Curse

Master Fuhon · Feb 08, 2009, 09:17 PM // 21:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

this latests patch moved the game back to pretty much what it was 3 months ago.
It made pressure much weaker, killed off a few pressure only templates and created more spikeable targets

Part of how spikes are concealed comes from:
Spammable skills – when you use them, the other team does not know if it’s the big spike coming or just a regular attack. Spammable skills looks like pressure.
Fast activating ranged damage bombs – Harder to see coming than what a melee class does, so don’t have as much time to react.
Post-facto defense removal – The target thought he was safe, bam, no defenses and dead
Blanket shutdown instead of time specific shutdown – Diversion/shame is up, you look for something soon. If you can lock something down indefinitely, there are less warning signs a spike is coming. Shutdown is also a key part of pressure.

The change to Mark of Insecurity has made spikes less disguisable. As would further nerfs to any of the four things I listed above reduce the power of spike, although I have a feeling Rend Enchantments would be the next biggest hit to spike, along with nerfs to spammable ranger 1s bombs, and finally by reduction in axe warrior deep wound spam.

Hitting Rend would push spikers to relearn other fast recharging removals, but I expect it would require them to need more redundancy in removal. When Rend was interruptible, people took multiple copies. The additional removal skills they would need to add would probably reduce defense in the build, or at the very least, reduce the offense of the spike. People casting extra enchant removals aren’t doing damage and aren’t defending, so it looks like this can change things. It could have been moved to Soul Reaping with 2 second cast and a 15 sec recharge, with a 1-9 scaling rate. Forcing a necro into a spike build isn’t synergistic; they deal mostly armor ignoring damage, and if the character is helping the spike, he’ll be in range. Other skills might eventually replace Rend, but it’s a start.

Ranger’s have interrupts; I don’t think killing turret flexibility would make them unplayable as a class. Hunter’s Shot should be changed to be armor ignoring set damage (like how Needling Shot was done). Read the Wind with a Flatbow is about mathematically the same DPS increase as Rapid Fire with a Recurve, which is why it could cost 10e since it’s better for spiking. Make Melandru’s Shot cause bleeding first and half the +dmg, and then the rest of the +dmg and cripple on the conditional. Split +dmg of Burning Arrow in half, make the second half of the damage require hitting a burning target. Rangers are such an anti-class they push builds out of the meta.

Dismember, make deep wound require a target below 50% health, above 50% health give it standard +5-21 dmg. Axes are always the spike guys. If the warrior has to finish the spike, it’s telegraphed.

Of course the biggest problem when suggesting spike damage nerfs is when people immediately recognize they won’t be able to kill anything with a build. That’s the point, take more offense instead of defense. If changes like these were done to nerf overpowered offense, I would consider the party healing nerf seriously, or modifying skills to punish enchanted characters more. Try to get push/pull back into the game by letting a team expose a fragile character and not be punished harshly for it. Being afraid to make the first aggressive move is not balanced, because the objective is to be aggressive and attack the Guild Lord.

Master Fuhon · Feb 08, 2009, 11:02 PM // 23:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

Its no great secret that I prefer a game where players actually die, it is also no great secret that I run primal because it helps me achieve that more easily,and lastly it is also no secret that I am against pure instagib spikes used to achieve those player deaths.

Missed responding to this, double posting because this is ending up as too much writing.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild_vs_guild

Winning conditions
-Kill the enemy Guild Lord.
-Have all opposing players reach 60% Death Penalty.
-In the event that time runs out, the team with the most aggressiveness will be declared victorious.
Only one of these conditions has to be met for a match to end.

Either the condition of 60% DP on all players or a dead Guild Lord is what was designed to win a match. Also, since the tiebreaker is a recent enough addition, the tiebreaker has been based on damage done to the guild lord (currently a combination of healing/damage called aggressiveness).

My preference is towards whichever winning condition will be more achievable which progresses from Aggressiveness -> Guild Lord death --> 60% DP. Use of the resign function is not relevant to this discussion, because we cannot be aware of the motivations of players who decide not to play out the rest of matches.

If you intend to make the 60% DP winning condition more achievable, you should know that the current state of GvG involves teams being too hesitant to make the first aggressive move in a match, effectively stalling in 8v8. The way to solve this would be towards making it easier to run straight towards the guild lord and damage him without dying. Any attempts involving buffing offense/nerfing defense would lead the game closer to your 60% DP conditions, but do nothing towards making the tie-breaker more achievable in game play (a team could run more healing characters to continually prevent the 60% DP condition).

My suggestions to nerf offense are designed to present a greater opportunity for characters to rush the Guild Lord to more easily decide the outcome based upon Guild Lord death or aggressiveness. Also, under the winning condition of damaging the Guild Lord, I would not prioritize problems with skills that do not directly defend him.

If you intend to advocate the position that another format is needed where the main objective is killing players, Team/Random Arenas are already places where that victory condition must be achieved. I'm not sure what popular opinion would say towards changing GvG towards what you want, but it sounds like 8v8 arena and not what I am familiar with.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Feb 09, 2009, 05:56 AM // 05:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

Its no great secret that I prefer a game where players actually die, it is also no great secret that I run primal because it helps me achieve that more easily,and lastly it is also no secret that I am against pure instagib spikes used to achieve those player deaths.

And it's also no secret that you prefer running highly defensive spike builds, as that's all you've been running for the past 2 years (and probably most of the time before that as well, iA ownzzzzzzzz).

360° · Feb 09, 2009, 04:48 PM // 16:48

Mitch is bitter cause he won't ever get a golden cape.

((((((

Byron · Feb 09, 2009, 07:58 PM // 19:58

Hard to argue with results, in my humble opinion.

Master Fuhon · Feb 09, 2009, 09:00 PM // 21:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Byron

Hard to argue with results, in my humble opinion.

It has always been highly appropriate for anyone in the competitive domain to conduct their own investigation into what gets results. Anyone not seeking out the causes of those results is not learning what it takes to win. Anyone seeking to reinvent how a game is played will be far behind the person who looks at the examples of success already in place and adds to them.

I can assure you that if you think arguing with results is a problem, solid results do not disappear by the power of argument alone. Results will always have the backing of what has been done to earn them.

Any and all balance discussions will go back to a discussion on what gets results, and the difficulty of the methods people go about getting results. So many types of balance arguments will also involve results arguments. Any argument against results is an argument against the idea of a game being balanced. Any defense of results is a defense of balance.

So now, if you find the idea of arguing with results difficult, it is probably the idea of balance that you find difficult. Otherwise, anyone who finds balance issues simple will have no problem arguing about results. In this case, I would disagree with you on the difficulty of arguing with results when we have a free flow of discussion on balance issues.

valence · Feb 10, 2009, 06:08 AM // 06:08

Wait, prage isnt a spike template?

Thought we took warriors for deep wound nothing else.

~GW 2009

qvtkc · Feb 10, 2009, 12:26 PM // 12:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Robster Lobster

I think a buff to Final Thrust could push more Sword warrior builds into the game for example

It should either not drain adrenaline, or it should cause a deep wound I mean look at the icon he is really pushing that sword in it should cause a deep wound.

[final thrust]

Or how about OP is right, offense should be nerfed not buffed.

Reverend Dr · Feb 10, 2009, 04:34 PM // 16:34

Primal is just a natural extension of the powercreep of speed stances. Why bring snares and have to rely on the warrior being snared to kite? Warriors have to be in frenzy to do real damage and that leaves them stuck at normal speed, just outrun them and suddenly they deal no damage. Every class sure seems to have easy access to 33% speed boosts now. Warriors need the boost of primal just to keep them at the same speed as whatever they are killing (don't give me crap about charge, it shields up and healing signet were the only useful things in the entire tactics line, shields up became crap and healing sig is just outclassed. charge alone is not enough to warrant bringing tactics on a warrior).

I'm not saying primal is perfectly balanced. A RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing powercreep over eviscerate. I'm not trying to put eviscerate on some pedestal, but primal clearly outclasses the old template and that's a powercreep. But closely tied into this is the buff speed boosts in general have received.

Robster Lobster · Feb 10, 2009, 11:39 PM // 23:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by qvtkc

Or how about OP is right, offense should be nerfed not buffed.

The OP is definitely right that various offensive skills should be nerfed, that doesn't mean that some interesting skills that have fallen out of play can't be buffed at the same time though.

Wild Karrde · Feb 12, 2009, 01:10 AM // 01:10

Lets hit All of Guild Wars with a Giant nerf bat.... destroy the power creep.

Nerf offense AND defense, Nerf it all.

Its been said a thousand times... WTB GW PRE FACTIONS!!!

ChopChop · Feb 12, 2009, 04:22 AM // 04:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

And it's also no secret that you prefer running highly defensive spike builds, as that's all you've been running for the past 2 years (and probably most of the time before that as well, iA ownzzzzzzzz).

Mitch..mitch..mitch *shakes head*

I don't know what to say to you anymore, I don't know why you persist in making massive amounts on forum posts on every damn GW forum, I don't know why you think your pathetic troll posts are even worth your time.
There is such a thing as a time and place to do things, even trolling, and when your getting constantly beaten to a pulp to by someone you can't turn and pick on him, thats not how life works.

How was the last game against you? oh flawless win for us I think.
What is our record now vs. you like 9 wins and 0 losses? .. to be honest I stopped counting.

I promised myself I wouldn't make this post, but you just have to keep picking and poking at it, you wouldn't see a stop sign if I planted it in your driveway.

Before I begin I would like to add a small disclaimer, this post is not meant to be a flame bait or troll, this is meant as public information so people can get an idea of who Mitch is and why no one, with the possible exception of his own guilds and loyal zealots, takes him serious.
Also note that I do not hate him, so don't read this as a personal attack, I like Mitch, ever since I began to follow his forum activity I have stopped wasting my time on Internet comics.

With all that being said, lets dance.

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

the VoD removal is pretty much the only mechanic change that happened 'recently' and it actually took rawr a lot longer to adapt to it.

Compared to who? Lets looks at this claim
First five months post VoD changes (this does not include our latest win)
KMD: 8th, 8th, 8th, 16th, 16th 3 wins 5 losses
rawr: 16th, 2nd, 2nd, 16th, 1st 10 wins, 4 losses

How is being the guild who does best on average, equal slow at adapting? .. we got to 2 of the first 3 finals.

Furthermore after 5 months of 'adapting', KMD lost to braQ who at the time had the title of being the lowest ranked nonsmurf guild in 20 (twenty) mAts to win a round in the single elims, solid work there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

Originally Posted by Jeydra View Post
@Mitch -

Come up with a build.

2 Warriors, Poison Ranger, Dom Mesmer, Bsurge
2 Warriors, Poison Ranger, Dom Mesmer, Water Ele
3 Warriors, Poison Ranger, Dom Mesmer
2 Warriors, Poison Ranger, Dom Mesmer, Paragon
Do I need to continue?

Yes you do because, YOU LISTED THE SAME BUILD 4 TIMES *face palm*

Here, I'll toss you a hint: Having 7 out of 8 players on the same template type, only to swap 1 character who stays on the same role does not constitute build variety in anyones mind except your own little euro honor utopia.
There is a difference between 'build variety' and 'here are some builds I want my opponents to play' .. try a dictionary.
Build variety can roughly be defined as builds distinctive enough to have thier own name, be it named by a guilds or by consensus, if you can't even distinguish between them by name then its not variety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

Build variety right now is basically limited to:
2 Warriors, 2 Rangers (either 2 turrets or 1 turret + 1 poison), Bsurge E/Rt, 2 Monks (Mo/W), Rit runner
2 Warriors, 1 Turret Ranger, Rt/N, 1 Mindshock Ele or Water Me/E, 2 Monks (Mo/W), Rit runner

Running anything else is pretty much gimping yourself.

Watching obs mode on any given day would shoot down your point, I don't even have to, try observing nH play.

That is your opinion because you choose to ignore most of what you see, and what you read, being selective about what information you acknowledge and ignoring most of what other people say and do does not make your version of reality any more true. Stating something doesn't make it so.

The fact that you yourself play different builds also beg to differ, and do not give me some BS line about how its 'more fun to play other builds' .. we both been in this game long enough to know that we play to win, you are not having fun when you lose and you do not play a build expecting to lose.

The truth is, you are not as good as you want to think you are, the difference between you and me Mitch is that, I openly admit I my strengths does not lie in my micro skills, I don't try to hide my limitations behind long forums posts and whines about how I lose to broken builds and bad luck.
I know my limitations and I do the best I can within them, I don't think I or rawr are any better than so many other people and guilds out there, and I approach everyone as being able to beat us.

You too should step down from that pedestal you put yourself on, realize your nothing special, and the next guy posting here is not 'some scrub' but an equal person with different opinions, just becuase he wasn't in 'uberguild xzy' does not mean his opinion doesn't count, or even that your opinion matters more.
Outside observes get things eerily right sometimes, you should listen to them more instead of getting emotionally attached to the game, spend some times thinking about what people are actually saying and perhaps just wording slightly differently than you are used to, instead of firing up the 'who r you' comment withing seconds.

Realize that you or KMD are not 'better than everyone else', be able to appreciate the fact that other people are right, and do not just take the default stance that everyone who disagree with your opinion are wrong.
Maybe then you can start improving some aspects of your game that other people are better than you at, and be a real threat to play against.

As silly as it sounds I want KMD to be a challenge for rawr, I want someone to step up to the plate and dethrone us, I want incentive to improve my game. And I am not talking about some random win, which I know for sure you will score on us eventually, KMD is certainly good enough to beat rawr.
Between playing almost every day and having more good guilds to practice against, KMD is bound to best rawr eventually, but when we start having an even win/loss ratio vs. you is when you really got there.

So my advice to you is go home, figure out what your weaknesses are in guildwars and start playing around them, and maybe then you will work it out.

Troll me all you want, I find some weird kind of humor in it, but troll me when your beating us, trolling a guy who is constantly beating you just makes no sense what so ever.
And trolling me while saying 'you only win because of the build you play' .. or 'because our monk lagged out' .. or 'because of American servers' .. or whatever the excuse of the day is, really just serves to make yourself look whiny and ignorant.
Good day to you sir.

And lastly, if your even going to attempt a half hearted comeback please do not split my post into 21 quotes and make it unreadable, that is for school kids, if you have no retorts for my points but can only pick on half sentences then, do not bother wasting your time and effort, I will ignore it.

Asplode · Feb 12, 2009, 04:33 AM // 04:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

please do not split my post into 21 quotes

rawr can't play vs split.

Case in point.

House Silvermoon · Feb 12, 2009, 05:05 AM // 05:05

wow im moved. chop chop flawless victory?

Robster Lobster · Feb 12, 2009, 05:26 AM // 05:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

Build variety right now is basically limited to:
2 Warriors, 2 Rangers (either 2 turrets or 1 turret + 1 poison), Bsurge E/Rt, 2 Monks (Mo/W), Rit runner
2 Warriors, 1 Turret Ranger, Rt/N, 1 Mindshock Ele or Water Me/E, 2 Monks (Mo/W), Rit runner

Running anything else is pretty much gimping yourself.

Watching obs mode on any given day would shoot down your point, I don't even have to, try observing nH play.

?

ChopChop · Feb 12, 2009, 05:49 AM // 05:49

I was thinking someone would make that exact reply, and I could give a long dissection on how it would probably turn out with both teams winning and losing some games if the match was played multiple times.

But thats not as much the point as much as the build being viable, and beating solid guilds in AT matches.

Diversity is people actually thinking different builds can win, diversity is not one build always beating another

... good post though, someone had to do it.

valence · Feb 12, 2009, 06:02 AM // 06:02

Diversity isn't just different builds viable. Diversity is different tactics shown in builds. There are a few incarnation of some random omegaspike builds atm, all the same to me.

So nH loses to a subpar guild and then you respond they still lose 50% if replayed couple of times. Certainly makes your diversity point valid...

Diversity atm is 'forced' by creating OP skills in a certain direction that shouldn't have ever been thought about to be created. Just a respond in power increase to nullify the current power spike builds containt. I really don't see why you favor these increases if the root of the problem lies somewhere else.

ChopChop · Feb 12, 2009, 06:12 AM // 06:12

Lets not get ahead of ourself here, I never claimed the game is perfect, or all skills are balanced well.

I believe party healing skills mainly koala pot must be nerfed before real pressure and split builds can work, and I also think there has been too many nerfs of 'good' pressure skills over the past 6-8 months.

But that doesn't change the point that nerfing skills just removes templates from play, it very rarely increase build diversity (historically it never did).
There is a small point to be made that toning down party healing and koala pot will help some, and I am all for this.

valence · Feb 12, 2009, 06:21 AM // 06:21

thats where i disagree, as long as any guild can take 5 defensive characters and still spike/pressure the same without any problem, partyhealing is not the bone of pressurebuilds. Note that i consider pressure a playstyle, not just a build.

if partyheals are compressed on defensive characters and not spread over 5, shutdown is more effective to allow pressure in. while the numbers on kaolei might be a bit off, i dont see it as the biggest problem vs pressure.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Feb 12, 2009, 08:52 AM // 08:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopChop

Compared to who? Lets looks at this claim
First five months post VoD changes (this does not include our latest win)
KMD: 8th, 8th, 8th, 16th, 16th 3 wins 5 losses
rawr: 16th, 2nd, 2nd, 16th, 1st 10 wins, 4 losses

I'd say losing to RSpike on Frozen means you haven't adapted yet, iirc it took you until the next monthly to comeup with more or less the current 'rawr build' which was surprisingly conceived by adding more defense to the build you (along with most other people) had been running until that point.

Also, in this period, you got decimated twice by [sup] and almost lost to StP for the ESL (even got flawlessed by them once).

Quote:

Yes you do because, YOU LISTED THE SAME BUILD 4 TIMES *face palm*

Here, I'll toss you a hint: Having 7 out of 8 players on the same template type, only to swap 1 character who stays on the same role does not constitute build variety in anyones mind except your own little euro honor utopia.
There is a difference between 'build variety' and 'here are some builds I want my opponents to play' .. try a dictionary.
Build variety can roughly be defined as builds distinctive enough to have thier own name, be it named by a guilds or by consensus, if you can't even distinguish between them by name then its not variety.

If you would have actually ever moved away from your own spike builds for just 1 second, you'd realise how different some of these builds play.

How can you even say that a build with 3 warriors a ranger and a mesmer plays the same way as a build with 2 warriors a ranger a mesmer and a bsurge?

Quote:

Watching obs mode on any given day would shoot down your point, I don't even have to, try observing nH play.

That is your opinion because you choose to ignore most of what you see, and what you read, being selective about what information you acknowledge and ignoring most of what other people say and do does not make your version of reality any more true. Stating something doesn't make it so.

The fact that you yourself play different builds also beg to differ, and do not give me some BS line about how its 'more fun to play other builds' .. we both been in this game long enough to know that we play to win, you are not having fun when you lose and you do not play a build expecting to lose.

nH's build? It still baffles me that people actually die to that build, let alone lose to it, then again I wasn't surprised one bit when nH lost to some low ranked team that just so happened to run rawrspike, funny how that goes.

We play the builds we play, because we enjoy the playing style, we know it's not the most effective/best playing style for winning, but we can still beat 90% of the people with them and to be frank, considering what's left to win in Guild Wars, having fun is a lot more important to me than having the best chance to win.

Quote:

As silly as it sounds I want KMD to be a challenge for rawr, I want someone to step up to the plate and dethrone us, I want incentive to improve my game. And I am not talking about some random win, which I know for sure you will score on us eventually, KMD is certainly good enough to beat rawr.
Between playing almost every day and having more good guilds to practice against, KMD is bound to best rawr eventually, but when we start having an even win/loss ratio vs. you is when you really got there.

Then why do you defend your build so much? When it's pretty obvious it's broken, just look at GeAr's performance last monthly, and compare it to the months before.

I don't get why you try so hard to keep other playstyles than your own from being viable, what do you possibly have to lose?

I want playstyles other than defensive spike and 'tiebreaker split' to be viable, this hasn't really been the case for a very long time.

Off-topic:
I don't even understand how you can say 'American servers' is an excuse when you go through great lengths with tests and switching accounts to ensure you play on American servers.