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"Condi builds are easier to play" and the widely accepted truth of how and why.


Grimjack.8130

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I think there is alot of misinformation when people talk about skill in this game, personally a majority of the vocal population I encounter via in game, reddit, or the forums tend to think Condition builds take less skill. They give different reasons, they give the same reasons, or they don't give a reason and just say: "Conditions are easy, stop making excuses for yourself" (something I expect to see alot in this thread.)

Reasons include but are not limited to; Conditions are passive gameplay, condition builds have a ton more stats, conditions are more spammable, and conditions have less counterplay. Some of these reasons do have some aspect of truth to them and some don't.

Condition builds can't be more passive than power builds, thats just not how this game works. For example, it takes one dodge to dodge a Warrior Axe F1, it also takes one dodge to dodge a Warrior LB5, or a Mirage Axe 3 (more on mirage and mesmer later). The point each skill does alot of damage and only takes 1 dodge to completely avoid, the only difference is the way they do damage, one is right as you get hit, and one is over a window of time after you get hit. Condition builds DO have a tendency to have more residual fields though, fields that pulse, that as a result might require more than one dodge to completely avoid, power classes also have these fields like Acid Bomb on Engineer but not as frequent, this is however 100% negligible in the grand scheme of things.

Condition builds can and most likely will get more stats than a power build, this is due to people playing 5 stats on power builds and 4-5 on condi builds. For power you tend to run Power, Precision, Ferocity, Toughness, and Vitality (sometimes boon-duration) and for condi builds you typically run Condition Damage, Toughness, Vitality, and Condition Duration, sometimes Precision. This is a pretty fair point. Trailblazer gives you exactly the 4 stats you main on condi builds, power builds get that luxury with Marauder if they don't want toughness, but it's pretty impractical to run full Marauder, unlike running full Trailblazer. Being a better player, having more skill, will let you win versus a worse player with more total or efficient stats.Condition builds tend to run a considerable amount of toughness because of how good Trailblazer's is as a stat.

Condition builds being more spammy is a weird argument, does it refer to the auto attack doing more, and since auto attacks can be spammed without recoil its more spammable? Or is it referring to condition builds having more skills that do good things, or lots of damage? I personally won't be looking into each auto attack chain to see if there are more good condition auto chains than power, nor will I be looking into each skill each weapon has to see if the typical meta condi weapons are more efficient or not, I think it possibly could be the case for the second point though. Does ranged make a build more spammable? Are conditions more ranged? Alot of questions need to be answered before we can truly get an answer to this.

Now some of this last point has already been addressed, a large portion of counterplay between power and condi skills are 1-1 ratios, if you didn't dodge the Warrior Axe F1, you get hit for 10k, same with not dodging the Mesmer Axe 3, it also would've only taken one dodge to avoid. But thats not where this point ends, theres a ton of condi cleanse in this game, so why do people say they don't have enough cleanse? Well once again there are a couple reasons, one is people tend to not run it, or not as much.

Some roaming spellbreakers for example tend to run around with a cleansing sigil, 1 utility for resistance, the discipline weapon swap cleanse, and resistance on Full Counter and think thats plenty, whether it is or isn't won't be debated. These warriors have no problem with other warriors, they're happy with their build til they run into a Scourge or a Mirage, they fight once, and the next time they fight, the Warrior decides to slot more Resistance, or condi cleanse. Why does the warrior not think that the build needs to be better at fighting condition builds and always have that extra cleanse on? Some people have no problem with counter comping whatever you're fighting, so that might be one of the reasons they have.The point that example is trying to make is people spec to fight power builds, because they can just toss out "Condition builds are easy" if they lose with a bad build. There are exceptions though, like always, Mirage in WvW is pretty insane with the 40% dodge food, it closes alot of the gaps that Mirages have without that food. There isn't enough cleanse to deal with that.Mesmer has had something like this for roaming pretty frequently, and now Condi Mesmer is instantly thought of as skill-less. I personally hate that the community accepts countercomping against what you're fighting.

But even then thats not where the condi and power counterplay debate ends. Condition builds have a tendency to be able to shut down boons better than power ones, and boons are very relevant nowadays. Does having an aspect of boon control really tilt the scale that far in the direction of Condition builds?

So its your fault when you get hit by a Mirage's Axe 3, but you never get hit by a warrior's GS F1, and its your fault that you never see roamers playing condi, so the first time you do you die with a build on you that runs a pathetic amount of answers to conditions.Maybe we'll get some decent conversations going.Maybe we'll get those same people who refuse to explain themselves saying the same 3 words. "Condi is easy."

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People say they don't have enough cleanse precisely because they don't dodge the applications. It's like saying you don't have enough armor because you repeatedly take direct damage to the face without trying to avoid it.

And I think the reason why this is the case is simple; most players don't know which skills that apply damaging conditions actually hit hard because they don't pay attention to where the stacks come from. They just notice them once they're already stacked up, and by then, it's probably too late.

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I think people mostly have a great disdain for specific builds like condi mirage and condi thief for example (when it was at its prime) because of the playstyle that accompanies the builds, but generalize it to all condi builds and make a false assumption that condi is easy despite the reality that there are many more meta power specs than there are meta condi specs. Meta does not necessarily or directly correlate to ease of use, but there is still something to take from the disparity. Personally I don't see how insta-downing someone with a power spec is inherently any harder than loading someone with a bunch of condis; it is all dependent on the class/build and its relation to the build you are fighting against it with.

TLDR: people like to overgeneralize, especially if it creates a scapegoat for why they lost.

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@Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:People say they don't have enough cleanse precisely because they don't dodge the applications. It's like saying you don't have enough armor because you repeatedly take direct damage to the face without trying to avoid it.

And I think the reason why this is the case is simple; most players don't know which skills that apply damaging conditions actually hit hard because they don't pay attention to where the stacks come from. They just notice them once they're already stacked up, and by then, it's probably too late.

I am guilty of this :'(Most of the time I'm looking at the amount of condis on me and when I should clear them instead of looking at what the enemy is doing and when I should be dodging XDI do know the basic of how most classes stack their condis, but mirage is on another level.I think it is because they got a trait that applies mirage cloak to the illusions and this makes the illusions OP at keeping up the condi application pressure (but I'm no mirage pro so kindly don't flame me if I am wrong XD)

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Condition builds can and most likely will get more stats than a power build, this is due to people playing 5 stats on power builds and 4-5 on condi builds. For power you tend to run Power, Precision, Ferocity, Toughness, and Vitality (sometimes boon-duration) and for condi builds you typically run Condition Damage, Toughness, Vitality, and Condition Duration, sometimes Precision. This is a pretty fair point. Trailblazer gives you exactly the 4 stats you main on condi builds, power builds get that luxury with Marauder if they don't want toughness, but it's pretty impractical to run full Marauder, unlike running full Trailblazer. [...] Condition builds tend to run a considerable amount of toughness because of how good Trailblazer's is as a stat.You are a bit late. There was only one single reason why condi is called noob playstyle and that's trailblazer and dire (and mercenary in pvp) - at a time where these stats were 100% viable.

Condi chrono, condi reaper, condi daredevil... just to name a few - they all could eat tons of direct damage. I remember very well the time when I fought condi reapers that didn't mind to dodge my grave diggers because of that absurd amount of armor and vitality. Try to kill a daredevil that has a 90% evasion uptime (while attacking at the same time), 3k armor and 20k health. These builds could misplay like crazy and would still succeed.

These were the times when that meme was created.

Now I said "was" because times haves changed.

  • in PvP defensive condi amulets are gone for a very long time and recently there have been only builds (not the whole damage type) that were overpowered (like condi mirage)
  • ANet released a huge condi update that removed condi burst for most specs (except mirage)
  • for wvw (remember: dire/tb!) condi on every spec (even mirage) is finally brought in line since sigil of cleansing clears 3 conditions at once. That's a welcome cleansing option for every spec in the game. The (after the condi update) still broken condi builds (mirage and thief variants) are finally dealable now

Being a better player, having more skill, will let you win versus a worse player with more total or efficient stats.Completely irrelevant argument. There is a top end on the skill ladder where you won't find worse players and where you are dependent on proper balancing.

So you are just saying: "When you got good, quit the game, because at this point skill will not be rewarding anymore!"

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a> @Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

People say they don't have enough cleanse precisely because they don't dodge the applications. It's like saying you don't have enough armor because you repeatedly take direct damage to the face without trying to avoid it.

And I think the reason why this is the case is simple; most players don't know which skills that apply damaging conditions actually hit hard because they don't pay attention to where the stacks come from. They just notice them once they're already stacked up, and by then, it's probably too late.

In some moments some of the condis that killed people weren't by scourge, but by other condi builds that can apply more widespread burn amounts by a burn guard.

In this game there was too many condis, and it killed players too fast by bursting. Having condis lower is a good thing for pvp, since it means you cannot burst people down instantly, but people are in denial if they think there aren't enough cleanses and resists.

Condi chrono, condi reaper, condi daredevil... just to name a few - they all could eat tons of direct damage. I remember very well the time when I fought condi reapers that didn't mind to dodge my grave diggers because of that absurd amount of armor and vitality. Try to kill a daredevil that has a 90% evasion uptime (while attacking at the same time), 3k armor and 20k health. These builds could misplay like crazy and would still succeed.These were the times when that meme was created.

You forgot to mention scourge, the king of condis who could corrupt all your boons and take them away blowing you up instantly while adding a ton of condis as well.

Being a better player, having more skill, will let you win versus a worse player with more total or efficient stats.

That's a silly comment comment.

Skill will take you far in the pvp area, but if you are fighting vs a broken class such as mirage and Mesmer were in pvp and the person knows how to play, there is only so much you can do versus a broken class.

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i am a necro main and when i play scourge it is way easier to shut down players than when i play power reaperwhen it come to necro the condi master yes condition build are more easier and braindeadi mean how hard to land a sand shade or a distortion skilltry play melee warrior without any CC and good luck landing a kill with all the evading and invulns in the gametrying to defend condition build or pew pew power build is pointless they are easier than melee power builds in solo Qsmy friend ask me to give him an advice for PvP he have core game only so i told him player condi minionmancer necro and he is at gold 3 that how easy to play condi in this game

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@"DragonFury.6243" said:i am a necro main and when i play scourge it is way easier to shut down players than when i play power reaperwhen it come to necro the condi master yes condition build are more easier and braindeadi mean how hard to land a sand shade or a distortion skilltry play melee warrior without any CC and good luck landing a kill with all the evading and invulns in the gametrying to defend condition build or pew pew power build is pointless they are easier than melee power builds in solo Qsmy friend ask me to give him an advice for PvP he have core game only so i told him player condi minionmancer necro and he is at gold 3 that how easy to play condi in this game

Agreed. A few seasons ago when i was playing spellbreaker or holo in sPvP i decided to try the broken Scourge. With zero hours on the class my win rate went from around 50-60% to 80% over a sample size of 20 matches (solo q). I certainly did not suddenly "Git Gud!".

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The only reason for people thinking that condition are cheesy are blurred consequences of being hit by condi combo. When you are getting hit by one shot DE you know what hit you. While fighting condi build the only information you get after getting hit is amount of condis in UI. Same applies for combat log, where you can find all condi application but it is extremaly painful. Death recap is not showing skills which applied condi.

Condition damage as well as power damage never were OP, and never will be OP. What can be OP is particular skill or trait in terms of amount of power damage, coefs, stacks, boons ect.

If anyone tells that condi or power damage is OP in general then it only shows persons lack of understanding of the game.

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There's definitely a problem with a lot of condi builds/skills being either spammable, passive or just not having as many clear tells on their attacks as most power builds.

However, part of it is that it's just inherently easier to learn tells for big damage power attacks since the effect is so clear to associate with the cause. As soon as a big attack lands, you see your health chunk, but with condi builds, it may take a second for you to realize that you're melting.

There's definitely a level of experience/skill associated with that, but some additional work to giving clearer tells on a lot of certain skills would help. I don't think Mirage 3 is that bad, but the Ambush is pretty hard to see since there's not hardly any wind up and the projectiles get caught in the visual spam.

Some skills are just inherently spammy though, such as Death Blossom on D/D thief and the condi dodge for Daredevil. Fortunately condi thief doesn't seem to be around like it used to be, but attacks that provide invulnerability while attacking are often inherently bad (and yes, I don't like Daggerstorm right now for that exact reason).

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I think part of the problem is that the only viable condi builds are also the worst offenders as far as spam. Mirage, thief, and necro tend to have the most spamming as far as condis go. Other classes that could do condi (engineer, warrior, guardian, ranger, ele) simply are not viable in higher tiers because it's super easy to cleanse/counter them. Plague signet on necro alone invalidates a lot of other condi builds.

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OP is missing a critical part of why condi builds are considered low skill builds for low skill players.

It's true that DOT isn't inherently any more easymode than normal direct damage. In fact it should even have more counterplay and be even more difficult to play in that regard. But it's not. Why? WELL BOOOOOIIIIII, to find that out you need to look at the skills themselves.

Look at some of the best power skills in the meta:

Photon forge - Holographic shockwave: Obvious animation on the holosmith. Huge telegraph. Animation locked during cast. Large windup.Whirling attack: Obvious animation, skillshot based, tell is in the weapon swapShackling wave: Post-nerf even grandma can dodge this skills tell now.Whirling defense: Very obvious animation, requires you to sit in it to get the full damage. 99% of the time dying to this is entirely your own fault.

Now lets look at some of the best condi skills in the meta:

All shade skills: Zero cast time AoE abilities with indistinguishable animationsCondi Mirage shatters: Zero cast time AoE abilitiesNecro staff: Low cast time ranged abilities with massive AoE

TL;DR the problem with condi isn't condi. The problem is the overwhelming majority of condi abilities are huge AoE instant cast skills that allow you to play condi builds by just running to wherever enemies are and 12345ing. https://www.twitch.tv/bikzesnake/clip/ShySoftAirGuitarVoteNay?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

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@Vagrant.7206 said:I think part of the problem is that the only viable condi builds are also the worst offenders as far as spam. Mirage, thief, and necro tend to have the most spamming as far as condis go. Other classes that could do condi (engineer, warrior, guardian, ranger, ele) simply are not viable in higher tiers because it's super easy to cleanse/counter them. Plague signet on necro alone invalidates a lot of other condi builds.

I think if P/D could get buffed in the right way, it could bring some potential to a thief condi build that's not spammy. However, as it stands, it still relies on the easily blocked/blinded Cloak and Dagger skill for the stealth condi attack, which is one of the biggest reason that thieves have tended to just go D/D and spam Death Blossom instead.

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Conditions have an advantage that power don't, you can cover them with even more conditions to prevent randomly a life saving cleanse. I do think, though, that there is now more than enough counterplay for everyone to agree that a "good" player shouldn't die against a condi build (except the problematic confusion mirage) and cry that the condi user have it easy.

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@"Master Ketsu.4569" said:OP is missing a critical part of why condi builds are considered low skill builds for low skill players.

It's true that DOT isn't inherently any more easymode than normal direct damage. In fact it should even have more counterplay and be even more difficult to play in that regard. But it's not. Why? WELL BOOOOOIIIIII, to find that out you need to look at the skills themselves.

Look at some of the best power skills in the meta:

Photon forge - Holographic shockwave: Obvious animation on the holosmith. Huge telegraph. Animation locked during cast. Large windup.Whirling attack: Obvious animation, skillshot based, tell is in the weapon swapShackling wave: Post-nerf even grandma can dodge this skills tell now.Whirling defense: Very obvious animation, requires you to sit in it to get the full damage. 99% of the time dying to this is entirely your own fault.

Now lets look at some of the best condi skills in the meta:

All shade skills: Zero cast time AoE abilities with indistinguishable animationsCondi Mirage shatters: Zero cast time AoE abilitiesNecro staff: Low cast time ranged abilities with massive AoE

TL;DR the problem with condi isn't condi. The problem is the overwhelming majority of condi abilities are huge AoE instant cast skills that allow you to play condi builds by just running to wherever enemies are and 12345ing. https://www.twitch.tv/bikzesnake/clip/ShySoftAirGuitarVoteNay?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

this is true, but also is other important think that make condis feel chesse unsportive play to most people:-that you have no relevant information on what are killing you: true, you have icons in status barr that shows the condis you have on you, but is also true that status barr is filled with a ton of icons that flashes and changes every second.

If they clarified the info in conditions on you, condis will be a more "legit" play. way to do this in my humble opinion:-Make 3 separate rows: one for condis, other for bons, and other for misc modificators(permanent bonuses aplied for other classes for just existing, food , boosters etc)-put in bons and condis a visible timer of time they will last, not this marginal bar that is hard to see and also you have to calculate by speed that fades out-show like is showed in barriers the expected life lost if actual condis ticks to the end

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Just going to bring up my previous essay about condition damage for speed. Condition Cleanses are seriously overtuned at this point because they've been in an arms race against two builds with the most cover and damaging conditions in the game rather than being balanced around the 1-3 condition damage spread of the other condition damage builds that could potentially be run.

"Aside from Mirage and Scourge nothing are rocking condition damage. And Reaper is at the very least just as popular of a build for ranked as Scourge if not moderately more popular than Scourge. The reality is condition cleanses and conversion into boons are both extremely over tuned at this point. Most classes can quickly throw off 3-7+ conditions repeatedly over the course of a single fight, or have strong resistance uptime. Scourge and Mirage are the only condition classes capable of keeping up not because their condition damage is high (It's not. Scourge and Mirage are actually some of the lowest condition damage available) but because they have a wide range of conditions (Or in Scourge's case a wide range of conditions and boon corruption) that gives their conditions a chance to dodge condition cleanses entirely.

Condition damage has completely fallen behind Power Damage in the scheme of things. To put this into perspective; Condition Berserker, Condition Firebrand, Condition Weaver, and Condition Holosmith have the higher condition pressure. Far, far beyond what Condition Mirage and Scourge are capable of. But even putting aside other weaknesses in those builds, the single biggest weakness that prevents them from ever becoming meta is the fact that when every class can effortlessly throw off 5+ conditions multiple times a fight, the bulk of their damage being tied down into one or two conditions means their effective damage output is zero.

Arenanet really needs to look at both normalizing the spread of conditions, balancing all classes around 2-3 damaging conditions with more serious ramping power. And also heavily pulling back condition cleanses to compensate for it. Cleanses are the condition damage equivalent to protection. It's supposed to help you negate damage, but at this point unless you're a build that can shotgun 6 conditions at once your effective damage output as condi is 0.

Anet should nerf condition cleanses by 50%+ across the board then trim Mirage's condition spread and condense it into fewer conditions. Right now power damage is absolutely over tuned compared to condition damage 7/9 classes are exclusively running power on a meta level. Mirage is mostly exclusively condi and Necro run a 50/50 split of condi and power.

I really want to see all the condition cleanses and conversions straight up reduced by 50%-75%. I genuinely think that's needed. Mesmers should have their cover conditions trimmed and their damaging conditions condensed into fewer conditions, mostly torment and confusion for thematic reasons with maybe a bit of burning with the torch skills. I think the reason you've seen tons of power creep when it comes to conditions cleanses is because Anet is a bit too focused on the only two meta builds keeping up and is power creeping cleanses in an arm race.

But like let's say a Burn Firebrand vs. a Core Guardian. The Firebrand has a lot of self sustain just like the core guardian, it has easy application of it's condition skills. But that burn Firebrand will never be able to hurt the Core Guardian. How could it? The Firebrand has almost entirely burning and a little bit of bleed. And that's somehow supposed to punch through this:

2x Condition Cleanse on Heal with Lesser Smite Condition2x Condition Cleanse on Virtue of Resolve2x Condition Cleanse on Smite Condition.12x Condition Conversion on Contemplation of PurityCondition Immunity during Renewed Focus2x condition Cleanse on Virtue of Resolve

Now I'm not saying that Core Guardian is OP. It's not and it fits into the meta moderately well, but it's condition cleanses are so over the top for anything not a Scourge or a Mirage and against Mirage at least it can survive for a while.

Or warriors who have:Healing Signet 6 seconds resistance12x Condition Cleanse with Signet of Stamina6x Condition Cleanse x 2 with Shake it OffMaybe running Berserker Stance still 4 seconds resistance

Unless you're a Mirage or Scourge you aren't going to be able to punch through that with condition damage. Period."

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@"Master Ketsu.4569" said:OP is missing a critical part of why condi builds are considered low skill builds for low skill players.

It's true that DOT isn't inherently any more easymode than normal direct damage. In fact it should even have more counterplay and be even more difficult to play in that regard. But it's not. Why? WELL BOOOOOIIIIII, to find that out you need to look at the skills themselves.

Look at some of the best power skills in the meta:

Photon forge - Holographic shockwave: Obvious animation on the holosmith. Huge telegraph. Animation locked during cast. Large windup.Whirling attack: Obvious animation, skillshot based, tell is in the weapon swapShackling wave: Post-nerf even grandma can dodge this skills tell now.Whirling defense: Very obvious animation, requires you to sit in it to get the full damage. 99% of the time dying to this is entirely your own fault.

Now lets look at some of the best condi skills in the meta:

All shade skills: Zero cast time AoE abilities with indistinguishable animationsCondi Mirage shatters: Zero cast time AoE abilitiesNecro staff: Low cast time ranged abilities with massive AoE

TL;DR the problem with condi isn't condi. The problem is the overwhelming majority of condi abilities are huge AoE instant cast skills that allow you to play condi builds by just running to wherever enemies are and 12345ing. https://www.twitch.tv/bikzesnake/clip/ShySoftAirGuitarVoteNay?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

While I agree conditions should be a little more difficult to play.I think you are understating some of the disadvantages of the skills that apply conditions.

Necro shades-- Are visually easy to see and have a delay attached to every skill they use.You could simple move out of the AoE ,

Mesmer Shatters- You can kill the clones before they even reach you,(unless you position yourself between the mesmer and 3 clones)

I don't really know what you could do with necro staff besides dodge, The marks do have different icons ( actually 2 of them do) but looking for that when the necro throws them on top of you is like asking someone to perfectly dodge a backstab

I think in the case of a lot of the skills, The stacks of conditions they apply should be lowered or the duration cut by about 10-20%I don't mind the nature of them being AoE skills. I do mind that they are AoE skills that apply conditions with long enough durations to be stacked beyond what is reasonable, and can be done so frequently.

-Another suggestion- Scale back some of the cleanses and make concentration lower the duration of conditions.Probably would be too unforgiving though

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I think it's mostly a bias.

Power is more easy to understand and fulfill, therefore players play it more. In doing so, most of them do not understand, and most of them Underestimate condition damage, to the point of flat out ignoring the mechanic, thus you see a fully booned up warrior charging a scourge that hasn't placed their fields yet, only to get insta nuked, to nobody but the warrior's surprise. And since they dont expect people to play condi, they dont plan a condi cleanse on hand.

I literally killed folks with my engineer rocking only my flamethrower, Simply because I geared all my Equipment and trait toward Burning (Nothing else, just burning). Nobody ever cleanse. So more often than not, yes, my HP is low enough that I get knocked down, but then the burning finishes the job, and I rise again. People dont use the mechanic that is meant to counter Condi applications. The one time you see it is high ranked PvP, WvW and raids.

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@"mortrialus.3062" said:Just going to bring up my previous essay about condition damage for speed. Condition Cleanses are seriously overtuned at this point because they've been in an arms race against two builds with the most cover and damaging conditions in the game rather than being balanced around the 1-3 condition damage spread of the other condition damage builds that could potentially be run.

"Aside from Mirage and Scourge nothing are rocking condition damage. And Reaper is at the very least just as popular of a build for ranked as Scourge if not moderately more popular than Scourge. The reality is condition cleanses and conversion into boons are both extremely over tuned at this point. Most classes can quickly throw off 3-7+ conditions repeatedly over the course of a single fight, or have strong resistance uptime. Scourge and Mirage are the only condition classes capable of keeping up not because their condition damage is high (It's not. Scourge and Mirage are actually some of the lowest condition damage available) but because they have a wide range of conditions (Or in Scourge's case a wide range of conditions and boon corruption) that gives their conditions a chance to dodge condition cleanses entirely.

Condition damage has completely fallen behind Power Damage in the scheme of things. To put this into perspective; Condition Berserker, Condition Firebrand, Condition Weaver, and Condition Holosmith have the higher condition pressure. Far, far beyond what Condition Mirage and Scourge are capable of. But even putting aside other weaknesses in those builds, the single biggest weakness that prevents them from ever becoming meta is the fact that when every class can effortlessly throw off 5+ conditions multiple times a fight, the bulk of their damage being tied down into one or two conditions means their effective damage output is zero.

Arenanet really needs to look at both normalizing the spread of conditions, balancing all classes around 2-3 damaging conditions with more serious ramping power. And also heavily pulling back condition cleanses to compensate for it. Cleanses are the condition damage equivalent to protection. It's supposed to help you negate damage, but at this point unless you're a build that can shotgun 6 conditions at once your effective damage output as condi is 0.

Anet should nerf condition cleanses by 50%+ across the board then trim Mirage's condition spread and condense it into fewer conditions. Right now power damage is absolutely over tuned compared to condition damage 7/9 classes are exclusively running power on a meta level. Mirage is mostly exclusively condi and Necro run a 50/50 split of condi and power.

I really want to see all the condition cleanses and conversions straight up reduced by 50%-75%. I genuinely think that's needed. Mesmers should have their cover conditions trimmed and their damaging conditions condensed into fewer conditions, mostly torment and confusion for thematic reasons with maybe a bit of burning with the torch skills. I think the reason you've seen tons of power creep when it comes to conditions cleanses is because Anet is a bit too focused on the only two meta builds keeping up and is power creeping cleanses in an arm race.

But like let's say a Burn Firebrand vs. a Core Guardian. The Firebrand has a lot of self sustain just like the core guardian, it has easy application of it's condition skills. But that burn Firebrand will never be able to hurt the Core Guardian. How could it? The Firebrand has almost entirely burning and a little bit of bleed. And that's somehow supposed to punch through this:

2x Condition Cleanse on Heal with Lesser Smite Condition2x Condition Cleanse on Virtue of Resolve2x Condition Cleanse on Smite Condition.12x Condition Conversion on Contemplation of PurityCondition Immunity during Renewed Focus2x condition Cleanse on Virtue of Resolve

Now I'm not saying that Core Guardian is OP. It's not and it fits into the meta moderately well, but it's condition cleanses are so over the top for anything not a Scourge or a Mirage and against Mirage at least it can survive for a while.

Or warriors who have:Healing Signet 6 seconds resistance12x Condition Cleanse with Signet of Stamina6x Condition Cleanse x 2 with Shake it OffMaybe running Berserker Stance still 4 seconds resistance

Unless you're a Mirage or Scourge you aren't going to be able to punch through that with condition damage. Period."

i like what ANET did with spectral walk cleansing 1 condi every 2 second for a 10 second duration and not 6 condi cleanse instaits like Damage over time VS cleanse over time its to some level like protection (the boon)

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Condi is easy...Sorry couldnt help myself...

More serious note, I only say Condi is easy for WvW where toughness vitality healing and condi stats are a thing, for pvp its sort of balanced now... Wasn't balanced around the time of condi change due to guards dropping people with 20k or more a tick on burns but thats been a while back nowThere was also scourge at release, that was intense. So was the era of port spamming poison thieves

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Extreme roles are bad because it becomes a counter vs counter battle. If somebody is running full zerker damage set then you need to either be zerker too or bunker up or condition them. The damage mitigation just isn’t enough to outlast the dps in this game. This means the fights don’t last very long unless you’re in a huge zerg (wvw) but even then pro guilds will wipe pugs every time.

Also base stats like toughness and health are different across professions. Stability, condition removal, healing, crowd control and dps is unevenly spread across them too. This means that some professions are more suited to “tank” roles. While others are more suited to “condition spam”. Then there are others suited to “zerker” burst dps.

This makes the game very difficult to balance because it is unbalanced to begin with. While yes it is true every profession can be any role some are more suited to it than others. The game can not be balanced except by numbers it seems.

There is many lessons to be taken from gw1 such as all professions having the same base health. Also healing being much more effective than it currently is. Then the pvp in this game might be more than just spamming of conditions and dps. There would be a true counter rather than just damage avoidance.

I think the biggest problem is balancing for different skill levels. Because some players have better reflexes or more experience playing a profession. This means that it is not even the professions that are unbalanced but the actual players themselves.

So what I have seen Arenanet do is make very easy builds like condition bunkers that everyone can use. Then there’s zerker thieves, elementalists, bunker guards, etc, that take a bit more skill. The main problem as discussed in Sirlin’s book is balancing for skill.

This is very difficult and he said that by giving easier options that can work, but don’t work as well as something which requires more skill. That is balance and I think Arenanet know this and what we have is a game balanced for different skill levels.

That seems to be the logical way of thinking about the metas of this game in pvp and wvw. And to me it does seem balanced and if people complain they simply need to “learn to play”. But that does not mean that builds that require much more skill should faceroll everybody either.

So in conclusion Balance is very subjective but if you balance for different skill levels it becomes much easier. And that is why a game can not ever be truly balanced. Because players and people have so many different skill levels.

The way we experience competition is by winning or losing. But also I understand that by being too subjective in our opinions of balance is bad feedback. By making the pvp combat challenging but also not too hard to learn creates a diverse pvp community.

The problem is when the game is objectively balanced completely without any player feedback then it becomes very unpopular quickly. This is why Balance is subjective because players who pvp want to have fun which is highly subjective. This is just my opinions of course because I’m sure that general balance is much harder than it seems.

Let's use the conquest meta as an example. We fight each other on small circles. And we have to hold these circles to win the game.

It’s not the condition amulets or boon corruptions that is the reason these condition classes are the best. It’s simply the fact that everything else that could counter the Conquest Meta has been nerfed by Arenanet to make way for Esports.

Instead of a power based twitch reaction time meta we have an abundance of conditions and passive gameplay. We have area of effect skills ticking away on a point. We have Bunker Specs putting out enough damage to kill players.

Why is this? Because Arenanet has slowly nerfed burst damage and replaced active damage mitigation with passive invulnerabilities. Now instead of dodging power based attacks with well timed evades we have classes running max AOE condition bunkers.

These condition classes are dominating because other classes cannot bring enough sustain to compete with them. They are kings of conditions and AOE at the same time with the best ability to stack boons.

You want to know why this game isn’t an ESport Arenanet? Because you catered too much to casuals and made this game too simple. If we had Monks they at least could heal the other classes without sustain directly instead of them slowly dying to AOE and conditions.

I call this game Gank Wars 2 and there’s a simple reason why. Immobilise stacking, Stun/Daze chaining and CC spam is neverending and only certain classes have enough Stability or condition removals to escape.

There is a general lack of sustain and too much dps (both conditions and power). What is the counter to DPS? Nothing…but in GuildWars 1 it was a Monk and that is why this game lacks depth. Dodge rolls aren’t a replacement for healing and protection that a monk class would offer.

I find it funny when people assume GW1 was only theorycrafting builds and counters. The combat was just as if not more active than GW2. The fact is it had interrupts and hexes (based around punishing enemy for spamming). Proper protection and healing spells (able to almost full heal from a spike of dps). Along with Conditions, Melee and kiting, Aoes, block skills/spells and teleports. Also I probably need to mention you couldn’t just spam skills either. They were reliant on energy which you had a supply of and when you ran out it had to regenerate.

^ There’s an example of what is possible with monks. Also here’s a list of monk spells in gw1: “Monks…with their unparalleled gift for keeping their allies alive” http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_monk_skills

Just some ideas and my opinion about the different builds. Since the meta seems to be either extreme conditions bunker or burst spike with not much room in the middle. I’m hoping healing support can be made more viable instead of people just seeing green numbers but not getting any loot.

Bunker and support do very little damage unless they’re a hybrid to do conditions but you generally need some healing power to be a good support player.

Arenanet are buffing support healing and I am glad for it. Problem is most of the full zerker burst spike damage just cannot be outhealed. There’s not much you can do to mitigate the damage either apart from your main heal, dodges, blocks, invulns and evades.

A full zerker amulet player will die in a couple of hits yet can 1shot other players, while a full on bunker such as a guardian can tank hits from multiple players. Also the condition guys in the middle cant really be blamed either since he needs to tank and do some dps through the toughness of the bunkers.

Even Monks can die and be pressured from burst damage as seen in the video but most importantly it gives a real counter to spamming of dps (either conditions or power damage). Right now it’s just a race to see who can spam and avoid the most damage to win hence we have all these “passive” condition builds and burst spikes that rely on being invulnerable.

Boons run out and can be stripped not to mention if the player isn’t in bunker gear they won’t be enough usually unless they have a good amount of toughness. Healing and condition removal is what keeps you alive in an actual fight and it seems to only work in wvw with lots of players running support.

Evades/dodges, condition removal, block and invulnerable skills all have cooldowns meanwhile the damage just keeps coming from autoattacks and aoes. This is why I think this game would benefit from having a monk, to counter the insane burst damage.

What I want simply is a game with monks like gw1 had where fights can actually last longer than a couple of minutes. But apparently Arenanet decided that healers are boring and everyone should just kill each other with dps. Healing and Damage Mitigation needs a real buff if this game wants to have any chance at being competitive and balanced.

Fights lasting longer hones skills and teamwork with players. The best example I can use in gw2 is wvw where there is enough support and the aoe limit of 5 prevents players being bursted down instantly if they make a mistake. The stacking zerg meta is there for a reason and all zerker and condition damage does is make it even more needed.

Remember gw1 we had so many skills and different builds and they could all be used because they countered each other. But that didn’t mean that some builds weren’t better than others for certain things. There is too many players complaining that 1 build is too powerful but in my opinion its all based on skill level. Burst can 1-shot bunker or condis but they have more defense making it harder.

Do you guys want a game with no “Overpowered” skills and everything the same and boring? Half the fun of games is to have fun and in gw1 I sure had fun in pve with my shadow form tank lol. So in all honesty maybe try different classes more and try to learn all the different skills and how they can be countered. There is no reason for nerfs because you guys refuse to adapt to the meta.

I played gw1 had fun but this combat system is more dynamic being able to actively dodge and every class having their own heals. I just get bored of the whole dps wins everything while damage mitigation and healing is not even considered. I think gw2 lacks depth and with a monk it could easily have it.

Maybe I’m just the type of player that likes when I’m needed such as Shadow Form tanks in gw1. There are many other players that I think want to be able to feel like they can help the party and be useful instead of just another player. This is why I love healing and damage mitigation and tanking is so fun.

I truly believe Thief's burst meta with bunker Guardian’s tankiness and Warrior’s Healing Signet and invuln stances balance each other out. Also Engineer’s, Necromancer's and Elementalist’s Aoe damage controls conquest points. Meanwhile Ranger's pets and long distance damage can take out these targets from a distance. Mesmer’s spamming of clones also allows them to easily confuse an enemy long enough for them to burst them down. This is truly the best meta we can get and if you don’t like it experiment with builds and kill the passive no skill builds as you call them.

If some builds don’t have a counter then reroll to them since they’re obviously so overpowered and never die. Maybe try playing as a team instead of trying to 1v1 everything. Burst/zerker will die quickly that’s a fact. Would you prefer the meta to be bunkers and conditions only?

This is the state of the meta and Arenanet will not change it because it attracts the most players. Do you think that there is more skill to playing your build and everything else is cheese? This is called not playing to win and making excuses.

Everybody plays for or against a profession and thinks it is Overpowered. Well I am simply going to say that is your opinion. There is no balance when everything is “overpowered”.

Arenanet will not listen to your complaints obviously biased against certain professions. Because all you want is for them to be nerfed and your own profession buffed. I will link “Playing to win” by Sirlin now.

http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub

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