Curse

Shayne Hawke · Dec 20, 2008, 06:21 PM // 18:21

Welcome to this year's edition of the "Fix Snowball" thread. Here we summarize what issues exist in Snowball today and make suggestions on how to fix them.

General Snowball

Dwayna vs. Grenth - Avalanche vs. Yellow Snow

Avalanche vs. Yellow Snow is a debate that's carried on for years now. Simply put though, Avalanche overpowers Yellow Snow. It's a fact. While it may not be the determining factor of who wins or loses, it proves itself to matter in struggles between teams of similar power. The following are ways to shorten this gap:

Reduce Yellow Snow to a 1 second cast time -OR- increase Avalanche to a 2 second cast time.
Hidden Rock's functionality changes to a Preparation/Skill with similar cast time and effect -OR- Yellow Snow's functionality changes to a Preparation/Skill with similar cast time and effect.
Put players under a Effect/Disguise that gives players of each side separate creature types -OR- change Yellow Snow to inflict Poison for an increased duration (15-20 seconds).

-OR-

Avalanche affects all creatures in the target's area.

Cast Times

As it stands now, the cast times for Avalanche and Yellow Snow are a second apart. Given how this works, a few scenarios can happen, like these:

a) A person begins to cast Avalanche. The target notices and begins to cast Yellow Snow. The caster can cancel Avalanche with a hope that the target will waste their Yellow Snow, eliminating a possible Hidden Rock and ensuring that their Avalanche will stick for a while.
b) A person casts Avalanche. The target casts Yellow Snow. By the time they're done using Yellow Snow, the first caster will have gained a second's movement on their target and eliminated a possible Hidden Rock.
c) A person casts Avalanche. Their target simply moves forward. The caster will more than likely catch up to their enemy.

Whatever situation takes place, the person using Avalanche will catch up with their target, and has a potential of eliminating a KD. The solution would be to even up the cast times. It would be preferable to drop Yellow Snow down to 1 second, because boosting Avalanche to two might make it too weak in the face of Dazed or a watchful Mesmer.

Glyph Status

The fact that Yellow Snow and Hidden Rock are both Glyphs that overwrite each other makes Yellow Snow a very undesirable option when in a pinch situation that could have that person losing their bundle. Switching either skill to something else would remove the danger of writing over the KD, making it a much more viable option.

Conditions

Disease isn't a great tool in comparison to Cripple, because this arena is about running presents to an "altar" and not about kills. It becomes especially annoying when you realize that Disease can spread, which causes it to be worth anywhere from helpful to disastrous. Giving each team different Creature Types so that Disease doesn't backfire to Grenth would solve this. Similarly, changing this condition to Poison would make it a little safer, yet weaker, so buff the duration.

On a more extreme side, one solution to the argument would be to make Avalanche affect all players on the field. This isn't exactly a serious suggestion, but I feel that it would be a condition to force Dwayna players to consider when and where to use their Avalanche as to not affect their own team.

Player Professions Skills

While there isn't any skill in this category that would be so powerful that it would make or break a game, there are certainly skills that are more desirable than others for how they work. For example, I find the Ranger's, Dervish's, Paragon's, and Assassin's skills to be mostly useless in either format. Necromancer would be ineffective in 4v4 and effective in 8v8 for similar reasons that the Ritualist would be effective in 4v4 and ineffective in 8v8.

The four professions that dominate both formats for their skills are the Warrior, Elementalist, Monk, and Mesmer, because they provide the effects most useful for moving, stopping, or protecting presents going from A to B.

There aren't any specific suggestions I have for any profession on how to "fix" them, because they all have their strategic use. There are just some skills that are better to use than others, given the style of play.

Rewards

Costume Brawl saw the first of the consecutive point system. This was something that I and a few others had hoped would appear again.

Victories in Snowball award 9 Gamer points and an additional Gamer point for each consecutive victory in the arena. The most Gamer points to be gained per match is 50.

Plain and simple. Would be nice for the Dragon Arena too, but that's not our focus here.

Automated Snowball Tournaments - 8v8 Snowball

Victory Conditions

Recently, it was discovered that the way Snowball Tournaments are played somewhat different from the 4v4 arena. Both teams, given ten minutes of play, are to collect ten gifts. However, there's an extra condition that makes this arena imbalanced: If either team fails to reach ten points, Dwayna becomes the automatic victor. This more or less turns these matches in to a game of keep-away from Grenth, and Dwayna gets the easy win. Coupled with having Avalanche, this is a broken condition.

At the end of ten minutes, if both teams fail to reach ten points, the team with the most points wins.
In the case of a tie between points, the match ends in a draw -OR- in the case of a tie between points, Grenth wins.

Plain and simple fix. The last suggestion, although by no means serious, is simply on the basis that if two teams tie in points and switched places for a rematch, the team that was first Grenth would be the victor because they would then have the more powerful of the two faction skills in their arsenal.

Observer Mode

A separate section for Snowball matches is added during the hours of a tournament.
All finals matches will be available for viewing.

The current way that Snowball matches are viewed isn't quite right, as you can only watch guilds in the top 100 play, and it is mixed in with any guilds doing the normal GvG tournaments. Split them up and adjust the system to show matches not restricted to simply top 100 guilds.

Rewards

For a team that manages to win all of their games, the total Gamer points they would receive is 90 points over 90 minutes + waiting time, which may extend to over two hours. 90 points per two hours is a horrible progression in that title, especially with the introduction of consecutive point gains.

I won't name a number for how many points should be earned per match or at the end of the tournament for team, but I do believe it needs a boost.

This is not such an important suggestion, given that the players in the tournament are already receiving normal tournament rewards. I just feel that a higher level competition of a festival game would have a higher level reward in that respective title track. If such a reward boost were to take place, there may need to be a reduction in the normal rewards from the tournament for sake of fairness/balance/etc.

tl;dr

Avalanche and Yellow Snow are imbalanced, so fix that. The tournament has glitches, so fix them. Ways to improve, balance, and fix this arena should be looked into before next year. The elimination of equipment effects was a good start.

inb4 someone tells me "It's a game, why so serious?" I don't remember anything about not being allowed to take something seriously just because it's a game.

Kerwyn Nasilan · Dec 20, 2008, 07:38 PM // 19:38

Agreed
12 chars

here to troll · Dec 20, 2008, 08:35 PM // 20:35

looks good and well laid out,
/agree

Ben-A-BoO · Dec 21, 2008, 12:06 AM // 00:06

/signed with 12 chars

Lykan · Dec 21, 2008, 12:38 AM // 00:38

It doesnt matter how well you explain it. Its been QQ'ed about every year, why would they care now all of a sudden?

Shayne Hawke · Dec 21, 2008, 01:04 AM // 01:04

Because this year, they added something new. I figure that as long as they're gonna work on fixing their 8v8, they may as well look at a long-standing balance issue.

Xx Da Best Xx · Dec 21, 2008, 01:05 AM // 01:05

Yes...this would be nice.
/sign

dilan155 · Dec 21, 2008, 01:20 AM // 01:20

/signed they need to either buff somethings or nerf another.

Massive Impulsa · Dec 21, 2008, 01:28 AM // 01:28

/after loosing the Snowball Finale vs Dom because the had a RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing imba snare made me qq,/SIGNED!

TheGuildWarsPenguin · Dec 21, 2008, 01:47 AM // 01:47

/signed

Snowball needs to be fixed.

FoxBat · Dec 21, 2008, 02:45 AM // 02:45

Thoughts on adjusting useless professions:

- Paragon's chant should be adrenal based (4? 6? 8?), and up snowball speed by 200% if possible. Dodging is a relevant trick so the ability itself isn't bad, just needs stronger numbers. This is another way-better-in-8v8 ability though.

- Let flurry build adrenaline, give it a recharge (4s?), maybe up to 50 damage. It can build for mega slightly faster vs single target, or you can punish people who bunch up with extra KDs.

- Sin gets a targeted shadowstep to target foe. Remove the heal, give it a long recharge, or half range if you have to. Then they can insta-snow down the shirt (lulz) or catch up with present carriers. OR Change side step to move you to target ally, adjust recharge as needed. That free mobility will pay off over the course of a match.

- While in derv avatar form, your "god" skill gets appropriately buffed. EG: Avalanche recharge to 20s, yellow snow transfers all conditions from self to snowball target on use, or other variations.

Shayne Hawke · Dec 21, 2008, 03:07 AM // 03:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by FoxBat

Thoughts on adjusting useless professions:

- Paragon's chant should be adrenal based (4? 6? 8?), and up snowball speed by 200% if possible. Dodging is a relevant trick so the ability itself isn't bad, just needs stronger numbers. This is another way-better-in-8v8 ability though.

Boosting the numbers would certainly help make it more useful, but it would still be underpowered. As for its effectiveness in 8v8, this skill really doesn't improve, because chances are that a person will be intercepting more attacks and won't have the chance to dodge them all. Attacks will still make it through to a person, and KDs will still strike.

Quote:

- Let flurry build adrenaline, give it a recharge (4s?), maybe up to 50 damage. It can build for mega slightly faster vs single target, or you can punish people who bunch up with extra KDs.

Yay to the adrenal build, nay to the recharge or damage buff. As a whole, it's an improvement that doesn't sound too strong. For that in an 8v8 format, it's more likely that it will strike multiple foes for faster Megas, so it would become a profession worth trying.

Quote:

- Sin gets a targeted shadowstep to target foe. Remove the heal, give it a long recharge, or half range if you have to. Then they can insta-snow down the shirt (lulz) or catch up with present carriers. OR Change side step to move you to target ally, adjust recharge as needed. That free mobility will pay off over the course of a match.

Changing the skill to a simple shadowstep-to-enemy skill seems like an interesting move. I agree that the mobility will be effective, but I can't figure how much so. If such a change was made, I'd also like to see a KD or snare added to it, along with a long recharge, but that might be extremely overpowered.

I'll leave your suggestion as is because I feel I'm underestimating the power of a shadowstep in Snowball.

Quote:

- While in derv avatar form, your "god" skill gets appropriately buffed. EG: Avalanche recharge to 20s, yellow snow transfers all conditions from self to snowball target on use, or other variations.

With there already being an imbalance between the two faction skills, I'm not going to support any idea of a "temporary buff" to either skill while in a specific mode. Your suggestion, however, makes me think that a sort of condition transfer mechanic on using Yellow Snow would be an interesting buff/change.

mrmango · Dec 21, 2008, 05:26 AM // 05:26

/signed
Well written.

Konig Des Todes · Dec 21, 2008, 09:38 AM // 09:38

I see nothing I disagree with, so:

/sign

Buterfly · Dec 21, 2008, 10:50 AM // 10:50

Agree with most of the suggestions
Suggesting that Avalanche not be AoE and Yellow Snow with a decreased casting time. Hidden Rock is used often, and if youre hit with it you can kinda forget even trying to use Yellow Snow to try to remove dazed lol a 4 second cast wtf o.o

Lex · Dec 21, 2008, 11:47 AM // 11:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Buterfly

Hidden Rock is used often, and if youre hit with it you can kinda forget even trying to use Yellow Snow to try to remove dazed lol a 4 second cast wtf o.o

YS is glyph, not spell.. so still 2 secs under dazed.

On topic: I've played 3 ATs with my guild already, and fights (like 90% of) in top8 are won by Dwayna.

Dwayna's advantage is less visible on typical random 4v4 (where I often win being Grenth) or on "lower levels" of AT but in AT finals Dwayna just owns and creates real advantage for very good players.

/signed

Nightfallen Phoenix · Dec 21, 2008, 02:33 PM // 14:33

/unsigned It's good as it is already.

Shayne Hawke · Dec 21, 2008, 02:48 PM // 14:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nightfallen Phoenix

/unsigned It's good as it is already.

Would you like to share a reason to that extremely empty comment?

ele pl · Dec 21, 2008, 02:48 PM // 14:48

/signed
12chars

shadows of hob · Dec 21, 2008, 03:09 PM // 15:09

Lol, numerous people, including myself, have given easy and good solutions to fix this problem 1 year ago, 2 years ago and this year. Nobody listens to us, so who cares?

But, of course, I /sign this