starlinvf.1358

So heres some advice. 4th Edition DnD rule set is designed to the mimic the mechanical approach of Modern RPG and MMORPGs. And frankly, it sucks. The underlying problem is that the sheer number of combat mechanics, and timer based cool downs, bogs the combat down to almost intolerable levels. It is severely unappreciated how much under the hood calculations go into action heavy games; and trying to mimic that in PnP RPG games weakens the whole experience. 3rd Edition DnD also had this problem, as it expanded the mechanics from 2nd edition with layers upon layers of additional modifiers and situational rules. A 3e combat session with more then 8 actors on the field (enemies or players) can take anywhere between 30-60 minutes.... boss fights could take literal hours if not handled well. This game was only designed to be played in stints of 3-4 hours; but the average adventure has anywhere between 6-10 encounters, and typically spans 2-3 sessions. While ironically appropriate that a system that is mechanically heavy will spend 60-80% of its time dealing with conflict/mechanical resolution, DnD's strength is supposed to be in its story telling aspects. The combat and dice rolls are there to deal with probability. But spending too much time on that, and the adventure takes forever to complete. I would highly recommend starting with more stream lined rules sets. 5e DnD is more streamlined, and I'd recommend it over 3e and 4e for beginners. However, a DnD rule books are expensive, and the class system doesn't mimic MMO staple classes. The class difference is important, as MMOs use a hard trinity model thats completely unique to Video games, and can only really function correctly there. DnD class structure is designed primarily for narrative flexibility, despite the amount of mechanical aspects involved in their design. If you want something free, I recommend GURPS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GURPS). You can find the base rule book online for Free, and there are sample adventures posted in various RPG related message boards or as resource books. GURPS's rules are extremely streamlined, usually reducing any given action to a single dice roll ,typically using no more then 2 numbers for modification. Its character building system is essentially freeform, using points to buy abilities based on its traits. This is designed to let you create your own skills, and is flexible enough to recreate somewhat simplified versions of MMO styled skills. Note that unlike video games, which used distinct skills or effects for every plausible action, GURPS approach allows a single base effect/skill to be utilized in multiple ways, thus creating varied effects to mimic the massive skill list of a RPG video game. So a single healing spell can start a single target, and later learn or create a condition in which it can be used as an AOE with modified effects. So rather then learning multiple individual spells, you expand it by spending more points to add effects, or use the environment (or even other skills) to modify the output. So using the above example again.... A healing spell defined as x HP over y number of targets can be both single target or AOE. Or a single target healing spell cast on a prism scatters its effects to an area around it. They aren't necessarily distinct skills you have to keep track of... just figuring out and manipulating its use to replicate the idea of huge skill lists using a much smaller, easier to track rule set. You can also local collector game shops, as most tend to host periodic "Game Nights" to both connect player groups, and generate business as a supplier of game materials. The hard part is finding a GM or Player that understands your mind set, so they can give relevant advice. MMO players wanting to dive into PNP is fairly common... but the rate of adoption tends to be pretty low, because MMORPG combat as a game structure is extremely difficult to do on paper, due to how much a video game automates the hard parts. Ultimately the greatest difficulty is getting people comfortable with the narrative/RP side of the game; which is normal supposed to take up the majority of session time. 2 things I recommend checking out is - and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8blPWVfzrI These are examples of what a game session sort of looks like when you strip out all the time spent doing "mechanical checks". You'll notice that what you get is a flowing story, where the action plays out far faster then it does at the table. This is an idealistic view of what the game is about. By making sure the narrative points are strong, without getting too bogged down in the specific of mechanics, a streamlined session should have a cadence thats similar to the videos I linked.

But what if I wanna do the event, and come back the treasure after the event is done? Check mate.

I think the question is a bit misguided. Map completion as an activity exists as an aside almost solely for the purposes of Completionist and literal "End Game" crafting that is legendary weapons. And with Gen 1 weapons not being account bound, and sold on the TP, anyone doing map completion is under no compulsion to do so other then then own. The reasons are not important.... the fact that you can side step it completely and still get the reward, changes the entire nature of the perceived problem. And even if you include the reasons, gold farming is so incredibly lucrative in this game that pursing legendary weapons for profit is practically a detriment given the number of non-gold rewarding activities you have to take part in. And pre-cursor crafting just adds several additional layers of consideration on top of all of that. Because of this, the answers to the question are not going to have significant direction about the activity itself, but how much of an obstacle people view it as to other things they are pursing. That out of the way. If you want to talk about the actual experience.... its..... inconsistent. And I highly suspect this has to do with level designers having free reign to play with ideas, and most of it being used due to time constraints. Lack of polish can also be seen in many late game areas, some even grinding game flow to a complete stop. The starting areas had most attention, and it definitely shows. This break in flow is ultimately what I think poisons the whole experience for many people. Because if it didn't, I doubt people would be aware enough to bother scrutinizing it the way they do. Consider Silverwaste is essentially the same format on a much smaller scale- but its stable flow and transitions of activities create a minor trance like experience. One that can be easily repeated for hours without becoming tiresome. The only ones that really complain are the ones who only see very minor obstacles that they can't be bothered to overcome.

Thats been on every Mesmer's wishlist since beta. And they'll never sell it, because it'd be impossible to sell anything else after it. Had a similar problem with Anise's replica, the Exemplar's Attire.... I understand that apparently what we got was the concept art version..... Anet didn't like the butt piece either, and replaced it when they did Anise's model. https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/en/uploads/forum_attachment/file/149558/H_anise.jpg ![aaaa] (https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/en/uploads/forum_attachment/file/149558/H_anise.jpg "aaa")

This should be not permitted because it gives you an advantage over other players. You exist in multiple locations. A normal player can't do this. Simple as that. Same thing could be said about multiboxing in general then, i can "exist" on multiple locations in pve aswell. As for advantage over other players any player can have multiple accounts. Playing wvw or pvp with voicecoms gives you an advantage aswell if the enemy team doesnt have it. Scouting is a trivial thing both teams do, it doesnt give you any substantial advantage other then doing something people dont generally enjoy. As a commander i wouldnt have to beg and ask people to scout something when i can do it myself. There are multiple issues at stake here though. First off, the reward structure in spvp and wvw is a lot more multibox friendly (not to mention afk leechers or bots) compared to general pve. Second, and specific to wvw, your multiboxed characters are taking away active slots from other characters on the map. That is an issue, especially since on fuller servers there will be queues. Now one could argue you might log out your extra characters when prime time hits, but the general rules can't take into account benevolent action from single players because there might just as well be players who would simply keep occupying the wvw slots. If i wanted scouts as a commander i would ask my squad, not many would be interested and most of the times they would want payment for it, which is acceptable for how boring it is. By using my alts i wouldnt need to ask people to do it, i could do it for as long and wherever i wanted. If its not my characters it will be someone else doing it. There are 4 different borders to chose from its not like 3 scouts is gonna mess it up for everyone, there are more single account players simply afking at any given time. The shared partcipation is there for scouters, thats why it was implemented. You cant just give out shared participation, you would need to have a squad with enough members to get the slots.if 3 scouts is not important, then why are you doing it? the adavntage is clear, since wvw benefits from intel because response time is a factor. the flaw is you’re pitching a workaround as the intended solution to a design problem compounded with a social problem. thats not acceptable because someone is now getting a mechanical advantage thats external to the game (in either software,acccounts, and hardware). Its also interfering with legitimate players ability to participate in wvw by taking up active map slots and server populaion caps. These need to be addessed by design. but in the meantime that doesnt give free reign to go against the spirit of the game mode. wvw is about a community cooperating to win a war.... people might not treat it like that, but avoiding it rather then tackling it only prolongs the problem. and frankly wvw has suffered for far too long with community problems and guilds not wanting to pitch in. thats something no amount of reward stacking is going to fix

Not as easy as it sounds. Unless you're ok with every hair style automatically clipping through it in a painfully obvious way. And just saying...... to even start doing what you're thinking, they'd have to break down every hair style into 5 or more pieces, and render them as 5 or more pieces (which in this engine is literally 5 more models worth of overhead per character added to the load). Even more modern MMOs take short cuts with hair to keep its as least complicated as possible.

But that doesn't cause mass panic..... which is a lot more entertaining

Personally I rather not have a thief as support. Themetically it just feels strange. how so? To me a rogue like character is suppose to be selfish no? It's about stealing and taking, not giving. The idea of support for me is a paladin type like the guardian. Or a wizard type like elementalist. Rogue assassin types are suppose to be stealth, teleport and damage.Thats overly narrow a mind set though. There are multiple viable concepts as an Umbramancer, you just need to stop looking at as "assassin class", and look at Deception as a theme. It might seem odd at first since theres overlap with Necro and Mesmer, but thats actually a good thing as both classes has some proof of concept on how you leverage it into an Espec. Shift focus from single target shut down (which is Thief's main MO) to Battle Field manipulation. Blinds, Decoys, Target Break, Taunts, Group Teleports, Barriers, Synergy with Venoms, a new form of Projectile Reflect, Vulnerability, Group Protection/Evasion/Aegis, Condition Transfer as a Venom effect, and traits which can buff party members when sharing aspects of Theif's core defenses in Stealth, Evade, use of Stolen Skills, Blind and leveraging Stealth attacks. The idea is to build a frame work which benefits from Shadow Arts and Trickery, by trading one or both damage trait lines to amplify defense, and/ or amplify offense of a group. On the defensive end, it shuts windows of opportunity by making offense more difficult, and on the defensive end, it creates windows of opportunity for team mates to capitalize on, and adds power/damage if they successfully exploit it. Thief already has several group utility options in Core, but are simply too hard to use because the other classes have no mechanisms to properly exploit them; thus rarely think about them. So rather then being distinct triggers or conditions for one shot bonuses, your skills/traits are split between laying down an AOE field for area control and setup, buffs which make team members the vehicle for your offensive effects, and effects that you apply to allies causing additional effects or bonuses. Its only a protoform of an idea, but with more time to think about it, I can draw up examples that can be compatible with WvW, PvP and Raids with various degrees of cross over.

Fighting upscaled enemies forces your attacks to fumble. It's like having permanent weakness, except there's nothing that can be done to prevent it. Rule #1 of video games..... as long as you can do even 1 damage, you can kill it. Just get really good at not dying, and you win by default

Another thing to consider is that Multi-guild is a foreign concept to many players, since this is one of the few games that allow it. Guilds are fundamentally a community building tool; but many groups have ego attached to it, since most games tend to frame guilds as inherently competitive. This this is pushed even harder in games with PvP elements, since it becomes a vehicle for reputation and political maneuvering. Some guilds take this so seriously, that many are formed to be a direct opposition to another. Most relaxed guilds won't care about rep, unless theres a mechanical or social reason for it. Things like guild missions (which need rep active for mechanical reasons), or hosting public events or organized bosses to show that some group actually does it, and may encourage people to join and help out in the future. For PvP and WvW theres also good reason for psychological warfare, since seeing large numbers of the same guild tag up can scare the opposing teams. The only mechanical aspects left for WvW are Claim priority and the need to Rep to get access to Tactics, but that doesn't prevent you from switching guilds rep on the fly if needed (I use all 5 of my guilds for claiming, since 4 of them are PvE focused but have maxed out guild halls). Those that force rep otherwise only do it for arbitrary reasons; most likely out of a sense of guild superiority/inflated egos. You run into this kind of guild leader in WvW all the time- and for all the big talk they display, many will get hilariously flustered the moment things get even remotely difficult for them. "We're best guild".... and then 3 defeats later.... "they're just blobbing us, because they'll never win a fair fight". But it get really funny when its obvious you got beat by a smaller bunch, and the commander still insists its because his team was outnumbered. Or blaming siege... thats another common one.

so...... what exactly are you getting at?

It's not, 3 and 5 actually do a fair bit of damage and 4 is a very useful breakbar contribution especially when you have stability. (Also 5 is great for mobility). It's the weapon used in the meta PVE holosmith raid build right now. You don't stay there and camp it of course but it does get used. ^This. Engi rifle is ok. On the other hand, warrior rifle is underwhelming. If Warrior LB is supposed to be their condi weapon, Rifle should probably be more of a power weapon. However with the current skills, it really doesn't fit well for power or condi builds. It likely needs an overhaul, but there are other more glaring balance issues that should be tackled first.The problem with War Rifle has more to do with how its a low mobility weapon, when most of the melee weapons have distinct movement characteristics, and most of them being pretty fast and fluid. The Rifle's theme is based on a Musket era Rifleman formation. Compare that to the Engineer, which uses it more like a shotgun, or the Deadeye, built around creating a positioning advantage to act as a sniper. Whats really wrong with the design is how substantially different it is compared to all the other weapons, to the point where it has no Complimenting weapon to create a build around. if you look at Ranger with LB+GS, those 2 weapons compliment each other extremely well due to GS having defensive options and gap closer in the same kit. Longbow also offers Stealth and Knock back, enabling the pairing to control the distance of engagement. There are really only 2 ways to address this. Either Rifle needs a rework to make it a better kiting tool, with something added to aid in gap closing; or a new Espec built around mid-ranged combat that the Rifle can easily slot into as a complimenting weapon.

Simple floaters or Non-simple?

But how long is "too long"? The levels are already notoriously short, and most fights basically scaling on your DPS suggests its logically scaling with the safety level of your build. I spent maybe 5-7 minutes on the Joko fight, and thats mostly because I got lost a little bit trying to figure out a mechanic, and not having enough CC skills loaded at the start.... but I still cleared it on the first attempt. I saw a video on TY where someone cleared it in roughly 10min using a not-damage oriented Druid build, and was fumbling around most of it (very likely a first attempt), not played to raid level efficiency.... but still cleared it in that single attempt. Even in the Scruffy fight, I spent more time with the gate nodes then Scruffy. But whats confusing me is that you're implying that the fights need to be even shorter when going in with no knowledge of the fight before the chapter starts, when its arguably so easy at this point that the only thing that drags out of a fight is lacking DPS at level below that of average player builds (which is already pretty low on the buildcraft ladder). If the take away from anything, I'd make the case that there should be a minor DPS check prior to the boss fight, so players have an opportunity to adjust their build before hand.

largely because if they did, none of the other back items would sell anywhere near as good.

I'm finding this whole thing an oxymoron? "Make the story more rewarding by adding more rewards to farm, but not enough to be abused", when thats pretty much whats going to happen when put emphasis on a better reward. In fact, thats the entire premise of this suggestion..... "make the story give more rewards, so I can abuse it, rather then doing that other method that already exists and does exactly what I need it to do". Its kind of hard to not fixate on that point, when its the foundation of the entire discussion.

Asking for optional things is not complaining. But explaining why is the complaining.

its fine outside of PvP. In PVP we're condensed misery and salt. PvP is fundamentally powered by a Sodium Chloride, and some atomic research centers have been trying to study PvP players in an attempt to design better MSRs (Molten Salt reactors). The biggest hurdle is distilling player egos into SMUG fuel (Salty, Miserable, Underranked, and Gud).

I beg to differ. It's a PvE game and PvE is what the majority plays. Of course it matters. Its actually what matters most. And in all honesty they are balancing around raids and thats what needs to end. What do you expect them to balance around? Great Jungle Wurm? I dont know, but not what around on a very high end what 20% of the players who play the game are doing, but balancing because of numbers on a golem is not the way to balance a game. Oh, I agree here - balancing around the golem isn't good. But balance has to be done around the top-tier content by necessity. It is the only place (in PvE) where OP and broken stuff is actually a problem, since it undermines the major point of it - to be challenging. So raid and fractal performance will always be most important considerations when doing PvE balance.Or just change the conditions of the encounter, and players will adapt anyway. Thats how it worked in Fractals, and within weeks people had already solved every problem it threw at them.

You take the blue pill—the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.You take the red pill—you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. And believe me, that rabbit hole runs deep......

I think this is the real problem. Cantha as it was left in GW1 had become an oppressed, xenophobic place, and as far as we know it hasn't changed since then. If we went back to Cantha there would be no way to avoid the elephant in the room that is The Empire of the Dragon without MASSIVE retconning. If Cantha in it's GW1 state was offensive enough, there's no way having the China/Japan/Korea analogue as a full-on oppressive, evil empire is gonna fly. Even if we stuck to the Jade Sea and Echovald regions, which are somewhat less east asian inspired, and walled off Shing Jea and Kaineng, Domain of Winds-style, It's still going to come across as offensive. I think we have a better chance of them making the continent of "Arid" into Totally-Not-Asia 2.0 than going back to Cantha. or people can get over themselves because it's a game and any similarities (or lack of) to real life are coincidental Good luck telling that to China

about the clovers you can buy 2 a day for fractal relics+ mystic coins. ( that way you never need to gamble in the mystic forge. ) But that requires a LOT of relics, which in turn requires a lot of fractal specific farming. MF with coins is just a function of gold and Karma (or other sources of Obsidian shards), and frankly gold is a lot easier to get then Relics, unless you're already a fractal focused famer.

As a map explorer that never really stopped me so long as I have a map I can look at. The irony here is that the content guide won't show you stuff you haven't been in proximity to, unless its an unexplored section. That distinction is important, because map complete is centered around "icons", and the content guide doesn't point to icons you haven't encountered yet. Something I'm ok with, because it demands reading comprehension when you're supposedly "stuck/lost". But then again I'm kind of old school........ be not a slave to the little dotted line.

If it isn't obvious yet from the other posts, the game does have a strong leaning toward burst damage being the most efficient approach to a lot of combat situations. Whats not really obvious to new players is "why". From a high level perspective, GW2 classes are built around PvP, which has specific thresholds and limitations to more or less allow them to kill each other. The problem is PvE is largely designed around Tank and Spank design principles common to most MMORPGs; many of which are designed around Trinity comp. The AI is pretty basic in its behavior- stands there and takes damage, only a hand full will run when in danger, and even then they'll eventually turn around and try attacking you again. They all have slow attack rates, Core map mobs have limited skill sets, and very few incorporates any kind of counter-play concept. To make up for this, they usually have a lot of HP (25k being around average), some degree of toughness, and substantially strong damage output per hit. They are somewhat balanced around a 1v1 damage trade, so they actually are dangerous to tanky builds with enough of them ganging up on you. As a player you tend to cleave on melee, so in a 1 v many situation, your damage output is flat per target (making your damage potential level), but incoming damage is multiplicative since multiple attacks are hitting you. Since Trash mob damage is pretty low, this tends to not be too much of an issue. But when you start dealing with mobs with stronger attacks (usually AOE), or higher Tiers such as Vet and Elites, they can potentially Out-DPS you in a protracted fight; even with ample defense stats in your build. This starts to make sense when you look at how the game handles its damage math. On the surface its a simple linear model, where effective DPS and Effective HP scales directly with how your stats are invested. Where this starts to go off the rails is the damage multipliers and skill coefficients, which results in a compound multiplicative effect. Classes also have far more damage multipliers available via traits then they do damage reduction. As a result, the per point investment into damage can be pushed a lot further then with defense ones. Another fact of the basic game design is that all mobs and players have 100% effectiveness regardless of health level. So be it 30 HP or 30,000, your skills, traits, and gear still perform just as good. And since enemies have this same thing going for them, the only way to stop incoming damage is either stun lock the mob with CCs so it can't attack (which isn't feasible), or to kill it so it ceases to be a thing. Since mob damage output is time gated, the faster you kill it, the less threat it can pose to you. One Shot a mob, and it'll be as if it never existed. This is why so many people lean toward a glass cannon build, since the high damage output shortens the fight, and lowers the risk of exhausting your active defenses. Which bring us to the active defenses. The best defense is not taking damage..... to which GW2, with an action combat system, very heavily favors. Dodges let you evade attacks and of its effects. Blocks prevent attacks and damage from connecting. Invulnerability and Condition clears stop damage from occurring, Personal Heal skill are infrequent, but very strong, to let you recover from damage taken. The first two counter front loaded damage from being lethal, while the latter two neutralize back loaded and over time damage. Since Dodging is base line ability for all characters, every player has access to the single strongest defense in the game. But to balance this strength, active defenses are treated as a resource within the game's balancing scheme, and is meant to be exhausted if overly taxed. They have limited windows of protection, and most have to be timed well to gain maximum benefit; some even down to a faction of a second. But with enough at player's disposal, and knowledge of how to best leverage them, many players can get away with minimal defense stats (if used at all). So within this type of environment, defensive stats can't win you a fight, and only effectively stalls death. But in some situations, that can be a big deal. Like surviving 3 hits instead of 2, or being able to shrug off weak attacks to focus your active defenses on the stronger ones. However, without a team comp to substitute damage in your place, going deep into defensive styled builds is almost universally a liability. There are also very few situations where a stat based tank build is actually a functional advantage, since the majority of PvE content is balanced around the standard 1v1 trade, and a high damage build with enough AOE can clear a group of mobs on their own. Expansion maps/content operate on similar principle, but a key difference is mobs are given more skills that increase their threat level against passive players. Things like build concepts, mimicking player skills (which are very strong), group comp in patrols, access to more CCs and AOE attacks, increased armor or damage stats for its tier, and a proper mixture of damage pressure and damage bursts that the player can't safely ignore. This also has a direct effect on active players, in that it opens up counter-play strategies that players can exploit, but also forces them to face situations they might be vulnerable to. But there is one thing the Devs made sure of in the expansions..... all the mobs, even the trash ones, are resilient enough survive things that would normally 1-shot mobs in Core Tyria. This causes most fights to last at least several seconds, allowing the majority of mobs time to use their more dangerous attacks. With the margin of error being a lot smaller when fighting these mobs, investment in defensive traits, skills and a small amount of defensive stats is prudent. Traits and skills add more resources to avoid or mitigate damage, while the defensive stats are a buffer against damage that will inevitably make it past your active defenses. This minor trade off is to buy you extra time in the fight, and allow additional rounds of damage output that (hopefully) kills the enemy before they kill you. With all that said, the dynamic gets a little different with a group composition..... but not as big as you'd think. Group content like Fractals, Raids, and team PvP/WvW allow you spread the requirements for a fight across several players. This allows more room to specialize for each player, and take advantage of the force multiplication it enables. But as an aggregate, you're effectively acting as one character that can multitask better. And not surprisingly, if the Supports can carry the job of defense/damage mitigation for the group, that frees up everyone else for DPS. The more damage you can dish out, the shorter the fight is. The shorter the fight, the less time you have to spend dealing with something that might kill you.

You need to look harder. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Inquest_armor_(heavy) I have to disagree with you on that. The Kurzick elite armor is definitely the better design in my view. And you did prove another point of mine with this example. Particularly on the human female model, look how weird the skirt sits on top of and around the hips. It looks like she's wearing a barrel. If this is the best you can do, then I stand by my opinion.(pinches bridge of nose) You might not like the way it looks, but its very much based on the Kurzik armor set.