Game Theory, Discussion 1

That's the point. Sha believes that they might not have, because the way GW works in PvE and PvP prepared them for other games that do not require as much in terms of team play or skill knowledge.

Although I am simplifying it a lot...

I fully understand what your saying in they way that when I was really active with the TFC community back in HL1 all the veteran players could and still do move on to newer games together completely dominating since they have a higher understanding on game mechanics in general. It also means they have social and mental attitude to seek out the higher level of competition within a new game.

The massive eloquentness witnessed in this thread is quite astounding. :P

But I have to agree with Arduinna. I'm kinda like that too. Got some builds that work. Change them sometimes if a certain build is more effective in certain missions or areas, same as armor that goes with the builds and weapon sets.
I do change heroes a lot though. But on average the triple necro builds plus a friend with a protection monk, an ele nuker and either a mesmer or ranger interrupter, or sometimes an earth ele warder, works fantastically in almost any situation. The only changes I make in that setup is dependant on the profession me and my friend are playing (If one is a monk, we take a warrior hero instead of tahlkora, if one is an elem, we swap the ele nuker hero, etc.)

This might give me an advantage to learn GW2 faster when that comes. But I can't be sure if someone who has never played GW1 might catch on at GW2 just as fast. It all depends on how long and how many different types of games people have played.

- Do you people even realize what the word "skill" means?

Do you suppose that when the original game featured ice elementals in icy environment, it would make sense to use fire magic for damage boost since the game was coded that way? And vice versa for lava monsters in lava areas. You only think the game needed skill because you were noob back then and things were relatively difficult for you.

This game requires no skill. Spend some hours reading up mechanics and learning non-obvious stuff what "allies", "height advantage" and "armor rating" means. You'll beat up any competition. Good skill is good. Bad skill is bad. Once you have the winner skillbar you can autopilot through any level in game.

Nash is rolling in his grave.

toasting, epic bread, ect. ect.

Great post as always Sha, very interesting subject. I agree with your post, teamplay is key in any cooperative game and guild wars requires a fair amount of that. Teamplay is particularly important in MMORPG's were individual player skill cannot hold a team as well as it can in say an FPS. Whereas a great spy, sniper, or scout in TF2 could kill up to 6 people in one opportunity, pulling off a clean 1 person spike with a balanced build in Guild Wars requires the player skill and coordination of about 5 people. Though the mechanics in these two games are very different, they are both games focused on teamplay, yet how valuable the skill of a single player in a group is much less important in a MMORPG situation. I could see team focus in GW definitely makes GW vets better players in other games.

inb4 this turns into a shitstorm fueled by Bryant Again and Dreamwind both refusing to quit arguing with each other for 10+ pages. ;D

i'd love to see you "autopilot" on a dom mes, playing gvg in the top 50. come back to us after you've won a gold cape.

His hypothesis is for anyone that's pved past 20, not top notch GvGers. GW has undisputably the most demanding PvP of MMOs, but that is not the topic. Watching top GvG players "pwn" WoW doesn't really tell us much of anything about GW's effect of PvE.

I haven't really played enough WoW to make real comparisons, but I understand the "raid" portions make all GW PvE pale by comparison. The closest analogue was DoA when nightfall was first released, before all the PvE skills entered the scene. The quality of players you brought in that mission actually mattered, even if you were giving them dumb jobs like BiP or SF nuker because the slightest mis-aggro would wipe. WoW guilds that simply want to complete raids, never mind all these speed clears the GW community goes on about, have to likewise select for PvE quality, and leave that one or two behind that would otherwise bring down the whole group.

Having said that, GW still has a ton of clever mechanics lacking in other games, most notably protection prayers, targeted interrupts, and domination magic. But those don't necessarily come completely to the fore in your average PvE experience- note the unpopularity of Mesmers, and the popularity of healer's boon monks and disrupting accuracy assassins.

- Sadly my Internet connection isn't good enough for that. Give me 7 heroes, I'll handle keyboard macro. Their Monk preprots, I'll unload a spike starting with Shatter Enchantment and ending 0.2 seconds later in dead enemy using the current most overpowered spike skills. If I'm exceptionally clever, I will spike target that isn't enchanted. How many targets can two monks protect? When heroes can steamroll through the game what does it say where the foundations of game lie? Nothing changes the fact that everything in the game works on simple equations. You might call calculating damage potentials skill, but I wouldn't. Which required more skill to you: IWAY or SWAY?

"No no no, that isn't True Skill. Use only skills and professions I approve."
"My self-styled PvP expertise doesn't extend to Hero Battles, so I refuse to call it True PvP."

so you're an elitist and a scrub, how does that work out for you?

lol
and how do you plan to run flags, deal with splits, or come anywhere near a gold cape with your 7 hero team? also, you point out how easy it would be to kill the other team but fail to mention how easy it must then be for the other team to kill you. maybe you don't think the other team could kill you easily because they don't understand guild wars as well as you. but somebody so good at guild wars couldn't seriously expect to win a gold cape with a 7 hero team.
ergo, you're either a troll or very bad at guild wars. i get the feeling that you take yourself very seriously, so you're probably not trolling.
double ergo, lol ur baed at gw.

- Teams only run flags because they realize killing requires certain amount of luck and timing, because of same human factors. Better question than split countering is how will they deal with counter-split of more effective build?

- It's going to be harder because of human factors. Your average GvG Warrior player wastes his adrenaline on non-spiking situations, selects protected targets, ignores effective movement. Spike teams fail because someone's Ventrilo had 400ms latency and others are going at 50ms, someone gave away the target or something else. The game works simply based on those errors. Take away source of errors (the human player) and you'll win. This applies to PvE and PvP alike. PvE skills are needed so that your average joe would have at least some incentive to take another player instead of his trusty hero-npc.

- That's not even the case. What makes good team in your opinion? I know: communication, coordination, ...

no u

are you sure you know how bad hero AI is?

- Are you sure you know it can be adjusted? ANET had to limit hero numbers in HA and GvG because they were too good.

Until you're #1 on the HB ladder from superior macro/micromanagement I refuse to believe anything that you're trying to convince us of.

- Suppose I was #1 in HB ladder. Then what? Don't you know that responding by questioning someone's achievements or status in community is fallacy called ad hominem?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

thats the problem. where im from, im sick of hearing smart ppl talk. my role is to dumb everything down. as such, i present the dumbed down version

Ppl in gw can find fun in wut others consider boring tasks, such as grinding, so they can find fun in other games easily.

in additional gw also promotes teamwork and complex thinking but thats an addendum and not the main point.

Uh-huh, no. It is you who are making extraordinary claims here and being told to 'put up or shut up'. Specifically, you claim that it takes just some hours to learn enough of the game to beat any competition. This is simply ludicrous and you are asked to either show us mere mortals that you have done it, or admit that you were spreading fertilizer. Compare:

Person A: Chess requires no skill. It takes just a couple of hours to learn how the pieces move and after that you'll beat any opponent.
Person B: Unless you are a chess grandmaster, I won't believe a word of what you just said.
Person A: Ad hominem! Ad hominem!

- Reading my post #33 helps.

- After reading post #33, you'll realize this isn't same thing. Same arguments can't be used for chess, because chess isn't 1) one-dimensional game, 2) game where hardware-induced problems play a role in success. Question is how difficult it would be to code chess-winning bot and how difficult it would be to code GW-winning bot. If chess-bot takes more time, chess is the kind of game that takes more brainpower to master. When you've read this message carefully you realize that no-one's position on any ladder makes any difference.

You are assuming that guild wars is a one-dimensional game. And the idea of anyone, even progamers from korea who play starcraft, microing 7 heroes + there own bar to do everything an 8 man team does it GvG is extremely ridiculous. It's hard enough to play one bar in GvG. But you're suggesting that you can micromanage EVERYTHING. You're gonna need more than 400+ APM and a much superior brain I'm afraid.