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Bring back hex and unique buffs


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Hello

I wondering why guild wars2 is not using their previous hex and buff system (guildwars1). I think it a very important part of any MMORPG because it help you feel unique.

Because in Gw1 every class had a different kind of buff and hex and the same time sharing the same debuff like poison etc.

Do you think they will bring back the hex and buff in order to make every class feel unique at some point?

Guildwars2 has less skills than gw1 so I don't think so it would be a very issue to balance.

What do you think?

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That actually have a simple answer.

GW1 was designed around the group consisting of at most 8 people - and it being a group, so with controllable builds. Unique hexes have the same problem original pre-change condi damage had - get too many condi users together, and most of them become completely useless as they can't add anything to the fight anymore. And most of the original GW1 hexes would have been completely OP if you allowed unrestricted stacking of them.

So, while it has indeed been a good thing then, it's not something that i'd ever expect to see in GW2.

And as for unique buffs... we do have a few, and it's debatable whether they are a good thing.

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@Astralporing.1957 said:That actually have a simple answer.

GW1 was designed around the group consisting of at most 8 people - and it being a group, so with controllable builds. Unique hexes have the same problem original pre-change condi damage had - get too many condi users together, and most of them become completely useless as they can't add anything to the fight anymore. And most of the original GW1 hexes would have been completely OP if you allowed unrestricted stacking of them.

So, while it has indeed been a good thing then, it's not something that i'd ever expect to see in GW2.

And as for unique buffs... we do have a few, and it's debatable whether they are a good thing.

Sorry but I don't think so have unique hexes by classes could be a big problem. If in your party do you 5 mesmer with the same hex it just renew the previous one.

In regarding the current unique buffs yes there are but but they are not very relevant or some of them are just passive.

Maybe I miss a game with more strategic game then the current mash buttons :(

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@lagrimabendita.8763 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:That actually have a simple answer.

GW1 was designed around the group consisting of at most 8 people - and it being a
group
, so with controllable builds. Unique hexes have the same problem original pre-change condi damage had - get too many condi users together, and most of them become completely useless as they can't add anything to the fight anymore. And most of the original GW1 hexes would have been completely OP if you allowed unrestricted stacking of them.

So, while it has indeed been a good thing then, it's not something that i'd ever expect to see in GW2.

And as for unique buffs... we do have a few, and it's debatable whether they are a good thing.

Sorry but I don't think so have unique hexes by classes could be a big problem. If in your party do you 5 mesmer with the same hex it just renew the previous one.

In regarding the current unique buffs yes there are but but they are not very relevant or some of them are just passive.

Maybe I miss a game with more strategic game then the current mash buttons :(

Don't know what you're talking about but unique buffs are the reasons some professions are so sought after. Alacrity, Spotter, Spirit buffs, Grace of the Land are but a few that you wouldn't build your raid comp without.

As for hexes, I was actually rather surprised none of the new Elite specializations had them, especially when the "Hex" unique debuff appeared in LWS3 Episode 6.

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@lagrimabendita.8763 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:That actually have a simple answer.

GW1 was designed around the group consisting of at most 8 people - and it being a
group
, so with controllable builds. Unique hexes have the same problem original pre-change condi damage had - get too many condi users together, and most of them become completely useless as they can't add anything to the fight anymore. And most of the original GW1 hexes would have been completely OP if you allowed unrestricted stacking of them.

So, while it has indeed been a good thing then, it's not something that i'd ever expect to see in GW2.

And as for unique buffs... we do have a few, and it's debatable whether they are a good thing.

Sorry but I don't think so have unique hexes by classes could be a big problem. If in your party do you 5 mesmer with the same hex it just renew the previous one.

In regarding the current unique buffs yes there are but but they are not very relevant or some of them are just passive.

Maybe I miss a game with more strategic game then the current mash buttons :(

What you're missing is the problem conditions had before they raised the stacking cap. lets say your build revolves around bleed, right? You were able to reach the bleed cap on your own, so if you end up at an event and there is more than one person using a bleed build, everybody past the first player is drastically reduced in effectiveness. This is why the old PvE meta was all power and crit, because unlike effects with stacking limits, power and crit always did full damage no matter what.

hexes and other buffs and debuffs have a similar problem.

Lets say your build is hex based and uses four hexes to deal damage or debuff the enemy. The stacking rule is, as you suggest, that additional applications of the skill simply refresh the duration. This means that even if there are a hundred players running that build, the effect on the enemy is only however many players it would take to keep those hexes up permanently. ALL hexes past that point don't actually affect the fight at all. If it takes five players to peramex the target, every player casting hexes past the fifth guy may as well not cast them at all as they're not actually doing anything to the target.

This is fine in a controlled environment, say a fractal or raid, as you can just switch builds so nobody's coasts are wasted. A good example of this is a PS Warrior. You don't need or want more than one because the second one isn't actually buffing anyone.

In an open world event with hundreds of people, not only are there so many players there's no way everyone can switch builds so that nobody's abilities are wasted, but you can't actually coordinate ahead of time with that many people, and even if you wanted to its functionally impossible due to the way events are designed to allow players to show up while they're in progress, at which point you guys can't swap builds anyway because you're already fighting.

The only way to get the complexity you seek over the space of the game is to literally have a different game. You'd have to go back to the entire game being limited party sizes or tune the enemies so that useless skill casts didn't matter, in which case direct damage is going to be super OP just as it was before because unlike your hex build, the zerker build is always going to do the same amount of damage regardless.

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