Firebrand is allowed to do Too Much in fractal

[Fueki.4753]

@Astralporing.1957 said:Warrior is a fixture in a raid composition now.I don't think raids should have too much influence, if any at all, when it comes to balance.Raids are mereley played by the top end, which possibly doesn't even amount to 1% of the players.

@Katary.7096 said:For all fractal content the solution is simple: The people that struggle with the content can play it on a lower tier.Except your wrong there. Doing lower tiers does not solve all problem. It probably doesn't even solve half of them.a few examples:In T1 and T2, the boss has nearly the same HP and damage output as on T3 (at least it feels that way, doing it with the very same T3 group), as well as all her AoE and CC spam.The burning tornadoes retain their broken hit boxes and unnecessarily high damage in T1.Bloomhunger still farts out poison AoE like there is no tomorrow.many things people have problems with are unrelated to the fractal tier.

Arenanet made fractals increasingly casual-unfriendly over the past few years and needs to fix that direction.

@Nephalem.8921 said:Does that mean reaper gets a 20% dps buff? Warrior is already one of the top dps professions.Most Reapers I see seem to be doing better than most Warriors I see.

Most raids can be 5manned currently and they are tuned for way lower dps. You could cut dps in half and they would need to adjustments.This implies that top end players are lacking of challenge.Cutting the damage down would provide you said challenge. It'd be a win to the top end.Also, the Top end supposedly does 10 times as much damage as the average, so cutting the damage in half might still be a rather mild nerf for the top end.

The new fractal is one of the easiest in normal modeIt's still overloaded with too high damage, too much HP and atrocious AoE spam.

People still struggling with bloomhunger shouldnt play t4 then.I don't think I ever mentioned T4. As I mentioned numerous times on these forums, balance needs to be done around the average, not around the small top end.

Not every fractal fight should be over in <30sec. Normal sunqua endboss is ~3min which isnt particularly long either.Even the one time I've beaten it, it took well over 15 minutes.

[Agrippa.1693]

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:Warrior is a fixture in a raid composition now.I don't think raids should have too much influence, if any at all, when it comes to balance.Raids are mereley played by the top end, which possibly doesn't even amount to 1% of the players.

@Katary.7096 said:For all fractal content the solution is simple: The people that struggle with the content can play it on a lower tier.Except your wrong there. Doing lower tiers does not solve all problem. It probably doesn't even solve half of them.a few examples:In T1 and T2, the boss has nearly the same HP and damage output as on T3 (at least it feels that way,

doing it with the very same T3 group),

as well as all her AoE and CC spam.The burning tornadoes retain their broken hit boxes and unnecessarily high damage in T1.Bloomhunger still farts out poison AoE like there is no tomorrow.many things people have problems with are unrelated to the fractal tier.

Arenanet made fractals increasingly casual-unfriendly over the past few years and needs to fix that direction.

@Nephalem.8921 said:Does that mean reaper gets a 20% dps buff? Warrior is already one of the top dps professions.Most Reapers I see seem to be doing better than most Warriors I see.Strange, in my experience I see it exactly the other way around, but what I'm really trying to say here is not what you or I see, but what real statistics and benchmarks actually show.

People still struggling with bloomhunger shouldnt play t4 then.I don't think I ever mentioned T4. As I mentioned numerous times on these forums, balance needs to be done around the average, not around the small top end.Well, I couldnt disagree more on this, really. Because if you

balance

around the average you actually balance around open world only, cause that's where the gross of the players are ... by far actually! So, the balanceteam should NOT focus on raids balance, not even fractals as a whole, not PvP, not even WvW!!! Again, your average, casual GW2 player is doing storycontent and open world! And I wouldnt be surprised if you look at total time spent, that it might even be more than 80% of it.What it also would mean is that you than need to balance around things like look and feel, thematic factors and lore. Becuase that's what your average player finds very important in this game.Nah, I'm really sorry but I would be completely

against

a balancing style like that. Balancing should be mostly about (class) performance, and that means that you balance to what classes are capable of, not what they are

generally/averagely

played as (and as a reminder, that's not in a sense of: this is an extremely useful support / DPS / heal class in the PvE endgame, but more like: this is my shiny character and this is my dark themed character!!!)

[Katary.7096]

@Fueki.4753 said:In T1 and T2, the boss has nearly the same HP and damage output as on T3 (at least it feels that way, doing it with the very same T3 group), as well as all her AoE and CC spam.

Do you seriously believe that your feeling on what a boss's stats are is going to serve as convincing evidence?

[Fueki.4753]

@Katary.7096 said:

@Fueki.4753 said:In T1 and T2, the boss has nearly the same HP and damage output as on T3 (at least it feels that way,

doing it with the very same T3 group),

as well as all her AoE and CC spam.

Do you seriously believe that your feeling on what a boss's stats are is going to serve as convincing evidence?

My personal feelings on her stats aside, one-shotting a player with over 20k HP should never happen in T1, yet it does.

[Nephalem.8921]

@"Fueki.4753" said:Except your wrong there. Doing lower tiers does not solve all problem. It probably doesn't even solve half of them.a few examples:In T1 and T2, the boss has nearly the same HP and damage output as on T3 (at least it feels that way, doing it with the very same T3 group), as well as all her AoE and CC spam.Her hp should scale normally. Did her a few times in t1-3 and "soloing" her there with t1-3 players. Her damage is almost nonexistant in early levels. The cm version has as much health as ensyloss and that boss came out way before pof.

@"Nephalem.8921" said:Does that mean reaper gets a 20% dps buff? Warrior is already one of the top dps professions.Most Reapers I see seem to be doing better than most Warriors I see.Because beginners in t1-3 dont know how to play and most of them havent read their skills or a guide.This implies that top end players are lacking of challenge.Cutting the damage down would provide you said challenge. It'd be a win to the top end.The balance between the classes is in a good spot currently. The only exception is necro. Cutting the damage down equally isnt easyso i would rather see a hp increase.Also, the Top end supposedly does 10 times as much damage as the average, so cutting the damage in half might still be a rather mild nerf for the top end.Thats because the average is used to faceroll open world with a mix of green masterwork gear and tries to do the same in fractals. The only way to balance for those players is by removing every bad choice. Only dps gear available in pve for example. No trait selections, etc.

People still struggling with bloomhunger shouldnt play t4 then.I don't think I ever mentioned T4. As I mentioned numerous times on these forums, balance needs to be done around the average, not around the small top end.That fractal is not hard at all. Nothing has hp in lower tiers and the oneshot attacks dont even oneshot.Not every fractal fight should be over in <30sec. Normal sunqua endboss is ~3min which isnt particularly long either.Even the one time I've beaten it, it took well over 15 minutes.

Please, just go to snowcrows or discretize, pick a meta build and try it again with a full team of meta build players. If you need 15min+ for it then its either a player problem or most likely a build problem. You can almost solo the cm that fast. SOLO.

On topic: Hfb is not even meta in fractals, the dps variants are. The problem was always that guardian just has too much tools which made it the safer "support" in classic 50 fractals compared to mesmer. Add quickness on top of strong utility and you get a strong quickness support. Groupwide aegis on a 12sec cd, wall of reflection and on demand instant stab are just too good. Chaos chrono was able to do that aswell but got deleted. But nobody played support firebrand in the beginning because mesmer was still able to do a lot of those things aswell.So in my opinion its not because firebrand is just way too op but because there is just no decent alternative in fractals anymore. There are only 2 choices to begin with. Current seize the moment chrono works great on static raid encounters but it just doesnt work in fractals. You need to shatter clones constantly which requires clones, it requires slow, its burst takes enternities to land which doesnt work either with current 3sec phases. SoI was the main quickness source for a really long time and it worked really well with dynamic fractal encounters but the current version is just purely designed for 10man raids.Compare that to firebrand clones which are just fire and forget instant casts. No other requirement needed.

[Nephalem.8921]

@Fueki.4753 said:My personal feelings on her stats aside, one-shotting a player with over 20k HP should never happen in T1, yet it does.

Which attack does this?

[Fueki.4753]

@Nephalem.8921 said:

@Fueki.4753 said:My personal feelings on her stats aside, one-shotting a player with over 20k HP should never happen in T1, yet it does.

Which attack does this?

That weird impact after she is flying back into the middle.I don't see why that attack should be so strong, especially on T1.I don't remember seeing a circle that indicates the affected area.

[Katary.7096]

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Katary.7096 said:Do you seriously believe that your feeling on what a boss's stats are is going to serve as convincing evidence?

My personal feelings on her stats aside, one-shotting a player with over 20k HP should never happen in T1, yet it does.

You have managed to establish an outright impressive track record of ignoring my questions. If you are going to write past me every time you post a response, why even have a dialog? Never mind.Depending on the mechanics in question there can certainly be value in an ability that one shots players, regardless of their armor or hp, even in a T1 fractal.

[Fueki.4753]

@Katary.7096 said:Depending on the mechanics in question there can certainly be value in an ability that one shots players, regardless of their armor or hp, even in a T1 fractal.

What kind of value do you see in players dying left and right?I certainly haven't seen anyone who had fun being dead on the ground and doing nothing.

[Cyninja.2954]

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Katary.7096 said:Depending on the mechanics in question there can certainly be value in an ability that one shots players, regardless of their armor or hp, even in a T1 fractal.

What kind of value do

you

see in players dying left and right?I certainly haven't seen anyone who had fun being dead on the ground and doing nothing.

If it is a very well telegraphed attack, there is value in having players feel consequence in ignoring it, especially if this attack becomes actually dangerous later on and paired with other mechanics. Remember that early fractals are not only meant as free loot but actually establishing a basis of knowledge of how this games combat works, and part of that basis is understanding that certain attacks are dangerous.

One could question if this should happen in T1, but my guess is that there are a lot of factors here which go hand in hand: poor builds, not maxed out gear, weak party setups, no boons, etc. So the reason a player might die to this in 1 hit can be attributed to all of those coming together in a negative way.

As such, yes, if a player goes down, that can serve a purpose: in this case literally giving the player an immediate feedback of him missing a critical part of the combat. After which you get back up, try again and try NOT to get hit by the same attack. or deal with it in some other way like healing, protection, aegis, etc. In T1 players have all options open to them.

[Fueki.4753]

@"Cyninja.2954" said:If it is a very well telegraphed attack,Is it well-telegraphed though?There is so much visual noise going on, from both the players and the boss' over-abundance of particle effects.There apparently isn't even an AoE indicator to show how big the radius of that attack it.

there is value in having players feel consequence in ignoring it, especially if this attack becomes actually dangerous later on and paired with other mechanics.Many players will never see the "later on", because it's no fun to them and such mechanics will possibly lead them to avoid certain fractals.

Remember that early fractals are not only meant as free loot but actually establishing a basis of knowledge of how this games combat works, and part of that basis is understanding that certain attacks are dangerous.For establishing a basis of knowledge, just knowing that this attack hurts a lot, without downing them, would be sufficient.Also, for establishing your basis of knowledge, the game should show how far players need to get away to not get hit by it.

One could question if this should happen in T1This is not to be questioned: It shouldn't be happen.One shots are fine for T3 and content of higher "difficulty", but that is for advanced players,not for people who just want to jump in and have fun.

poor builds,not maxed out gear,weak party setups,no boons, etc.I don't think these should be of much relevance in T1.As implied above, T1 should be the "go in with whatever you want and have fun" Tier.

As such, yes, if a player goes down, that can serve a purpose: in this case literally giving the player an immediate feedback of him missing a critical part of the combat. After which you get back up, try again and try NOT to get hit by the same attack. or deal with it in some other way like healing, protection, aegis, etc. In T1 players have all options open to them.It seems like you forget that the majority of players does not have fun treating games like school or a second job (or first job for some people) and don't want to put in too much effort, yet all the value you see in that attack seems to be addressed at people who do enjoy treating games as such.

[Cyninja.2954]

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:If it is a very well telegraphed attack,Is it well-telegraphed though?There is so much visual noise going on, from both the players and the boss' over-abundance of particle effects.There apparently isn't even an AoE indicator to show how big the radius of that attack it.

I'm not sure which attack you mean. Generally all attacks of the new fractal are telegraphed or worst case she takes a short break before changing phases.

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:there is value in having players feel consequence in ignoring it, especially if this attack becomes actually dangerous later on and paired with other mechanics.Many players will never see the "later on", because it's no fun to them and such mechanics will possibly lead them to avoid certain fractals.

If this is not fun to them or they decide to not learn, then they have no reason to advance in fractals or other challenging content. The requirements to reading and avoiding attacks, or in other ways mitigate them, only increase in harder content. As such, having Sunqua Peak as last fractal before T2 introducing this makes a lot of sense.

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:Remember that early fractals are not only meant as free loot but actually establishing a basis of knowledge of how this games combat works, and part of that basis is understanding that certain attacks are dangerous.For establishing a

basis of knowledge,

just knowing that this attack hurts a lot,

without downing them,

would be sufficient.Also, for establishing your

basis of knowledge,

the game should show how far players need to get away to not get hit by it.

No, it is not sufficient. Let's be real honest here. If "big hits" were sufficient, players would not be in such a bad state skill wise when entering beginner challenging content.

Sure, if there is an issue with range or damage indicators, that should be remedied.

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:One could question if this should happen in T1This is not to be questioned: It shouldn't be happen.One shots are fine for T3 and content of higher "difficulty", but that is for advanced players,not for people who just want to jump in and have fun.poor builds,not maxed out gear,weak party setups,no boons, etc.I don't think these should be of much relevance in T1.As implied above, T1 should be the "go in with whatever you want and have fun" Tier.

Well then we disagree. I don't think T1 should be the "go in with whatever you want and have fun" tier which is devoid of ANY challenge.

T1 is a stepping stone to fractals WITHOUT fractal instabilities which add layers of management on top. As such, a basis of how to approach this content should be the goal. Not getting hit by slow telegraphed attacks WITHOUT being impaired by instabilities seems like a good idea here.

@Fueki.4753 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:As such, yes, if a player goes down, that can serve a purpose: in this case literally giving the player an immediate feedback of him missing a critical part of the combat. After which you get back up, try again and try NOT to get hit by the same attack. or deal with it in some other way like healing, protection, aegis, etc. In T1 players have all options open to them.It seems like you forget that the majority of players does not have fun treating games like school or a second job (or first job for some people) and don't want to put in too much effort, yet all the value you see in that attack seems to be addressed at people who do enjoy treating games as such.

Come on, you are making it sound as though T1 were challenge modes. T1 fractals are kitten easy (and I don't mean from an experience stand point but from mere health and damage values possible and on enemies), mechanics can be dealt with in multiple ways, attacks are slow, enemy numbers are low and IF a healer is present you can literally never dodge (and in most cases even without a healer).

Let's not hyperbole here please. Learning the very basics of how this games combat works, and remember that dodging IS an absolutely essential basic skill (so elemental that the developers tried to implement a mini tutorial for it for level 2-3 characters), is hardly "no-lifing" a game.

Yet again, if players are over burdened with this, it makes sense for them to quit advancing BEFORE they move on. The new fractal is 1 big training ground and tutorial area with multiple mini bosses explicitly designed to teach players to read, learn, react and adapt to what they see in combat. It's designed that way from the ground up. Not face-tanking would be part of that goal.

[Laila Lightness.8742]

Change to fb could be they have to chose wich tome to use they can only use one of the tomes ( like daredevil dodge) you must trait wich tome you want to use

[Fueki.4753]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

you are making it sound as though T1 were challenge modes. T1 fractals are kitten easy (and I don't mean from an experience stand point but from mere health and damage values possible and on enemies), mechanics can be dealt with in multiple ways, attacks are slow, enemy numbers are low and IF a healer is present you can literally never dodge (and in most cases even without a healer).I do not think of them as challenging, but I know people who think T1 is a challenge.I also do not think of Sunqua Peak as a challenge either.In T1, it's more of an atrocity created by cheap numbers bloat.It's like they Took the T3 version, simply removed instabilities and reduced the Agony level.

In Fact, I even consider T3 Twilight Oasis with the Flux Bomb and Fractal Convergence instabilities (which is an atrocity as well) to be less terrible than T1 Sunqua Peak.There is no good reason a T1 fractal should be harder than most T3 fractals.

T1 is a stepping stone to fractals WITHOUT fractal instabilities which add layers of management on top. As such, a basis of how to approach this content should be the goal. Not getting hit by slow telegraphed attacks WITHOUT being impaired by instabilities seems like a good idea here.For most fractals, this works.But Sunqua Peak with its number creep is more akin to a landslide.One can't learn a boss, while being dead most of the fight.A Stepping stone should be encouraging, not punishing.

[Katary.7096]

@Fueki.4753 said:This is not to be questioned: It shouldn't be happen.Unless you are a developer posting on their private account, I do not think that this decision is up to you.One shots are fine for T3 and content of higher "difficulty", but that is for advanced players,T3 is often the first time that new fractal players have to actually deal with the mechanics of the content, since they can no longer rely on the low stats of enemies to get through the fractal. It is advanced compared to tiers one and two and yet it is also where most of the learning starts.not for people who just want to jump in and have fun."Just fun, no obstacles, success guaranteed" is a description that fits open world content much better than fractals, including tier 1. Additionally you are ignoring all the players who consider it a fun experience to try content, fail it and then succeed because their failure taught them how to do better.

@Fueki.4753 said:I do not think of them as challenging, but I know people who think T1 is a challenge.I also do not think of Sunqua Peak as a challenge either.In T1, it's more of an atrocity created by cheap numbers bloat.It's like they Took the T3 version, simply removed instabilities and reduced the Agony level.That is the kind of statement which you want to support with actual numbers.