Curse

Blame the Monks · May 04, 2007, 07:33 PM // 19:33

Conceptually he is right, but I agree lots of water skills need a nerf.

pah01 · May 04, 2007, 07:54 PM // 19:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Pluto-

You mean like the icy shackle ele who chains it on a runner with freezing gust to perma-snare someone for 3 minutes?

And Mantra of Recovery memsers who try to sit on a monk and chain those two great examples of hexes done right on a target over and over and over again?

I think you missed the point.

I would argue that mantra of recovery is a skill that belongs in the category of "not rewarding" player skill much. Using this skill probably handicaps you because it removes skill from the use of diversion. Now i wont say that this skill is overpowered because it isnt - it just removes thought from play.

There are better skillbars for a dom mesmer than using mantra of recovery and IMO the player who used diversion/shame thoughtfully is far more dangerous than the MOR spammer. This is a good thing and thankfully Mantra is not used as much by the very best mesmers.

Icy Shackles comboing with freezing gust is annoying when you want to run someone through to the flag. I think that the recharge of gust could do with a look - it would still be used if it had a longer recharge. Spamming costs energy and you are being predictable which is another bad thing.

However even with those two situations the water line/dom lines better reward skill than curses and this is obviously down to the duration of ridiculous debilitating hexes like price/spirit and so on.

Joe

Patccmoi · May 04, 2007, 08:58 PM // 20:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by pah01

I think you are almost correct here when you state that the eurohex is a fairly balanced build in the fa. It does have the ability to change tactics etcetera.
However a Character that doesnt have the ability to output some damage in a spike isnt a character worth bringing in a truly balanced build.

However the problem here isnt just about what is balanced(in terms of changing match tactics and full team builds) but whether or not a character can play offensively as well as defensively. A curses necro is not balanced in that it has one job and one job only - hex some poor melee bastard(s) to hell. Just because he can do it(hex a warrior) on a split does not mean that his template is balanced. It just means that he isn't entirely one dimensional.

Concurrently A water ele can split, can spike, can control melee, can snare offensively and defensively which is what balanced templates are meant to do. A curses bar is not useful so much in an offensive push.

Not only that the game should be about skill use rewarding individual player skill as much as possible. The fact that water snares and dom hexes do this is due to the fact that they are debilitating but last for short periods of time - thereby rewarding timing. Diversion/Shame and snares are great examples of hexes working as they should.

Curses dont do this as much due to the fact that its debilitating hexes last upto 30 seconds. This is a fire cover hex then forget.

Joe

I don't personally think that you need everyone in the team to have some spike damage or to have every character being able to switch tactics. It's like people that want all their melee to be nearly fully splittable with everyone having his own condition control and self-heal. That's not absolutely necessary, cause in the end your monks will be somewhere and at least 1 guy will likely be able to be in a monk range.

In the same way, i don't think that Curses Necro can't be part of balanced build because they can't spike or because they can't 'change tactics'. Sure he can't fill as many roles as a Water Ele or Dom Mesmer, which are about the most versatile casters in the game. But a curse necro is BY DESIGN offensive and defensive. The hexes are debilitating, they add defense by screwing up the other team's offense. And the hexes are offensive, because they degen (and a Necro with Faint, Reaper's and Parasitic can actually spread a quite good amount of degen. In skirmishes 1 Necro like that can actually keep 2-3 people at 9 degen on his own, which is decent pressure, as well as partially shutdown their attackers, which is good defense).

Not every single template in a balanced setup needs to be 'balanced' imo. I mean, monks sure aren't and they shouldn't be. The point is to have the BUILD able to switch strategy and adapt, not every single character in it necessarily. If for example a curse necro doesn't has a spike assist but can help keeping the other team under enough pressure that spike targets actually start at 75% health, he's contributing as much to the spike as someone that would directly spike but that wouldn't degen to have people start lower. If by bringing a curse Necro you can actually forgo bringing extra defense against melee on that E/Mo and he can bring more pressure or different utility, well the utility is just transferred in the build, not lost.

With all that being said, i do think curses are stupid. I STRONGLY prefer low duration hexes when it comes to debilitating stuff at least. I think that Price/Spirit of Failure lasting 30s is attrocious and that things like Reckless Haste are waaaay too debilitating for the duration/recharge ratio (Blurred Vision too btw for people talking as if Hydros are all well balanced hexes. Blurred can be kept nearly 100% of the time on more than 1 guy if it doesn't get removed, it's not a particularly easy interrupt and it's extremely debilitating to attackers). I'd be happy to see hexes as a whole redesign to have lower cost/duration/recharge across the board. Make Backfire last 5s but be 10/2/10. Raise Empathy damage significantly but make it last 1..8s. Make Faint last 5..10s but be 5/1/5. Something like that would also remove the horrible idea of 'cover hexes', basically skills that you bring only to screw up hex removal and don't have any real other point anyway (who brings Parasitic Bond for the heal again?), allowing for more open skill slot options and more utility on hexers bar.

But i don't agree that Curse Necros or Illusion Mesmers can't currently be part of a well balanced setup.

Thomas.knbk · May 04, 2007, 09:11 PM // 21:11

If they do that, they'd have to reduce the recharge on all hex removals as well.

pah01 · May 04, 2007, 09:42 PM // 21:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

With all that being said, i do think curses are stupid. I STRONGLY prefer low duration hexes when it comes to debilitating stuff at least. I think that Price/Spirit of Failure lasting 30s is attrocious and that things like Reckless Haste are waaaay too debilitating for the duration/recharge ratio (Blurred Vision too btw for people talking as if Hydros are all well balanced hexes. Blurred can be kept nearly 100% of the time on more than 1 guy if it doesn't get removed, it's not a particularly easy interrupt and it's extremely debilitating to attackers). I'd be happy to see hexes as a whole redesign to have lower cost/duration/recharge across the board. Make Backfire last 5s but be 10/2/10. Raise Empathy damage significantly but make it last 1..8s. Make Faint last 5..10s but be 5/1/5. Something like that would also remove the horrible idea of 'cover hexes', basically skills that you bring only to screw up hex removal and don't have any real other point anyway (who brings Parasitic Bond for the heal again?), allowing for more open skill slot options and more utility on hexers bar.

This is the Bitch :P

I totally agree and this is one of the most important things that needs doing.

The thing is - you don't cover conditions because of the existence of a skill called draw conditions. Given that would draw hexes be a bad addition to the game? How would Hex removal be shaken up to deal with a different system of hexes? The debilitating ones anyway.

Edit: To discuss on whether midliners should have some decent spike ability - I think they should - but thats a philosophy of mine that resulted from an admonition from EW when we were noobs that our build needed more damage from midliners on a spike.
Joe

Patccmoi · May 04, 2007, 10:56 PM // 22:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomas.knbk

If they do that, they'd have to reduce the recharge on all hex removals as well.

Well, yes. And that'd be good too. The removals that have an interesting effect (say Shatter Hex) could stay pretty much as they are or some be slightly nerfed and have a slightly lower recharge. But hex removal doing nothing but removing a hex could be reduced in recharge to be slightly under condition removal. Say Remove Hex could be 5/1/4 and Holy Veil 5/1/6. Smite Hex could go down to 10s recharge. With less use of cover hexes, single hex removal would also be much more meaningful (cause atm to actually remove anything but a cover hex with single hex removal against a hex build is luck most of the time). I'm not sure about something as drastic as Draw Hexes, or it would need a higher cooldown at least (say 10s), but something like Convert could be buffed (say reduced to 10E/12s cooldown).

The only hexes that i could see keeping a longer duration overall is pure degen (Conjure Phantasm, etc.). Cause those don't need to be removed to beat hex teams, you can heal through. HP spam or LoD can cover for most of the damage they do. But with the rebalancing of hex removal they'd likely benefit too from a slightly lower duration and lower energy cost/recharge.

But i'm not expecting to see much of that happening cause it's a HUGE rebalancing involving tons of skills. There would be PvE people whining left and right, 4v4 players angry, etc. I think it'd be far better for the game, but i fear it's too late. Let's just hope they come up with a better hex system in GW2. Ofc i'd be extremely happy if something happened for GW1 though...

And about midliners and spike, personally i nearly always include a spike skill on midliners cause i think it's good. But i saw successful guilds running successful pretty balanced builds with some support characters having no spike skill at all, so what i'm saying is mostly that i don't believe it's mandatory. It's a good thing to fit on most midliners if possible, but some builds have room for some chars that don't have any. There's also different utility you can have on a spike that's not a spike skill, for example R/Me that had Blackout before were more useful during a spike using it on a monk than actually trying to fit a spike skill.

Patrograd · May 05, 2007, 01:08 PM // 13:08

It seems clear to me that hexes are imbalanced. Yes hexes can split or fight 8v8, but only because of game mechanics where hex removal is so much poorer than the ability of a hex team to apply debilitating hexes. Yes it can be countered by running an anti caster build, but such a build leaves you vulnerable to the other FOTM 3 warrior 2 paragon stuff. Very difficult to build to counter both and still leave enough skillslots for damage.

Water hexes, especially blurred, are arguably imbalanced, although if they are run in a non hex build they are at least counterable. Putting them into a hex build just further imbalances the whole concept. Water hexes wouldnt be imbalanced if the curses line wasnt. Blinding surge is another imbalanced skill, any skill that allows you to not need to worry about timing needs to be taken away. It used to be that a blind ele was a really skilled job, now any scrub can do it effectively. Hit button 1 on recharge pls.

MOR spammers are imabalanced for the same reason that curses necros are. They require no thought or skill to play, MOR is a scrub elite that allows poor players to become dangerous ones. There is no reason otherwise to run it over a skill like Power Block for example. People choose it because its easier to run MOR, even though its about 100% less effective than Power block in almost every situation. But running power block efficiently requires your mesmer to be switched on, good at interrupts and with enough game knowledge to be able to do something other than diversion and shame spam monks. Power block also requires good communication across the whole team. All of these things are hard work though, why bother when you can just run MOR and tell your mesmer to sit on the monks?

"Lazy" bars like MOR spammers, cripslash warriors and curses necros need to be taken out of the game as they reward poor players. "Active" bars like Power block mesmers, cripshot rangers and non cripslash warriors need to be encouraged as they reward skilled play.

Symbol · May 05, 2007, 04:06 PM // 16:06

The biggest reason that curse hexes need to go is because they suck the life out of the game.

Being shut down for 30 seconds at a time where you have nothing better to do than sit around with your thumb up your ass totally blows.

BTW I don't see how cripslash is a "lazy bar". It gives you a strong snare which pumps up your damage output, but it's no more "lazy" than any other warrior bar, just more effective than most.

Patrograd · May 06, 2007, 01:23 PM // 13:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Symbol

BTW I don't see how cripslash is a "lazy bar". It gives you a strong snare which pumps up your damage output, but it's no more "lazy" than any other warrior bar, just more effective than most.

You're probably right, it just seems to be one of those bars though where you spam skills on recharge for the most part, there doesnt seem to be a great deal of skill or timing involved as there would be for example on a shock axe or backbreaker hammer

Patccmoi · May 06, 2007, 01:59 PM // 13:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patrograd

You're probably right, it just seems to be one of those bars though where you spam skills on recharge for the most part, there doesnt seem to be a great deal of skill or timing involved as there would be for example on a shock axe or backbreaker hammer

Honestly, with most teams having a RC monk these days, spamming cripslash-gash on recharge mindlessly can end up healing the other team more than you're pressuring, so i'm really not sure it's that mindless.

Sure you can spam your skills on recharge, but so can most other builds if played bad. I can agree that Cripslash is possibly stronger than some other warrior builds when using its skills on recharge, but it doesn't mean at all that it's a mindless bar. There IS a much bigger distinction between a good Cripslash and a bad one than for say a SF Ele, an SP sin or a Curse Necro.

And while i do agree that more skills rewarding player skills is good and should be aimed for, i think that some people just exagerate it talking as if absolutely no skill should exist if it doesn't need some thought into using it. Think of skills like Conjure for example, personally i see no problem with them. Yes, it's just a damage buff and it doesn't take skill or timing to activate, but some skills like that are fine imo as long as they're balanced taking it into consideration. If you could pressure as much by putting Conjure on your bar instead of Frenzy for instance, it would be retarded, but it's not. Its effectiveness actually depends in great part of how well you use your IAS and how well you can stick on softies (instead of say build some adrenal on their melee) cause if you don't get enough damage out of it you're gimped compared to a warrior with an extra utility slot, so in the end to play a Conjure warrior that will be as good as a warrior without it isn't mindless. Skills like that actually force you to change your tactics to make the most out of them, and in the same way a good Conjure warrior will make good use of it to strongly pressure midline/backline while a bad one might spend too much time out of IAS or hitting their frontline and won't really take advantage of it and would've been better off with other utility. So yes, i'm all for more skills rewarding player skill, but i don't believe that every skill that doesn't directly requires player skill to use should be nerfed/removed either.

FoxBat · May 06, 2007, 02:04 PM // 14:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

There would be PvE people whining left and right

For most situations, lower-duration/lower-cost hexes would be a *buff* for PvE. Mobs typically die too fast for long-term single-target hexes to matter... that's even in most Hard Mode areas.

Symbol · May 06, 2007, 04:11 PM // 16:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patrograd

You're probably right, it just seems to be one of those bars though where you spam skills on recharge for the most part, there doesnt seem to be a great deal of skill or timing involved as there would be for example on a shock axe or backbreaker hammer

Let's see, a typical cripslash bar has either cripslash-gash-final or cripslash-gash-sun and moon, with one other attack skill (I'm partial to dblow myself, but lots of people run bull's strike). Apart from sun and moon none of these things are what you want to spam on recharge.

Although honestly, even when talking about things like shock axe there's some spamming going on. I mean, if you have a charged executioner's built up, you don't always save it for when your eviscerate is ready, you throw it out on someone for more pressure. It's just the nature of the game, some skills are best used as often as possible, and some...aren't.

Thom Bangalter · May 07, 2007, 09:06 AM // 09:06

spamming with warriors is not the same as spamming on a caster.

Wasteland Squidget · May 07, 2007, 09:36 AM // 09:36

A couple random points here...

Characters that spam are not necessarily easy to play. Monk bars use a huge number of spammable skills, and they are arguably one of the most skill-based caster classes in the game.

MoR mesmers do require skill, in that the difference between a good one and a bad one is huge. However, MoR mesmers remain reasonably strong in the hands of weak players, because they can create a reasonable threat without ever changing targets. At higher levels of play, spamming on a monk isn't enough, and MoR plays much more like a normal (if supercharged) mesmer bar.

Cripslash is fine from a player skill standpoint. I don't particularly like the bar, but it's no less skill-intensive than any other sword warrior.

The reason you don't see curse necros in balanced builds isn't just because they're inflexible, it's because they force huge portions of your build to be similarly inflexible. You can't just drop a curse necro into your build, you have to run another hexer to effectively overload their removal/LoD, you have to run humility to deal with elite hex removal, and you have to run Aegis to get the most out of price/spirit. Bringing in a curse necro means adding at least two inflexible templates to your build, both of which get rocked by exactly the same counter. Playing Eurohex against a team with mass removal is essentially fighting 6v8, because your two inflexible characters are almost completely shut down before the gates even open.

Skye Marin · May 07, 2007, 09:38 AM // 09:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thom

Quick thoughts:
1)There are plenty of "near balanced" builds which take a basic balance framework and add a primary tactic without sacrificing flexibility. Hex-heavy balance, condition heavy pressure-spike, melee overload... all these have a gimmick element/primary strategy without sacrificing balance. That is to say, each have a pressure/spike option, split option and offense/defense option.

2) I played a bit of TA (I'm not a big TA player) successfully running 3 fairly mundane rangers: flexible damage interrupters easch with a slightly different flavor. We were all playing the same class with the same general build type, but the play style was completely balanced pressure spike. 6 rangers across 8 targets is harder to organize, but if you could extend this ranger concept to GvG I would argue that you are running balanced. Spike/Pressure option exists, rangers are very split flexible and you can play offensively or defensively depending on target selection. While I wouldn't suggest trying this, it would be a balanced build tactically.

I'd say another key feature to a balanced build is that it can't be defeated by a few choice skills. If a few copies of Shadow of Fear or Blurred Vision were thrown on your teammates, then it would be pretty tricky to maintain a steady level of high damage. In this case, if you face a Shield of Deflection, then your job becomes very much harder. Once your opponent is able to analyze your build and make a quick checklist of it's weaknesses, then they are able to cross-reference the current strengths of their own build and capitalize.

A good balanced build would have them guessing for a while, and a solid balanced build with a good team behind it will have them switching tactics and skill use all the way to the end of the match.

The Fallen One · May 08, 2007, 01:16 AM // 01:16

I'm going to go out on a limb here and try to answer the OP's question about "Why Dev's should promote balanced builds". There are a couple of reasons imo. (We already have a ground work for balanced builds set out, so I'm going to assume we can accept said guidelines without debating over the various borderline builds).
1)Most veterans don't like "gimmick" inflexible builds. (Me included). Many have already left Guild Wars, or at least the competitive side, because of the overpowered and inflexible nature of many builds you see today.
2)ArenaNet gives out hundreds of thousands of dollars once about every season (excluding this recent ream of fun seasons) for skilled players as *nearly* a publicity stunt, what keeps and draws some people to the game? Without skill involved their whole market for competetive plummets, considering half of their marketing scheme comes from people spreading the word of how good Guild Wars is or how much fun they have playing it, and *this is pretty opinionated* without skill, where's the point of the game? This also ties into reason number one, if you have veterans who are disappointed about how a game has turned out they're not going to suggest it to their friends.

Thus, it is to ArenaNet's (the Dev's) financial benefits to promote "balanced" builds.
Again(not to sound like a state of the game article or anything) but this is my opinion on the question, and should be veiwed as such. (Don't crush me if you don't like something.

)

Patrograd · May 08, 2007, 08:45 AM // 08:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

Characters that spam are not necessarily easy to play. Monk bars use a huge number of spammable skills, and they are arguably one of the most skill-based caster classes in the game.

Agreed, but monking is still about using the right skill on the right person at the right time which is what guild wars should be all about imo. I personally dont have a problem with spam builds, it is thoughtless spam builds that are as strong in the hands of a weak player as they are in the hands of a good player that cause issues. A curses necro is probably the best example of this.

Quote:

MoR mesmers do require skill, in that the difference between a good one and a bad one is huge. However, MoR mesmers remain reasonably strong in the hands of weak players, because they can create a reasonable threat without ever changing targets.

It seems that MOR is often used to just throw diversion out there in the hope that it will catch *something*, well *anything* really. it is this indiscriminate diversion spam, whether onto monks or midlines, that while it is strong (because you will certainly catch something worthwhile) just promotes poor play and allows second rate mesmers to perform like superheroes. The only time I really feel that I get elite value from MOR is when playing in a spike build where having more shame/shatter is nice.

Quote:

Cripslash is fine from a player skill standpoint. I don't particularly like the bar, but it's no less skill-intensive than any other sword warrior.

Agreed, it was a bad example. I love playing cripslash because it is so ridiculously easy to use to create huge pressure, and I think thats where I was coming from. I guess you could say the same about a Melandru dervish mind you.

Quote:

The reason you don't see curse necros in balanced builds isn't just because they're inflexible, it's because they force huge portions of your build to be similarly inflexible. You can't just drop a curse necro into your build, you have to run another hexer to effectively overload their removal/LoD,

I have noticed recently that there are starting to be "balanced" teams now that have dropped their defensive ele (bsurge or water eg) for a curses necro. In fact, this bar is so insanely powerful that you *dont* need another hexer to overload removal, he can do it all by himself. Strong in split, strong at the stand. Its silly really.

Frantic-Sheep · May 08, 2007, 11:01 AM // 11:01

Just a random question (I mean, I agree with everything above - or at least almost everything), but what actually caused the whole discussion about hexes? The migraine bar for example has been around for a long time, with maybe a few additions/changes with the coming of new chapters. Curse anti-melee necro's have been around for a long long time as well right? Is it the new skills that chapters brought that amplified the power of their curses? Or the boost of some hexes with an update? Dunno

do you?

bungusmaximus · May 08, 2007, 11:42 AM // 11:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frantic-Sheep

Just a random question (I mean, I agree with everything above - or at least almost everything), but what actually caused the whole discussion about hexes? The migraine bar for example has been around for a long time, with maybe a few additions/changes with the coming of new chapters. Curse anti-melee necro's have been around for a long long time as well right? Is it the new skills that chapters brought that amplified the power of their curses? Or the boost of some hexes with an update? Dunno

do you?

SS is cheaper now if I'm right, and migraine mesmers don't have soul reaping, that also help quite a lot. I as a fervent TA warrior understand where necro hate comes from anyway. They just stand there, slap 5 antimelee hexes on you, you remove it with purge/convert and he just slaps 5 antimelee hexes on you again. In matches like that I should be grateful to land 1 single hit ><.

Symbol · May 08, 2007, 12:14 PM // 12:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frantic Sheep

Just a random question (I mean, I agree with everything above - or at least almost everything), but what actually caused the whole discussion about hexes?

Price of failure is a 2s cast now. Aegis is much easier to run with buffed GoLE, amplifying its effect. GoLE + Signet of Lost Souls also makes energy management a non-issue for hexers, whereas before they had to blow their elite on offering of blood. This means they can use their elite for truly dangerous hexes like spoil victor (which was buffed hugely) or reaper's mark.

Basically its a combination of more effective hexes and more effective energy management that has pushed the curse bar over the edge.