3/23 PvP Balance

A power Guard buff in the future would be nice. Burn DH only came to be because power damage on Guardian is extremely low since the Writ of Persistence nerf and hard to land with low mobility.

Adding the Sigil of Fire effect to our F1 Virtue of Justice in form of a new trait or removing the immob on True Shot would work wonders in order to make power Guard a little more viable, because as it stands right now most of our weapon skills are nerfed symbols, support skills, control skills or autoattacks, with little to no burst option left without running full glass canon.Glad to see Burn DH nerfed though, well done and thank you!

Blinks in surprise

Thank you so much for communicating with us! Good patch!

Thank you very much Cal & Systems Team for your efforts in continuing to balance sPvp for outperforming/oppressive builds to keep this game mode fresh season to season. I do have a few questions though concerning other areas of the game mode you may be looking at.

Are there any plans to remove duo queue/queue syncing from ranked given its tendency to imbalance random matchmaking and give partner teams an edge?Are there any plans to look at class switching pre game start as a way to prevent manipulation of class/match dynamics before a match starts?

And lastly, we noticed that some engineer abilities in WvW were adjusted for balance but not mentioned here. Are there future plans to adjust WvW balance in Roaming/Small Scale & Zerg/Large scale to match the recent efforts put forth in the sPvp arena?

Thanks and keep up the good work.

Thank you for the communication and hitting a lot of the strongest meta builds (guard/herald).

Interested to see how this will change the meta.

Trading mender's amulet for sigil of transference seems like an elegant solution to the support/bunker problem we have at the moment (albeit less than ideal considering the loss of another amulet). I like that it would bring down the durability of support builds while compensating for the loss in healing output. To that end, perhaps we could see a reduction in healing power on healing based amulets and an increase in % healing to allies?

It's worth noting that this may push supports towards sage amulet instead of menders, leading to more dps/support hybridization than we have now. If supports can recieve similar healing output with transferrence sigils as they can with mender while running sage, this might end up resulting in a resurgence of support firebrand/ hybrid scourge. Just a thought.

Marshal amulet should stay but swap the stats to:

1000 power1000 precision500 healing power500 condition damage

Give supports an option that says "I want to sacrifice my personal survivability to dish out as much damage as possible". When compared to sage/avatar, this wouldn't be unhealthy.

Lastly, I'd like to give a big thank you for taking the time to write this out. Communication like this is exactly what we need. Even if it's just the occasional write up like this where we can better understand your thoughts, and the general direction you'd like to move in.

Love the post and the communication, nicely done!

But I note (respectfully) the statement about:

"from a balance philosophy point of view we don’t want AI-heavy builds to be a pillar of the PvP meta"

and the elephant in the room that is botting. Now botting is not a "pillar of the meta", but it is a big enough issue that it needs to be spoken about and addressed, please.

I'm happy to see this communication. BRAVO. Also, YES! The game is way too SLOW right now! Needs to be faster paced (less bunkers/supports).

Barrier across the board needs to be nerfed. People shouldn't super sustaining themselves with "false" HP

I will bite any though about having these balance updates move over to WvW?

This is really good communication - I only wish for more of this in the future. Nothing I can really complain about here! Thank you!

I am just satisfied that you consider more the actual in game development than the forum circus, glad to know you're keeping a close eye to AT matches rather than the silver/bronze soloQ "experience" on the forum

1) Thank you for all your hard work. While not all of us agree with some of the decisions your team has made the effort is appreciated especially given Covid times.2) Can there be some targeted buffs next round coughs in warrior?3) Can there be some WvW love as well instead of just PvP balances (both nerfs and buffs)?

Good changes, I agree with the slow pace and waiting for the scourge touch, when support guard is brought down, scourge might be not that mighty as it is now. Especially if you looking for Marshall and menders Amulett to remove, since that's where scourge gets it barrier power

Let's look how mat looks like

No nerfs on Warrior is a win for this patch for me. But anything, please anything, for changes that would allow warriors to not be bound to a single build (in Strength Spellbreaker)!!!Berserker needs to return to the meta, not as a cheesy one-shot/glass cannon build. Also, need some way to bring back Core more into the game.

I digress though. Good job and keep it up.

@Lan Deathrider.5910 said:1) Thank you for all your hard work. While not all of us agree with some of the decisions your team has made the effort is appreciated especially given Covid times.2) Can there be some targeted buffs next round coughs in warrior?3) Can there be some WvW love as well instead of just PvP balances (both nerfs and buffs)?

Assuming they keep the same approach of using stats and gameplay data, consider zerg gameplay primarily...and preferably ignore all the forum drama, first considering that 2/5 of a zerg is firebrand...2/4 is scrappers and 1/4 is scourge/reapers, the first balance efforts should be directed at that...rest can follow

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@Lan Deathrider.5910 said:1) Thank you for all your hard work. While not all of us agree with some of the decisions your team has made the effort is appreciated especially given Covid times.2) Can there be some targeted buffs next round

coughs in warrior

?3) Can there be some WvW love as well instead of just PvP balances (both nerfs and buffs)?

gotta think about the goal for balance. that's a hard one for WvW imo. there are so many differing opinions of how the game should be

i would hate to see guardian nerfed in WvW just because it's popular, and to see the entire mode descend into pirate ships and clouds because melee push is no longer viable anymore.

maybe I'm bias because I play warrior and like a melee push, I'm sure there are tons of deadeye and ranger players who would argue range cloud gameplay is ideal WvW. some players don't even like the idea of zergs, and think they shouldn't exist at all.

i feel like what WvW should be is so much more debated than sPvP, that it's just so much harder to balance there. then you have small Vs large scale, customisable stats and all these things- and it just gets messy.

Gone over a whole year of basically nothing but nerfs mainly increased cool downs and damage reductions to bring game play to a slow boring crawl and the plan going forward is to just keep nerfing. Decap meta is a symptom of overnerfing where nothing else does stuff, so you play player vs point instead of player vs player. Lessons have not been learned, you won't speed the game up again until you start actually letting people use their non auto attack skills with reasonable regularity. Really the game is more spammy than ever because you run out of skills to use so fast then just spam whatever comes off cool down first since there is nothing else to chose from other than autoing. But yeah moar nurfs totally making game more fun. Also just cut to the chase and remove all amulets other than berserker and sinister because defensive stats on gear are totally the root cause of the boring gameplay.

@Cal Cohen.2358 said:

Minion Necromancer

• Death Nova: Reduced power coefficient from 0.6 to 0.45 in PvP only.

slightly reducing the punishment of killing them in melee range.

While I very much do appreciate the MM reductions does this now imply that this trait actually works and deals strike damage when minions die?As far as ive ever been able to recall the strike damage has always been bugged so that its never EVER dealt any form of strike/power damage despite the tool tip saying it should. It makes me wonder if the previous nerf and this one even matter because the trait never dealt damage strike/power damage anyways.

Its some what bugged me that this trait continues to get nerfed specifically in power coefficients when it deals no power damage in the first place.Is there any way of looking into this?Or can anyone confirm if this bug has been fixed as far as i know its always been bugged for years now.

While SoJ needed some adjustment, three 50% nerfs stacked on top of each other (+minor mitigation and sustain nerfs) might be a bit much for Burn DH, especially since you later lament the slow pace and lack of damage in the meta.

Personally a bit sad to see that Minionmancer, per design, is just not meant to be ever viable in any gamemode, although somewhat understandable for PvP.

If you remove Mender's anyway in favour of an Outgoing Healing Sigil (which does not affect Barrier), I'd hope to not see Scourge obliterated any further on behalf of Mender Scourge.

Glad to see Rev getting tuned down a bit.

Appreciate the communication, although I do find it odd that you want to go as far as deleting any main support Amulets, while nerfing any options that are or are getting popular because they precisely counter people stacking up and bunkering with a support, such as Burn Guard and Scourge.

It is fine to remove Mender's Amulet and lead supports to use Avatar's Amulet, but instead of removing Marshal amulet just change stats to:

Power 1000Precision 1000Healing power 500Condition damage 500

Without vitality or toughness, and without ferocity this amulet wouldn't provide much power damage nor much condition damage nor much tankiness.

What about WvW? And PvE? I know WvW had a huge balance patch today too (1 change, for engi), but can we have some discussion on that?

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@Lan Deathrider.5910 said:1) Thank you for all your hard work. While not all of us agree with some of the decisions your team has made the effort is appreciated especially given Covid times.2) Can there be some targeted buffs next round

coughs in warrior

?3) Can there be some WvW love as well instead of just PvP balances (both nerfs and buffs)?

I'm 100% biased considering I main engi, with scrapper and core being my preferred two specializations, but if scrapper is nerfed in WvW then it will be a nearly dead elite spec. Outclassed as a dps and as a support in PvE. Relevant, but still outclassed in PvP (and given how freely nerfs are dished out this is subject to change within a single patch). And stripped of it's role in WvW it'll have no place to shine.

What scrapper needs isn't a nerf. It needs a rework.

@choovanski.5462 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@"Lan Deathrider.5910" said:1) Thank you for all your hard work. While not all of us agree with some of the decisions your team has made the effort is appreciated especially given Covid times.2) Can there be some targeted buffs next round

coughs in warrior

?3) Can there be some WvW love as well instead of just PvP balances (both nerfs and buffs)?

The main targets would be : engineer and necromancer, both of them have been receiving nerf mostly in PvP only where other professions have seen huge meta changing in both modes......elementalist...ranger...warrior....thief...mesmer they been all nerfed in both gamemodes at 60/40 rate where necro and engi have been mostly 80/20 for PvP/WvW.

I'd like to see some adjustments for engineer : Purity of Purpose needs an ICD and Necromancer for starter needs Lich Form duration reduced to 10s globaly and not just pvp while it's 20s in PvE/WvW....also they may want to look at Reaper's onslaught finally ......a trait granting 40% crit dmg for just pressing F1 where ele needs to invest 3 traits, trigger FA(if running it) and still need to crit first to reach same result....and there is also Deathly Perception granting a 39% crit chance just by pressing F1...this sort of traits allow for something like :

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSQAEO0WgNYA-zVIYSUwDA-w

A full soldier build with marauder burst...

@ArthurDent.9538 said:Gone over a whole year of basically nothing but nerfs mainly increased cool downs and damage reductions to bring game play to a slow boring crawl and the plan going forward is to just keep nerfing. Decap meta is a symptom of overnerfing where nothing else does stuff, so you play player vs point instead of player vs player. Lessons have not been learned, you won't speed the game up again until you start actually letting people use their non auto attack skills with reasonable regularity. Really the game is more spammy than ever because you run out of skills to use so fast then just spam whatever comes off cool down first since there is nothing else to chose from other than autoing. But yeah moar nurfs totally making game more fun. Also just cut to the chase and remove all amulets other than berserker and sinister because defensive stats on gear are totally the root cause of the boring gameplay.

sounds like rev main upset that their skills might have actual cooldowns.Btw, if someone were to ask me whats the cooldown on Phase Traversal I would take a guess 15-20s, the fact that skills like this were getting away with fucking 5s cd is the reason why rev is played by the best and why the best tend to win.

As for the general feedback.Most damage skills lost ~30-33% dmgMost sustain lost ~ 25% output.On top of that CC no longer does damage, so overall damage went down closer to ~35-40% while sustain went down much less, instead off removing healing amulets, just nerf the actual passive sustain, its not just supports that heal too much. Everyone does, I as a berk amulet roamer shouldnt be able to heal close to 300k SELF HEALING in a match. Just my thoughts.