Curse

zwei2stein · Jun 18, 2009, 02:20 PM // 14:20

Just innocent question: Every so often when ritualists are being discussed someone claims that spirits are bad for game and terrible mechanic.

Why?

I for one think spirits are awesome mechanic for one reason:

They do not require skill slots to be countered; they can be deal with by any direct damage, which is plentiful at 'ballanced' (whatever that might be). As little as wanding from casters can take care of one or two.

Spirits that get damaged by their effect can even have their effective 'power' reduced by damage even if you only throw bits of damage towards them. Say, Shelter can be directly auto attacked to decrease amount of triggers that opposing team will receive from one cast.

On top of this, they usually have restrictive cast times and recharges.

Compare this to, say shouts that are incredibly hard to remove and require overly specialized skills to prevent from being activated and once activated they are there to stay no matter what opposing teams does.

---

So, given we are not discussing specific spirits, what is inherently bad about this mechanic?

Killed u man · Jun 18, 2009, 03:35 PM // 15:35

They are bad because there has been a general concensus they are bad.

Like with most builds in GW, people won't try them, or think they are worthy of trying, untill it becomes meta, or people see for themselves how "good" it is. (In short: Noone tries new stuff/tries stuff)

Now in reality, Spirit builds (spammers) weren't always bad. During factions days, there was no spirit limit and people had like a million pains up. (Glyph of renewal + anguished was linguah or something)
And in HA, a Rt/R ritlord spiritspammer was used in pretty much every build.

In GvG, Spirits were never really used due to the simple fact that every spirit is ATLEAST 3 seconds cast time (interrupt fodder), and it simply isn't mobile.

Note a few things here however:

GvG has become more of 8v8 Stand match, so Tbh, I don't know why Spirits both offensive and defensive, arn't used more often, even just for shitz and gigglez.
But even then, you still have to "ask" the enemy team to push into your spirit base. The defensive spirits are nice (Shelter, Union), but they just die so incredibly fast (Mainly due to the various Health nerfs, I think spirits used to have DOUBLE the hp they have now), and the offensive ones usually have such a low level, a warrior can 1 blow kill them. (So U need to run atleast a bsurge, unless you're fully relying on shadowsong to do some mad backlining)

Please don't post leaked skill updates. Thanks.
Edit: Sorry, didn't even know it was real

FoxBat · Jun 18, 2009, 04:00 PM // 16:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

So, given we are not discussing specific spirits, what is inherently bad about this mechanic?

On many maps, the defensive ones are effective around footmen range - the same reason people are whining about recuperation. Also, pure spirit spammer builds are incredibly boring to play.

Edge Igneas · Jun 18, 2009, 04:47 PM // 16:47

I think a major problem is just the fact that Spawning Power is pretty useless, or could have better effects at least that would define Ritualists. Spirits can have nice effects, but can be easily destroyed, unlike minions which move freely and can be controlled in greater numbers, you can only have 1 spirit of the same type in range.

Even if you have 2 ritualists who animate a pain spirit, only 1 spirit will be active, which is a fat slap there.

Ec]-[oMaN · Jun 18, 2009, 04:56 PM // 16:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

On top of this, they usually have restrictive cast times and recharges.

Compare this to, say shouts that are incredibly hard to remove and require overly specialized skills to prevent from being activated and once activated they are there to stay no matter what opposing teams does.

---

So, given we are not discussing specific spirits, what is inherently bad about this mechanic?

Placement of spirits, range of spirits. Only thing that can stop you from pooping spirits are rangers, and skill based interrupts/ cry of frust. They are almost dipping into the same mechanics of shouts, as in once used can only be damaged, and if your damage can't reach them, then ohwell they serve as very passive forms of skills. As with shouts/chants the more of them you have, the more problems occur, strength in abundance.

I don't know anyone who would enjoy playing a character that just shits these things as their sole purpose, is that desirable?

zwei2stein · Jun 18, 2009, 05:45 PM // 17:45

Killed u man & Edge Igneas :

I did not mean to ask why spirit spam is weak, but what is rationale for nerfing it and keeping it nerfed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FoxBat

On many maps, the defensive ones are effective around footmen range - the same reason people are whining about recuperation. Also, pure spirit spammer builds are incredibly boring to play.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ec]-[oMaN

Placement of spirits, range of spirits. Only thing that can stop you from pooping spirits are rangers, and skill based interrupts/ cry of frust. They are almost dipping into the same mechanics of shouts, as in once used can only be damaged, and if your damage can't reach them, then ohwell they serve as very passive forms of skills. As with shouts/chants the more of them you have, the more problems occur, strength in abundance.

I don't know anyone who would enjoy playing a character that just shits these things as their sole purpose, is that desirable?

So its mostly about range and ability to hide them relatively far from enemy frontline/midline and forcing other team either overextend or to just let spirits live while their own team enjoys ability to push deeper themselves while still retaining some support from spirits. Basically, positioning advantage.

So, this means that reducing their range to, say, Earshot would be first step enabling restoration of functionality of more spirit based builds.

Being boring is another issue, but would viable builds focusing on spirits necessarily have to be just pooping em around and doing nothing else? Wouldn't spirit bar be able to accomodate some utility, like, whadoiknow, ashes drops (timing for best effect, avaiable during pooping), instants like shouts or just normal skills with activation, etc ...

shinyglove · Jun 18, 2009, 05:57 PM // 17:57

i think this mechanic isn't bad, it's as you said a balanced thing. but as stated by foxbat, they are rather boring to play.

smilingscar · Jun 18, 2009, 06:44 PM // 18:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

Killed u man & Edge Igneas :
I did not mean to ask why spirit spam is weak, but what is rationale for nerfing it and keeping it nerfed.

Because while spirits are incredibly slow/weak, once the rit gets them laid down they can kill anyone who walks into range. The Norn fighting tournament, while a pve gig, showcases this extremely well. If the rit has the time to prep, they can 1v1 anyone with knockdowns, blind, interrupts, and lifesteal all at once. So that makes some people think they deserve to be nerfed. And perhaps rightly so.

On the other hand, they are still incredibly cumbersome, slow, and fragile. And only an idiot wammo rushes into a pod of spirits solo (then again, healing hands is the perfect counter

). And thus some people call for buffs. Me, I think both camps could be satisfied if painful bond would be killed and all spirit damage nerfed/removed, followed by buffs to casting time and recharge. Then, spirits would be simply about the bonus effects, and would be mobile and active to play, but not deadly in and of themselves.

Reverend Dr · Jun 18, 2009, 09:03 PM // 21:03

Spirits have long range. They can be cast and placed where it is not really possible (assuming an even match up between teams) to interrupt or kill spirits. Anyone that saw the old Rit Lord communing rits back during factions remembers this.

If spirit spam is less effective at support than a midline then spirit spam is going to be ignored in favor of midline (as is currently the case). If spirit spam is as effective or more effective than a midliner then spirit spam is going to be overpowered. Combine this with the lack of skill needed to effective play a spirit spammer and you will see that it is a playstyle that shouldn't be encouraged.

Yes the whole commuting like sucks now, but it was a poorly designed mechanic and better a poorly designed mechanic that isn't used than forcing a poorly designed mechanic into the game.

Keira Nightgale · Jun 18, 2009, 09:44 PM // 21:44

Should have made them a passive effect who hit both party members and foes alike. At least you'd have to think before popping them out.

[DE] · Jun 18, 2009, 10:36 PM // 22:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keira Nightgale

Should have made them a passive effect who hit both party members and foes alike. At least you'd have to think before popping them out.

You're basically 'Smiter's Boon'ing' all the Rit spirits that attack or aren't party-wide. No one would want to use Shadowsong when it might shit all over your own warriors.

Also how would spirits such as Preservation choose who to heal in an unbiased manner? I can understand how your idea might work for Recuperation and other Rit spells that have a party-wide effect, but for most of the spirits it's just ridiculous.

Master Fuhon · Jun 18, 2009, 11:00 PM // 23:00

This could be seen since Factions beta, a time when the random arenas were dominated by spirits. After seeing a Ritualist before the match started, you could tell your teammates 'kill spirits' and have this suggestion completely ignored. This has been a problem since the beginning of the game: a large number of players have difficulty adapting to strategies that require actions aside from kill the healer, attack the healer, or shutdown the healer. These types of strategies are instead based around things like: coordinate what you are doing with your teammates.

Over time, a large number of players in the game have been rewarded for one-sidedness and 'individual skill' despite the game being designed around strategy. They go into matches and expect to be able to execute the same plan and win with it because of the faulty notion that individual skill prevails over everything. People hate the expansions and the new mechanics they brought because those mechanics force a shift away from the previous 'winning' strategy that allows the current state of 'team' to function. For that reason, they have pushed to see alternate strategies taken out of the game through the suggestion of skill nerfs.

Notice the complaints about the mechanics: shouts/weapon spells cannot just be removed (although some of these are strong because they are balanced like backline functions instead of support), shadowstep characters cannot just be chased (this forces snares and funneling strategies into team builds), and stances force target switching (harmful to physical spiking, resistant to interrupting). These mechanics force coordination when they are implemented.

But there is a different problem tied in with the inflexibility in strategy that encourages skill nerfs. PvP and the other game modes had degraded into assigning players inflexible roles. Healer, support, frontline. These types of roles require almost no communication between teammates because they are completely inflexible by nature. These types of roles are designed to exploit weaknesses in your own teammates without your opponents doing any of the work. People are performing as interchangeable single player roles in a team game. This is the same super-star concept you are likely to find in any poorly performing sports franchise that shells out a ton of money and fails every year. It's a losing concept by design; the skill balancing should not be forced to try to allow it to win.

In actuality, mechanics like spirits are very good for a healthy 'team' meta game. If implemented properly, they would encourage people to learn to cooperate instead of expecting individuals to come through and execute assigned roles. The type of atmosphere that is currently in place encourages individual blaming (player failed, profession failed, execution failed), when in reality, these accusations are being made to mask greater team failures. Skill balances cannot fix these types of dysfunctions. Referencing back to the example in the beginning, the reason why the original team lost is because they were not open to communication.