Malthurius.6870

Not to derail, but for FFXIV specifically, the high APM occurs in bursts (generally, every 2 minutes). Most of the time you're doing your basic 1-2-3 as a physical dps or spamming a single spell as a caster. So, most of the time, your APM is going to be around 20-30, and jump up to 50-70 every 2 minutes for about 10-20 so seconds. By contrast, GW2 is in a near constant spam (depending on profession). I found that casually "try-harding" scourge in open world that I almost never have a period of just auto-attacking. I definitely feel the demand physically in GW2 is much higher than FFXIV. They may reach the same APM heights, but GW2 keeps you at that point for longer and more frequently.

I'm not 100% confident of this, but it seems like the hits all pile up in the final hit if you don't get them to register during the charge portion. The reason I believe this to be the case is purely based on the damage I've seen it do when this happens. In solo open world, it hitting for 20k in the final hit with max might and vuln on the target *feels* right, even if it feels wrong that no damage accumulates during the charge animation itself. And if that is the case, seems like the issue is purely one of game feel. Feels bad for that whirling charge to do nothing until the final tick. Someone with more time and care than me could probably go and test this; to reiterate what I think is happening: The damage is registering, but the damage isn't shown until the final hit of death's charge.

I was playing Specter in open world for the first time and I thought that the Well utilities felt bad to use; or "unfun" and slow. Most of the wells have a 3/4 second cast, with the 2 exceptions of silence and bounty at 1/2 second (assuming because they're support oriented and not offensive), and gloom at a full second (as healing utilities tend to be). I imagine these casts are this long because of the shadowstep aspect of it, but I would argue that makes them even worse. Most thief shadowsteps are instant, and with as much mobility as thief has, the shadowsteps feel cumbersome rather than helpful to me. I would much prefer if they worked like Necro wells- if the shadowstep aspect wasn't there, I think I would even be fine with the 3/4 second cast. It would feel a bit more natural to me. If the shadowstep must stay, I think it would be better if the shadowstep was instant, and the well had a delayed activation of 3/4 to 1 second. It would flow much better, imo. Or, if it cannot be instant due potential broken teleporting shenanigans, give it a projectile travel time (shortbow 5, infiltrator arrow equivalent) or give it a 1/4 second cast at the most.

I've been going through the Charr story on a new character in anticipation of the new Expansion, Elite Spec Weapon limitations being removed has made me quite excited about Necromancer in particular, and I noticed that a number of Charr NPCs in the Ash Legion and Loyal Soldier quests have pink/red fur! Here are the two in question: https://external-preview.redd.it/iFFruwv9F7kF78zyrSnSlLufVnCUEt59gE12k8wZwe4.jpg?auto=webp&s=2426a74b97474538a11591935fb5d60eb0437b1d https://i.imgur.com/iy4w3gZ.jpg And Korukhan the Blacksmith has apparently blue fur: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Korukhan_the_Blacksmith#/media/File:Korukhan_the_Blacksmith.jpg I would kill for the pink options here- Charr fur colors are so limited and these colors have been canon since launch, can we players get some access? (Unrelated, but how about making the Omalkhan horns an option as well, instead of having to do the janky gender switch trick to access them.)

You're not even engaging in my arguments. What's the difference between 5-man and 10 man content besides numbers? Or, here's another question, what's the difference between dungeons and fractals? You lower the numbers as well, and healing and buffing become easier because of the 5-target limit. The goal of an easy mode is accessibility, no? Why wouldn't you also lower the number of people required to open up accessibility even more. also, if number of players is all that distinguishes raids from other group content, then we already have easy mode raids... they're called world bosses 🙃

They would have different content, this isn't hard to understand. You can't do a Fractal or Dungeon of Forsaken Thicket because Forsaken Thicket is a raid with different enemies, different mechanics, different stories, different bosses. That's what a 5-man ""raid"" would have that the fractals don't. The title of this thread is "How would you handle an Easy Mode raid", and my answer is lower the barrier to entry by reducing the number of players required so that they could experience the content and become familiar with the mechanics of raid design. So, here's a question for you. What does having 10 people in a raid change vs 5 people? And don't say "It turns them into fractals". I mean, what changes mechanically or meaningfully? At most it changes the dynamics of buff and healing application because most things are limited to 5 targets, but aside from that.. very little.

So, the only difference between raids and fractals are the number of people required to do them? Are you actually serious?

Tell me what fractal tier Forsaken Thicket is in, I can't seem to find it.

5-man is the answer. 10 man raids were a mistake, they changed the trajectory of PvE balance irreparably and created an arbitrary barrier to entry by requiring 10 people and those people to have a certain minimum competence. A big reason why people have a hard time getting into raids is because of 1. they don't like doing challenging content that relies on the performance of others. 2. they have social anxieties that prevent them from seeking out groups. It's much easier to circumvent both of those reasons by reducing the raid size to 5 (as it should have always been, imo, but I'd settle for it being the easy mode variant). 1. Smaller groups places more personal responsibility on the individual, meaning that a player feels less "out of control" of the group's success. 2. It's more reasonable for an individual to have 4 close friends than 9, and pugging in the context of a smaller group is easier for someone with social anxiety. Beyond that, a 5-man mode makes transitioning to a 10-man version easier. If someone has cleared the 5-man with their friends, they're probably more confident (and the groups looking for people will probably be more confident) that they meet the minimum skill required to clear the content.

Can we get 5 man raids instead?

Because I also built it around cleaving since thief currently has very limited 5-target attack options. That's also why the auto-attack string has multiple hits (kind of like warrior axe auto-attack). In my mind it would be animated completely differently from every other greatsword, not unlike how staff is animated completely different from even the revenant staff. I think for off-hand sword I would approach an elite spec in a very different way: the initiative mechanic I wrote couldn't really be explored thoroughly without a new main-hand at minimum. I think this concept could potentially work with main-hand axe as well. The slower autos on the greatsword could also be a balancing mechanism: every other weapon would generate initiative a bit faster than the passive regeneration of thief while attacking with their autos. Greatsword would swing a bit slower (each skill hitting multiple times so it still feels fast) making initiative gain a bit slower within this concept, but it would allow for a bit more extravagance. This would also make quickness have better synergy with the entire thing. Quickness on greatsword like this would feel really good in my mind and the elite spec gives you a few ways to access it. If you wanted even faster attacks, sword and pistol would still be options.

Here's a quick idea for a Thief elite spec I whipped up really fast. I didn't include many numbers anywhere because this is mostly conceptual and I don't have time to get into the weeds of minute balance for something completely theoretical. This was also designed primarily from a PvE point of view so some of these ideas may be completely busted in PvP or WvW. I'm just putting this out here for a fun discussion.

I already said I dislike that FFXIV has a cash shop; the difference is that almost all of the content in FFXIV besides the few dozen things in the cash shop are obtainable by playing the game. The GW2 cash shop has hundreds, if not thousands of items in it that could have been used to enrich content in game instead of being obtainable through a menu. For example, imagine if in order to get the branded mount skins you had to do a series of collection achievements directing you to a wide variety of content with lore about why you have branded mounts? Or the holloween mount skins, that could have been attached to a halloween event collection. That's a lot more interesting than just coughing up 20$ or 1000g. When it comes to cosmetics, I just wish they were a part of content instead of disconnected cosmetic fluff that means next to nothing. They don't have to be difficult to earn either, just obtainable in a way that makes sense and that feels like a reward for going out and doing content. What if the bloodstone black lion weapons were part of Bloodstone Fen and dropped from the zone the same way Pact and Elonian weapons drop from HoT and PoF? Make them super rare if you have to, I just want them in the game and not in an html web store.

But this is contradictory to Gehenna's point of "this is how Anet make money". Most people aren't like you and probably spend more than 15$ a month on the game, otherwise Anet wouldn't be able to pay their developers, would they?

Then what about my middle grounds? Surely you wouldn't disagree that it would be better if you could obtain these cosmetics, skins, or maybe even bag slots via achievements, collections, or specific content *in addition* to the cash shop, no? If grinding gold is an acceptable option to you, then making them obtainable via specific tasks should be palatable as well. and don't tell me you guys actually are okay with the state of build templates.