Pwr or bunker meta

?? PvP players

We have seen that the recent balance patch has changed the game a lot and I was wondering how you feel about this.

Which one you prefer and leave a comment why. Please don’t post any profession / elite specialization related comments - you’ll find plenty other discussions about why this and that is OP... the question here is which meta is more entertaining. Thanks

@LegendaVagyok.9132 said:?? PvP players

We have seen that the recent balance patch has changed the game a lot and I was wondering how you feel about this.

Which one you prefer and leave a comment why. Please don’t post any profession / elite specialization related comments - you’ll find plenty other discussions about why this and that is OP... the question here is which meta is more entertaining. Thanks

Professions does matter when it comes to power+bunker meta(in a way; it is a personal taste/plastylele though-based on different circumstances you may encounter-high risk vs low risk situations)

((Excluding two professions who are all-around meta's and who are near immune to them -Thief/Mesmer))

Power Meta is more entertaining to me because i can play 6 years of broken bad design mechanics without putting any effort or taking any risks whatsoever to excel at it without any sweat

---seriously, why go bunker if you can 1 shot??---

---have a good day---

You can't talk about meta without mentioning anything about professions or elites, because certain builds of build combinations are what define a meta....

Anyways, I think a healthy meta is one where everyone can kill everyone, and can die to everyone. FIghts should not last more than 40-50 seconds, but no less than 10, since most heals are 20-25 secs CD, a heal should be used once, at most twice during a fight, and that second heal is the deciding factor; if you interrupt/guarantee it then you gain a massive advantage over the other.

I think we have a somewhat healthy balance in our hands, it is just missing some fine tuning on some outliers, namely holo/soulbeast/spellbreaker/sw.d thief/mirage/scrapper where either the sustain is too high or the sustain/damage ratio for the amulet they are wearing is off (like being able to equip paladin/marauder and be able to heal back up at the same rate as other classes that need to equip something like mender to be anywhere near that level of self-sustain, like elementalist). We also need to "even out" some classes that bring some good stuff, but only shine in very specific situations, like revs and necros (revs have high damage but low sustain and condi clear, same with necros, power needs to be shifted back to more sustain/defense from offense so that they can be a little more independent and can be played in more situations, also let us heal necros through shroud).

I would like to see less sustain supports and more offensive supports, like for example, a staff ele brings lots of support via CC and fields like the staff water #4, air #3 & 5, earth #4 & 5, auras which can be quite impacting with offensive boons and removal of condis by applying auras and such, however, due to the existence of instant 900-1200 range teleports that ignore LoS and have unblockable attacks attached to them (revs and thieves, both can completely bypass defenses and blocks, distance and obstacles and burst the lowest armor/health class in the game and there is nothing eles can do about it) or necros constantly converting everything while eles havent been keeping up with the powercreep of other supports like FB and scrapper. But I honestly think we are almost there, just tune outliers on both ends.

neither is preferred. problem is that the counters to the op problem builds are useless against everything else. I would like to see outlier builds buffed like Fortus.6175 said.

If your "bunker meta" is the post-patch environment, I'll gladly take that over the previous. It's not stupid tanky like the start of HoT, but the power damage is less extreme to allow some thought to skill use.

Though ultimately, the power creep of both needs to be drastically reduced.

You should start a forum poll to get some clear cut results.

With the addition of e-specs I agree professions don't really matter as most can build for dmg/sustain/heals and it comes down to being able to bunker a point requiring 2 or more people to take you down.

I believe the optimal balance would be to allow a duelist to stall any 1v1, however only allow skilled players to survive and hold a 1v2. This leaves +1's more efficient and good rotations are rewarded, while a good duelist can keep the opponent outnumbered on the rest of the map.

That being said, this isn't as simple as blanket nerfs and buffs across the board as certain matchups are already close while some even are spot on as of right now. Take tramawarr for example, it's in a really good spot for it's role. Same goes for power herald. Holosmith could even do with some buffs at this point because they have been stable bruisers, and scourges have just the right amount of tankyness to not be godlike under a support.

What would be most benificial would be to identify the different specs within professions and forcing the overperforming ones to choose traits a little more carefully while allowing the underperforming to get the best of both worlds. All it takes is moving traits around tiers mostly, some desperately still need reworks.

Recognizing that the gamemode now has meta-builds and balancing them in a vacuum would be the fastest way for anet to make PvP enjoyable, as they could then later try to open up for more unused skills/specs to compete instead of what they do now treating all professions/specs equal with a drizzle of buffs to the least used traits/skills.

This method would encourage new meta growth and theorycrafting, while avoiding powercreep. They would even have the power to make something FoTM by simply moving some traits around on a profession, easily giving everyone a dps, support and duelist role option.

Essentially this would mean if there was a meta with Soulbeast, Weaver and Scrapper as the overperforming duelists (intendedly so), then they would take the lowest performer and make the other on-par with it. Same for dps. Support however should be flavoury.

Movement meta is the only correct choice. Too bad the only interesting movement mechanics in GW2 are locked onto mounts.

@Swagg.9236 said:Movement meta is the only correct choice. Too bad the only interesting movement mechanics in GW2 are locked onto mounts.

Um. . . .no. they are all on thief. :P

@JonnyForgotten.4276 said:

@Swagg.9236 said:Movement meta is the only correct choice. Too bad the only interesting movement mechanics in GW2 are locked onto mounts.

Instantaneous teleports aren't raptor leap drifting, super jumps, or terrain-based speed management like the beetle. Thief is a bore compared to what mounts allow players to do.

Power.

Conquest on a whole is far more healthy a game type with a higher TTK.GW2 Conquest will always struggle to be an e-sport but if you want spectators it will inevitably be far more interesting with people that can die at any moment, forcing teams to then adapt to the change in map advantage, and player placement. Realistically with our visual noise no one wants to watch 5 guys sumo across 3 points. The only way you could maybe make a bunker meta interesting in this way is if you change how decap/point contest works.

For actual game play, some may find it fun to sumo on points but having the dynamic where it takes ages for one person to die is going to lose it's luster pretty fast. Plus it's way to easy to snowball from early momentum which for the sense of fair play I don't think creates a healthy game.

If this was a Push the cart, or Tug of war game type on a linear or 3 lane map; maybe everyone being a bunker would work. However, with conquest no.

I am not opposed to the idea of scrapping conquest if we got something better if everyone wanted to have a higher TTK.

I feel like the game needs to evolve away from conquest to ultimately solve this issue. (Maybe we need something similar to TF2's "Symmetrical/Linear Control Point.")

Like Daishi.6027 said, pwr meta is way healthier than bunker meta in terms of esports and competitive play. I much rather watch a tournament where people need faster reactions and can't fuck up too many times or they'll instantly die, than a tournament where everyone is a bunker and nobody is dying so nothing is happening and people can make mistakes after mistakes without punishment.

Problem is conquest. It's just a flawed game mode when its your only game mode.

I prefer condi meta cus condi doesnt kill you in 1 sec and the fights don't end in 2 hits so it requires skill , unlike power cheese trash

and tank meta is trash cus nobody ever dies and the only ppl that have fun are gankers, and currently we're in some complete utter garbage tank meta and the worst patch since PoF came out. Incompetence

@Snellibee.2761 said:Like Daishi.6027 said, pwr meta is way healthier than bunker meta in terms of esports and competitive play. I much rather watch a tournament where people need faster reactions and can't kitten up too many times or they'll instantly die, than a tournament where everyone is a bunker and nobody is dying so nothing is happening and people can make mistakes after mistakes without punishment.

cheese 1shotting has nothing to do with reactions or skill in a game where there are classes that can teleport from 1200 range with burst and no line of sight lmao, prediction is mostly anticipation and you can't anticipate rev/thief/guard ganks and thats why this game isnt competitive and saying that is hilarious

I dunno why you think we are in bunker meta. It is only scrapper. Not much changed otherwise from last patch. If you are not playing scrapper, nothing has changed for you in terms of damage except Ed from enemies.

Bunker Meta is obviously terrible since it turns priority away from fights to get solely decided over decaps/rotations. So generally a fast paced meta based on high burst is fine, but it shouldn't turn into oneshot fiesta either. The balance is especially hard to strike on the sidenodes, it shouldn't be endless stalling but it is also good if Sidenoders can survive outnumbers by kiting so that 1v1s actually matter and the game doesnt solely get decided on teamfights and +1s. Unfortunately that aspect is a bit lacking in the current meta. It also why I was not as strictly against passive lifesavers as most people here, because it allows you to survive high pressure situations (aka 1vX) without being a full bunker.

I don't think you have to pick one or the other. Ideally both could coexist, but I'd like to see certain design ideals preserved:

• Glass builds should exist, but should have counterplay - ie. Dodge their burst, punish them with counterattack
• Tanky builds should exist, but shouldn't be able to 1v1 or 1v2 indefinitely if the opponents land their skills successfully
• No builds should entirely negate all of a certain type of skill/damage. That is, no perma-stab ignoring CC indefinitely, no perma-resist or perma-cleanse nullifying all condi damage indefinitely, no perma-evade or long invuln chaining, no perma-stealth
• Stats should mean something, tanky builds should rely mostly on tanky stats for their defensiveness. Currently tankiness is mostly a factor of traits and skills rather than stats

My ideal fight for an average build vs a slightly less skilled bunker would go for ~1 minute with the average build eventually winning due to them landing more of their big skills and the bunker failing to match defense to those skills.

My ideal fight for an average build vs a slightly less skilled glass player would go for ~10-20 seconds with the glass player attempting to burst, the average build avoiding that with dodges/blocks/mobility, then turning around and landing CC and damage themselves.

Bunker meta (post-HoT) killed e-sports

Balanced meta showed e-sports potential (pre-HoT 2015)

But right now since ANET added too many obnoxious defensive mechanics, there BETTER be more damage. So obviously the best meta right now better be high power critical builds so bunkers don't give people cancer by being undecappable for 15 minutes and there is actual back and forth games.

More damage = evade spammers are actually a little bit more tolerable.More damage = dodging ACTUALLY feels rewardingMore damage = maybe your game has a chance of people taking it seriously again

The clear problem lately, whether it was about condi mirage, scourge, or bunker scrapper, is that all these builds are really easy to play at a correct level, and the learning curve is close to inexistant.It surely takes skill to be played in plat 3, but you can have correct results by using skills on recharge on average rank, and i find it way too forgiving.

I just want to say - with last patch arena.net killed all fun in pvp. We had too much defense skills before patch, over9000 boons which pop instantly from every move, so it became impossible to track it. Now i feel myself a bot. I try to find a window between engi skills, while he stays in center while dropping bombs, all boons, instant condi clear, reflect projectiles or just running around almost unkillable.

How can it be fun? Hey, arena.net, tell me any reason to waste time on it?

@"otto.5684" said:I dunno why you think we are in bunker meta. It is only scrapper. Not much changed otherwise from last patch. If you are not playing scrapper, nothing has changed for you in terms of damage except Ed from enemies.

I said the game has changed a lot, didn’t say that it’s a new ‘full’ bunker meta. Although by adding just + one viable bunker it is now slowly shifting into that direction, which I find a little less entertaining.Ideally one tanky spec would be enough for the conquest game mode, whilst these recent matches are full of scrappers, chronos and firebrands.

actually this patch made pvp playable again. fights do not finish in 3.2 seconds being oneshotted by a sniper or dotted to death. now fights are long.

scrapper is not immortal. warrior + hammer is a huge counter to it

doing dps is not fun . this is not a fps. there supoosed to be strategy .

I'm not a fan of this meta I would say scrapper is overturned in his defense abilities by a lot. I saw a lot of other 'bunker' builds no one of is comparable to scrapper.How do I come to this conclusion? Because a single player can stop a 5 man group with support and (nearly) all boons long enough so that his team members respawn and come back.

I must say this isn't the way it turns out of the whole round what they also do is basically split and let the scrapper run mid and let the other team fight him while they cap the other 2 points you can try other strategies but in sum they have an unfair advantage in all those scenarios also planning a new strategy (in the mid of the round) in a mode were hardly anyone talks with each other and even less follow a plan I think it is a bit much ....

How it currently works is everyone knows what he/she needs to do or doesn't this is what a good group differs from a bad.With fixed 5 people group in a voice chat basically gild pvp with ladder this would be a completely other topic.

I think the current bunker meta didn't started with scrapper but rune change and the changes which they did to deadeye basically around the same time the chrono started to get its changes.

In general I see the problem that some classes did too much dmg for fair pvp in the sense they could one shoot you this shouldn't be the case. I know that from other action mmos were fight were more like a brawl.

About the skills I also see that weapon skills rarely have impact most of them they do have pull or push effects. The stats in pvp also not much because the variability is limited in pvp in wvw and pve its a bit better but mostly tank/minstrel or diviner gear allow here creativity. Boons and traits are overturned in most elite specs the problem is when you reduce them you have to replace all the weapons sets basically everything in the game .

From a PvE view they reduced the dmg and boons a lot in the last months(with exceptions) while they increased the incoming dmg in the fractals so I need to make the build less glass more bunker.

I love how people wasting time on sides trying to force a scrapper off the node during half match. For those who haven’t realized how important is rotating and leaving that bunker, this is a kind reminder: do NOT waste your team’s precious time unless you have a serious +1 with you. A +1 with decent burst (condi is cancer is better) and you should cc or disable otherwise it’s lost. Leave, rotate take the other two nodes this way generating value for your team. ?

entertaining or not ppl will pick what make they win more.

So the bunker meta is what'll see in the next 6 month

Power meta fun when 1v1 ingBunker meta fun when not getting wiped in mid fightMaybe it's just that there should not be a mid fight thing ever... Or not ;)