Curse

Snow Bunny · Jan 26, 2008, 09:41 PM // 21:41

Oh by the way, I know, completely unrelated to the update, but...

Bring LoD back

/end

blakecraw · Jan 26, 2008, 11:38 PM // 23:38

Make splinter weapon piercing damage (makes sense to me, splinters, piercing), and give archer's armor vs piercing. Then they also have a (very) little bit more protection from sin split. Rangers can just swap to an elemental bow when they go archer hunting, unlike ele's who can't swap to physical spells if the archers get an ele armor buff; so, such a change shouldn't hurt anybody who doesn't deserve it.

Tab · Jan 26, 2008, 11:40 PM // 23:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snow Bunny

Oh by the way, I know, completely unrelated to the update, but...

Bring LoD back

/end

pls rly rly rly rly rly rly rly need

Riotgear · Jan 27, 2008, 12:06 AM // 00:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Simply nerfing Splinter Weapon in a way that balances it makes a whole lot more sense than nerfing Splinter Weapon to do elemental damage and then buffing up archers to resist that damage. One of these is a self-contained solution that does not interfere with other parts of the game; the other has a whole slew of consequences.

I suggest a significant recharge nerf, and possibly removing a strike off the top end as well.

The concern is whether or not Splinter Weapon prior to VoD is helping or hurting the game. Personally, I think it's made things a bit more interesting, being problematic primarily at VoD. Ancestor's Rage needs a kick in the junk in all phases.

Maybe even a flat armor increase to all types at VOD would suffice (which would also be affected only if Splinter's type is changed), I think the focal point of any adjustment should be increasing NPC survivability at VOD, while increasing the viability of taking them out before then.

Neo-LD · Jan 27, 2008, 12:41 AM // 00:41

Monthlies are fairly indicative of where the peak of competitive play lies at any given moment, and what we all saw just now was pretty sickening. Lolsins, Clumsiness spammers, VoD-way, all wrapped into one conveniant package that goes by the name of "Sineptitude." I struggle to think of a more nauseating build - something needs to be done, decisive action needs to be taken.

Kaon · Jan 27, 2008, 01:14 AM // 01:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neo-LD

Monthlies are fairly indicative of where the peak of competitive play lies at any given moment, and what we all saw just now was pretty sickening. Lolsins, Clumsiness spammers, VoD-way, all wrapped into one conveniant package that goes by the name of "Sineptitude." I struggle to think of a more nauseating build - something needs to be done, decisive action needs to be taken.

Decisive action is exactly what needs to be done! Although not at the arenanet offices (actually yes, but not on this issue) but ingame, with the guilds facing them.

What you are doing right now is exactly what has caused so much damage to the game. People see something winning and yell nerf. This is how gale and cripshot got nerfed. Instead you could think perhaps people aren't playing right.

As i said before, ultimately it's about the question: does sinsplit make the game more fun? My answer to that is hell yeah, it actually becomes something different that 8v8 interrupt-frenzy-spike-blockfest or the occasional one dimensional split and flagpush.

People also lost to airspike at the start of gw because they had no idea how to handle it, but as soon as people realized that they actually had to coordinate themselves things were fine.

Calling mistral edge bad are the words of a bittered loser and scrub.

Neo-LD · Jan 27, 2008, 01:34 AM // 01:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaon

Decisive action is exactly what needs to be done! Although not at the arenanet offices (actually yes, but not on this issue) but ingame, with the guilds facing them.

What you are doing right now is exactly what has caused so much damage to the game. People see something winning and yell nerf. This is how gale and cripshot got nerfed. Instead you could think perhaps people aren't playing right.

As i said before, ultimately it's about the question: does sinsplit make the game more fun? My answer to that is hell yeah, it actually becomes something different that 8v8 interrupt-frenzy-spike-blockfest or the occasional one dimensional split and flagpush.

People also lost to airspike at the start of gw because they had no idea how to handle it, but as soon as people realized that they actually had to coordinate themselves things were fine.

Calling mistral edge bad are the words of a bittered loser and scrub.

Look, [Me] played to win and got gold capes, and hats off to them for that. If I were in the finals, or in any game with money on the line, I would do the same thing and run the lamest, most broken-ass-shit that I could find.

But after the dust has settled its up to the gamers and developers to sit down and look at whats really good for the game. Is basecamping good for the game? No. Is spam good for the game? No. Is button mashing good for the game? No. Is AoE-NPC farming good for the game? No.

This begs the question, what is good for the game? I submit that things that are good for the game make gameplay interesting and make the outcome significant. Things that reward player skill, especially. Sineptitude is the manifestation of all things that dont.

The state of the game at any given time is not the player's fault, and so no one can fault [Me] for winning as they did. But there is nothing wrong (and indeed, everything right) with holding on to idealism, that the game may be better in in the future.

Riotgear · Jan 27, 2008, 02:17 AM // 02:17

Variety is good.

Sineptitude is bad.

This seems to have been the general consensus from a while ago as well. After the last AT, everyone was asking for Sineptitude to die in a fire and get some variety that didn't involve button-mashing.

lacasner · Jan 27, 2008, 02:39 AM // 02:39

Riotgear I would agree with what your saying, but look at it this way. By saying purely this and this is button-mashing and this or this is "bad" simply is too subjective and doesn't give Me enough credit, imo, for winning. A sin does things well that a war cannot, but a war does many things well that a sin cannot do as well.

Their build requires a different type of strategy and tactics to play, sometimes easier and sometimes not, but the thing is they just took the meta and did what the circumstances of the situation called for. So I think at least we have to give them a little credit in their win.

Div · Jan 27, 2008, 02:57 AM // 02:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by lacasner

Riotgear I would agree with what your saying, but look at it this way. By saying purely this and this is button-mashing and this or this is "bad" simply is too subjective and doesn't give Me enough credit, imo, for winning. A sin does things well that a war cannot, but a war does many things well that a sin cannot do as well.

First of all, hats off to Me for winning a tourney, all while just running one build. I don't understand your point about "A sin does things well that a war cannot, but a war does many things well that a sin cannot do as well." A sin is able to press 123456 without adrenaline and have a chance to get a kill. A warrior is able to, with his skills and decision making, pressure, switch targets, and then adrenaline spike a third or fourth target. A sin is by far easier to play than a warrior.

Quote:

Their build requires a different type of strategy and tactics to play, sometimes easier and sometimes not, but the thing is they just took the meta and did what the circumstances of the situation called for. So I think at least we have to give them a little credit in their win.

Yes, the strategy will be different than the typical balanced or defense-oriented build. However, for a build to have so much split power, collapse power, snares, VoD ability, etc. is just too imbalanced for most of the community. If they wanted, they have enough defense to sit in the same spot and 8v8 just about forever as well (which makes them so strong at VoD). The sins have a nasty combo, but I think the much bigger problem are the mesmers. I don't have a concrete suggestion as to how to solve it, but after talking with people (in SpNv and such), even they feel the sineptitude build is OP. That says something when the one of the best sineptitude guilds for the past few months says they understand the brokenness of the build.

Yue · Jan 27, 2008, 03:04 AM // 03:04

Pretty sure HaND said the same thing in their interview.

Div · Jan 27, 2008, 03:17 AM // 03:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yue

Pretty sure HaND said the same thing in their interview.

We'll see what Me says in their interview now

Riotgear · Jan 27, 2008, 05:58 AM // 05:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

I don't have a concrete suggestion as to how to solve it

The biggest culprits seem to be:
- Another lolsin instagib chain that needs to go away.
- Siphon Speed.
- Shroud of Silence + Iron Palm + Rigor Mortis.
- Imagined Burden.
- Siphon Speed.
- Shadow steps.
- Siphon Speed.
- There isn't really a clear way of dealing with the mesmers.

The meta is largely to blame also, as things become more centric on warriors bashing archers with Splinter Weapon, hexing the living shit out of the warriors becomes more effective.

Double Pact · Jan 27, 2008, 11:24 AM // 11:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

There isn't really a clear way of dealing with the mesmers.

There is?
You can lower the damage, so frenzy + vod != suicide
You can increase cost, so they can't spam it
You can increase recharge, same reason
You can buff hex eater vortex to a playable level again, so you can aoe the shit out of their archers at vod

Btw i'd like to add empathy to your list, the skill is insanely strong since the damage was buffed. now, it deals way more than 100dmg per hit on a frenzy warrior at vod - spoil victor level -.-

DutchSmurf · Jan 27, 2008, 11:37 AM // 11:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Double Pact

There is?
You can lower the damage, so frenzy + vod != suicide
You can increase cost, so they can't spam it
You can increase recharge, same reason
You can buff hex eater vortex to a playable level again, so you can aoe the shit out of their archers at vod

Btw i'd like to add empathy to your list, the skill is insanely strong since the damage was buffed. now, it deals way more than 100dmg per hit on a frenzy warrior at vod - spoil victor level -.-

Why would you be using Frenzy at VoD when you have either empathy or clumsiness/ineptitude on you?

Riotgear · Jan 27, 2008, 12:39 PM // 12:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Double Pact

There is?

I mean that there is not a practical way of dealing with the mesmers in their current form. Frontline harassment and interrupts in particular become extremely ineffective.

Quote:

You can buff hex eater vortex to a playable level again, so you can aoe the shit out of their archers at vod

Hex Eater Vortex should not be destroying the possibility of running any sort of anti-melee hexing. Leave it.

deya · Jan 27, 2008, 12:49 PM // 12:49

Sinsplit is not overpowered, it's just direct counter to metabuild.

Sinsplitters did adapt their gameplay so that they can win everyone running metabuild, how did metabuilds react?

IZZY PLS NERF CAUSE WE CANT BEAT THIS WITH OUR PRECIOUS BUILD!!!

Lorekeeper · Jan 27, 2008, 01:11 PM // 13:11

i think a major reason why sineptitude causes so much grief in some players minds is that conventional blockway builds are not well prepared to allow them to face those builds as well as they would like to.

The strength of the sineptitude build is its mobility, 3 monk defense, anti melee hexes (that make almost any physical template cry) and the fact that almost all of its offensive characters can kill NPC really fast (including its sins and mesmers).

Conventional blockway is rigid and only small number of templates in the build are able to kill NPCs before defense is quick enough to react. Its rigidity is party caused by its 'legitimacy' in terms of skill requirement... hex based skirmish characters require far less preparation and skill to run... but that was always the nature of hexes in this game... they are fire and forget skills that only require proper targetting... after which the hexes perform their intended jobs regardless of the player using them. Conventional skirmish templates (Excluding the E/D mindblast) require far more involvement from the player in order to effectively kill.

Conventional strategy in GvG with 'blockway' tells people that you split with rangers and warriors and rit... offensively or defensively. Very rarely would a warrior split off alone... very rarely would a ranger split off alone and be able to push into an enemy base without facing adequate defense (vs good teams). Alot of attention was focused at the stand, people were comfortable with conventional means of fighting... interrupt wars on wards and aegis... pressure spikes on monks... splinter farming NPCs at VoD. Theres a great mistake to be had in complacency... in settling into a status quo.

Sineptitude, although based on less skill requiring templates, just doesnt conform to the rigidity of contemporary GvG attitudes and play styles...

In that respect i think or rather i hope that sineptitude will help to make players realise that the current conception of what GvG should be like (boring interdependant builds that are anchored to the stand and tailored more and more towards the VoD fight at the stand) is not the be all and end all of what GvG COULD be like. GvG was never and should never be a static environment, due to the size of the maps and build choices available to everyone.

Unfortunately there isnt a clear build type that counters sineptitude... in a way it is designed perfectly to exploit the huge amount of pressure backlines feel while trying to keep up their frontlines at VoD while the frontlines try to clear out enemy NPCs.

There are skill options out there that could help frontlines survive the clumsiness, ineptitude, NPC dmg spam at VoD but they are very one trick pony style skills and only reinforce the true problem at hand here that is...

The gameplan to win GvG by wiping NPCs at the stand.

Maybe we need to shift towards more fluid builds that seek to kill NPCs before VoD. Maybe if you want to beat teams aiming to do this you need to adapt your VoD builds... but while that is difficult... maybe the only solution is to shift towards builds of the same type... with more skirimish capable characters who can go off on their own and kill an NPC or two before anyone notices... what alot of teams lack is the option to counter gank. They send back their skirmish templates to defend the base and they leave the stand team full of rigid templates who are useless in skirmish situations... one part of the team contains all the skirmish ability to defend and attack an enemy base and the other half only really has the ability to stall the other part of the opponents team (it rarely will contain enough offensive power to wipe the enemy stand team without requiring a collapse from the split team).

Id like to see a shift in peoples attitudes towards GvG before i make the kneejerk call for a nerf.

Im no expert the practice of this theory... but while i see the majority of builds stuck glued to their blockway meta with motigons i can only beg the question whether they are the ones at fault here and not the balance of sineptitude itself.

Riotgear · Jan 27, 2008, 02:04 PM // 14:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lorekeeper

i think a major reason why sineptitude causes so much grief in some players minds is that conventional blockway builds are not well prepared to allow them to face those builds as well as they would like to.

The reason people hate Sineptitude this time is the exact same reason they hated it last time: Nobody likes instagibbing lolsins, forcing spikes through via brute force, a midline based on relentless spam, and a split force that can throw positioning tactics out the window.

Trying to pitch it as beneficial now because the balanced meta build sucks ass is ridiculous. You're trying to argue that burnt toast tastes better than a rotten turd. Both suck. Get rid of them. Fix the damn game. If partygons and lolsins are never seen again after the next skill update, I won't be mourning the loss of either.

Quote:

Im no expert the practice of this theory... but while i see the majority of builds stuck glued to their blockway meta with motigons i can only beg the question whether they are the ones at fault here and not the balance of sineptitude itself.

People are "glued" to it because the options have been continuously eroding. Motigons are one of the most boring templates ever, you think people want to run this shit? People have been asking for options forever so they could run something else. Before that they were asking for better party heal options so games wouldn't become so dependent on stomping LoD with Humility spam. Nobody is glued to the meta. They hate it. Anet has no clue how to fix it though, and their attempts to do so have only made it worse.

The LoD nerf forced devoting an entire character slot to the role. The hammering of monks and beefing up of midliner offense has forced defense saturation. The NPC buffs have put more emphasis on wiping NPCs, except they didn't make splits any more viable at doing so. AOE-grinding them remained the most-effective option, one which conveniently gets kicked in the face by triple-clumsiness.

Lorekeeper · Jan 27, 2008, 03:01 PM // 15:01

I am not justifying sineptitude, i find it quite lame too. But i dont think the lameness and effectiveness of the build can be blamed purely on the build itself... i blame it on the approach people take to facing it. Its a highly mobile build yet the meta is full of people running immobile builds... its no wonder sineptitude dominated the MaT (especially given the map rotation).

Of course if you dont know you are going to face sineptitude, this observation does not apply. But if you know for certain that you are going to face it, who really is to blame if you run an inflexible build that cant cope with a build full of lame skirmish characters with high mobility? Anet? They may take part blame for it... but not all.

I know very well why people have settled into the motigon balanced meta... but ive also seen and played vs guilds running builds with far more skirmish ability. So it find it incredibly ignorant for people to say there arent any options BUT to run motigons stallway... although i might not agree with Anets method of encouraging split style play i also find fault players who still arent prepared to take it in their own hands to run more flexible builds that arent so static and rooted to the stand. The main issue with Anet's solution to VoDway is that they did nothing to improve the split meta... but in addition to that it seems players themselves are reluctant to even try to shift in a split direction at all. There are some guilds having success running builds that pack alot of skirmish templates not limited to sineptitude... im sure there are a couple of other possible team templates that could pack as much skirmishability too. If you are going to stick with a mesmer build with a defensive tool that limits it mobility... and a paragon who simply has no mobility at all... coupled with a VoD strategy that relies heavily on splinter weapon being present at the stand... you are going to struggle mightily vs builds designed with mobility in mind... and if they see that your build relies on splinter weapon at VoD... im pretty sure they will send a 3 man split to your base and force you to send either your rit flagger or your monk to defend... either way... static approaches to GvG are highly vulnerable to mobile approaches that exploit their limited gameplan.

Sineptitude represents the extremely lame representation of what that style of build can achieve in such a static meta... is that to say that there arent ANY viable builds that can emulate its mobility and skirmishability?

If you lose to sineptitude running blockway with motigons and you do not admit to the limitations of your build but instead cry about the imbalance of sineptitide that is what i have issue with.

I wont give high praise for [Me] as players, but they made a very smart decision in analysing the prevalent attitude towards GvG meta for the past year or so... static builds designed to splinter farm NPCs at VoD.

Sineptitude is perfectly designed to counter that highly inflexible approach to GvG.

So i ask again. Whos fault is it for the effectiveness of sineptitude?

Is it really that imbalanced that NOONE can beat it ever? Or do people lose to it because they just havent had much practice vs dedicated skirmish builds that are well built to prevent their own strategy of splinter farming NPCs at VoD from work so well? Do people lose to it because they didnt have the benefit of foresight to know exactly what they were facing which might have allowed them to shift their build around? If they didnt know what they were facing and chose to run static blockway... dont you think they would have struggled in general vs ANY highly mobile build anyway?

Noone is forced to run blockway with motigons... its just the easiest build for players who want to stall the fight until VoD in 8vs8 situations and do their best to farm NPCs. Noone wants to run difficult builds... sineptitude and blockway are just the easiest builds possible to achieve their relative strategies... stalling to vod or ganking till vod.

stalling till vod does present players with a limited choice of build... because of the loss of LoD... that issue has been beaten around for months now.

But i just dont accept that split meta is limited only to assassins with teleports...

and until i see people actively splitting with much more flexible builds i will stand by that belief...

of course Anet could help split meta immensely... but thats a not good enough excuse not to explore it already.