This is a suggestion and discussion that was given from a PvPer for PvE

Lord Mendes, I bet that ANET values the dollar more than the whinging of the PVPers. And, both Mommy and Daddy pay for juniors account in addition to playing on it in many cases. So, ANET has to start kissing PVE butt if they want PVE people to forget the nerf and check out the game, again.

As for the soul reaping points, I am not going there other than saying, "Seeing is believing, and ANET is doing nothing at the moment. So, there is nothing to see."

In PvP, the game has become Build Wars more than ever. That is, even vs. a skilled team, 1 or 2 overpowered skills can easily determine the outcome of the match. What better way to analyze game imbalances than through this format?

PvE is predictable, and the ai do not have equal levels and attributes for the most part. Just because a level 30 boss wipes your party, does not mean the skills he's using are overpowered. They are simply 3x their normal strength due to the level difference. On the other end, because of the predictability factor, there are just a million ways to succeed in PvE. It's not like there will be 3-4 skills that if changed, will make the game unbeatable. Solo builds may be changed, yes, but overall it's just a minor inconvenience rather than a game breaker.

For the most part, the dominant skills don't mix anyway. If I decide to PvE PuG (which is rare, nowadays) the builds people will template post are usually pretty far removed from anything I ever see in PvP. I decided to monk the deep the other day (first time in many months) and ended up being mocked because I hadn't included a certain skill -- A skill which I'd pretty much forgot existed because of its impracticality in PvP. I guess that makes me the noob, but it just goes to show that the skill sets people use in PvE rarely corrolate to PvP. Consider Ensign's thread in the Gladiator's forum. While those suggested changed would make worlds of difference in PvP, I don't see it breaking PvE if those changes were implimented.

If you follow the theme here, it's that balance is much more critical in PvP than in PvE. Skill changes will have effect on PvE, but they literally make or break PvP. As such it makes sense to me that balance changes should predominantly focus on PvP.

This is where our arguments differ (if I am reading this correctly).
What I am saying ("skill balances are done with PvP in mind") is based on what Anet has been saying and two years of observation ("skill balances are most likely PvP influenced, unless something is gamebreaking in PvE").

You sir, are just assuming that Anet will suddenly start to appease to PvEers regarding skill balance. Using your logic, Anet will stop balancing skills because they will upset PvEers if they do.
Wishful thinking is a wonderful thing.

Lord Mendes, ANET cares only about PVP. So, you are most likely correct for your first bit. But.... They keep screwing over PVEers and expecting us to buy their crap. So, they best get to kissing PVE bum aaaaaaaa whole lot if they want to any of the older PVE types to stick with them until GW 2 comes out. :P

PvE balance can't be fixed by tweaking AI's health or skillbars alone, that just simply isn't enough.

If you do that, you get the problem that as skills are balanced for PvP those skills becomes too powerful or too weak in PvE. And in the long run, things just gets worse and worse. MM and SS are good examples, they're both insanely powerful in PvE, MM mitigates a ton of damage while SS deals out a ton of damage. There's no arguing that SS and MM are among the best uses necros have for PvE. And in the long run, players might become really bored of playing those builds... but they're pretty much forced to play them since the alternatives are weak. And this just gets worse and worse, since MM and SS are relatively weak in PvP and thus are unlikely to ever be nerfed... while other skills continue to become nerfed.

The mesmer is an even better example. I'd say that 75% of all the mesmer skills in the game are absolutely useless in PvE. Certain skills such as Backfire, Empathy and Mistrust are good in PvE. But on the other hand... Tease, Diversion, Blackout, Ignorance, Overload, Panic, Power Flux, and countless other skills are near useless. And to make it worse, while Backfire and Empathy are pretty good, it can be argued that an SS necro would be able to deal out more total damage (especially considering SS can be useful when applied to any foe... while backfire and empathy are conditional)

This is the sorts of problems you get if you only balance PvE via monster health and monster skill bars. And it's gradually getting worse because Anet aren't implementing proper fixes.

As I see it, there's only 2 ways to really fix PvE balance:
1) Drastically improve monster AI and make their skillbars slightly random (not too random, as that might potentially give them a useless build, but enough randomness so that the players can't be sure whether or the enemies are equipping enchant removal, hex removal, etc) and make sure every monster has 8 skills.
2) Balance skills as in PvP (this has the consequence it'll affect PvP... in that case, they can give all skills different stats for PvE and PvP)

I know what you are trying to to get at here and get frustrated with skill balances but the only one you are upset about is BHA.I can understand that and most do but if you look at the flipside of it you would see it differently.Look at it from a PvP Monks pov you did mention cop not all Monk use cop on their bar.When playing in a GvG match you don't know what the opposing team has.Their Ranger could all have BHA and when the team is split that makes a Monks jop even harder 10 sec may not seem long to you but it is to a Monk that may have diversion them as well.

When it comes to PvE the mobs can be balanced and for the most part Hard Mode it not balanced out.The crawl in Old Ascalon are way overpwered and some other are as well I found Witman's Folly not to bad but for old Ascalon forget it with backbreak no way.Then there was the time you and I went out of Granite yes in HM as you were showing me some stuff.There was only one Gnasher left when you died so I took it on ad couldn't.It over powered me with Deathly Swarm.It is just like the Bog Scales outside of Sactum Cay or Stingray Stand they to are over powered with Deathly Swam and no way Alesia can't heal it.

When we were outside of Granite I should of been able to negate the damage use Reversal of Fortute very easy but no way.That one Gnasher should not have been a problem for me with 13 in protect.I would have to say that Hard Mode as well as the bosses are way over powered as some have been crying to use 7 heros.I doubt that would do it no Anet needs to do a complete over haul of hard mode.This is the reason I don't play it unless I am safely in a wurm.The may want to look at the skill Deathly Swarm as well.The AI needs an adjustment in certain areas in normal mode as well as the henchies need their skill bars reviewed.I heard someone say Devona well that is the best Hench in the game other than some of the Alesias 3,6.15 and 20 are the best.

I hope you can understand where I am getting at here when it comes to Monking in PvP as well as PvE .

No I did not understand a single word

Honestly I don't think most PvErs understand how much spike damage they can take later on in the game, what with energy armor, multiple superior runes, and an overall lack of self defense. It's like everyone operates under the assumption that the tank will keep all the aggro forever, and if it ever breaks everyone needs to run away and reset it.

Ever seen a 60ed Ele try and do anything with 2 sups and no health parts? It is really, really funny.


What does overpowered even mean in the context of a monster skill? That it's too challenging? That's not really overpowered, it's just a hard encounter. That it excludes too many strategies before you even look? That's just weak design and narrow. As far as I can gather, overpowered only makes any sense in the context of player skills.


Healing Seed is win in PvE you noob!

...actually it really isn't, people are just used to it. It's ok on a Healer's Boon bar, but Shield of Absorption and Prot Spirit are more key everywhere else.


I don't think that it's more critical in either gametype, but it's more sensitive in PvP. Small differences in how a skill works or in what's good have huge effects on the PvP metagame, how matches play out, and whether or not the game is fun. Just for example, Mending Touch on a 4 second recharge was too good in GvG, but on a 6 second recharge I think it's a perfectly fair skill and good for the metagame. Did that change have any practical effect on PvE?

In PvE you have characters like the 1 HP BiP or 55 Monk, which are insanely effective at what they do, but aren't balance problems. Why? Because they don't take other people's jobs. In fact the only character that I'd really call overpowered in PvE is the Ele Obsidian Flesh tank, because it takes the tanking job away from Warriors and gives it to a profession that already is very good at nuking. As long as each profession has their distinct role that they do better than anyone else, PvE is generally considered balanced. Individual skill changes that make their relative power higher or lower is just noise.

Peace,
-CxE

Scince the buffs to channeling it has become a very useful line in PvE as a matter of fact. Having it nerfed again would remove a possible role from PvE Rts. One of the main reasons i like playing Rt is the variety of playstlyes they have, nerfing channeling skills would reduce that variety, making the class much less attractive.

Yes, it's true that the PvP affecting PvE issue IS an issue and certainly needs to be dealt with... and I can't say I'm too happy about the European ONLY FoW chest running weekend.

I understand you perfectly unfortuantely most others wont. But you kinda missed the point of the show. That there are other ways of doing the same thing. Yes BHA is a big deal when if these changes do happen it would make it useless and they may as well delete it as a skill altogether then. And you know how I monk. If BHA and that conditions are that much of a problem to some one then theres a problem with that monk or his teammates.

I'm sorry but this approach is total crap.

Anet has done this a couple of times already, most recently with the introduction of hard mode, and it just makes the game weaker.

My favorite lightbringer run used to be in the depths of madness. You would take the magonite bounty, beat some margonites, take the shadow bounty, beat shadows and the odd torments until you got to the area where the torment bounty was. This was tricky because there were 3 patrols of torments and one patrol of titans and a necro boss all in the area of the bounty making it very tricky. But, if you got the bounty, you could double ytour lightbringer points on the run and access the easy margonites in the back too. Before the soulreaping nerf, you could complete the area with good tactics and a MM.

After the soul reaping nerf, you couldnt complete the area with necromancers. (I'm sure you could, but not agressively). Necromancers couldnt recover quickly enough after deaths of minions/pets/henchies to sustain the fight when the secondary mobs eventually collapsed on you.

Within a week of the soul reaping nerf, the mob spawns in the area were completely changed. Instead of tricky patterns with patrols... you got a bunch of static patterns... making the area another lure nuke lure area. Theres nothing as dangerous in the areas as those titans that wandered into the two-mob torment fight... exploding on impact with all that aoe everywhere from both sides. BORING. I miss the old area, which was much more interesting.

Yesterday I finsihed vanquishing Perdition Rock (Norgu with Hex eater vortex ftw)... and I noticed that instead of 4-5 patrols of hydra running around to gank you at the start of the map, there was only 2 patrols of hydra. At least on patrol now never moved from its start location and at least one, and up to three patrols were removed entirely. While hydra are elementalists, and elementalists in hard mode are to be feared... The change made the map ridiculously easy... easier in hard mode than it used to be in normal mode.

I was hoping for a challenge to break up the grind, but it wasnt there.

Anets gotten it right before. When Mind Burn was tweaked to a 5 second recharge, they change the ring of fire sparks of the titan AI to not exclusivly spam it... so the area played like it did before. Good change! But, when anet ruins explorable areas for pvp balances... the result, IMHO is a least sometimes a blander less interesting game.

What don't you understand?In a nut shell to put it easier Hard Mode is way over powered and in normal mode the AI with deathly swarm need to be looked at.This is an AI rebalance issue from the talk that is going on in The Gladiator Forum of the Wishlist 2007.

Hardmode is hardly overpowered. The problem is that people bring the same skillset for every zone rather than adapt to what the zone and mobs there have. If you know your going to get hit with hard aoe then bring bring a rit or lod monk for backup. Saying something is overpowered in PvE is just an excuse that you don't know how to deal with it.

Then I suggest you go and use reversal of fortune on Reyna from the backbraking Crawl and see how long your mana does.They should be just the same as the nromal mode crawl but I vanqished Witmans Folly with my Ranger easier than Old Ascalon.

Then I suggest you go out an use reversal of fortune on Renya in Old Ascalon and see how your mana holds up.I did Vanqish Witmans Folly as the crawl only have ViM not Backbreaker.

I would suggest you go out and try to Vanq. Old Ascalon 1 hero and 2 Henchies and you will be spamming RoF untill your man burns out.I vanq all of Witmans Folly as the crawl don't use backbreaker.I burned my mana on Reyna who died a lot.

Been there done that. I'll throw in a legendary guardian title too.

I think I see the issue. Why mindlessly spam RoF when you could negate most of the damage with PS/SoA, maybe throw an occasional ZB? More effective and energy efficient. HM isn't overpowered, it just requires you to think a little and be decent at the game.

The worst thing that can happen is a PvP player giving suggestions for PvE.