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How do you feel about the imminent balance patch, and why?


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@"Multicolorhipster.9751" said:. . . I'll go with a "there's a what?" option every time if you give us one, because I think people overstate how unbalanced this game is all the time . . . I'd rather see all the energy that goes into the heated balance debates that nobody can ever seem to agree with, go into something that benefits everyone on a larger and more permanent level.

I hear you, MCH.9751! Now, I'm pretty much still a newb to GuildWars 2—well, my official rank is Newb Corporal (NCpl.) Szubxero, Golf Co. 3rd Newbish Battalion, 7th Newbs Regiment (Rating N-6); my NOS (Newbish Occupational Specialty) is 37337 (Newbish Kluge Berserker). I started playing in late November and ponied up the paltry sum of $29.99 for the basic paid package. Hey! Don't look at me like that—Times are tough and I'm a starving student. xP I can say with complete confidence and utter faith that this was a wise decision, as I realized about an hour after I first started playing I was already exhibiting signs of clinical GW2 addictive disorder, and realized life was going to be painful without the game and especially it's kind-hearted, friendly, more than helpful community of the world's greatest and most talented MMORPG gamers. And it's a glorious world, this Tyria. For over a decade I was a fanatical WoW fundamentalist zealot, and I will always have a special place in my gamer's Hylian heart container for WoW, and still play from time to time. Anyway, forgive the digression.

As much of a masterpiece as GuildWars 2 is, like all MMORPGs, there are some bugs, some "bad apple" players (well in my albeit limited but intense experience so far, at least, I haven't met a single, non-friendly-as-hell PC (or NPC for that matter xP)., and other things that aren't perfect. One of these uber-ubiquitous outrages is that every time a change in the mechanics, gameplay, UI/UX or even lore department occurs, whether it benefits the masses, enfeebles us or can be seen either way, there will always be a boat packed to the gunnels with whining and complaining about it, threatening to stop playing, believing it will absolutely RUIN the game's future and generally give the melodrama required to win an Academy Award or Oscar their best shot to convince the developers/project team to not affect the change. This almost always fails, of course, and I'm not a hypocrite, so I will mirthfully admit I've been guilty of such obscene, un-gamer-like acts of vulgarity and child-like tantrums on many occasions, but I hardly ever get that upset over changes to MMORPGs I play any more, because I realized (a) there is, statistically speaking a very low chance of success to change it, (b) it is only allowing them to control my emotions and I don't like other people controlling me, © as dope-ass and gorgeous this game is, or any other for that matter (and since I'm an aspiring game developer start-up entrepreneur and life-long game programming/development fanatic, that's saying a lot), it's still just a game, and finally (d) nothing is ever quite as bad as we fear it will be. It might be bad, but things are never as bad as they feel or appear to be, and in general have a way of working themselves out, with patience and reason. Besides, a lot of the times after the changes happened I decided (grudgingly, at first xP) that many of them I actually liked, even if I still missed the non-changed pre-updated version and wish they could leave an option for both.

Sorry for the long-winded reply. I'm just so glad someone else is sick of that cynical or pessimistic attitude and juvenile, passive-aggressive behavior and speech. Sometimes they really do make disgusting, retarded, numb-nutz-like changes, but not *that often, and it's rarely worth leaving the game. Improvise, adapt, overcome, like Clint Eastwood said, and it'll all be good. Thanks for sharing your opinion! :+1:

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@Naxos.2503 said:I cant say Very Hopeful, nor can I say Teeming with dread.

I have one specific request for the balance team, is that Engineer turrets get an Actual look into. An attempt to better them and make them viable. Unfortunately, since they haven't exactly been touched for a while, and the last time they've been touched has actually downgraded their use, I am neither expecting -a- result, nor a -good- result on that regard. It's Something that has been on my mind (And quite a few engineers, judging by the engineer forum) and most including myself have outright given up on that skill family.

There's a lot of core engineer that has aged very poorly. There's maybe a handful of different utility skills that are worth your time in PvP and 2 entire traitlines barely see use.

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@"Ben Phongluangtham.1065" said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

You keep talking about the size being really big but how big is it compared to a pretty normal balance pass like this?

He did say every skill and trait has been reviewed. Should give some idea about scope and size.

Reviewed but not necessarily changed.

He said the amount of changes will be hard to even put out on a note. Does that explain it better?

How is writing patch notes hard? You just type them. If I was typing patch notes instead of my own post I'd be doing it right now. Think about that.

Not been much of a writer, huh? Explaining technical things in a simple way is an art and a science.

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@"Ben Phongluangtham.1065" said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Nice attempt at spin already. PoF has been out for years now. Why are "the number of changes so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict"? What have all the other balance patches been? Are you admitting that they were all failures? What can't you internally test and predict at this point with PoF??? Is it a staffing issue or a competency issue?

If it's a staffing issue, just take more time. It's better to get things right than look foolish and not catch things players catch immediately.

If it's a competency issue, release the patch notes prior to going live and get some feedback.

The reason you're in this boat to begin with is that you released patches without internally testing stuff and predicting the interactions. If you are ALREADY admitting that will be the case with this balance patch, you've failed from the start.

Nobody could take your internal testing seriously before when you released fewer changes that had to be hotfixed. Many of those things that had to be hotfixed could have been identified in 10 minutes of internal testing or 1 button push. Some changes weren't enough and classes went a full year and counting being OP. Now you're already admitting similar issues with this patch? WOW...forgive the pun...cuz that's the game I'm playing now (classic) because you guys failed so miserably.

Thanks for the warning at least.

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@"SubZero.4319" Thanks, and late welcome.

I'm not going to pretend to be a saint, or put myself on any sort of pedestal. Really my line of thought is equally pessimistic and cynical. Not to the level of wishing death or bankruptcy or something else what's ridiculous on Arenanet when I don't get my way, but I have essentially boycotted Ranked, and i'm not going to support it or touch it until things change; if things even ever change. Not exactly foaming at the mouth with anticipation there.

Just that part though. I really don't mind any other part of the game, and I still play and enjoy most of it. This one aspect of sPvP I find pretty broken though. I'm not going to say it's balance making me feel that way either, like I tried to say before.

Arguing and especially getting aggressive over balance just seems kind of petty to me. It could all be rendered meaningless is just a few months, and it is designed in such a way that there is never a unanimous compromise to reach. Again, always winners and losers.

Like... big upcoming balance patch is cool and important and all that, sure. But can we get a big feature patch too at some point? Maybe get rid of all the bots and high-level match-fixing in Ranked? Pretty sure that benefits everyone but the bots; who are actively breaking the rules, and the very small minority of "top" players that make a killing off of smurfing, metagaming exploit-like 'features', and boosting.Not to mention add some actual content to the content-starved gamemode.

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@SPESHAL.9106 said:

@"Ben Phongluangtham.1065" said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Nice attempt at spin already. PoF has been out for years now. Why are "the number of changes so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict"? What have all the other balance patches been? Are you admitting that they were all failures? What can't you internally test and predict at this point with PoF??? Is it a staffing issue or a competency issue?

If it's a staffing issue, just take more time. It's better to get things right than look foolish and not catch things players catch immediately.

If it's a competency issue, release the patch notes prior to going live and get some feedback.

The reason you're in this boat to begin with is that you released patches without internally testing stuff and predicting the interactions. If you are ALREADY admitting that will be the case with this balance patch, you've failed from the start.

Nobody could take your internal testing seriously before when you released fewer changes that had to be hotfixed. Many of those things that had to be hotfixed could have been identified in 10 minutes of internal testing or 1 button push. Some changes weren't enough and classes went a full year and counting being OP. Now you're already admitting similar issues with this patch? WOW...forgive the pun...cuz that's the game I'm playing now (classic) because you guys failed so miserably.

Thanks for the warning at least.

The biggest change is that they have a balance team specifically for spvp now.They didn't have one for years.

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Dear Anet, Please balance / reduce powers of Mesmer and the Elementalist, as clearly these are broken classes for a long time and you have lost many players of the game because of this neglect. Also it is well overdue you improve / re-balance powers of the Guardian, as you ruined this class for a very long time now. Thank you

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Did anything change about the foundations of the game like base HP and armor?...I have a very bad feeling about everything

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Is there some kind of goal you guys are working towards with the changes, something in particular you're shooting to achieve? You might have mentioned it somewhere else but I didn't see it. I think it would be great for the community to know that so we know in what context to take the balance changes.

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Honestly after playing for 7 years and seeing how bad these balance updates the past 3 years have gone, I hate them. Every balance update makes me either redo my gear, change my build, or even relearn the class I've been playing for years (cough chrono nerf from summer 2019 cough). Worst case having to switch classes for a while til hopefully, another balance update "balances out the nerf". It's tiresome and just the sound of the phrase "balance update" just makes me stress and panic. It really kills the fun and the lack of response from all the feedback people post in forums is even worse. Yeah chaotic is an understatement. You guys don't realize how this chaos affects players and fun. We need stability to be able enjoy the game without all this stress.

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i honestly dont really know and with the passing days i feel like i start to care less and less cause they will no doubt do things that make sense and alot of things that dont make sense.

Game modes wont be added so balance is still likely in the end going to be stuck in a spot thats not super well fitting for a capture and hold style game mode. That in itself is likely a massive part of the problem.

As far as things being over looked as Ben said a lot of that could be reduced with public testing. I still think this is a feature that would have been worth doing for big changes like this especially when you dont know what the public will come up with hours or a day after release especially if its something thats not fixable and requires something being disabled or left broken for weeks/ months at a time.

While pubic testing balance changes is going to be subject to a lot of harsh "WHY DID YOU NERF ME SO HARD BUT NOT X PROFESSION!" it would also reveal a lot of things that you guys will no doubt overlook by mistake. The game has alot of skills and traits, runes, sigils etc without a doubt you are going to overlook alot of things especially things that are not meta right now but still "pretty strong" but just not used because meta is some what better.

I guess if i hope for anything is that a good majority of past values still being held from the launch of the game can be just let go opening up some freedom to make each profession as balanced as possible rather than holding a few of them to some standard that is just not very compatible in the game that exists today in 2020.

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Ok, see this thread where Ben remarks on a big balance patch: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/comment/1129659#Comment_1129659

Specifically:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:A lot of this stuff is actually in progress right now. Hopefully we'll be able to give more details soon. I'll give a somewhat vague status update on each one:

Big Balance Patch: First pass is basically done. Cmc is running through some last minute changes and it should start internal testing soon.

-and-

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

The patch is going to be .... sizable. So big that I don't think it's possible to predict everything. But the plan is to be as quick as possible with adjustments after the big one hits. Also keep in mind that it's going to be primarily splits. So there are some limits on what can be done.

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Any thoughts on an early preview in case people are going to have to regear their builds after for WvW? Takes some time to regather mats for a major shift.

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Balance would mean every class works on an even level, on the same skill level for each class (e.g. you don't need to try hard on each class but if you do, the skill ceiling is very high. Skill floor very low). Builds are not too powerful or too weak for their respective roles. They are in between and fluctuate based on skill level.

To just scrap builds that used to work in favor of new traits, skill functions, and whatnot isn't balance, it's migrating from one rough environment to another. While I do appreciate more builds becoming viable my concern is if a few of these builds are broken.

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@Laera Myrith.7605 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Do we have a rough ETA? preferably more specific than Q1.Thanks in advance

We don't have an announced date yet. But it won't be during this current season.

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@otto.5684 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Dunno man. You guys are hyping this thing, but did not give us any info to indicate how is this patch any big. This rarely ends up well.

Cmc mentioned on the WvW stream today. 800-900 objects have been changed so far. Just with the splits.

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@mortrialus.3062 said:

@"Ben Phongluangtham.1065" said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

You keep talking about the size being really big but how big is it compared to a pretty normal balance pass like this?

He did say every skill and trait has been reviewed. Should give some idea about scope and size.

Reviewed but not necessarily changed.

He said the amount of changes will be hard to even put out on a note. Does that explain it better?

How is writing patch notes hard? You just type them. If I was typing patch notes instead of my own post I'd be doing it right now. Think about that.

Typing up the notes itself isn't the problem. For the splits alone, the list is finished. We're discussing how to present the notes a digestible way and in a way that makes it easier on us to follow feedback conversations.

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

Dunno man. You guys are hyping this thing, but did not give us any info to indicate how is this patch any big. This rarely ends up well.

Cmc mentioned on the WvW stream today. 800-900 objects have been changed so far. Just with the splits.

Ok, i know pretty much everything can be an object, but well, that's impressive. Seems like this thing is the size of pre HoT specializations thing.

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

You keep talking about the size being really big but how big is it compared to a pretty normal balance pass like this?

He did say every skill and trait has been reviewed. Should give some idea about scope and size.

Reviewed but not necessarily changed.

He said the amount of changes will be hard to even put out on a note. Does that explain it better?

How is writing patch notes hard? You just type them. If I was typing patch notes instead of my own post I'd be doing it right now. Think about that.

Typing up the notes itself isn't the problem. For the splits alone, the list is finished. We're discussing how to present the notes a digestible way and in a way that makes it easier on us to follow feedback conversations.

Just slap me with a mondo sized pastebin dump. I want to print it out, sit down by the fireplace and read it next to the fire.

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@mortrialus.3062 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

You keep talking about the size being really big but how big is it compared to a pretty normal balance pass like this?

He did say every skill and trait has been reviewed. Should give some idea about scope and size.

Reviewed but not necessarily changed.

He said the amount of changes will be hard to even put out on a note. Does that explain it better?

How is writing patch notes hard? You just type them. If I was typing patch notes instead of my own post I'd be doing it right now. Think about that.

Typing up the notes itself isn't the problem. For the splits alone, the list is finished. We're discussing how to present the notes a digestible way and in a way that makes it easier on us to follow feedback conversations.

Just slap me with a mondo sized pastebin dump. I want to print it out, sit down by the fireplace and read it next to the fire.

Lmao. You and me both.

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@"Naxos.2503" said:I cant say Very Hopeful, nor can I say Teeming with dread.

I have one specific request for the balance team, is that Engineer turrets get an Actual look into. An attempt to better them and make them viable. Unfortunately, since they haven't exactly been touched for a while, and the last time they've been touched has actually downgraded their use, I am neither expecting -a- result, nor a -good- result on that regard. It's Something that has been on my mind (And quite a few engineers, judging by the engineer forum) and most including myself have outright given up on that skill family.

For the rest of the classes, I'd say, a look into a certain class's ability to outright cancel any damage inflicted to it almost infinitely. Warrior is still completely broken in 1v1 if someone is using all the blocking and invulnerable skills plus stamina regen that they have available. It's plain not fun to fight against a warrior. That level of damage evasion is rivalled by thieves, but on thieves at least, that thematically makes sense. Some classes retain the ability to shirk away a ton of damage, while being able to deal a lot of damage due to not having to invest their stats into damage mitigation, and there lies one of the biggest issues within the current system. A class should not be able to access max defense, and max offense potentials at the same time. Either they're both average, and balanced, or one is stronger than the other. Both is just too much.

Turret rework? Hah, that's a good one.

They were a problem pre-HoT in pvp so they nerfed them so hard and removed trait interactions until they may as well not exist. Basically scorched-earth "we do not want to deal with these, make them all bad choices". And they've never been touched since. Number tweaks wouldn't cut it. The entire skill category needs to be gutted and replaced.

Then elite specs came out and every single one has been more disruptive than turrets ever were.

I'm hoping for the same thing, but let's face it -- turrets haven't been touched for five years.

A second pass I would hope to see is bringing engineer's alchemy and elixirs into a place where the profession can provide competitive amounts of boon support. Engineer as a whole is by far the most selfish profession in the game. Everyone else has ways to provide valuable group support in PvE, in many cases while dealing respectable damage. Engineer does not.

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@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:It's going to be somewhat chaotic for a while. And I'm sure there will be overlooked things or unintentional problems. The number of changes is so large that all possible interactions are impossible to predict. Our goal is to be able to respond relatively quickly to issues that come up. And there will probably need to be a decent size follow-up release to continue to refine. Balance is a long term commitment, not a one release solution.

You keep talking about the size being really big but how big is it compared to a pretty normal balance pass like this?

He did say every skill and trait has been reviewed. Should give some idea about scope and size.

Reviewed but not necessarily changed.

He said the amount of changes will be hard to even put out on a note. Does that explain it better?

How is writing patch notes hard? You just type them. If I was typing patch notes instead of my own post I'd be doing it right now. Think about that.

Typing up the notes itself isn't the problem. For the splits alone, the list is finished. We're discussing how to present the notes a digestible way and in a way that makes it easier on us to follow feedback conversations.

I mean, not for nothing, I'm actually very worried about this. One of the most demotivating things is when game play an style changes due to balance or meta changes. I may be one of the few players that is FINE with the current balancing, state of conditions, cc, etc even when i get roflstomped by them.

I'd rather have the game I know and love, than a massive rebalance that makes it uncomfortable and unfun.

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