker, and spellbreaker can be maintained 100% with the right build. SFs cannot tank damage...if they start taking damage they're in trouble, especially now. You can mitigate the damage with skills, but that gets expensive for a perma.

600 monks can tank in so many places that a SF sin cannot. There are very few places a SF sin can tank that a 600 monk cannot. VS Farming comes to mind, and even then the perma needs a monk to keep him alive. There's a reason that even pre-nerf, SF sins were not doing dungeon runs. And since the highest-value golds in the game come from dungeon end chests, I'd say that 600/smite has more impact on the rare weapon economy than SF does.

I'd like to see a response to my contention that Zkeys have more of an effect on GW's economy than SF permas ever did.

FengShuiDove · Dec 25, 2008, 05:04 AM // 05:04

If it's not Ursan, it's Shadow Form. If it's not Shadow Form, it'll be something else. Let's just nerf *all* skills so nothing can be better in any given situation than anything else. Oh wait, then Warriors and Paragons would be broken because of armor level, and Scythes and Hammers would be broken because of their higher max damage. Lame argument is lame.

[DE] · Dec 25, 2008, 05:14 AM // 05:14

Quote:

So because ps and sb are useful elsewhere, the build which has been proven to be much more overpowered than SF perma when it comes to farming shouldn't be nerfed? And because Shadow Form has no use other than farming, it should be removed altogether?

No. Please stop assuming stuff that I didn't say. Also, SB+PS is not nearly as imba as SF and I have no idea why MisterT69 insisted it as so.

edit: Not sure how many times I have to insist that SB+PS is not nearly as OP as SF. It has so many more natural counters than an SF sin. If it was more powerful you'd see it being run in the elite missions over SF. But SF allows for more bar compression, has less counters, and has been guaranteed by Anet that you'll always be able to maintain it 100% no matter how many nerfs it goes through (sad right?). It's possible to run SB+PS everywhere you can run SF, Spellbreaker and the such allow this. But SF is so much OP and has been proven as so.

A11Eur0 · Dec 25, 2008, 05:35 AM // 05:35

Show me the proof. Make a list of elite missions, dungeons, farm spots that can be run with either, and the potential rewards from either.

600/smite will win in sheer dollar value of potential rewards. SF might win with sheer numbers of kills per unit time, but the individual rewards are lacking. Eternal Blade, Obby edge and Frog Scepter are the only specific high-dollar golds that are obtained through using a perma-sf without help from a 600/smite. Everything else is riddled with non-targeted damage, touch kills and signets. Runs can be made with monks, warriors, rangers, you don't need SF. 600/smite can run every dungeon in EOTN. That's silverwing recurve, dryad, BDS, emerald blade, frog scepter, eaglecrest axe, etc etc etc. Ectos, shards, gold unids, event collector items...obtainable much easier with 600/smite than SF perma with the exception of vaettir bombing for unids.

FengShuiDove · Dec 25, 2008, 05:38 AM // 05:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by [DE]

(1) Not sure how many times I have to insist that SB+PS is not nearly as OP as SF... (2) It's possible to run SB+PS everywhere you can run SF, Spellbreaker and the such allow this. (3) But SF is so much OP and has been proven as so.

(1) 600 < SF. (2) 600 = SF. (3) SF deserves to die.

Umok.

kostolomac · Dec 25, 2008, 05:54 AM // 05:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crom The Pale

The problem with GW right now is that people are doing quests/missions/dungeons that they have already done 1000+ times. So they have turned to the quickest/easiest way to get through them.

Until we have some new content you shouldn't expect to see much more than wiki/farm builds in play. It is just the nature of gaming really.

Best post on page 5.

Tyla · Dec 25, 2008, 05:57 AM // 05:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by A11Eur0

Low level skill? What is a low level skill, the "elite skill" shadow form?

When I emit the previous words, I'm assuming that there is a player, or a group of players that are low-skilled, but want to complete an elite area. I'm assuming they can't get past a first mob of an elite area using builds that aren't over the top, but when apply those certain skills that are incredibly easy to use while placing an incredible gain - so much, that it at least halves the time of a mediocre parties' completion using a build that isn't absolutely imbalanced.

Quote:

There is no "low level skill" unless you're talking about mending or healsig. It's how you use it. If you take advantage of game mechanics to profit, that's just how it is. Perma-shadow form is no different from a 55 monk or 600/smite duo. They're all effective in specific areas and are both just as fragile, Shadow Form is actually more fragile than 600/smite because it's one spell that needs two other skills to maintain and really has no cover. 600/smite is a bunch of enchantments that work together but you can survive if one of them drops, for at least one or two hits depending on the enemy you're fighting. Each has its downsides...daze and enchant removal for the 600 and PBAoE, enchant removal, touch skills, traps for the perma. Both require near-constant attention to survive.

The only thing in farming that requires any part in learning is enemy AI. After that it's just "press this button, wait X seconds, press again". You don't take a 55HP Monk into an area with heavy enchantment removal, and the same is with a 600/smite anyway, but Shadow Form allows you to overcome 90% of all game mechanics with permanent maintenance within a grand total of 3 skills, 2 with Consumables leaving an incredibly huge amount of skill slots to deal damage with.

Quote:

It's funny how people who are usually claiming "lol pve, c-space with heroes and it's done" are now claiming that these builds are removing all skill from PvE elite areas. Irony.

It's not really based on the conception of irony, because you've never had the ability to Heroway elite areas that efficiently. That is, outside of SF usage. PvE was a joke, but it's being dragged to the point where there's a button which just gives you access to the spoils without any given difficulty.

Quote:

I'll say it again: it was the players' choice to use these gimmicks. You can't argue with that. If it's hard to find a group doing what you want to do how you want to do it, obviously you're in the minority. How hard is this to understand? Why, if more people want to use the gimmicks, should those gimmicks be nerfed? This game is all about the loot now. It's undeniable. That's why the only replayability in this game stems from farming for titles and getting the rare skins/expensive armor/rare minis/tonics. People want to remove the grind necessary to obtain these items, so they choose the fastest methods...enter gimmick builds.

People will always choose the easier routes for the most part, and I believe anyone with a brain understands that. But sometimes, ease is a bad thing to comply with. It creates laziness and carelessness, leaving the victim with a craving for even more ease.

As for this game being about the spoils for your armour, wouldn't that turn this game into some sort of dress-up game in which you have to take part in grinding to progress? This isn't Second Life or anything of the sort.

A11Eur0 · Dec 25, 2008, 06:11 AM // 06:11

The only people who play the game for anything other than flashing ones' e-peen or gaining max titles for the hell of it are new players and casual players. Casual players don't use perma-sf to play their game, usually. Casual players also don't usually participate in high-level content unless they happen upon it. Those that do happen upon it usually die miserably and give up. Some move on to PvP, some move on to be higher-end players who do elite missions and such, some quit altogether. Each change is a choice made by the player. Each skill that inhabits a player's skill bar is a choice made by that player. Builds exist for teams to complete high level areas without using SF and cryway, but they're a bitch to PUG, there's too many specific roles to be played so it's hard to form a group unless it's organized beforehand(guild group).

I didn't just say armor, I said armor, weapons, rare skins, minis, tonics. It's not just dress-up. It's dress-up-and-put-on-weapons-and-show-your-rare-mini-while-using-an-everlasting-tonic. In effect it IS like Second life but you kill shit instead of buying a house.

I still don't see how it's ruining the game, if the majority of the players enjoy using it, and only the vocal minority such as those posting in this thread have anything against the gimmick builds. Seriously. What's so bad about the vast majority of the GW playerbase having an easy way to play high-end areas? If people want to use balanced or physicals, i'm sure they'd find a way to do so. They'd come on here, look at all the anti-SF hate, look at the guilds of the people putting it out there, and find a way to join those guilds. That's what I did.

Shyft the Pyro · Dec 25, 2008, 07:37 AM // 07:37

By itself, Shadow Form was never bad. It was an annoying skill that the exploding plagued assassins used in Cantha to draw minion aggro and actually make missions hard-ish if you wanted to master completion. Otherwise, it sucked, because - as the plagued assassins demonstrated - you blew up the moment it wore off.

The problem here is the interaction of things, or more specifically GWEN. Glyph of Swiftness and consumables made certain things permanent - things that should never have been. This is NOT an oversight, but a design decision on ANet's part. The need to sell HOM & GW2 dictated that there be a way for players to grind farther and faster, which is why Ursan and consets made it into the game.

Mind you, if the challenges set up in GWEN were not of as high a magnitude, the general player population wouldn't feel the need to resort to "cheats"... but because of the way the game is designed, people have been forced to. The fault here lies first and foremost with ANet - for not giving the players another campaign or even another expansion, and therefore cranking things up "for the long haul" of GW2, and therefore needing to give players an "easy" button. Even when player dissatisfaction with the "easy" button caused it (Ursan) to get nerfed, ANet chose to simply make sure there was another one to replace it rather than looking at the core issue at hand.

Which essentially means that "nerf X" is always going to be pointless. "Make Y easier to complete" is what we should be shouting at ANet, pointing out the mistakes in game design rather than the overpowered strength of player tools given to us by ANet to beat said design.

zwei2stein · Dec 25, 2008, 10:31 AM // 10:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by A11Eur0

Nerfing builds that allow casual players to have fun in high-end areas and actually complete them is what's killing GW. People want fast, easy ways of doing things and reaping the rewards. If you take away all fast ways of completing things, you're forcing them to spend frustrating hours to maybe complete something, so they're not going to do it. They're going to move on to other games. Only the hardcore dedicated GW players will stick it out and join guilds that complete these areas balanced.

That is some major bullshit that does not even make sense.

First, casuall players are definitelly NOT the ones to run cryway, nor the one benefiting from pretty much any imba. It was true about ursan, and it is true about cryway: It is ran by dedicated, but unskilled, people for who it is about the only way to do something and be "l33t". FFS, go join cryway pug and count chaos gloves.

Your casualls wont really even have right characters in right places. Or have grinded titles. Or know about that SF at all. Or care about daily platinum gains and efectivity of runs.

So stop using actuall casuall players as shield, because whatever that makes you look, it definitelly is not good, well-wishing-upon-those-less-fortunate, fellow.

A11Eur0 · Dec 25, 2008, 11:17 AM // 11:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

That is some major bullshit that does not even make sense.

First, casuall players are definitelly NOT the ones to run cryway, nor the one benefiting from pretty much any imba. It was true about ursan, and it is true about cryway: It is ran by dedicated, but unskilled, people for who it is about the only way to do something and be "l33t". FFS, go join cryway pug and count chaos gloves.

Your casualls wont really even have right characters in right places. Or have grinded titles. Or know about that SF at all. Or care about daily platinum gains and efectivity of runs.

So stop using actuall casuall players as shield, because whatever that makes you look, it definitelly is not good, well-wishing-upon-those-less-fortunate, fellow.

Fine, less-than-hardcore players. Or they have been around the block before and know what happens with balanced pugs, so they want their quick groups when they can get them and run the builds they need to do it. Or they just want to finish the areas as fast as possible to repeat for profit. Either way, it's what the people want, obviously, because that's what most people are doing. If Anet nerfs these things, they're going against the majority merely due to you, the vocal minority.