Curse

Ensign · Jul 28, 2007, 12:05 AM // 00:05

Balance changes to competitive Guild Wars PvP have been driven by two principal goals - primarily, to make the game more active, more fast paced, and more lethal; and two, to minimize the prominence of Mes and other shutdown effects that inhibit a player's ability to play the game.

These two goals are strictly at odds with each other. Furthermore, not understanding just how much those goals conflict is likely responsible for the shoddy state of high end PvP gameplay in Guild Wars.

First, a quick recap of general threat/answer fundamentals to set the stage. In order for an answer to be effective, it must, fundamentally, put its user further ahead than his opponent when it is used appropriately. If one player makes a proactive move to win the game, any answer to that move the other player makes *must* put him further ahead, statistically, in order to be an actual answer to that move. Why? Because if it does not, the best answer to that move is to make the move yourself. If you cannot get ahead by breaking symmetry, there is no reason not to make the same move yourself and preserve symmetry until the other player makes a mistake. Hence a response must be more effective than the threat. This is fundamental, first order threat/answer that is a foundation of every game of strategy.

The second order of threat/answer is similar to the first - in order for a counter to their counter to be effective, it must, again, be even more effective than their play and leave you even further ahead. The reasons are identical to the first, a counter to a counter is even more narrow than a counter to a threat, even more situational, and if you cannot gain an advantage from using it instead of a more general threat or counter it is simply useless, as you are better off using those more simplified plays. Further counters evolve in the same way. This sort of counter to a counter system is most evident in the attack-block-throw-reversal combat system that is common to many fighting games.

In Guild Wars, the same principles apply. Offense is your first tier, defense your second.

Mes is your third.

The fundamental problem with Guild Wars balance is that those higher order counters, the shutdown and reversals that are key to complex, high level play, are neglected or even nerfed in favor of simplified threat/answer gameplay. The lack of strong disabling abilities, the ones that allowed teams to cut through or render ineffective defensive networks in the past, is directly responsible for the slow, defensive gameplay that dominates the current landscape.

The era of Guild Wars when things died consistently in high level play ended with the obliteration of Gale. Gale was a critical component of high level play because of its ability to create time advantages. It was a skill capable of holding on to a window of opportunity, prolonging vulnerabilities and forcing kills. Losing Gale, on top of the previous hammering of Blackout, eliminated the primary tools for holding a vulnerable opponent down, making it much more difficult to score kills.

Energy denial and attrition has taken a series of hits. Some direct, from straightforward nerfs to the edenial skills themselves. Others, indirect, between hammering the ability of characters featuring edenial to function by gutting their own emanagement abilities, and introducing newer, better defensive skills that are more efficient and harder to shut down.

Enchantment removal took a huge blow when Drain Enchantment was hammered. In previous metagames, Drain Enchantment was a cornerstone skill that was ideal for removing important long-term enchantments (like the modern Attunements or Conjures), while doubling as emanagement to power that character. Now, the skill is something taken out of desperation to remove the piles of enchantments in usage, despite its weakened state.

The current metagame build, VoDSpike, is a clear example of how far things have gone awry. Featuring piles of hard, static defenses on multiple characters and many with 1 or 3/4 cast times, teams are left trying to crack the web with purely reactive interrupts on those fast cast times, or with demanding, 3 second cast spells in hopes of slowing down the defenses somewhat. While builds of old would have worn down the defenses with edenial, disruption, and removal, culminating in a push on an opponent aided by Blackouts and Gales, in the modern era teams end of swinging and missing into piles of defense until VoD, when only the huge shift in offensive power coupled with waves of NPCs are able to break the stalemates.

There are two possible futures for Guild Wars. One is where player control wins out, and shutdown effects continue to be marginalized. Without those higher order counters being prominent parts of the game, high level play will continue to feature teams flailing away into walls of defense, without adequate tools available to break through and force a win. The other is where shutdown wins out, and through those disabling effects the fast paced, lethal gameplay that used to feature prominently in the game is restored.

You can't have it both ways. The choice is yours.

lacasner · Jul 28, 2007, 12:15 AM // 00:15

Quote:

The fundamental problem with Guild Wars balance is that those higher order counters, the shutdown and reversals that are key to complex, high level play, are neglected or even nerfed in favor of simplified threat/answer gameplay. The lack of strong disabling abilities, the ones that allowed teams to cut through or render ineffective defensive networks in the past, is directly responsible for the slow, defensive gameplay that dominates the current landscape.

Hmm someone should make a skill list with proposed changes so Anet can get some ideas..Oh wait...

O_o

Guillaume De Sonoma · Jul 28, 2007, 12:57 AM // 00:57

Very good article. Makes me miss Blackout and Gale and they play styles they promoted.

MsMassacre · Jul 28, 2007, 02:21 AM // 02:21

Interesting article and a very good point. If it's any consolation, PvE is in the same boat. After all, we get all the same mesmer nerfs and cast time boosts for ele's and necros that you do, and what's worse, overpowered monster skills and environmental affects. End result; it is always more effective to wage a war of firepower vs. firepower than to attempt to disrupt the enemy.

I haven't played a lot of pvp but was really disappointed to find it in the same situation. Nobody wants to try to counter enemies, they just want to run their offense and their defense and smash into each other and see who wins.

InfernalSuffering · Jul 28, 2007, 02:22 AM // 02:22

There is an obvious trend with the mesmer hate. Throughout Guild Wars key mesmer skills have been nerfed again and again. Esurge, Drain Enchant, Spiritual Pain, and the holy grail - Blackout. ANet is definately tending towards letting teams use long lasting, static defenses that require little or no skill to use. The problem is that, while those defense can be broken through, you still have to pressure out their monks who have new, high-power elite skills and you have already wasted all your shutdown. By the time you can recover, they have those static defenses back up again. The time when you can keep "windows of opportunity" open is gone. Diversion seems to try to serve in Gales place but diversion leaves you an option. You can cast through diversion, you cant cast through gale. Mesmers make the game fast paced. Or rather, Mesmers made the game fast paced. As a mesmer/midline I am all for the buffing of mesmers and shutdown in general.

I dont see how Ensign can complain, iQ ownz at VoD.

Riotgear · Jul 28, 2007, 03:05 AM // 03:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by MsMassacre

Interesting article and a very good point. If it's any consolation, PvE is in the same boat. After all, we get all the same mesmer nerfs and cast time boosts for ele's and necros that you do, and what's worse, overpowered monster skills and environmental affects. End result; it is always more effective to wage a war of firepower vs. firepower than to attempt to disrupt the enemy.

Sympathy for PvE tends to wane for a few reasons:
- Once you find a strategy for a PvE encounter, it is always going to work.
- Defenses in Guild Wars are extremely powerful, meaning you can generally hard-counter whatever you're going against.

Witness stuff like DoA being seen as ridiculously hard when it comes out, and later zones are getting cleared with 2 people or even solo.

Shutdown doesn't work in PvE for a few reasons, primarily that you're going up against disproportionately powerful monsters that don't care if they die or not, bosses shrug off shutdown attempts with hex/condition shortening, and of course, e-denial doesn't work anyway because apparently they all have huge energy stores and some ungodly amount of regen.

Quote:

I haven't played a lot of pvp but was really disappointed to find it in the same situation. Nobody wants to try to counter enemies, they just want to run their offense and their defense and smash into each other and see who wins.

The reason people want to run "their build" is the same reason builds and classes exist in the first place. Variety is there so that players can act using the strengths and weaknesses that best suit them. It's an extension of play style that allows players to compete against others instead of competing with the interface.

I'd completely disagree with Ensign's post, and I find it very ironic that hard-shutdowns are being promoted at the same time that BHA and Signet of Humility are so commonly complained-about.

The real problem is power creep. Power creep has been a problem since Nightfall's release, a mess they never really cleaned up, and have postponed cleaning up so they can get EOTN out. Offense-heavy teams are packing more offense, defense-heavy teams are packing more defense, and both make it harder to support variety because you wind up needing to pack numerous things just to not get crushed, and numerous other things to cut through turtle teams.

Gale and Blackout don't need to become stronger, because cutthroat offense teams are going to have a field day with them. What needs to happen is the evening out of several offensive AND defensive options. The lament of Gale and Blackout simply leads me to believe that too many builds are severely lacking counters short of completely preventing a member of it from doing anything. Similarly, I don't think rebuffing them is going to help, because it means high-offense teams are just going to be more capable of forcing kills, forcing even more defense to be run to keep it in check, and then the option becomes either running a cutthroat offense or turtling up and spiking.

Shane Postus · Jul 28, 2007, 04:20 AM // 04:20

Seems like this thread will finally be a beacon of intelligent discussion instead of some of the trolling stuff that seems to plague every other thread. This is such a shock i hardly know where to begin.

Both ensign and riot have a point though i believe youre both making the same point just stated differently. From what i gather from ensign's post, you have an offence which is countered by a defence. However the defence must be greater than the offence that it is encountering or else it is better to use an offence yourself... fire vs fire if you will. Now assuming that the offence and defence are in balance, the third step will be for the offensive team to substitute in some shutdown to penetrate the defence. Again the shutdown must be more effective than the defence or else the offensive team will simply be better off packing more offence and try to smash through with force. Now, from observing the game from past to present we can see that shutdown comes primarily in the form of the mesmer, interupters of all sorts, and snarers. However, hexes and conditions are also valid means of shutdown that most professions each have an abundunce of.

So... basically, now referring to riot's post, the shutdown is less effective than more offence due to the "power creep" initiated by the expansion packs released. Therefore teams pack more offence... resulting in opponents packing more defence in a cycle that cant end unless a third element (shutdown) emerges (re-emerges).

Now for my own little spiel... though its not all that much to add to this, as the op was quite self-explanatory. Lets look at it from a financial standpoint. Anet is in this business to make money. As there are no monthly fees the only way to make money is from selling expansion packs. Now for anyone competetive in PvP (PvE is a different story really, though it somewhat follows these principles) they know they need the new expansion to stay competetive, even if only for a few skills required. The only reason people would buy the expansion (for PvP) is for access to stronger skills. I present you the question, would you rather buy an expansion with skills that all do double damage, more healing, and greater defences; or an expansion with skills that do the same thing but with different conditions or circumstances... assuming both were avaliable? The answer obviously is the one that has enhanced skills because you know that other people will be running the buffed skills and you need those skills to compete. Therefore its more profitable for Anet to promote imbalanced skills with each new expansion (and attempt to fix it later) than to add balanced skills that arent requisites for builds but would enable diversity. In the end the power of the dollar is greater than the voice of the players. This problem will never be fixed simply due to that, although any other opinions would be welcome as this is a grim fate that awaits us and id rather hear some better predictions if anyone has them.

twicky_kid · Jul 28, 2007, 04:46 AM // 04:46

Season 1 tactics:
Gale 1 monk and blackout other and spike or Gale both monks and spike.

Season 2 tactics:
Constant KD pressure with bull's charge, thumpers, and condition overload.

Season 3 tactics:
Wait for vod. Smite or nuke NPCs.

Right now you win very easily by creating your build to exploit vod and def the base well. Extremely boring which is the reason the steady decline of high end pvp. No one wants to wait 20 minutes just to get some where. I remember a time when both teams met at the flag stand you knew some one was going to drop within the first 30 seconds. Ah, the good ol' days.

selber · Jul 28, 2007, 05:28 AM // 05:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

First, a quick recap of general threat/answer fundamentals to set the stage. In order for an answer to be effective, it must, fundamentally, put its user further ahead than his opponent when it is used appropriately. If one player makes a proactive move to win the game, any answer to that move the other player makes *must* put him further ahead, statistically, in order to be an actual answer to that move. Why? Because if it does not, the best answer to that move is to make the move yourself. If you cannot get ahead by breaking symmetry, there is no reason not to make the same move yourself and preserve symmetry until the other player makes a mistake. Hence a response must be more effective than the threat. This is fundamental, first order threat/answer that is a foundation of every game of strategy.

The second order of threat/answer is similar to the first - in order for a counter to their counter to be effective, it must, again, be even more effective than their play and leave you even further ahead. The reasons are identical to the first, a counter to a counter is even more narrow than a counter to a threat, even more situational, and if you cannot gain an advantage from using it instead of a more general threat or counter it is simply useless, as you are better off using those more simplified plays. Further counters evolve in the same way. This sort of counter to a counter system is most evident in the attack-block-throw-reversal combat system that is common to many fighting games.

I will quote this just because it can't be said often enough.

Those are the basics and it's disturbing if some players always come up with the annoying buzzword "counters" when a problem with balance occurs.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

In Guild Wars, the same principles apply. Offense is your first tier, defense your second. Mes is your third.

For Guild Wars, this is wrong, IMO. Since i was a beginner in this game, i always had the impression, that you don't win matches in this game by killing someone, but by not getting killed by someone. Looking back at the guilds who won tournaments or championships, i had my finger on the trigger as it seems. You need a good offense, but defense is more important if one want to secure a sure win. Mes are just there to shoot some holes into the defense of your opponent or to shut down specific counters, so you can get kills even with a quite low offense. In general i would count them as a offensive threat. Mes were never really needed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The fundamental problem with Guild Wars balance is that those higher order counters, the shutdown and reversals that are key to complex, high level play, are neglected or even nerfed in favor of simplified threat/answer gameplay. The lack of strong disabling abilities, the ones that allowed teams to cut through or render ineffective defensive networks in the past, is directly responsible for the slow, defensive gameplay that dominates the current landscape.

I think it's not only a balance problem. Balancing can only modulate the effects of gamedesign and as far as i can say anything about it, it's more a gamedesign issue. VoD is one of those pretty obvious design issues and a big reason why it's better to run a build that also works under the conditions of the VoD-shout. Gamemechanics like hexes, the NF-reworked shouts, chants, echos, weaponspells or avatars are all such issues aswell.

One may be also aware that teams in former times just had not as much knowledge as today. The success of guilds like EvIL or WM was also based on the fact they had a good headstart. Same goes for the other guilds that played GvG constantly since release. The skills they used were effective for their time, but also the skills the opponents used were not always that good and there were not so many well-known generic builds.

People nowadays have alot of new powerful and buffed tools to cut through defenses. Thing is, the defenses have also improved. I don't think the quality level of offensive skills has gotten worse directly compared to the defensive ones, more the opposite. However, the quantity of defensive skills per build has increased a bit. That's because of many reasons, but i think just the defense a boonprot alone could offer was in no comparison to a modern LoD-monk. This would be expandable, but i won't go there.

Besides that: Guild Wars has a limit. If you have been playing this game for some time you can't go over this certain limit and won't find too much new strategies or groundbreaking ideas. You will also find yourself in the situation you can hardly improve your personal gameplay on execution levels or to put it simple: you can't improve your skill alot. Someone might say it is not possible for a game to get rid of this limit, but games like CS or Starcraft have been proven it can be achieved. Guild Wars is not such a game and i don't think it can get one by just balancing skills, even tough, smarter skillbalancing could push a good part into this direction.

Sorry for my english
--selber

Riotgear · Jul 28, 2007, 06:00 AM // 06:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shane Postus

So... basically, now referring to riot's post, the shutdown is less effective than more offence due to the "power creep" initiated by the expansion packs released. Therefore teams pack more offence... resulting in opponents packing more defence in a cycle that cant end unless a third element (shutdown) emerges (re-emerges).

There is a third element, and it's not shutdown, it's disruption. Shutdown is simply an extreme of disruption.

Most of the current balance issues are issues because disrupting them is either ineffective or the abilities to do so are questionable. Aegis is hard to disrupt due to range and the nerfing of Drain Enchantment. Conjure because of the short cast time and also because of the Drain nerf. The number of counters to shouts are microscopic, and the number of counters to chants is not far behind. Melandru is run largely because it removes the possibility of numerous disruption options. Hexes were harder to disrupt because of crappy removal options and short cast times.

If you want to view it as a three-way "spectrum," then the problem is that power creep has created viable builds at the extremes of several ends of the spectrum. Hex builds were an extreme of disruption, both offensive and defensive. Stuff like triple-conjure and triple-Melandru are extremes of offense. Most spike builds and dual-Paragon builds are extremes of defense.

These extremities are the "gimmicks" that everyone hates, and I'm not sure I can really say the solution at this point is to make disruption stronger, because disruption is generally able to be leveraged by extreme offensive and defensive builds anyway, which in turn just makes them even stronger. High-offense teams don't need MORE energy denial or enchant removal, for example. In fact, they used to have more enchant removal with Grenth, and it sucked.

As mentioned before, part of the problem isn't so much that the disruption isn't strong enough, it's that things are overly resistant to it. No amount of buffing Blinding Surge, for example, is going to make it better against Melandru dervishes. No amount of buffing Distracting Shot is going to make it work against Aegis if you're out of range. These sorts of things don't need stronger counters, they need MORE counters and/or more vulnerability to counters.

Almost every balance problem can be traced to powering up or creating something not prone enough to disruption, or overly prone to disruption yet relentlessly buffed until it's disgustingly overpowered once you figure out a way around the counters. And on that note, players WILL defend the cornerstone of their builds vigorously if the counter list is short, which is why VULNERABILITY is the solution, not more disruption.

Lord Natural · Jul 28, 2007, 06:10 AM // 06:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by lacasner

Hmm someone should make a skill list with proposed changes so Anet can get some ideas..Oh wait...

O_o

That thread was great, but I think we're past the point of a few tweaks fixing the game. The bottom line is, the developers, whether intentionally or not, have moved away from the fundamentals which made Proph a balanced game (at least relative to GW's current state). You now have multiple classes capable of effectively combining support and offense, more efficient monk skills, and less ability to shut them down. Delete Rits from the game, give some respect to the mesmer, and we might have a game again.

Saphatorael · Jul 28, 2007, 06:52 AM // 06:52

I see your point, Ensign, nicely worded and very true.

IMO, the fact that there were more professions added over time, screwed over the balance badly, as well.
The prime example would be Random Arena's. Though not representative for any form of serious pvp, the fact that people quit so much, is that the only really good healers, are monks (face it, without protection prayers, you're going to have a hard time). People quit alot more now. There's still only 4 slots in a RA team, which left you with a reasonable chance of having a monk in the team. But with 10 different professions running around, the odds of getting a monk have slimmed, but people still want one in the team. Thus the increased amount of ragequitting.
You kind of 'pray' that you might get decent teammates when you hit the 'Enter Battle' button, and leave when it's not (FYI, I hardly ragequit RA, if I leave, it's after we've lost/miraculously won the match).

It's a bit different for high-end PvP, though. You have a build, get players to play the roles, and pray that you don't run into an anti-you teambuild.
The versatility of the game has killed itself, to me. Especially with ANet buffing the lesser-liked professions 'till it can be used as a gimmick. See Heroes' Ascent for more info.

PS: I just woke up, so bear with me for crappy spelling and horrible wording

the_deSKtructor · Jul 28, 2007, 07:23 AM // 07:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shane Postus

Now for my own little spiel... though its not all that much to add to this, as the op was quite self-explanatory. Lets look at it from a financial standpoint. Anet is in this business to make money. As there are no monthly fees the only way to make money is from selling expansion packs. Now for anyone competetive in PvP (PvE is a different story really, though it somewhat follows these principles) they know they need the new expansion to stay competetive, even if only for a few skills required. The only reason people would buy the expansion (for PvP) is for access to stronger skills. I present you the question, would you rather buy an expansion with skills that all do double damage, more healing, and greater defences; or an expansion with skills that do the same thing but with different conditions or circumstances... assuming both were avaliable? The answer obviously is the one that has enhanced skills because you know that other people will be running the buffed skills and you need those skills to compete. Therefore its more profitable for Anet to promote imbalanced skills with each new expansion (and attempt to fix it later) than to add balanced skills that arent requisites for builds but would enable diversity. In the end the power of the dollar is greater than the voice of the players. This problem will never be fixed simply due to that, although any other opinions would be welcome as this is a grim fate that awaits us and id rather hear some better predictions if anyone has them.

Personally, i don't enjoy playing broken builds.
If anet promotes unbalanced skills, people may also stop playing gws, don't u think?

Div · Jul 28, 2007, 02:03 PM // 14:03

I think the biggest problem is for Anet to find the balance between a very powerful offense-driven meta and the current meta where everyone takes wards, blinds, aegis, etc. to stall until VoD in an attempt to spike down the opponent or opposing archers. While it is undeniable that the gale/blackout-lock during the early days may have been too strong, I don't think Anet ever perceived that the meta would turn to this by nerfing those skills. It's just far too difficult to tell on their part (or possibly in general, on anyone's part). They blindly assumed people would go on playing those skills in a weaker state as before without changing playstyles.

However, the biggest problem lies in all the new skills that are added in an expansion. While other professions got strong defense, protection, and healing skills, the mesmer got the nerf bat. The mesmer, acting as one of the largest forces in an overwhelming offense, is reduced to a much smaller role today trying to predict skills to catch with diversion (which in itself is difficult if the opponent knows what he/she's doing).

Besides the obvious skill balance issues for Anet right now (ritspike, hexes, assassins, etc.), there are finer details to look at. For example, whether they want to buff certain types of offense or shutdown to promote a more offensive playstyle. By offensive, I mean a build that revolves around a strong pressure to eventually break down opposing defenses, and not like a spike where they simply get kills due to being too fast or have small packets of powerful damage.

Perhaps the developers have for the most part given up on GW1 as it seems, but these are good considerations for them for when they create GW2 skills and balance.

v o i d · Jul 28, 2007, 06:22 PM // 18:22

In Guild Wars you have two primary ways to kill in an 8vs8 scenario (ofc you can combine them):

1. Shutdown. Skills like Gale and Blackout allow you to disable a character. No matter how much energy the monk has left, if he's sitting on his ass or blacked out he can't prot or heal.

2. Attrition. By disrupting defensive skills, intelligent target swaps, rapid spikes or pure e-denial you drain the enemies energy. Eventually the opponent reaches a point, where he can't prot or heal anymore. Even when his monks see the spike (and good monks see pretty much all spikes) they just don't have the energy left to save the target.

Since Gale and Blackout got nerfed so hard, the first option isn't really viable anymore. Is this a bad thing? I don't really know. As much as i love both skills, i also see the point that the best monk in the game can't do shit when he's knocked down by a Mesmer's Gale you pretty much can't stop.

Be it intentional or not, Izzy seems to prefer the second option. Now Ensign is complaining about the endless stacks of defense; let's have a look:

- Blinding Surge: It's surely a strong spell and annoying to fight against, but i don't think it needs a nerf. Attunement strips combined with well timed draws and diversions already help a lot. It's also not that hard to dis shot it.

- Ward Against Melee and Aegis: Everyone seems to hate these two and screams for nerfs, but if they get hit, builds with lots of physical chars will go rampant. It's a mesmer's job to shut this stuff down, the problem: there are next to no good mesmers who can actually time in this game.

- Shield of Deflection: I think this is the main source of all evil, infact, this skill might be Satan himself. Whenever there is SoD on a target and you have no enchant removal available, the target can be considered 'cold' for any kind of physical pressure. Minimal cast time and low recharge with a moderate duration is way too overpowered. 10 energy in the times of GoLE / Divine Spirit is just no real drawback. It's funny that some teams still bring RC, which is rubbish compared to SoD. Make this skill 15 energy and it would be fine (i have no problem if this beast dies again).

Now what's left that is broken and can't get fixed by skill balance? Victory or Death. At high level play it's all about farming npcs with your Dervish. If these shitty npcs would only have a grain of AI and not ball so much, everything would be okay.

That being said, Drain Enchantment needs a 25 sec recharge.

Blame the Monks · Jul 29, 2007, 01:01 AM // 01:01

Good post. Unfortunately, probably too late for competitive GvG.

twicky_kid · Jul 29, 2007, 01:46 AM // 01:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

The real problem is power creep. Power creep has been a problem since Nightfall's release, a mess they never really cleaned up, and have postponed cleaning up so they can get EOTN out.

Really there isn't much power creep. I'd give anything to have chain lightning returned to its original form. How about that 150 dmg lightning orb? 3 sec KD 5e gale? 2 sec cast diversion.

Lets not forget ether renewal + 80 maintained enchantments. Remember when maintained enchantments didn't have a range limit?

Really we haven't had too much power creep. Everything just got nerfed to shit. Just go look at the update page after season 1 was over.

Add to that hex and condition removal became way too strong because of season 2's overload tactics. Then look at the nerf list again after season 2.

Its not power creep its nerfing. More defensive skills have been added each chapter compared to offensive skills. All the while offensive skills are getting nerfed left and right.

I find it very funny that RC hasn't been hit with the nerf bat. One can dream right?

Greedy Gus · Jul 29, 2007, 05:08 AM // 05:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by twicky_kid

Its not power creep its nerfing. More defensive skills have been added each chapter compared to offensive skills. All the while offensive skills are getting nerfed left and right.

Just plain wrong. Even if there were 8000 defensive skills and 40 offensive skills (half of which can be nerfed to uselessness), the only reason to run heavy defense is because offense in the meta is strong enough to warrant it.

Your scope is too limited if you can't see any power creep, it's mostly from new skills & mechanics introduced into the game, with the addition of some overbuffs thrown in. Balanced teams are bringing shitloads of defense, and people still make kills before VoD with very efficient offenses that pack more punch per skill.

Seamus Finn · Jul 29, 2007, 07:24 AM // 07:24

Just to follow up. Offense has been nothing but buffed(if you think of mesmers as "the third tier"). Caster damage is better, though still inferior, and physicals are crazier than ever with the introduction of the paragon. You have strong physical pressure combined with an energy engine that can run strong party support and can switch targets much faster than a warrior, making them very hard to prot. Layered, party-wide defenses seems to be the popular answer since people don't like wiping in 30 seconds I suppose... I would agree with Ensign though, that the weakness of the current mesmer is what keeps battles so static. Compare the amount of dual dom builds in past seasons to now. And that isn't considering that I think mesmers are really being run out of desperation, whereas before they were run because they were good.

black_mischief · Jul 29, 2007, 09:18 AM // 09:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by v o i d

Now what's left that is broken and can't get fixed by skill balance? Victory or Death. At high level play it's all about farming npcs with your Dervish. If these shitty npcs would only have a grain of AI and not ball so much, everything would be okay.

This has always been the real problem. VOD has always been broken and that's why people mainly play defensively for it.

I see the points in the original post, but I disagree with most of it.

I don't see how gale and blackout being nerfed was a bad thing, they were pretty obscene and required absolutely 0 skill to completely disable a monk. I don't see how that is good gameplay.

I dont think mesmers have been balanced that improperly. EDenial was also a nearly mindless button pressing process that could completely disable characters. Spam mind wrack, esurge, eburn, sig weariness? Where's the great gameplay there?

PLeak requires interruption talent and is reasonably strong. Maybe the skill should be adjusted slightly to improve it. But it's used very well by some players. Today, the game only has a few truly great dom mesmers, Anita, Brett, etc. But, they win games and it's quite clear. Their value at VOD is minimal, though, and that's why people don't run them. Mesmers are not bad because their balance is mishandled or weak, it's because VOD is so screwed up/broken/overpowered and they are not characters who deal well with that environment. Who needs a mesmer when you'd rather have a derv just blowing stuff up or a paragon buffing all your archers?

I also think the OP completely neglects the value of rangers as shutdowns. Their interrupts are cheap and can produce huge value for a team. I'd rather see rangers d-shotting LOD than some 0 talent mesmer just spamming signet of humility. That is the case today in many games. Rangers can also shutdown aegis/defensive anthem/wards, etc.

The game has seen some good offensive skills introduced, particularly in Paragons. Their defensive skills have been reduced significantly and their offensive buffing is pretty strong. And most recently, mesmer interrupts now work on chants/echoes.... did we forget this slight buff to mesmer interrupts? Defensive Anthem has declined in usage materially.

The other real problem is a handful of skills like SoR that shutdown split gameplay and drag things out until VOD. The game needs alternative strategies besides just capping flags and waiting at the flagstand until VOD. The shrine on isle of wurms is an OK example of something that drives a different objective besides just waiting until VOD. Splitting off to kill NPCs ahead of VOD is another strategy, which is really limited today by SoRegen and other game balance issues (mend touch).

And finally, I think some issues are just unfixable due to game mechanics. Game balance is never going to work perfectly the way this game is set up, allowing players to pick whatever skills they want, to combine effects, stack enchants/hexes/whatever. The functionality of certain game mechanics like spirits, weapon spells, kd's, etc. are not well suited for high level PvP.