Stop ruining new Elite Specs with trade-offs, cast times and insane aftercasts

[Genesis.5169]

3 minutes ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

 People said they the same thing for dragonhunter at the HoT beta but then they buffed it before the launch and it's become stupidly overpower.

 

Futhermore, a e-spec like Vituoso may stay forever crap in it's core in pvp but it's better than have a forever overpower Scourge 

I just want to say nobody gets class hate like mesmers even when they bad mesmers always in the conversation.

[Mik.3401]

6 minutes ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

 People said they the same thing for dragonhunter at the HoT beta but then they buffed it before the launch and it's become stupidly overpower.

 

Futhermore, a e-spec like Vituoso may stay forever crap in it's core in pvp but it's better than have a forever overpower Scourge 

DH is still a guardian and became viable because of trapper rune. Virtuoso is a Mesmer and Mesmer is underperforming across the board - it has no core lines to back it up like guardian does. It is just crap and that’s it you are right

[mortrialus.3062]

32 minutes ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

 People said they the same thing for dragonhunter at the HoT beta but then they buffed it before the launch and it's become stupidly overpower.

 

Futhermore, a e-spec like Vituoso may stay forever crap in it's core in pvp but it's better than have a forever overpower Scourge 

Scourge on PoF release was more tolerable than necromancer as a whole has been post megabalance, because even though scourge was hilariously overpowered offensively, it lived in an ecosystem where lots of other things could kill it just as fast.  Scourge on it's own was a sitting duck and it needed to be baby sat by a firebrand support and that's when it would get truly unstoppable.

Which is absolutely better than balance now where we're seeing 40-60% necromancers every ranked game and Minionmancer was on both of the MAT finalist teams.  Necro as a whole right now is more dominant and overrepresented than scourge was at it's absolutely most broken. 

So in a heartbeat, I would take PoF scourge over EoD deliberately bad classes because even broken PoF scourge would still get slapped absolutely bullied by deadeye, daredevil, power mesmer, power and condi mirage, spellbreaker, core guard, fresh air weaver, core ranger, soulbeast, holosmith, 

Edited September 22, 2021 by mortrialus.3062

[Genesis.5169]

15 minutes ago, mortrialus.3062 said:

Scourge on PoF release was more tolerable than necromancer as a whole has been post megabalance, because even though scourge was hilariously overpowered offensively, it lived in an ecosystem where lots of other things could kill it just as fast.  Scourge on it's own was a sitting duck and it needed to be baby sat by a firebrand support and that's when it would get truly unstoppable.

Which is absolutely better than balance now where we're seeing 40-60% necromancers every ranked game and Minionmancer was on both of the MAT finalist teams.  Necro as a whole right now is more dominant and overrepresented than scourge was at it's absolutely most broken. 

 

I just want to say this is true, back when scourge was absolutely absurd and the forums were wild about it because we didn't have 2v2 and 3v3 i remember it well. We had debates about a class that had such massive area denial in a point holding game mode, crazy how necromancers made it out of that fine but symbol brand didn't. But ill say it again most these changes come from the forums and players Anet has no vision for the game what ever vision they had the tossed with with the HoT PvE nerf that change cascaded into every game mode.

[Jumpel.3972]

1 hour ago, mortrialus.3062 said:

So in a heartbeat, I would take PoF scourge over EoD deliberately bad classes because even broken PoF scourge would still get slapped absolutely bullied by deadeye, daredevil, power mesmer, power and condi mirage, spellbreaker, core guard, fresh air weaver, core ranger, soulbeast, holosmith, 

As an example, it would be ok for you to have bladesworn pair with a thief to be able to OS people from stealth in pvp  at EoD launch ? 

 

I would rather have an undertuned e-spec at launch then buff it and avoid to have an excessive synergy with other class like sourge/firebrand for PoF

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

Like Kuma said, trade offs need payoffs…otherwise the trade offs are just handicaps. Likewise, payoffs need trade offs otherwise you get busted, spammy and  generic gameplay. 
 

as someone that vividly advocates and stresses how important the correct implementation of trade offs are and how important they are to the balance of the game, seeing bad implementation of it is disappointing.

 

truth be told I haven’t logged into the game during this beta, but based on what I’ve heard and seen in the streams, I feel like Anet is trying…but dropping the ball…again due to a lack of understand how trade offs should be implemented and why getting it right, is absolutely critical. 
 

 

[Clownmug.8357]

Looking through all the feedback threads it seems like people have been conditioned to believe a spec is terrible if all the skills aren't instant / near-instant activation and deal tons of damage. I guess that's the result of trying to become an e-sport so hard for years and forcing twitchy gameplay to make the game look competitive.

[Allarius.5670]

I think a lot of what we are seeing is not a trade off design issue. I think what we are seeing is (1) learning curve, (2) a numbers issue, (3) missing quality of life tweaks, and (4) a lack of proper trade offs for existing elite specializations. 

 

2 and 3 are what the beta is all about. Numbers are a numbers fix. Quality of life (cast times, after cast, movement while casting, etc.) should smooth out gameplay where it feels clunky and disjointed. We saw the same problems for previous elite specializations and they didn't even have proper trade offs on release. 

 

4 is an issue that probably won't get enough attention until post-EoD release when we get promised full time balance resources.

 

HOWEVER, some of the design choices are all over the place and do need more work. For example, Catalyst doesn't even have a tradeoff and Hammer lacks fields and finishers to synergize with traits. Jade Sphere and Hammer can be made to FEEL better with number tweaks and quality of life alone, but the internal synergy is missing and needs more design time. Some of these inconsistencies are surprising, but I don't think their existence is unexpected.

Edited September 22, 2021 by Allarius.5670

[Aktium.9506]

18 hours ago, mortrialus.3062 said:

Might as well make it simple and just make the game mode core only. 

Sounds great. That enables them to bring up the rest of the Core classes to Core Guardian/Necro/Ranger levels. Then they can make the elite specs have proper tradeoffs this time while not being broken overpowered bandaid solutions to broken underpowered Cores.

[mortrialus.3062]

56 minutes ago, Aktium.9506 said:

Sounds great. That enables them to bring up the rest of the Core classes to Core Guardian/Necro/Ranger levels. Then they can make the elite specs have proper tradeoffs this time while not being broken overpowered bandaid solutions to broken underpowered Cores.

Because nothing was ever over powered in Vanilla GW2 and everyone was happy. 

The PvP scene would be completely dead if everyone was still playing the same classes and the same builds for 10 years. 

Edited September 22, 2021 by mortrialus.3062

[Genesis.5169]

58 minutes ago, Aktium.9506 said:

Sounds great. That enables them to bring up the rest of the Core classes to Core Guardian/Necro/Ranger levels. Then they can make the elite specs have proper tradeoffs this time while not being broken overpowered bandaid solutions to broken underpowered Cores.

 

All core class are fine even on mesmer (compared to the rest of mesmer not the game)

[DaZeeHero.5210]

People who cry for nerfs before something is even released properly are to be pitied as they clearly have low intelligence no self worth beyond their imagined game knowledge, and no respect for the fun of others or playstyle choices.

 

Just look at this, the new elite specs horribly bad compared to everything else and how did we get here? because Aenet made the mistake of listening to the worst possible people.

 

Protip to any and all game devs, NEVER EVER take advice from someone who asks for nerfs more than other adjustments or buffs.

[DaZeeHero.5210]

To clarify, "Adjustment" is a balance change that is not technically a nerf since the class or playstyle remains just as powerful in pretty much all the same ways, but changes its mechanics so as to eliminate or reduce some form of exploit or unintended consequence. this is what should be happening instead of most nerfs we see.

 

yes it is harder to do than making an entire spec or playstyle worthless, but it is also not going to kill the game long term like nerfs always do if they keep up.

[mortrialus.3062]

4 hours ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

As an example, it would be ok for you to have bladesworn pair with a thief to be able to OS people from stealth in pvp  at EoD launch ? 

That depends.

First, that's a whole lotta effort to down maybe one person who might just get immediately revived after the fact.  PoF had multiple one shot builds, from 60k Worldly Impact Soulbeast to a 30k Churning Earth Weaver, to 20k Gunflame Berserker.  None of them were very good, saw much use,  and were basically memes that sometimes nailed a couple of funny kills without having any impact on the meta as a whole.  And also because we had class balance that made sense, those meme builds were also just as easy to kill back.

And yeah those one shot builds existing weren't ideal, but they were nowhere near as bad for the game as Minionmancer and Double Port Reaper are right now.  And those builds are omnipresent in ranked and won the MAT.  They're unavoidable.  

On the other hand, one over powered build right before the Megabalance that was actually unhealthy was Shadow Arts DP thief after the rework.  With backstab and the reworked life steal traits from Shadow Arts they could get 14k backstabs (7k on the backstab + 7k in damage procs from Shadow Arts).  Not only this they had a reworked Smokescreen into a ring, giving them something like 33% uptime on a blind field that destroyed projectiles and was the size of Graveyard node.  And it comes with everything else that makes DP thief good, top tier mobility, stealth, steal.   It wasn't true oneshot but it was too much damage to have given to DP thief on Shadow Arts which was already a super survivable traitline, and was extremely self sufficient, had plenty of survivability thanks to Shadow Arts as a traitline. Unlike the meme one shot builds, it was actually good.

So it depends.  Is it actually good an meta defining is it actually reliable and self sufficient and survivable, or is it a meme that ultimately doesn't impact the game at large and all you can do with it is squeeze a couple of cheeky kills from people? Because it sounds like churning earth memes rather than actually good.

Just by the nature of of GW2's defensive orientated king of the hill game mode, anything really really overpowered defensively is way worse for the game than oneshot builds.

4 hours ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

I would rather have an undertuned e-spec at launch then buff it and avoid to have an excessive synergy with other class like sourge/firebrand for PoF

First of all, I'd rather see something that ambitiously changes the way a profession mechanic works in a way never seen before like Scourge than something like Virtuoso where its basically "you have shatters except they're the exact same as core time except worse in literally every regard especially damage. Love, -CMC"

The thing is, if you don't make sure something has the tools to succeed, then the only way it even can be good is if the numbers are busted. 

Just look at the design of Virtuoso dagger you have:

1.  A pure damage, low velocity projectile.

2.  A projectile that in order to do the maximum amount of damage you need to get into melee range, detarget the enemy, aim your camera to their feet, and then fire.  Low velocity.  No other utility.

3.  A slow moving projectile that fires slow moving projectiles.  No other utility.

Now compare this to some other simply more well thought out ranged weapon skills:

Ranger Longbow

1.  High Velocity Projectile

2.  Main damage skill, high velocity good at any range.

3.  Stealth to escape a target that gets close.

4.  Knockback to push a close target away or set up a burst with your main damage skill.

5.  A long range AOE cripple that is ground targeted, applies cripple to keep targets away, and can rack up 10k damage.

 

Deadeye Rifle:

1.  High Velocity Projectile

2.   Cripple / Immobilize to keep a target away from you.

3.  Main damage skill, high velocity good at any range.

4.  A massive blink backwards that can be spammed if targets get close / a projectile destroying wall if someone tries to attack you from range. 

These are just more complete kits that have ways to keep people away, do good damage at max range, and get away from the target should they close the gap.   Virtuoso Dagger has none of these and regardless on what offhand you have it doesn't make the kit as well rounded as those competitively.  You can get one stealth or one stun or one pull or one block, just one of those, so at most you can get 1/3rd the utility of these other just objectively better ranged weapons.  

Virtuoso simply does not have the tools to be an effective ranged damage dealer.  And sure maybe it'll get buffed but the only way you can make it good with the skills it currently has as it doesn't have any real built in strategy and utility to the weapon is to just make the numbers on it really big.

[DaZeeHero.5210]

Who or what is CMC sounds like a total BEEP on gaming.

[Stalima.5490]

11 hours ago, Vancho.8750 said:

I tested it on every trait, I don't want to be an kitten, but can you stop posting nonsense if you don't know what you are talking about.

 

I don't understand, all I was saying is that if the dragon trigger is allowed to do more damage, anet are stuck having to balance up an unblockable, unblindable stun that also doubles as a mega burst, thus they would have to nerf it down to it's current levels the problem there is that it rather messes up what I think the dragon trigger was supposed to be about.

[Lucentfir.7430]

9 minutes ago, DaZeeHero.5210 said:

Who or what is CMC sounds like a total BEEP on gaming.

Anet thought it was a good idea after they had to let go of their old balance team, to put a single person to fill in the entirety of the vacated team position. Also responsible for the 2020 February patch with lazy blanket nerfs and making hard cc do 7 damage, and intentionally breaking traitlines with 300s ICDs with that were supposed to be fixed well over a year now. 

[DaZeeHero.5210]

In response to dragon trigger, if you're talking about that one skill for bladesworn, I'd rather it do less damage and be faster and more often useable than do OP damage and be something that has a long cast time and recharge. that's not neccesarily a nerf in fact if it makes it more useable and still quite good it could end up a buff in most situations.

[Sindrener.1592]

Trade offs should be removed entirely, its a fkn huge mess thats all over the place. Some trade offs are considered trade off if its just a change in mechanic from core specs in example holo, herald etc but they are straight up just better. Meanwhile some classes recieves trade offs to essentially nerf the class cus they cant fix it? Some specs dont have their trade off in pve for example.. imagine a new player trying to pvp with this mess 😂 They also make it so much harder to balance around the trade offs as well.. its just lazy quickfixes everywhere 

 

 

[DaZeeHero.5210]

A trade off is just another way of saying "This class or spec can do one thing better than it can do some other thing" it can be done correctly and it can be done in a way that ruins the skill/spec/build type.

[Aktium.9506]

1 hour ago, mortrialus.3062 said:

Because nothing was ever over powered in Vanilla GW2 and everyone was happy.

Hell no. I hated, and still do hate, the old pre-HoT Cele meta. It was awful

That has nothing to do with the fact that before they even consider balancing elite specs, the core classes should be more balanced.

Elite specs being flat out better than core on any class as much as it is for some classes is a complete travesty.

[ClickToKill.8473]

I haven't played all of the current testing e-specs yet, but I had a lot of fun with the last 3.  You do have to remember every beta class we are getting is unpolished and is still currently being worked on by Anet, so changes will happen. 

 

Trade-offs are something Anet was planning since the HoT e-specs, but some of the HoT specs didn't get trade-offs.  Only later did they hit the over-performing specs with trade-offs in the form of nerfs. 

[DaZeeHero.5210]

Yeah I don't think elite specs should be significantly superior overall to core specs. however I don't think elite specs need nerfing overall either, but some core specs need help.

 

Each elite spec should have its own gameplay possibilities it enhances. Like how Mirage enhances clones and Chronomancer adds all kinds of new group buffs and debuff potential. Reaper adds to the survivability and hybrid gameplay of necromancer, similar to how Scrapper does for engineer, while Scourge goes further down support route and Holosmith goes to high melee dps territory.

 

These elite specs still have aspects of support and survivability, as they should, but add more functionality to specific aspects of gameplay.

[mortrialus.3062]

1 minute ago, Aktium.9506 said:

Hell no. I hated, and still do hate, the old pre-HoT Cele meta. It was awful

That has nothing to do with the fact that before they even consider balancing elite specs, the core classes should be more balanced.

Elite specs being flat out better than core on any class as much as it is for some classes is a complete travesty.

There's always going to be tier lists and some classes / characters / builds will be on the top of the list while others on the bottom.  And we were way closer to balance before the megabalance than we are now, where at least every profession had one or more builds that was excellent for PvP. 

Like in the patch right before megabalance we had.

1.  Both Reaper and Core necro were both excellent, meta even, but weren't absolutely flooding the game. Scourge would have been good if it wasn't dealing with the loss of self shade.

2.  Support Tempest and Fire Weaver were excellent choices with Fire Weaver being the best sidenoder in the game. Core ele needed help.

3. Spellbreaker was excellent and core warrior was solid.  Beserker needed help after getting reworked and immediately nerfed.

4. Holo had 2 excellent builds, rifle and prot.  Scrapper had a number of solid but not excellent builds.  Core engineer needed help.

5. Firebrand had support and symbolbrand both of which were excellent.  Power core guard was gutted, but had a solid support build. DH was an okay C to B tier spec.

6. Revenant was still stuck with power herald which was meta.  Core could use help and renegade, like minionmancer, probably shouldn't be good in PvP in the first place.  At least Kalla legend shouldn't.

7.  Ranger had solid core and soulbeast builds but druid was struggling. 

8.  Thief was meta with Shadow Arts core.  DP daredevil and SD core were solid. 

9.  Condi Mirage was excellent and power core and mirage were solid.  Chronomancer was unviable after the removal of illusory persona. 

 

I'd go back to that in a heartbeat than the game we have no where ranked is a necro fiesta with matches being 40-60% necromancers.  And really the only core builds that were really really struggling were ele and engie and oh hey the megabalance didn't fix that.

[Blocki.4931]

Or, and you could take the approach that actually makes sense and doesn't just blatantly disrespect the entirety of the last two years, you tune them according to feedback gathered so that the ones that feel awful to play due to an abundance of those issues to be fixed.