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Love running maurader gear on thief d/p build and bursting tiny chunks off the meta builds hp even with assassins signet only to get one or two shot by a meta builds dps with 10xthe sustain if I miss one dodge.great job balance team lmoa or getting caught if 10 red circles unable to move while just getting destroyed.or watching classes continually reheal themselves while other cant all while having same amount of dps.or in wvw groups just sitting and throwing boulders and petw pewing with rangers while the other server just stands there cuz approaching means death from the rangers,catapults and scourge ring lol fun playstyle. I honestly have a hard time believing the balance team have played the game let alone other classes for more than 5 minutes lmao

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When will boons, conditions, and control effects be reviewed, again?

These are a few ideas rolling around in my head:

  1. Can more boons and conditions be changed to stack in intensity?
  2. Can each profession receive special bonuses or reductions for casting or receiving certain boons, conditions, or control effects? For example, make Thief's blind be a stack of two, the Thief will passively auto-clear 1 stack per 3 seconds, and a stack of 10 blind (not stacking duration) will cause a boss mob to miss the next attack.
  3. Reduce the quantity of boons, conditions, stun breaks, and control effects associated with passive and auto-attack skills. The cost of these things should, in all cases, be significant, yet worth it when the time is right.
  4. Update Unshakable to be more complicated in how boons and conditions are handled. The Defiance bar was a big improvement but boss mobs can be better. Additional modifiers specific to bosses and mob types might add or subtract potency to specific boons and conditions adding more variation to group compositions and profession builds.
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@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@"Aeolus.3615" said:more power to unblocables....

It's exactly the same?

It's really weird people don't know unblockable attacks can't be reflected or destroyed. If anything it's more power to block Ines and traits.

It's not the same.

Previously if an "unblockable missile" was in flight it could be destroyed with these skills but not blocked or reflected. Now it will bypass that.

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@TexZero.7910 said:

@"Aeolus.3615" said:more power to unblocables....

It's exactly the same?

It's really weird people don't know unblockable attacks can't be reflected or destroyed. If anything it's more power to block Ines and traits.

It's not the same.

Previously if an "unblockable missile" was in flight it could be destroyed with these skills but not blocked or reflected. Now it will bypass that.

Literally just tested this us UU on Sb against CPC on Reaper. Went right through.Also here on the wiki:"Unblockable is a property of attack skills which prevents the attack from being blocked, and in case of ranged attacks, reflected or otherwise destroyed by effects of skills."

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@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@"Aeolus.3615" said:more power to unblocables....

It's exactly the same?

It's really weird people don't know unblockable attacks can't be reflected or destroyed. If anything it's more power to block Ines and traits.

It's not the same.

Previously if an "unblockable missile" was in flight it could be destroyed with these skills but not blocked or reflected. Now it will bypass that.

Literally just tested this us UU on Sb against CPC on Reaper. Went right through.
"Unblockable is a property of attack skills which prevents the attack from being blocked,
and in case of ranged attacks, reflected or otherwise destroyed by effects of skills.
"

Then Anet has some attacks that function weird compared to whats stated. It could be NPC specific for all i know but there are currently missiles in game that are destroyed by said skills.

Edit from the wiki itself "Notes - There are a few fields and NPC skills that ignore this property and block "unblockable" projectiles regardless."

Which is why the change is being made, but doesn't explain why something that's "unblockable" shouldn't be destroyed by effect's that destroy missiles.

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@"Magolith.9412" said:

Illusionary Counter: This skill now uses an 8-second cooldown in all game modes.Confusing Images: The physical damage of this skill has been split and reduced by 50% in PvP and WvW.

This is a pretty terrible change that makes scepter kitten-tier. It will have nothing to compensate for it's terrible AA seq.

Meanwhile, invincible scrappers and LB memebeasts go untouched.

Confusing Images: The physical damage of this skill has been split and reduced by 50% in PvP and WvW. <<<<<< Not make sense... A.Net you need to review this or the idea is to remove scepter from wvw? Maybe it makes sense!Really! Now "SCREPPER" need a big nerf ! big nerf!

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I have to let your know that...

"Fatal Frenzy: This trait no longer gives boons. Instead, while in berserk mode, this trait reduces toughness by 300, increases power by 300, and increases condition damage by 300."

This one in particular is bullshit... like wow... really bad, there are signets in other classes that almost double this with no draw back, like assasins signed that gives you 540 power period.

In this game you usually go power build or condition, hybrids never work well (unless you are one of those degenerates that likes to play for fun) at least not inside the current meta, to lose 300 thoughness to get the benefits of either power or condi according to my "current build" isn't attractive at all.

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@mortrialus.3062 said:Nerf core engineer more. Specifically the Alchemy and Inventions traitlines.

Give core Engineers weapon swap as well as higher damage on kits, rifles, and pistols to bring them up to the level of other professions as well as access to unblockable shots and you might find there'd be less resistance to such changes. Engineers aren't a monolithic body. Most class communities aren't. Yet every expansion it seems unilaterally decided that the first thing to suffer under the heading of Engineer should be the core specs.

People complain(ed) about Scrapper. They complain(ed) about Holosmith. Not everybody who played an Engineer wanted to play a Scrapper or a Holosmith or even wants to now. It was enough to support the company to buy the expansions. We didn't need to have our arms figuratively twisted behind our backs in order to sell that content. Yet the core specs have been steadily systematically destroyed in order to give capabilities to the E-specs or to avoid overlap or situations that could make them 'overpowered' or 'overtuned' and that's laughable because for a short time after each were introduced that's just what they were. Some are saying that again.

Here's the rub. Most of the functionality, uniqueness and power stripped from core was never put back.

There's also been little to no communication. Every time it appeared to me as a player -as someone on the outside of this process- that whomever was in charge of producing them went straight for gutting core with the rationale of, 'These E-specs are going to be so cool that nobody would ever want to play core after they land.'

Well not everybody did. Not that that mattered to the brain trust in charge of profession development. So go ahead and ask for Alchemy and Inventions to be nerfed. Anyone having trouble squaring off against the average core Engineer (glass, bunker, condi, or hybrid) in any competitive mode running today is either AFK, crippled, or stoned out of their gourd when playing and the latter two aren't necessarily a guarantee of failure.

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@"Wiler.9873" said:I have to let your know that...

"Fatal Frenzy: This trait no longer gives boons. Instead, while in berserk mode, this trait reduces toughness by 300, increases power by 300, and increases condition damage by 300."

This one in particular is kitten... like wow... really bad, there are signets in other classes that almost double this with no draw back, like assasins signed that gives you 540 power period.

In this game you usually go power build or condition, hybrids never work well (unless you are one of those degenerates that likes to play for fun) at least not inside the current meta, to lose 300 thoughness to get the benefits of either power or condi according to my "current build" isn't attractive at all.

It's a Minor Trait, so you will always have it, no matter if you are running a Power or Condi build.Giving it both is probably less to encourage hybrid builds rather than making sure to facilitate both Power and Condi builds, and not making the Trait essentially just be a negative if it just gave let's say Condition Damage and you were running a Power build.

Sacrificing 300 Toughness, especially as Heavy Armor class, for 300 Power and Condition damage is a pretty decent deal, even if you are only fully utilizing one of them. Especially on Warrior, which has the highest base health as well. It essentially makes you a Light Armor Class with the highest base health, comparable to a Necromancer, while gaining extra Power and Condition Damage.

Assassins Signet gives you 540 power for 5 seconds on a 20 second Cool Down, and has a much greater opportunity cost of being an Utility skill compared to a minor Trait, which makes them hardly comparable.

And who knows, maybe a Grieving Berserker with something like Flame Legion Runes will actually work well, but regardless, I'm not sure it helps to say Hybrids never work well while criticising trait additions that may be incredible potent for hybrid builds, potentially facilitating them, as useless.

I'm certainly excited to see how this performs first once it's live, and it's been a long time since anything on Warrior excited me to try it out.

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@incisorr.9502 said:

@"Irenio CalmonHuang.2048" said:
  • Confusing Images: The physical damage of this skill has been split and reduced by 50% in PvP and WvW.
  • Evasive Mirror: Increased this trait's cooldown from 1.5 seconds to 10 seconds in PvP and WvW.

I never thought i'd ever see a game developer as biased as this.

In what world do you change a value by 50% or 600+% and sleep sound and safe at night?

Do you realize you nerfed a skill by 50% (half) and then nerfed another skill by increasing it's cd by 600%+?

Do you know if you went to any other game in existence and said that a weapon or a skill is getting nerfed by 600% that people would lose their sanity? Imagine if in league of legends or in counter strike they nerfed (or buffed) any existing ability by SIX TIMES ITS VALUE. SIX. TIMES.

Anyway, the mirror nerf aside i think mirror deserved the nerf but not this much. You either increase the duration/CD to give more room for counterplay either rework the trait.. however, you even nerfed the alternative

Blinding Dissipation: This trait no longer blinds foes on the activation of each shatter skill. It will now cause Cry of Frustration to blind every target it strikes. Blindness duration is split between game modes, lasting 1.5 seconds in WvW and PvP and 3 seconds in PvE.

lol what a joke, now the dueling 2nd trait is garbage no matter what you pick. All there is to this is bias and targeted nerfs and nothing else. Since when did this trait need a nerf? It only works on shatters which already have 20+ sec cooldowns but yeah lets nerf even more pepeGa

and look at this

this is before the nerf. You wanna tell me that after the nerf it'll do 1000 damage? it has 2.25 sec channel time and half a sec pre-after animation, it's the second slowest skill in the game.But wait, it gets better
you buffed the very same skill that you're now nerfing, less than a year ago. How can you be so biased and have such ridiculous double standards? This is so hypocritical lol

the skill by itself isn't even strong, it does less damage than all sorts of other class skills that you completely left untouched. Sickem? Rapid fire? Literally does 3 times more dmg than scepter and with 2 times more range but you nerf the
very skill that you just buffed few patches ago
??????????

Also these patch notes look incomplete, there can't be just that i mean where are the scrapper changes or the revenant nerfs or the sickem nerfs , holo??!???????

You literally have no clue how the game works and what's strong and what isn't and what needs nerfing/buffing. Grats for nerfing the 2 out of 100 mirages in top 100 too btw, literally the least played class that's getting nerfed yet again because instead of targeting chrono you target base mesmer again. Grats on leaving all the broken classes untouched.

exactly!

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@"mortrialus.3062" said:Repeater: Initiative cost of this skill has been reduced from 4 to 2 in all game modes.

Someone in the balance department keeps trolling XD

I'm going to admit it... I was running round Tyria with a single pistol on my thief getting specific numbers to calculate efficiencies for a build I was making early this year. So I had to laugh abit when I saw the Repeater buff patch notes just a few months after I had done this. (If the devs saw a sudden increase in the number of Repeater skill activations in Tyria earlier this year, it was prolly me... but I don't really use a single pistol & I dont think anybody does or should.. but perhaps I will re-run my evaluations again when this patch goes live "for fun" lol).

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@hugeboss.5432 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:Repeater: Initiative cost of this skill has been reduced from 4 to 2 in all game modes.

Someone in the balance department keeps trolling XD

I'm going to admit it... I was running round Tyria with a single pistol on my thief getting specific numbers to calculate efficiencies for a build I was making early this year. So I had to laugh abit when I saw the Repeater buff patch notes just a few months after I had done this. (If the devs saw a sudden increase in the number of Repeater skill activations in Tyria earlier this year, it was prolly me... but I don't really use a single pistol & I dont think anybody does or should.. but perhaps I will re-run my evaluations again when this patch goes live "for fun" lol).

FYI this is also a flip skill on the P/D set. It isn’t just for single Pistol users (of which there are none).

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Here's my question:

With this update, we are adding a trade-off to the profession skill that keeps the theme of a melee-oriented specialization.

How does removing a Daredevil's ability to use steal to close a long gap help us melee in any way?

If Anet wants us to melee they should be giving us more abilities to stick to a target not less. The range drop would be appropriate if we were getting something useful towards that end. Unblockable isn't it.

Maybe something like:

Physical Supremacy: This trait changes Steal to Hitched, which tethers the target to the thief and gives the thief a stolen skill and X seconds of X% base damage reduction. Toughness improves total reduction. Neither can leave 600 range of each other for X seconds. Stunbreaks used by either the thief or it's target will break the link. If either party attempts to use a skill to get out of range that is not a stun break it results in a knockdown and puts that skill on cooldown + X seconds. Stability applied after Hitched is engaged counters certain effects of Hitched but does not remove it - That means an attempted non-stunbreak maneuver to get out of range won't give the knockdown but the target still can't leave range. Stability applied before would prevent it of course.

It would work a lot like Guardian's Ring of Warding while allowing some counterplay for the target and helping the thief to be toe to toe for the duration. Most importantly it offers significant risk/reward choices in its use. Which is all I want.

And if you wanted to make it really sexy and give thief a GvG/WvW group perk, let it affect targets in an AOE. Would force the thief to use discretion on its use in small scale and be great for locking down targets for bombs.

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The more I look at it the more I see a bad patch.

The biggest problem is there is just too much cancer in PvP that is getting a free pass. Firebrand is still completely broken when played properly. Scrapper is still immortal. Mesmer is still rework carried and visual clutter is unfun. Soulbeast still has infinity+1 stability stacks and broken disengage. Rev sword 4 still too much burst ( just revert it back to a block already holy kitten ). Scourge still has the broken blood res and in general is too spam-friendly. Thief can still chain RNG daggerstorms forever. Spellbreaker still carried by too much passive sustain.

But nah, gotta nerf druid pet by 20%. Priorities. :expressionless:

Huge nothingburger.

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@Basharic.1654 said:Here's my question:

With this update, we are adding a trade-off to the profession skill that keeps the theme of a melee-oriented specialization.

How does removing a Daredevil's ability to use steal to close a long gap help us melee in any way?

If Anet wants us to melee they should be giving us more abilities to stick to a target not less. The range drop would be appropriate if we were getting something useful towards that end. Unblockable isn't it.

Maybe something like:

Physical Supremacy: This trait changes Steal to Hitched, which tethers the target to the thief and gives the thief a stolen skill and X seconds of X% base damage reduction. Toughness improves total reduction. Neither can leave 600 range of each other for X seconds. Stunbreaks used by either the thief or it's target will break the link. If either party attempts to use a skill to get out of range that is not a stun break it results in a knockdown and puts that skill on cooldown + X seconds. Stability applied after Hitched is engaged counters certain effects of Hitched but does not remove it - That means an attempted non-stunbreak maneuver to get out of range won't give the knockdown but the target still can't leave range. Stability applied before would prevent it of course.

It would work a lot like Guardian's Ring of Warding while allowing some counterplay for the target and helping the thief to be toe to toe for the duration. Most importantly it offers significant risk/reward choices in its use. Which is all I want.

And if you wanted to make it really sexy and give thief a GvG/WvW group perk, let it affect targets in an AOE. Would force the thief to use discretion on its use in small scale and be great for locking down targets for bombs.

As if thief wasn't op enough in gvg setups

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@Nimon.7840 said:

@Basharic.1654 said:Here's my question:

With this update, we are adding a trade-off to the profession skill that keeps the theme of a melee-oriented specialization.

How does removing a Daredevil's ability to use steal to close a long gap help us melee in any way?

If Anet wants us to melee they should be giving us
more
abilities to stick to a target not less. The range drop would be appropriate if we were getting something useful towards that end. Unblockable isn't it.

Maybe something like:

Physical Supremacy: This trait changes Steal to Hitched, which tethers the target to the thief and gives the thief a stolen skill and X seconds of X% base damage reduction. Toughness improves total reduction. Neither can leave 600 range of each other for X seconds. Stunbreaks used by either the thief or it's target will break the link. If either party attempts to use a skill to get out of range that is not a stun break it results in a knockdown and puts that skill on cooldown + X seconds. Stability applied after Hitched is engaged counters certain effects of Hitched but does not remove it - That means an attempted non-stunbreak maneuver to get out of range won't give the knockdown but the target still can't leave range. Stability applied before would prevent it of course.

It would work a lot like Guardian's Ring of Warding while allowing some counterplay for the target and helping the thief to be toe to toe for the duration. Most importantly it offers significant risk/reward choices in its use. Which is all I want.

And if you wanted to make it
really
sexy and give thief a GvG/WvW group perk, let it affect targets in an AOE. Would force the thief to use discretion on its use in small scale and be great for locking down targets for bombs.

As if thief wasn't op enough in gvg setups

Well it's basically a power creep patch. Ignore what is broken, buff random things instead in hopes it magically changes the meta. This never turns out well.

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Mesmer traits that influence shatter skills typically affect all shatter skills [...] In this update, we're moving to change some of these traits to affect specific shatter skills in a stronger way, in order to both cut down on this bloat and to make the individual trait selections more meaningful.

I don't think, that this will work. Maybe other players think vastly different than me, but why would I take a trait, that affects only ONE skill? So far, if there were traits, affecting one skill, it wasn't the only thing they did.

Take for example the proposed change to Confounding Suggestions:

Confounding Suggestions: This trait no longer increases daze and stun durations. Instead, Diversion stuns foes for 1.5 seconds and no longer dazes foes.

Stun is nice, but only if it really lands. In PVE f3 shatter was already quite strong, I don't think it needed to be any stronger, in WvW with the amount of stunbreak I typically encounter, I would not spec confounding suggestions either. Especially as I have on that level available as traits:

  • empowered illusions, which affects all damage coming from illusions (which in turn means it affects a multitude of skills)
  • rending shatter (I suspect, you will do something about that, too, maybe move it to f1 shatter only - but even then: 1 stack of vulnerability on 1 shatter skill? I would not be thrilled)

The same thing could be said about the change to Blinding Dissipation:

Blinding Dissipation: This trait no longer blinds foes on the activation of each shatter skill. It will now cause Cry of Frustration to blind every target it strikes. Blindness duration is split between game modes, lasting 1.5 seconds in WvW and PvP and 3 seconds in PvE.

Now, that sounds like a serious debuff. Where before it blinded with every shatter skill (and IMO blind is not that strong an effect), it now only does so on f2 shatter. And it competes with two other traits:

  • Evasive Mirror - reflect after a successful evasion (nevermind that with the cooldown of 10s it will probably be irrelevant) - affecting all skills allowing evade (including Mirage Cloak)
  • Fencer's Finesse - affecting all sword skills

I don't think the new traits as they are currently designed will be able to compete with other trait choices, as their focus is too limited. A such limited focus might be compensated by making the single skill a lot stronger - IMO the current changes do not really do that, and if they did, this might cause other balance issues. It is also a lot harder to build synergies with such traits, which in the end is, what we players are looking for.Maybe all this is part of the focus for the upcoming balance change; maybe there will be a lot more debuffs coming all over the place to lower the overall power level; I can only judge what I currently see, and to me these changes seem a bit shorthanded. YMMV

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The best way to balance the game right now is to give thief clones and shatters and give mesmer rifle dodge roll stealth and malicious stealth attacks. I've always wanted to be backstabbed with a scepter or even a staff it would be cool. Better yet malicous focused focus attack that pulls you into yourself turning you inside out and then explodezing yerself.

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