Curse

crimsonfilms · Apr 13, 2007, 08:21 PM // 20:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by GloryFox

(snip)

I am unsure how much you GvG but Rit meta where developed. As much as the core 6? Of course not. That would impossible considering the core are at least 1 year old of retail and months of public beta testing. Not to mention that after the nerf is when Rits where actually considered to be more than spirit spamming. It is after the nerf and buff that Rits where able to be incorporated to a build while not being just a Rit Lord spammer.

But expecting people to sit through broken and imbalance meta, is just not possible. Mechanics and balance is the utmost importance in PvP.

And this 'why not just adapt' crap is unfounded. Even the lowest level of GvG guilds have extensive discussion on builds. Look at iQ's and QQs forum. Hell look at this forum. Look at the endless discussion how good or bad a skill is. And this does not even count the in game talk (Vent/TS) and guild's own forums. Which in my experience is where the overwhelming majority of build discussion happen.
Where is the PvE discussion about builds?

So people crying about 'PvP should learn to adapt' are people who seems to have no experience in serious GvG/PvP. If anything they are the most active people who discuss and evaluate these skills.

PvErs seem barely able to tolerate 1 week of post nerf SR, and hell has....

PvPers sits through months of broken and imbalance skills and mechanics.

Seriously, where do you base this idea of "not enough time to develop the meta" argument?
How much time is needed?

ensoriki · Apr 13, 2007, 08:26 PM // 20:26

Less time is needed instead of the strong nerfs the Buffs should've came

Change skills to have a spirit affect

Change Shroud of Silence and Vow of Silence.....To actually mean SIlence

No shouts,no spells, no echos.

GloryFox · Apr 13, 2007, 10:17 PM // 22:17

Quote:

Before I played Guildwars, I played Magic: The Gathering, and the two games have been noted for their strategic similarities. I played Magic during one of the most problematic times in the game's history, the Standard Seasons when Mirrodin Block was legal. Mirrodin gave rise to Ravager Affinity, one of the most broken archetypal decks in the game's history, and the Mirrodin Metagame was focused almost solely around being able to contend with and defeat the Ravager menace. This was an example of an unhealthy metagame, and Wizards of the Coast, heeding the calls of thousands of frustrated players, implemented one of the first Type 2 (Standard Format) bannings since six years prior, which all but removed Ravager Affinity from the metagame (but not after the deck had made a strong presence at most of the high level tournaments, including Worlds).

The point of the Magic anecdote, is that even in times of an unhealthy metagame, it is still important to let a counter-metagame emerge, especially in a game as versatile and unpredictable as Guild Wars. With so many skills available, it is impossible to create a build that will dominate 100% of its opponents.

However, with the frequent skill updates, Anet forces periods of so-called meta-metagames upon competitive players, in which a large number of people take to playing a gimmicky build, with the sole aim of winning matches. No gimmick build is unbeatable, but they do run a high challenge rating, and it is for this reason that they beat many teams (who are unprepared to deal with them). However, before the metagame can balance itself out, Anet swoops in with another skill balance, and suddenly, nobody knows what is viable anymore.

The only natural result of such an action is for people to play the next most powerful thing.

And then we're back to square one.

This is not the way you nurture a healthy metagame; rather, this is a great way to stunt its growth.

Having played Magic the Gathering competitively for 10 years I think I know a thing or two about the Meta game. Guild Wars is no different in term of selecting skills for builds. The above post was the perfect example.

Yes in a Meta game you will have a dominant build until the next pack or expansion comes out. Yes if you only focus on balance builds you will ultimately find unbalance in destruction as Gimmick can almost always beat balance. This is true in modern warfare, magic the Gathering and in Guild Wars.

Once everyone is playing the Abusive build of the month weather it be IWAY or Land Destruction in Magic the Gathering a counter always emerges. Usually in the form of another Gimmick build to rue the day.

Quote:

posted by Blame the Monks
Sorry, Glory, but you just don't know what you are talking about.

Mesmer signets and the like were tried and discarded because they were too narrow. A team with 64 slots cannot justify devoting multiple slots to counter one narrow gimmick when there are dozens out there. See original post. It wasn't impossible to counter rits, it was just impractical to counter rits given the other gimmicks you were forced to counter and the other things you were forced to do.

I think you take PvP too seriously if your afraid to loose. Obviously somebody beat the spirit spammers as everyone did it in GvG pre Nightfall. OH? You mean you did not evolve and use Ritual Lords your selves? You did not adapt? Overcome? Improvise? Warfare suddenly became imbalanced because someone used Guns instead of Bows and Arrows? People used Airplanes for Air domination and your asking why can't we all just use infantry?

If you loose you loose that is what happens in Rock Paper Scissors games like Guild Wars, Magic the Gathering and other games that must focus on build selections before entering combat. There is not guarantee to win and if the other player beats you because of a Gimmick good for him he adapeted to the nature of the beast in combat. That person understood the game. That team of players adapted to the Meta game and left you in the dust. If a single Gimmick such as the Ritual Lord becomes the norm for all encounters then my build choice is easy. Its counter Gimmick time with another Gimmick that will evolve over time. That is the evolution of the Meta Game.

So yes I do understand a thing or two about the Meta Game and its evolution. Be it MtG or GW or real modern Warfare.

Gimmick beats balance almost every time and there is no guarantee of winning.

Blame the Monks · Apr 13, 2007, 10:32 PM // 22:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by GloryFox

Obviously somebody beat the spirit spammers as everyone did it in GvG pre Nightfall. OH? You mean you did not evolve and use Ritual Lords your selves? You did not adapt? Overcome? Improvise?

Actually, no. My peers and I were the ones who defined the meta, outplayed scrubs on rits, and then realized it was imba and convinced Izzy with logic and experience. My peers being the tiny group of consistent top 20 guild members. Of course, your alleged experience in MTG is probably much more indicative of skill in GW than actual excellence in GW, but hey, who's keeping score.

Anyhow, you were about to show me how you can counter the meta in game, as opposed to talking about your experience in MTG on the forums. Don't tell me about how easy it is, prove it, as no one else has managed to do so.

Chop chop.

crimsonfilms · Apr 13, 2007, 10:38 PM // 22:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by GloryFox

If you loose you loose that is what happens in Rock Paper Scissors games like Guild Wars, Magic the Gathering and other games that must focus on build selections before entering combat. There is not guarantee to win and if the other player beats you because of a Gimmick good for him he adapeted to the nature of the beast in combat. That person understood the game. That team of players adapted to the Meta game and left you in the dust. If a single Gimmick such as the Ritual Lord becomes the norm for all encounters then my build choice is easy. Its counter Gimmick time with another Gimmick that will evolve over time. That is the evolution of the Meta Game.

So yes I do understand a thing or two about the Meta Game and its evolution. Be it MtG or GW or real modern Warfare.

Gimmick beats balance almost every time and there is no guarantee of winning.

Thus you just explained why GW PvP loses a lot of skilled players and is not taken seriously by some.
PvP is largely supposed to be about skills - like any typical PvP game.

And gimmicks dont require for you to 'understand' the game. Ob mode, cut and paste, mash buttons. These is the mechanic when the meta at its worse (ranger spike, Rit spam, hexway, rit spike, etc).

Trying to compare guns and arrows illustrates people misunderstanding of the mechanics. We do not have the power to evolve our tools. Just how we use it and even that is limited. Trying to compare it to an arms race is is false.

Rock Paper Scissors is the worse meta for a PvP game like GW GvG.
And playing the build wars is absurd since your win:lose ratio will not actually be representative of your skill. Why even have a tournament? To find who has the best lucky charm?

Bottom line is, if you want GW RPS meta, then the game's PVP will die and attract less serious PvPers. GW PvP will never be taken seriously along other good PvP when it has a potential to be.

tomcruisejr · Apr 14, 2007, 12:00 AM // 00:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blame the Monks

Actually, no. My peers and I were the ones who defined the meta, outplayed scrubs on rits, and then realized it was imba and convinced Izzy with logic and experience..

Now you all know why. Certain people dictating the balancer so their favorite builds will be untouched. Bias at its finest.

GG?

GloryFox · Apr 14, 2007, 12:21 AM // 00:21

Quote:

Thus you just explained why GW PvP loses a lot of skilled players and is not taken seriously by some.

Yes and? What’s your point if they wanted to do a serious PvP game try Counter Strike. You take this game too seriously when there are better options for PvP. GW is a trading card game. Tell me what happens if you choose to not take a res signet? You have the choice not to but wisdom tells you to take one. What happens when you run into Ritual lord after Ritual Lord. Simple you begin changing your build to compensate. Even if it’s a simple Banishing Strike or Mesmer Signet. You adapt you Overcome and you Improvise.

Quote:

PvP is largely supposed to be about skills - like any typical PvP game.

Sniping is a skill. Using the terrain for tactics is a skill GW is no real skill. Heck I used to think maintaining 14 bonds was a skill until I did it on a regular basis and realized GW requires very little skill at all. Tried DoA? Hardest area in the game of GW and NO SKILL REQUIRED just an ability to push buttons in order follow directions then rinse and repeat.

Quote:

And gimmicks dont require for you to 'understand' the game. Ob mode, cut and paste, mash buttons. These is the mechanic when the meta at its worse (ranger spike, Rit spam, hexway, rit spike, etc).

Really what is there to understand? A win is a win you don’t have to “understand” to win. You just win and if you loose you loose. Everyone has accsess to the same skills so its therefore an even playing field. That is the nature of PvP in any game. You should play my son Stratiego he complains all of the time that Marshals are too powerful since they kill everything but a spy, you sound just like him. Guild Wars is not a religion that requires theology of understanding to play, you seem to speak as if you need it. You say I don’t understand? Well after playing since prophecies beta yes I do understand GW. It is a push buttons and follow instructions game. And that goes for the best build you can make in GW.

As for nerfing an entire line of skills in an attribute, there were other options than nerfing an entire attribute into near oblivion like ANET did to Communing. OR nerfing a particular skill until it become completely unusable like “There on Fire” or “Incoming” or nerfing the energy management skills for a Mesmer then increasing the casting times of almost all of the dominant Mesmer skills because someone found a good meta game way to use them. Please understand that yes I do understand the game however GW PvP can never be balanced as it is. All you end up doing is creating another dominant PvP build rinse reapeat. Seriously when does the madness stop.

Quote:

Trying to compare guns and arrows illustrates people misunderstanding of the mechanics. We do not have the power to evolve our tools. Just how we use it and even that is limited. Trying to compare it to an arms race is is false.

You don’t have to evolve your tools just level the playing field and make all skills a viable option without killing both skills and attribute to do so. As it is you have destroyed many skill options by over nerfing and not allowing the counters to flourish more. It is you who do not understand the mechanics of PvP game play. Arrows and Gun was a good illustration because technically both have access. BUT if you choose to bring arrows to a gun fight who’s fault is it.

Quote:

Rock Paper Scissors is the worse meta for a PvP game like GW GvG.
And playing the build wars is absurd since your win:lose ratio will not actually be representative of your skill. Why even have a tournament? To find who has the best lucky charm?

You see there you go with skill again thinking skill has something to do with pushing buttons in GW. Where skill comes in is knowing when to push that button and understanding what counters what and when to use it. You plan for the worst and hope for the best like a good football game. It’s skill when you can follow orders of a good leader or recognize when and when not to disenchant. Etc. Etc If you want skill to matter more then I challenge you take a balanced build into DoA and win not using any Gimmicks.

As for tournaments Ill find them interesting when tournament rules say you can’t use secondary professions and you must have one player for each class in the current GW PvP game. Then and only then will "skill" be important in GW PvP because Gimmicks will be forced out of play. Meanwhile I’ll stick to real PvP games like Counter Strike until GW realizes they are killing the game by not allowing a meta game to exist with some class skill options better than others. Until that happens Gimmicks will rue the day.

Quote:

Bottom line is, if you want GW RPS meta, then the game's PVP will die and attract less serious PvPers. GW PvP will never be taken seriously along other good PvP when it has a potential to be.

As it is you are loosing PvP players because of the same “we can’t loose or else” attitude that permeates the top 20 guilds. As long as they control the meta game more PvP will die and then only then will you realize I was right.

A good build and a little luck is what makes GW PvP competitive and fun to play. You on the other hand want to remove that “luck” factor simply because your afraid to loose.

GloryFox · Apr 14, 2007, 12:33 AM // 00:33

Quote:

posted by tomcruisejr

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blame the Monks
Actually, no. My peers and I were the ones who defined the meta, outplayed scrubs on rits, and then realized it was imba and convinced Izzy with logic and experience..

Now you all know why. Certain people dictating the balancer so their favorite builds will be untouched. Bias at its finest.

GG?

I could not have said it better... and we wonder why? just why? sometimes.

lacasner · Apr 14, 2007, 12:44 AM // 00:44

Someone here on this forum thought of a self-balancing GW, where if certain skills were used to often an engine would "balance-itself" and change the stats of the skill. Maybe that would solve the problems of everyone playing 1 cookie cutter build, but I don't know the details of how it would work.

crimsonfilms · Apr 14, 2007, 12:49 AM // 00:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomcruisejr

Now you all know why. Certain people dictating the balancer so their favorite builds will be untouched. Bias at its finest.

GG?

Hmmm... that is interesting considering a lot of the top players hates the way Izzy does the balance....
Not to mention that the variety of builds in top guilds...

So you have dozens of people with varying interest what they think should be nerfed/buffed-- what does that lead to?

Quote:

You adapt you Overcome and you Improvise.(snip)

Hardest area in the game of GW and NO SKILL REQUIRED just an ability to push buttons in order follow directions then rinse and repeat.

A good build and a little luck is what makes GW PvP competitive and fun to play. You on the other hand want to remove that “luck” factor simply because your afraid to loose.

Your whole argumentis conflicted I do not even know where to begin to address it.

You want luck, yet you want people to "learn and adapt" and yet you argue there is nothing to 'understand' (aka learn).

And the whole skill thing not existing? Wow. Do you really believe that or you have not played at the level where there is skill involved?
If you want 'sniping skills' I'm sure you can DShot 3/4 spells 90% of the time. If you do, there are about 100 dozen guilds waiting to recruit you.
If there are no skills involved, I'm sure your guild must be doing really well in the top 20?

Afraid to lose? Really this is vague. It is not about fearing as it is following the basic underlying concepts that rule most succesful PvP games.

You need a more consistent argument because it is heavily conflicted and inconsistent.

Blame the Monks · Apr 14, 2007, 01:31 AM // 01:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomcruisejr

Now you all know why. Certain people dictating the balancer so their favorite builds will be untouched. Bias at its finest.

GG?

I'm in yer alphas....frenzying on your Izzayz...

makosi · Apr 14, 2007, 01:47 AM // 01:47

One of the main reasons I barely PvP is because this game has too much emphasis on button-bashing instead of actual skill (contrary to the back of the boxes).

Rangers are the worst whether they're thumping, touching or spamming bow interrupts. "Bash your buttons and win" is a more suitable motto. Yes I know there are counters but counters don't make balance.

Consider a new Fire Magic spell which deals 1,000 unconditional, armour ignoring damage. Is it imbalanced? Prot Spirit, Shelter, interrupts, KD all exist to counter it.

On a second note, we all know the so-called 'metagame' and flavour of the month but that doesn't mean everyone is using it. Taking counters on the assumption that you'll be facing one build can leave you with useless skills if the opponent has something else.

I've said it once and I'll always say it: Build Wars: Google Your Build and Win™

Shmanka · Apr 14, 2007, 02:18 AM // 02:18

No offence to this poster in particular but why the hell is there all this talk about Izzy? Good poster, neat ideas and I can agree and disagree with some. I am not a top player either but this kinda stupid how we have to bring particular people into how balance is done (besides ANet).

Primarily the M:TG example is gold, pure gold.

This is what I find interesting though, ANet's attempt to find balance is by reducing the effectiveness of used skills and not enhancing unused skills.

Seems very degenerative to me.

crimsonfilms · Apr 14, 2007, 03:09 AM // 03:09

Quote:

No offence to this poster in particular but why the hell is there all this talk about Izzy?

Because he is the one that heads the game balancing department.

Quote:

One of the main reasons I barely PvP is because this game has too much emphasis on button-bashing instead of actual skill (contrary to the back of the boxes).

You are wrong for the most part.
The game involves tremendous amount of skill. Button mashing and copy and paste can only take you so far. Not like Evil or WM's build is secret... :/

NEvertheless, there is a large part of the game that is vulnerable to non skill based play style.

DreamWind · Apr 14, 2007, 03:18 AM // 03:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by GloryFox

Having played Magic the Gathering competitively for 10 years I think I know a thing or two about the Meta game. Guild Wars is no different in term of selecting skills for builds. The above post was the perfect example.

Yes in a Meta game you will have a dominant build until the next pack or expansion comes out. Yes if you only focus on balance builds you will ultimately find unbalance in destruction as Gimmick can almost always beat balance. This is true in modern warfare, magic the Gathering and in Guild Wars.

If you loose you loose that is what happens in Rock Paper Scissors games like Guild Wars, Magic the Gathering and other games that must focus on build selections before entering combat.

So yes I do understand a thing or two about the Meta Game and its evolution. Be it MtG or GW or real modern Warfare.

Gimmick beats balance almost every time and there is no guarantee of winning.

I'm glad you brought up Magic the Gathering for the sake of this discussion. I have been playing it for a while also, and I can tell you that it is far more balanced that Guild Wars.

Look at it this way...the Magic metagame has shifted a lot through cycles, but usually there are many different decks that are viable. Now look at a few past metagames...such as the necropotence metagame. In that meta, necro was the dominant deck that nearly every pro played because everything else was inferior. That was a BAD metagame.

Now there have been a bunch of other bad metagames in MTG where one deck dominated the field. MTG has a lot of guys working on card balancing and set balancing. If that group of guys can create bad metas on accident, lets look at Guild Wars. Guild Wars...one guy does all the balancing. To say that Guild Wars metagame is balanced is absurd.

And people want skill over build. In ideal Magic metagames (such as some of the previous extended metas), as many as 10 different decks were competitive, and the best players usually won. Now back to Guild Wars...look at the ladder. Near the top are a bunch of guilds who got there via rit spike and soul reaping and other OP builds. To say that they are skilled enough to be up there is crazy.

In Magic, if I see guys at the top of the rankings, I know they are good and did not just abuse a deck all the way to the top. Theres a big difference there.

Captain Robo · Apr 14, 2007, 04:36 AM // 04:36

Okay, first of all, thank you to everyone who has been keeping this great discussion going.

I'd like to place some emphasis on some current skill balances by Anet which have solidified, in my mind, that they often don't really know how it will affect the metagame.

Cases in Point are Mind Blast and the Conjure enchantments. During the April 10th update, Mind Blast was reduced in damage duration (it currently does less damage than Flare at any level of Fire Magic), immediately after receiving a significant damage buff on April 5th.

When people started using Mind Blast in conjunction with Mark of Rodgort for a near-Searing Flames effect, Mind Blast was reduced significantly in damage. Mind Blast, as stated before, does less damage than Flare, with the only boon being the minimal energy gain you get from spamming the skill (If you're an Elementalist using this skill for energy management, there are much better elite options available). There is now no point whatsoever to use this skill.

The common justification for the nerfing of this skill is that it became degenerate with Mark of Rodgort. However, I fail to see how this is even NEARLY as broken as Searing Flames used to be.

Now, Searing Flames is a skill I truly considered to be broken; it is clearly less so after the nerf, but it still retains a high degree of power.

Therefore I fail to see the comparison made beetween Searing Flames, which spreads AOE burning and massive AOE damage to all enemies on fire when spammed, and Mind Blast + Mark of Rodgort, which causes burning when the hexed targets are struck with fire damage. Sure, it gains you energy, but does no AOE damage whatsoever.

Do you honestly call something as inane as Mind Blast + Mark of Rodgort degenerate? Maybe in RA, and even that's a stretch. Hell, Searing Flames + Mark of Rodgort is twice as degerate as Mind Blast could ever hope to be, at least that keeps a constant stream of damage on the target, with sporadic AOE burning/damage to nearby foes.

Lets look at the possible non-nerf options we can use to counter this "broken" skill combination:

1. Pick a hex removal.
They all work to mitigate the burning caused by Mark of Rodgort.

2. Pressure the Elementalist.
If an ele is getting his ass beaten, he's not casting spells.

3. Pick an Interrupt.
Distracting Shot anyone?

4. Spread out.
Don't get AOE hexed by Mark of Rodgort. This also works against Searing Flames.

5. Diversion.
Quintessential spam stuffer.

If your team build is incapable of doing any of these things, you deserve to lose to Mind Blast + Mark of Rodgort.

However, I'm being longwinded. The point of bringing up Mind Blast is that Anet immediately nerfed it after people started using it. The point of buffing its original damage was to make it more appealing to the community, but once the skill was picked up, it was deemed "broken." As I've shown, it is clearly not. The community was not given appropriate time to react to the buffing of Mind Blast, figure out how to counter it without crying, and then move on. Instead, the skill gets axed into oblivion; unless the energy gaining part of this skill becomes incredibly good, you should never, ever use a Fire Magic Elite that does less damage than Flare: Its just bad form.

As for the Conjure enchantments (as well as Brutal Weapon), their damage was also buffed during the April 5th update, but as of today, they now do less damage and have a longer recharge. Previous to April 5th, any melee character who seriously used the Conjure spells immediately lost all credibility on the battlefield. The damage was insignificantly more and the spells themselves were generally considered useless.

However, with the damage buff, the Conjure spells saw some serious use, both in GvG and HA. While the subsequent nerf to their damage was relatively minor, the recharge hit is relatively significant, and it leaves me wondering what the exact reasoning behind the update was...

Now that people actually considered using Conjure spells, Anet suddenly decided that the spells were degenerate enough to warrant a nerf; especially when the extra damage from the Conjure spells is mitigated not only by anything that normally hinders melee/ranged physical attacks, but also by enchantment removal! One piece of enchantment removal instantly turns every Conjure skill on a warrior's bar into a dead slot.

How is that broken?

Previously, the matters of combating a Ritualist dominated metagame have been discussed, and while Ritualists were annoying as hell when they were at the zenith of their power, counters did exist which were not all that uncommon to be using in a build anyway!

When defensive Ritual Lords were dominating the metagame, a number of common tactics could be employed to fight them.

1. Rushing
A good team was almost always capable of putting enough immediate pressure on a Ritualist to quickly drop him before any spirits came up. This usually involved massive tactical overextension, but was generally a viable strategy if your team knew what they were doing.

2. Knockdowns
I remember that a great deal of Knockdowns were prevalent in the Factions metagame, which forced a lot of Ritualists to go Rt/W for balanced stance. However, knockdowns were still great against the rest of the enemy team, and also effectively put the Ritualist on a timer, during which he could safely cast spirits.

3. Cripshot Rangers
Cripshots were still seeing a great deal of play at this time, and interrupts could render a ritualist completely ineffective.

4. Mesmer-Based Counters
A mesmer packing enchantment removal and Cry of Frustration (again, at the time, these were extremely common options), was heavy leverage against an enemy ritualist. Being able to strip their Boon and use ranged interrupts killed their strategy.

5. Splitting
If anything hurt a Ritualist more than any of the above tactics, it was splitting. By forcing a Ritualist to stay on the move, his spirits become useless. Good split tactics annihilated Ritualist based defenses.

A versatile, balanced, team could pull off any of these tactics in GVG, and stand a good fighting chance against Ritualists. While Ritualist Spirits were indeed overpowered, as the game had never been exposed to a passive defense of that magnitude, a good team could still outplay a Ritualist based defense. A strategic nerfing of the spirit's health would have limited their all-encompassing power to a bearable level, but instead Anet attacked all angles of Ritualist Strategy. Hell, even nerfing Ritual Lord a bit harder would have fixed the situation; but instead the spirits became incredibly overcosted and Boon of Creation became useless.

Guild Wars should never get to the state where an experienced and talented team regularly loses to teams of inferior quality simply because of skillbar choice and preference. Strategy should play a larger part in the outcome of the match and allow the stronger team to win. Gimmick builds will always arise, but they need not dominate the metagame when you include a character or two to counter them, especially when these characters are also capable of countering a great deal of other builds.

Thankfully, this is a lot easier to do in Guildwars than it is in Magic.

Interrupt Rangers and Domination Mesmers are great answers to spammy gimmick characters or builds prevalent in the metagame, but you can't expect to win a match just because you're playing a certain character. The trick is to be prepared for the metagame by using skills that won't be useless against other types of builds.

You have to play the character to the full extent of its power.

But with the skill balances as frequent as they are, I'm afraid that people are always going to be scrambling towards a gimmick build rather than playing something that takes true skill to play.

If you're losing to a particular build or strategy, crying foul at the skills used against you is a measure that should only be taken after a careful evaluation of your team's ability and strategic implementation. The skills themselves can be blamed if they are truly degenerate and still manage to beat you after every countermeasure has been exhausted.

That, in my opinion, is the definition of a degenerate metagame.

targetdrone · Apr 14, 2007, 07:21 AM // 07:21

Maybe they do know. But they don't seem to be doing it.

They seem to want the balance to shift to people buying more editions, not necessarily playing the game better and in more varied and fun ways[1]. Searing Flames = NF. Mark of Rodgort, Meteor Shower = Prophecies.

Keep in mind with their current business model, they don't get money if people don't buy new editions/expansions.

[1] By the way, I thought running was a fun (emergent?) phenomena in Prophecies. But Anet sure clamped down on it in Factions. I've proposed that they create a challenge mission that involves running real low level human players, but I guess they don't like running- dunno why - after all they claim the game isn't about grinding.

Captain Robo · Apr 14, 2007, 07:34 AM // 07:34

I used to be a runner when I was building up cash in Prophecies. However, I did think that being able to bypass entire areas of the game, just by running, was kind of broken.

But not being able to run anywhere, as in Factions... is really annoying.

=HT=Ingram · Apr 14, 2007, 11:42 AM // 11:42

A metagame is a game within a game that has little to nothing to do with the existing game as it was designed.

Metagames in GW include;

Roleplaying,
Naked dances,
Congo lines,
Inflation Racketeering of market,
Spamming chat needlessly and inappropriately,
Random Arena Leavers just to annoy others (Some people just get off on this),
Custom Quests (not in game but posted on web with rewards in guilds),
Running taxi services,
Rock, Paper, Scissors,
Roll Die,
Pet fighting/betting.

those kinds of thing...

PvP and PvE in general are considered the primary purpose of the game.
Missions,
Quests,
Chests,
Exploring,
Skill acquisition,
Equipment acquisition / improvement,
PvP Competition,
Attaining Favor and Faction,
Alliance competition,
GvG competition and ladder advancement.
Personal improvement (Titles)...

as to the Skill balance nerfs, well yea they are frustrating, but in many ways it makes it clear that its not about the build, its about what you can do with your class and skills in a ever changing system. I personally think that keeps things fresh, and FORCES players to deviate on occasion from a build they have been misusing or over using for months, in favor of trying something new... If they don't they get owned for not evolving!!!

Captain Robo · Apr 17, 2007, 06:26 AM // 06:26

I'm sure "metagame" can be applied to any of those situation, but here... and pretty much anywhere else, the context refers to the current state of affairs in the pvp environment.