Quadox.7834

The class mechanic changes, tho I do not like that idea too You take berserker, and equip a dagger mainhand. Whats your F1?You stay core thief, you equip rifle. How does anything work on that build? etc. What wouldn't work on core thief rifle? Sure, it would be terrible bcs no stealth on dodge and steal puts you in melee and so on, but that's not a problem (it would only be a problem if it were too strong). I'm going to reverse the question, what would work on core rifle thief? Losing the malice mechanic means you get no stealth and deal no damage, losing the deadeye traits means you have no initiative management and even less stealth. You're basicly a free kill.Same with core thief on staff. You lose initiative and endurance management tools, and weakness application. But you're still forced to staying mostly melee, without the tools to stay alive in melee. I could go through every class and every e-spec weapon, which I'm not going to do. Half of them would be just pointless, some of them would be outright terrible like the thief ones, and some of them would greatly benefit the class. So some classes would get something, others would get nothing.The release of EoD will bring enough new skills/combos and chaos to entertain you. We don't need this additional tinkering with a well thought out e-spec system.We don't need the chaos of EoD throwing a wrench in this current well-thought-out meta either by that token.Well thought out espec system. okay, that's a good one. Thats a subjective opinion of mine. If we look at the objective facts though: the 4 pillars of an elite specialisation are: new weapon, new tratline, new support skills, altered class mechanic. The reasoning you gave to erase one of these is... "diversity and more options improves balance" (thats a hot take) and "no reason not to".The not-so well thought out part was the fact that most especs were just straight-up upgrades to core specs. Especs having exclusive weapons while core specs have no exclusive weapons are part of this - it increases the numbers of options that the especs have over core, which results in a higher likelihood that especs are meta over core. More options = more versatile = higher chance of being meta. By letting core specs equip these weapons you increase possibilities and diversity. Also, in regards to the "hot take", you can read this in JusticeRetroHunter's posts. I like how you assume just because I explained one example in detail that that must be the only reason. Sword would be just as useless in the hands of a core ele or core engineer, core guardian with longbow would be able to stack so many modifiers that it could oneshot squishies from 1200+1500 range with true shot(power DH at least needs to tether you first), and the list goes on.There is no reason that sword would be useless on core elementalist, and the only reason sword would be worse on core is because of the lack of heat mechanic, but it would still allow for some interesting core power sword/shield builds. It also doesn't matter if the new weapons would be sup-par, so be it, it would not ruin anything, including your enjoyment of the game.There would be overpowered and useless combos all over the place. Balance in general would be worse until the devs make several balance passes to tone down the outliers, and several currently balanced builds/combos would be ruined in the process. And after all this work, we MIGHT not be worse off than we are today.You honestly think core guardian stacking every damage modifier to oneshot with longbow would be the mew meta or something. This is highly delusional. You havn't given any good examples of what would be overpowered yet.So it's not minimal work, it would harm balance instead of helping it, and in general it would add to the chaos right along/before EoD release. And you call my mentality terrible right after arguing that giving unfair advantages to only some classes is cool... thats funny.Having options is not an unfair advantage. The espec weapons are most certainly not all overpowered compared to core and are not supposed to be. Look at reaper greatsword par example. I have stated that it is only a problem if it is too strong, not if it is too weak. If rifle on core thief only allows for some meme build and nothing viable, this does not take anything away from thief, in the absolute worst case it adds zero.I value balance and fairness, guess I'm just that kind of a horrible person.You are probably very nice to your grandma.

Power block is bugged and has a hidden 3 sec ICD on the damage and weakness (but not the cooldown increase part). I believe it has been like this since the defiance bar interrupt skill rework. "This trait can only damage enemies with defiance bars once per interval." Basically, it is supposed to have a 3 second interval on defiance bars in PvE, but it currently also has the same interval in PvP because of this bug. Maybe someone could post it on the balance discord as I doubt the devs read this forum anymore. I have reported it ingame in the past.

The class mechanic changes, tho I do not like that idea too You take berserker, and equip a dagger mainhand. Whats your F1?You stay core thief, you equip rifle. How does anything work on that build? etc. What wouldn't work on core thief rifle? Sure, it would be terrible bcs no stealth on dodge and steal puts you in melee and so on, but that's not a problem (it would only be a problem if it were too strong). I'm going to reverse the question, what would work on core rifle thief? Losing the malice mechanic means you get no stealth and deal no damage, losing the deadeye traits means you have no initiative management and even less stealth. You're basicly a free kill.Same with core thief on staff. You lose initiative and endurance management tools, and weakness application. But you're still forced to staying mostly melee, without the tools to stay alive in melee. I could go through every class and every e-spec weapon, which I'm not going to do. Half of them would be just pointless, some of them would be outright terrible like the thief ones, and some of them would greatly benefit the class. So some classes would get something, others would get nothing.The release of EoD will bring enough new skills/combos and chaos to entertain you. We don't need this additional tinkering with a well thought out e-spec system.Well thought out espec system. okay, that's a good one.So because it doesn't give thief any new viable options, you just cannot tolerate that most other professions get more options to tinker with, at minimum work on anet's part compared to, say, designing a new weapon. so far the missing berserker burst skill for dagger is the only thing I know that would need to be added. What a terrible mentality.

Diversity and Balance are the same thing yes. The word "balance" is just misunderstood because of the history of the word : From probably since the early turn of the past millennia, the definition of balance has always meant placing two things on a scale, to try and see if the scale balances out. Back then, this was the primitive understanding for what made it possible to trade goods and make math calculations to determine the values of things for bartering... I have 5 chickens, they weigh the same as your 3 bags of seeds, therefor its an equivalent trade. Balance back then, was also used in a religious contexts such as the saying, "the balance of nature" and that's a pretty common saying even to this day...but nobody really understood it and that's why "the balance of nature" remained in this sort of religious abstraction in history. Since then, people have gotten smarter, and by the time thermodynamics came about in the 1800's, balance was no longer a good way to describe what we see in the physical world. Systems live in a thermodynamic world, in which we make a heterogenous systems become homogenous through a process of entropy. We use these principles in order to do "work" and so a system in a homogenous state is essentially a state of a system that can no longer do work...and becomes inert. Balance of a system now meant that balance is an equilibrium of parts in a system where no part is different then any other part. By contrast, a heterogenous system, is the opposite...where all things are defined not by how the same they are, but rather how different things are from each other. In essence, balance and diversity live on a spectrum between two ends. One end is homogeneous and the other is heterogeneous. On the homogenous end we find all things in complete equilibrium...where all things are the same, and everything is completely equal. On the opposing end, we find diversity, where all things are different from every other thing else. The old ways of thinking about "balance" is no longer valid in this description...why? Because the most balanced state is the most inert, homogenous state, where all things are completely equal to one another and all process in this spectrum go from heterogeneity to homogeneity. This is why one of the thermodynamic laws is that entropy always increases, and it's why our coffee always disperses from a beautiful swirly milky mixture into a homogenous brown liquid....it's the inevitable way of the world, in which a homogenous state is what all things are eventually heading for. It goes even deeper then that... because we haven't even touched on scale invariance, which is how these processes are invariant at all scales, and that all systems are really moving between homogenous and heterogenous constantly by utilizing the next scale above or below it (That a heterogenous or homogenous system on one scale is homogenous or heterogenous on a larger one), and that this is the only way systems are able to actually do work, by exploiting the entropy of the system above or below it. but essentially the old way of using the word "balance" is not sufficient to describe anymore, actual behaviors of things in the world. It's okay to say it in a sentence but when you try to describe a real process, you simply can't say the word "balance" without being wrong in some way, and so you have to say it in accordance with what we now understand. A perfectly homogenous system can't evolve without some sort of heterogenous catalyst...Fortnite is a good example of a near homogenous game. It is in essence perfectly balanced, but there is one heterogenous component...and that component is the decision in which where you land in the game effects the outcome of the rest of the game. This allows a system of components to evolve from a maximally heterogenous state (The state in which all players have chosen different locations) to a convergent and collapsing homogenous state, where all players eventually meet and kill each other to see which of them will be the winner. The storm isn't even a necessary component to make this process happen, it simply makes this convergence happen faster and in a finite amount of time. If you were to zoom out on this process, you'd see that the end convergent state is just the same homogenous state as what the game began with at a different scale before the heterogeneity was introduced. So you started with 100 homogenous players all in the same place (the bus) and you now have just 1 homogenous player in a place on the island. Both of these states here are equivalent to each other because the system no longer evolves...and if you think about it of course they would be equivalent right... just as equivalent if it was 1000 players on the bus, or a million...eventually there will be just 1 at the end of the game. And this is a critical component to understanding why both aspects of homogenous and heterogenous things have to exist in a game. So it's very archaic way to think about this...but essentially without diversity (heterogeneity) a system can not change. and perfect balance (homogeneity) is the heat death of change...if I were to make a rudimentary analogy, Diversity is like being alive, while balance is like being dead. All things in nature live and die, and you need things to die in order to live...and it's a cycle. The optimal strategy is the eventual collapse to a single meta build. Now how is that a bad thing? Well aside from that mathematically it is inert and prevents the system from evolving, it is just not fun for everyone to play the same build on the same class. This is what we want to avoid...people don't like seeing 10 scourges each match, and people don't like when the counter-play to scourge...is another scourge. There is also common theme in everything here, and it's about time. Thermodynamics spells out for us that a system moving toward equilibrium is inert in that it no longer has the ability to do work. In complexity theory, the same kind of entropy exists, in which there is a maximal complex state where things are computationally inert. If the ability to do work, or the ability for a system to evolve is defined by us reaching an inevitable end state of a system, then it would be obvious that it's in our best interest to make the heterogenous evolution of a system take more time so that we can enjoy the heterogenous evolution of the game longer. Removing a choice, while reducing the total number of possible states, can in practice increase diversity, options, and slow down entropy. Banning meta-knight in Smash Bros Brawl made the game more interesting, because it was so strong that players were basically forced to pick certain characters (especially a mirror meta-knight) to counter it. And yet meta-knight was way less unbalanced than many things have been in gw2 (partially because there is no healing in that game), because a good player could still beat a good meta-knight on other characters, whereas in guild wars 2 it is not uncommon for actually unwinnable matchups to exist, especially in the case of builds with high sustain. Thats the equivalent to nerfing the top tier build. Its also only really true if one build is overcentralising, in somethign we can call a tier 0 format. And no, Meta-Knight was way more unbalanced than anything GW2 has ever seen. Its more unbalanced than most things, I can only think of 2 charactery ever as broken as they were.Absolutely not when it comes to 1v1, strict 1v1 balance just matters way more in a fighting game than a conquest 5v5 mode. Anyway, this specific point actually doesn't matter that much to the discussion. Fighting games are a different beast to MMOs. Fighting games by default tend to stagnate, its only recently that patches became a common thing.ALL games tend to stagnate, that's what JusticeRetroHunter has been trying to tell you.There is also the issue that its not even that simple. FighterZ has had a stagnant meta recently, with the silverback being the best character by a wide margin for months. And it decreased enjoyment of the game immensely. ??? Yes, so nerfing/removing silverback would probably increase enjoyment (but i don't know anything about that game), which was my point, that removing something (thereby reducing the number of absolute options) can result in an in-practice increase of options and/or enjoyment.

The class mechanic changes, tho I do not like that idea too You take berserker, and equip a dagger mainhand. Whats your F1?You stay core thief, you equip rifle. How does anything work on that build? etc.What wouldn't work on core thief rifle? Sure, it would be terrible bcs no stealth on dodge and steal puts you in melee and so on, but that's not a problem (it would only be a problem if it were too strong).

Okay, good discussion. Things that would need to be added: Berserker burst skill for dagger (1 total)More? Can't think of anything. Weaver dual skills don't depend on offhand. So far, seems very possible for expansion-worthy content.

?!??!????!???????????? Does meta druid use staff? Does meta daredevil use staff? Does Burn DH use longbow? Does meta tempest use warhorn? Does power herald use shield? Does condi chrono use shield? Does meta scourge use torch? Does meta reaper use greatsword???!!!?!?!?????!???

Off the top of my head, Mirage Axe arguably, Druid staff maybe?Mirage axe in what way? De-targeting? No, that exists on mirror images. Core thief with rifle would be pretty terrible. Its worse than DE rifle (which isnt already good), since you replace steal with one that gets you close, and you dont have anything you can do up close. Also you lack the ability to activate the stealth attack. A bigger worry to me would be something like burn guard getting access to Axe.That's true, it would be terrible, but that luckily isn't a problem, it would only be a problem if it would be too strong. This could be solved just by making it locked to one per loadout? Also, Staff/Rifle thief would be one of the worst builds ever imagined.Yeah you could limit it like that if it would become a problem, but I can't say I see it. For example, axe/shield mesmer doesn't sound like a particularly busted set in my opinion. Torch is mesmer's best offhand, not shield. But there could be a combination I'm forgetting on one of the classes. It would certainly help core engineer, to finally have a power weapon worth using. Though it might also be chaotic enough to cause issues.Some chaos is really fun - new expansions are chaotic, but also fun and refreshing.

Increases options & diversityDiversity and options improves balance (read JusticeRetroHunter)More fun and theory-craftingThey can still be paid content (unlocked by buying expansions) just as they are now.Would greatly benefit certain lacking professions, especially engineer.No reason not to.Discuss

Diversity and Balance are the same thing yes. The word "balance" is just misunderstood because of the history of the word : From probably since the early turn of the past millennia, the definition of balance has always meant placing two things on a scale, to try and see if the scale balances out. Back then, this was the primitive understanding for what made it possible to trade goods and make math calculations to determine the values of things for bartering... I have 5 chickens, they weigh the same as your 3 bags of seeds, therefor its an equivalent trade. Balance back then, was also used in a religious contexts such as the saying, "the balance of nature" and that's a pretty common saying even to this day...but nobody really understood it and that's why "the balance of nature" remained in this sort of religious abstraction in history. Since then, people have gotten smarter, and by the time thermodynamics came about in the 1800's, balance was no longer a good way to describe what we see in the physical world. Systems live in a thermodynamic world, in which we make a heterogenous systems become homogenous through a process of entropy. We use these principles in order to do "work" and so a system in a homogenous state is essentially a state of a system that can no longer do work...and becomes inert. Balance of a system now meant that balance is an equilibrium of parts in a system where no part is different then any other part. By contrast, a heterogenous system, is the opposite...where all things are defined not by how the same they are, but rather how different things are from each other. In essence, balance and diversity live on a spectrum between two ends. One end is homogeneous and the other is heterogeneous. On the homogenous end we find all things in complete equilibrium...where all things are the same, and everything is completely equal. On the opposing end, we find diversity, where all things are different from every other thing else. The old ways of thinking about "balance" is no longer valid in this description...why? Because the most balanced state is the most inert, homogenous state, where all things are completely equal to one another and all process in this spectrum go from heterogeneity to homogeneity. This is why one of the thermodynamic laws is that entropy always increases, and it's why our coffee always disperses from a beautiful swirly milky mixture into a homogenous brown liquid....it's the inevitable way of the world, in which a homogenous state is what all things are eventually heading for. It goes even deeper then that... because we haven't even touched on scale invariance, which is how these processes are invariant at all scales, and that all systems are really moving between homogenous and heterogenous constantly by utilizing the next scale above or below it (That a heterogenous or homogenous system on one scale is homogenous or heterogenous on a larger one), and that this is the only way systems are able to actually do work, by exploiting the entropy of the system above or below it. but essentially the old way of using the word "balance" is not sufficient to describe anymore, actual behaviors of things in the world. It's okay to say it in a sentence but when you try to describe a real process, you simply can't say the word "balance" without being wrong in some way, and so you have to say it in accordance with what we now understand. A perfectly homogenous system can't evolve without some sort of heterogenous catalyst...Fortnite is a good example of a near homogenous game. It is in essence perfectly balanced, but there is one heterogenous component...and that component is the decision in which where you land in the game effects the outcome of the rest of the game. This allows a system of components to evolve from a maximally heterogenous state (The state in which all players have chosen different locations) to a convergent and collapsing homogenous state, where all players eventually meet and kill each other to see which of them will be the winner. The storm isn't even a necessary component to make this process happen, it simply makes this convergence happen faster and in a finite amount of time. If you were to zoom out on this process, you'd see that the end convergent state is just the same homogenous state as what the game began with at a different scale before the heterogeneity was introduced. So you started with 100 homogenous players all in the same place (the bus) and you now have just 1 homogenous player in a place on the island. Both of these states here are equivalent to each other because the system no longer evolves...and if you think about it of course they would be equivalent right... just as equivalent if it was 1000 players on the bus, or a million...eventually there will be just 1 at the end of the game. And this is a critical component to understanding why both aspects of homogenous and heterogenous things have to exist in a game. So it's very archaic way to think about this...but essentially without diversity (heterogeneity) a system can not change. and perfect balance (homogeneity) is the heat death of change...if I were to make a rudimentary analogy, Diversity is like being alive, while balance is like being dead. All things in nature live and die, and you need things to die in order to live...and it's a cycle. The optimal strategy is the eventual collapse to a single meta build. Now how is that a bad thing? Well aside from that mathematically it is inert and prevents the system from evolving, it is just not fun for everyone to play the same build on the same class. This is what we want to avoid...people don't like seeing 10 scourges each match, and people don't like when the counter-play to scourge...is another scourge. There is also common theme in everything here, and it's about time. Thermodynamics spells out for us that a system moving toward equilibrium is inert in that it no longer has the ability to do work. In complexity theory, the same kind of entropy exists, in which there is a maximal complex state where things are computationally inert. If the ability to do work, or the ability for a system to evolve is defined by us reaching an inevitable end state of a system, then it would be obvious that it's in our best interest to make the heterogenous evolution of a system take more time so that we can enjoy the heterogenous evolution of the game longer. The optimal strategy is not one single meta build. Ex there have been many metas where thief has been mandatory but stacking 5 thieves is obviously not optimal. Player psychology and preference is important. Helseth doesn't only play mesmer because he thinks it is the most optimal spec in every scenario, and if you know Smash Bros. Melee, amsa doesn't play yoshi and axe doesn't play pikachu because these are the most optimal characters.Removing a choice, while reducing the total number of possible states, can in practice increase diversity, options, and slow down entropy. Banning meta-knight in Smash Bros Brawl made the game more interesting, because it was so strong that players were basically forced to pick certain characters (especially a mirror meta-knight) to counter it. And yet meta-knight was way less unbalanced than many things have been in gw2 (partially because there is no healing in that game), because a good player could still beat a good meta-knight on other characters, whereas in guild wars 2 it is not uncommon for actually unwinnable matchups to exist, especially in the case of builds with high sustain.While the Melee meta keeps evolving somewhat, due to the game's good core mechanics, people have known since the first tier list in 2002 that Fox, Falco, Shiek, Marth are in the top tier of characters. And fox has been in the number one spot for 15 years. Yet despite getting zero balance patches since, this has not decreased enjoyment of the game, because the melee "inert state" turns out to be pretty good, because the other characters (or rather about half of them) are good enough. Thus there is an argument to be made that fun mechanics and enjoyable gameplay take precedence over what we might call a heterogenous state.I had more thoughts on this topic, maybe I'll type it out later but for now this will have to be enough.

quickness should get removed from self when you enter lich but otherwise it seems fine. it's kinda like genji ult in OW.

basically every fighting game

If you think DH is lacking good survivability then you're playing it wrong Do not really have any troubles as a power coreguard vs DH on g3 and p1. Rangers just obliterate the DH.It is now just about stealth and kiting; that is the only reason why they are good. If you remove it, then the only option is to go with Valor, but you will have your damage deducted. So, the DH will need to use "defensive" traitline to get more sustain at the price of it's damage? Are you serious about even thinking to complain about that? It's because playing the game is too hard. Most have been conditioned to think they can survive forever while doing insane damage. We've come this far just to have more useless complains. It's "slowing" down the game to remove damage that instant kills.. Wow who would have known, but when we had instant kills there was no build variety at all outside anything that.. You guessed it, could survive forever and do insane damage. Wdym, ever since the february megapatch, the game has been the easiest it has ever been. Just turn off your brain and spam off cooldown. The lack of damage means you cant ever be punished for any mistakes, and worse yet, because of the lack of damage, spamming everything off cooldown is not even a mistake. And no, we had great build variety pre-patch. Its now that build variety is severely lacking. Its not though. The february megapatch, and every change afterwards, was just a mistake. They could've just not made the megapatch. Or after seeing how overwhelmingly negative the response was, they couldve reverted the whole thing, admitted it was a mistake, and gone back to the drawing board. That wouldve been a "win" as you put it. No, that's just you. You and a handful of other loud voices have been waging this crusade, but I, and quite a few others, are of the opinion that the direction with the Feb patch was a good one. Whether everything SINCE then has been done well..... that's another topic. As multiple polls here, and player numbers in PvP have shown, its not "just me". In fact quite the opposite, its just you enjoying the new patch. We have had multiple polls about the february megapatch since. The best it had was 55% voting that it was bad, 45% that it was good, and that was right after it came out. Now? Its somewhere between a 66/33 split in favour of pre-patch being better to 75/25 in favour of pre-patch being better. Sure, there is a loud minority, including you, that believers the february patch was better, but the majority of players think its significantly worse. Its why player numbers went into an extreme downwards spiral right after it was implemented. Its not terribly complicated. Spammy isnt about how often you can use it, but if you use it off-cooldown, or not. Sure pre-patch cooldowns were shorter. But you couldnt just use them off cooldown. You had to wait for the right opportunity to use them. If you didnt, you died. Now? Damage is so low that both mistiming cooldowns can't really be punished, but also you just straight up cant wait, your damage is already low, delay it more and you might even fail to kill with a +1. So you use everything off-cooldown. Thats spammy. People are bored of the game mode, and they're tired of learning a build only to have it nerfed. Thats always been true, thats not the reason. People also arent bored of the gamemode, theyre bored of the current state. Its pretty easy to debate. Balance is worse, and its the primary reason population is so low. That and it just not being fun with how low damage is.source on pvp player numbers? Besides the top of the ladder being lower and more sparse, you mean? Or, yknow, the playerbase being so small, the matchmaking system is no longer functioning correctly, as is the ranking system? Its pretty obvious the playerbase its the lowest its ever been.i don't know if the playerbase is smaller, larger, or the same as before, which is why i asked for a source. maybe we can ask ben or cmc. 2. when it comes to tournaments, inhouses, etc the top end is better now than before. Someone is petty.it's called hyperbole

To have viable 1v1 builds available on every class, you have to design the game a certain way. GW2 was absolutely not designed this way, PvP was viewed as interaction of opposing teams. Both game design and later balancing efforts aimed to make 5v5 the enjoyable, balanced experience.Teamfighting requires you to specialise into a role. Every class is better at different roles, for example a thief will never facetank the enemy damage in a teamfight, but it can outrun everything. This level of specialisation means some classes have the tools to 1v1, while others lack some of it, and a few unlucky ones cannot 1v1 at all. 1v1 in general is very basic and entry level PvP. This game aimed to be the new ESL hit(yeah i know, it sounds funny 8 years later, but they did start out with the intention), and serious&competetive PvP games usually revolve around competeing teams, so thats the enviroment the devswanted to create with this game aswell. who cares. 1v1 is still some of the most fun content this game has to offer. 1v1 miniseason please.

if you want to beat condi mirage, stop trying to fight it "normally" at the start of the duel. play defensive for 30 secs or something, when he has used shatters and signet of illusions he doesnt have much juice left. and be aware that if you avoid torch burn (or cleanse it), the majority of the damage comes from confusion, which has a very low duration, and can often be countered by not using many skills. also, kill clones if you see an opportunity to do so.

desert distortion

I don't want to play Spellbreaker. If Spellbreaker needs to be nerfed to balance the other two variants, then do it. Right now Spellbreaker is barely viable (as a sidenoder, it is inferior to several other classes; which, mind you would be fine if it could do anything other than sidenode meanderingly, see below) and the other two variants aren't. I don't want to nerf three classes just to balance my own. Give me a couple more seconds of damage mitigation and you can keep everything else where it is. Fair, but the expectation of damage delivered to ranger vs damage delivered to warrior skews the MU in the rangers favor (or, perhaps I should say the armor rating and hp difference doesn't justify warrior having to eat the damage). Fair. No.Fix the other two specs. war might not do great into ranger but it does better into prot holo than ranger does.

i agree with shao that diversity in regards to specialization choice is higher, at least for mesmer, where chrono mirage and core are all playable and have some advantages over one another. in previous patches (pre-feb but especially in early PoF and early HoT) core was just unplayable compared to mirage/chrono. and from what i've seen there is a similar case on most other professions (ele probably being the worst one, but then again weaver/tempest are both good and different from eachother so even ele is a 2/3).

wonder how many years it will take for the community to realise that downstate... kinda sucks.

If you think DH is lacking good survivability then you're playing it wrong Do not really have any troubles as a power coreguard vs DH on g3 and p1. Rangers just obliterate the DH.It is now just about stealth and kiting; that is the only reason why they are good. If you remove it, then the only option is to go with Valor, but you will have your damage deducted. So, the DH will need to use "defensive" traitline to get more sustain at the price of it's damage? Are you serious about even thinking to complain about that? It's because playing the game is too hard. Most have been conditioned to think they can survive forever while doing insane damage. We've come this far just to have more useless complains. It's "slowing" down the game to remove damage that instant kills.. Wow who would have known, but when we had instant kills there was no build variety at all outside anything that.. You guessed it, could survive forever and do insane damage. Wdym, ever since the february megapatch, the game has been the easiest it has ever been. Just turn off your brain and spam off cooldown. The lack of damage means you cant ever be punished for any mistakes, and worse yet, because of the lack of damage, spamming everything off cooldown is not even a mistake. And no, we had great build variety pre-patch. Its now that build variety is severely lacking. Its not though. The february megapatch, and every change afterwards, was just a mistake. They could've just not made the megapatch. Or after seeing how overwhelmingly negative the response was, they couldve reverted the whole thing, admitted it was a mistake, and gone back to the drawing board. That wouldve been a "win" as you put it. No, that's just you. You and a handful of other loud voices have been waging this crusade, but I, and quite a few others, are of the opinion that the direction with the Feb patch was a good one. Whether everything SINCE then has been done well..... that's another topic. As multiple polls here, and player numbers in PvP have shown, its not "just me". In fact quite the opposite, its just you enjoying the new patch. We have had multiple polls about the february megapatch since. The best it had was 55% voting that it was bad, 45% that it was good, and that was right after it came out. Now? Its somewhere between a 66/33 split in favour of pre-patch being better to 75/25 in favour of pre-patch being better. Sure, there is a loud minority, including you, that believers the february patch was better, but the majority of players think its significantly worse. Its why player numbers went into an extreme downwards spiral right after it was implemented. Its not terribly complicated. Spammy isnt about how often you can use it, but if you use it off-cooldown, or not. Sure pre-patch cooldowns were shorter. But you couldnt just use them off cooldown. You had to wait for the right opportunity to use them. If you didnt, you died. Now? Damage is so low that both mistiming cooldowns can't really be punished, but also you just straight up cant wait, your damage is already low, delay it more and you might even fail to kill with a +1. So you use everything off-cooldown. Thats spammy. People are bored of the game mode, and they're tired of learning a build only to have it nerfed. Thats always been true, thats not the reason. People also arent bored of the gamemode, theyre bored of the current state. Its pretty easy to debate. Balance is worse, and its the primary reason population is so low. That and it just not being fun with how low damage is.source on pvp player numbers? please ban unowen, literally nobody enjoys his posts

I already try that sadly... But the thing is if I try to +1 a node and dont kill the enemy player instantly, it seems I always get ganked by the thief at that point. I guess I overstay my welcome and Ideally I should rotate if I miss/whiff, right? The thing is > @Dadnir.5038 said: I'm playing core Power. I know its unforgiving but condis build are so boring to play... Also, It seems like mesmer is better with duo partner to actually help pressuring the thief when he jumps you. I feel like mesmer/thief has like the biggest rock/paper relation of any game I've played. Mesmer has powerful ability on loooonnng cooldown and miss easily if the person has blind, teleports (to follow your ports) or lots of evade which thief has it all... The only way I could possibly win/stall (more probable the latter) a equally skilled thief is dodging the opener steal burst. domi duel illu, or do you have chaos? No chaos, domi duel and illu. Probably might want to go chaos I guess? But I feel like I do no dmg when I go chaos line...nah stick with domi duel illu, it's a fun spec and you will learn the mechanics of the game better. vs thieves it's going to be difficult. you need sword/torch first of all. second, you need to have quick reactions and coutnerpressure them in the brief period after they open on you and before they reset via stealth etc. if the problem is that you are fighting someone else and getting +1d by thief, then you need to keep track of the enemy thief on the minimap and learn no-port spots (places you can stand where thieves cant steal on you) etc.

I already try that sadly... But the thing is if I try to +1 a node and dont kill the enemy player instantly, it seems I always get ganked by the thief at that point. I guess I overstay my welcome and Ideally I should rotate if I miss/whiff, right? The thing is > @Dadnir.5038 said: I'm playing core Power. I know its unforgiving but condis build are so boring to play... Also, It seems like mesmer is better with duo partner to actually help pressuring the thief when he jumps you. I feel like mesmer/thief has like the biggest rock/paper relation of any game I've played. Mesmer has powerful ability on loooonnng cooldown and miss easily if the person has blind, teleports (to follow your ports) or lots of evade which thief has it all... The only way I could possibly win/stall (more probable the latter) a equally skilled thief is dodging the opener steal burst. domi duel illu, or do you have chaos?

warrior has higher base health and armor than ranger and higher hps, it doesn't need to block as much

magic bullet has 1/2s cast time, very noticable sound queue and travel time My mistake there, it is 1/2 seconds. Still, i'm 90% sure the sound queue is unreactable considering it happens at the end of the animation, and the travel time, for all intents and purposes, may as well be instant, especially at close range. It's one of the fastest projectiles in the game. You also can't distinguish the sound from duelist. Even if it is possible to react to the sound, factoring in ping (mine is 64 for context), you'll end up wasting a dodges on duelist if you go by sound alone. I wouldn't nerf the stun duration though or anything like that, but I would move the sound queue back a bit and change the pitch. You could even reduce the cast time(hand waving) to 1/4 seconds, but give the bullet a 1/4 second delay before it fires (you could put a unique animation here). You'd actually end up buffing the ability in some cases since it'll be harder to interrupt, while making it a tad less frustrating. Magic bullet isn't the only ability I'd give this sort of treatment to btw, I wouldn't mind there being a sweeping pass on the game to improve clarity across the board.Spinal Shivers, for example would have a chilly mist swirl around the target before it hits. Battering ram would be an actual mechanical ram that does a headbutt animation on the target, ect. Your suggestion of the bullet "lingering" in the air for a bit is an interesting one. Though to be honest the main problem is that duelist animation is too similar.I don't think this is just mesmer problem it is kinda general problem with allot of ranged attacks in the game. For some reason mesmer has on of the good telegraphed ranged weapons, the GS, even though its supposed to be the class with the magic tricks, but it does have some iffy animations on other weapons. Stuff gets really wishy washy like for example ,Ranger Longbow or Warrior Rifle where every projectile looks like the basic attack. Yes definitely. They added the lb4 windup animation (spinning thing) a long time ago for this reason, which was a good change. Before that point-blank-shot just looked like a regular auto pretty much.

This. Druid has 2 dazes, and they're balanced by the fact one has a massive windup, the other places you in the danger zone (adjacent) to your targets. They are balanced by the fact that they have other uses besides daze, namely healing and stunbreak