Upcoming Balance Update

[Cave Rock.4869]

Thanks for the update Gaile, I am a patient person and can wait for the balance team to work their magic. Cheers for the hard work that the teams do, sending my support to those devs from Cave Rock and Bluevoltron42.

[kKagari.6804]

@Cave Rock.4869 said:Thanks for the update Gaile, I am a patient person and can wait for the balance team to work their magic. Cheers for the hard work that the teams do, sending my support to those devs from Cave Rock and Bluevoltron42.

It has nothing to do with patience.

[Vagrant.7206]

@"Cave Rock.4869" said:Thanks for the update Gaile, I am a patient person and can wait for the balance team to work their magic. Cheers for the hard work that the teams do, sending my support to those devs from Cave Rock and Bluevoltron42.

[markot.3946]

You had a decent expansion launch and then ruin it by waiting over a month to fix clearly broken balancing....

Well done?

And if you screw something up with this balance patch, what, its just another 3 months till the next one!

And if you are having trouble balancing so many classes and specs.... stop adding more as a feature? Maybe fix the ones that no one is playing instead of adding another 'elite' spec to furthur make balancing harder?

Also.... try communicating with your customers? You cant make a game an 'esport' just by saying it is. You need to acually engage your customers, explain things to them, tweak things in a timely fashion.

[Ayumi Spender.1082]

Wait. The balance would be just for PvP? Because I have 0 cares on the competitive part of this game.

[kKagari.6804]

http://www.dota2.com/duelingfates/

wow its almost like a massive joke now:

down the page you can read this: "To give everyone a chance to prepare, the first season will begin in two weeks." Even a game with solid balancing gives the population two weeks to prepare.

[Dyfinz.2348]

I didn't do too well last season, but I am not gonna put myself into the hole further. Will be skipping this season as it seems too chaotic as is and if the Anet team is waiting until the day season starts to release changes you can count me out. Also to the ones playing ESO... I started getting into it myself, playing a Nightblade lol.

[Maugetarr.6823]

@Gaile Gray.6029 said:A message from the Balance Team:

There seems to be some incorrect information and/or unfounded expectations surrounding the next balance update, so we’d like to shed a light on our plans:

The next balance update will not take place this week; it is scheduled to come out next week, on November 7. The release date still could change due to unforeseen circumstances or shenanigans beyond our control, but that is our plan right now.

Just a quick question. Would it be possible to implement sort of a rotational balancing schedule? Say every week a small balance patch is added for a single class. So we have classes 1-9; week 1, class 1 gets some minor buffs/nerfs to numbers (duration, stacks, cd) depending on what's under/overperforming. Week 2 class 2, week 3 class 3, and so on. So every 9 weeks you end up with all the classes having been adjusted and you get to see how the player base has reacted to the changes, and then week 11 you implement mechanics changes (traits, weapon skills) to all the classes if a trait proved impossible to balance through number changes. Then 2 weeks after that, at week 13 (effectively week 1), it starts all over again. You keep a schedule of all the classes every 3 months and can address problems that pop up faster. If something pops up that's game breaking on one class you can swap balancing that specific one for what was scheduled and push everything else back a week.

Edit: I realized this could come off as critical since it's not really easy to convey tone in a message like this. It was more of a suggestion that I thought might even out your work flow and help alleviate some criticism about slow balance updates.

[otto.5684]

@Gaile Gray.6029 said:A message from the Balance Team:

There seems to be some incorrect information and/or unfounded expectations surrounding the next balance update, so we’d like to shed a light on our plans:

The next balance update will not take place this week; it is scheduled to come out next week, on November 7. The release date still could change due to unforeseen circumstances or shenanigans beyond our control, but that is our plan right now.

Thanks for the update. I am not sure there was “incorrect” information. Clearly though there was a lack of communication which led to much unfounded expectations.

Hopefully this is a big patch. Majority of PoF elites are seriously unbalanced.

[ElderNewt.5840]

Least we have a date now.But more is needed Anet.. communication! ..At least show us some preview of the up and coming balance.. maybe even seek feedback before it goes live..

[Darknicrofia.2604]

Lets be honest here, the vast majority of the player base thinks the current balancing cadence a joke. Esports investors saw the hilarity of the lack of expediency at which season 1 pvp's bunker mesmer meta was handled and bailed. Something clearly is being lost between the player base, the rest of the gaming industry, and you.

I won't turn this into another flame topic of how you guys manage to churn out gem store skins of "choya on a stick" for 500 gems once every 2 weeks on the dot like clock work yet can't be bothered to address glaring balance issues for months on end, so I have this proposal for you:

How about you be blunt with us in terms of opportunity cost to your company's bottom line; give us a hard amount of gems/dollars the player base must spend/donate so you can spare a few resources from the bi-weekly gem store update to actually balance the rest of the game?

Make it a global goal display in game for all I care, "we are 50000/75000 gems away from a balance patch this week" would certainly be received better than "we reduced x skill's cooldown by 5 seconds, see you guys in 16 weeks"

Thanks.

[TheOrlyFactor.8341]

@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:Wait. The balance would be just for PvP? Because I have 0 cares on the competitive part of this game.

Same. I imagine that's where a lot of this rage is coming from. Really wish it would stay in the PvP section because this part of the forums has enough of its own bitterness to contend with. :x

[Razor.6392]

@kKagari.6804 said:

@shippage.1983 said:We really need more frequent, smaller patches. The off-season should be the dev's chance to test balance changes, not right as the season starts! Do they listen to player feedback?

Why bother having an off season at this point anyways?

This is the off season.

[Haishao.6851]

@Darknicrofia.2604 said:Lets be honest here, the vast majority of the player base thinks the current balancing cadence a joke. Esports investors saw the hilarity of the lack of expediency at which season 1 pvp's bunker mesmer meta was handled and bailed. Something clearly is being lost between the player base, the rest of the gaming industry, and you.

I won't turn this into another flame topic of how you guys manage to churn out gem store skins of "choya on a stick" for 500 gems once every 2 weeks on the dot like clock work yet can't be bothered to address glaring balance issues for months on end, so I have this proposal for you:

How about you be blunt with us in terms of opportunity cost to your company's bottom line; give us a hard amount of gems/dollars the player base must spend/donate so you can spare a few resources from the bi-weekly gem store update to actually balance the rest of the game?

Make it a global goal display in game for all I care, "we are 50000/75000 gems away from a balance patch this week" would certainly be received better than "we reduced x skill's cooldown by 5 seconds, see you guys in 16 weeks"

Thanks.

Will you be giving everyone gold so they can switch rune and armor stats every weeks as well?

[Lunateric.3708]

@Haishao.6851 said:Will you be giving everyone gold so they can switch rune and armor stats every weeks as well?

Not every balance patch means gear changes so I find that argument pretty weak.

[Fenom.9457]

Any S4 hints? hyppppppeeee

[Greener.6204]

Not all things in development are gated by money. Also, the last major update for skills was on August 8th, so just under 3 months ago. We've also only had the PoF skills to balance around since September 22nd.

[troops.8276]

@TheOrlyFactor.8341 said:

@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:Wait. The balance would be just for PvP? Because I have 0 cares on the competitive part of this game.

Same. I imagine that's where a lot of this rage is coming from. Really wish it would stay in the PvP section because this part of the forums has enough of its own bitterness to contend with. :x

I know it's weird right?What was all ways going to be an obviously unpopular announcement with the pvp community,Delivered in a very unapologetic way,By a highly experienced mod,In the main forum.

I cynical person might start reading things into that....good thing there's a strong community spirit here that goes well beyond the borders of pve v pvp.

[Vayne.8563]

Let's be honest here, the biggest majority of the player base of any MMO hasn't a clue about balance. No clue at all. Not even a little. There are people running around with necromancers that aren't complaining they're underpowered or nerfed because they just don't know. Do you think the biggest percentage of people who play MMOs visit forums or reddit or dulfy? I'm going to guess they don't.

A big portion solo and don't go outside the game at all. They run around and kill stuff and believe they're playing the game. So no I don't think the vast majority of people think the balance is a joke.

It's possible that a decent percentage of people who post here think the balance is a joke however, but even that's just a guess. In general, it's more likely that PvP players are more likely to complain about balance and we know 60% of the player base focuses soloy on PvE, so yeah.

Anyway, money isn't the reason balance changes aren't more frequent.

[Sarrs.4831]

Appreciate the heads up. Would really like it if we could get more of a lead on what the balance team is doing, though, and when we can expect changes in the future. I'm sure that PoF has been a big strain but it would be great to get some steady news on balance.

I'm actually curious how difficult it'd be to have a member of the balance team do a SOTG stream at the end of each season, and go over what they thought was good/bad/weird about the season. I'm sure they're quite busy but being able to pick their brains would be really nice.

@Karaeir.5097 said:...I think I have a Stellaris game to finish.

They've been teasing too much new stuff that I can't be satisfied with the current build. :(

[Ayumi Spender.1082]

@troops.8276 said:

@TheOrlyFactor.8341 said:

@Ayumi Spender.1082 said:Wait. The balance would be just for PvP? Because I have 0 cares on the competitive part of this game.

Same. I imagine that's where a lot of this rage is coming from. Really wish it would stay in the PvP section because this part of the forums has enough of its own bitterness to contend with. :x

I know it's weird right?What was all ways going to be an obviously unpopular announcement with the pvp community,Delivered in a very unapologetic way,By a highly experienced mod,In the main forum.

I cynical person might start reading things into that....good thing there's a strong community spirit here that goes well beyond the borders of pve v pvp.

I mainly asked as the only ones I'm hearing complain are about PvP and season this and season that.Which is why I'm curious.

Sorry I don't know how Arenanet does these whole balance patches or what they do them around, but that's why I'm curious if it's a pvp thing or an overall thing.

[Samug.6512]

This game needs more than 4 balance patches a year...

[Maunzi.3764]

Thank you for sharing the date. It is good to know that a balance patch IS incoming relatively soon.

Please also consider sharing details early, like your competitors do. It would solve a lot of anxiety problems we have right now. Perhaps drop one such post in every class forum, detailing the changes you have planned so far.

[XenesisII.1540]

Oh good taking another week to get it right.Please be sure to include more one shot skills for every class, terrible that a couple classes have the monopoly on this, thanks.

[Swadow.6213]

Frankly I see this as completely unacceptable. Putting balance patch on the same day as the start of the season heavily screws the start since there is no time at all to adjust to the changes.

Not only were some things already adjusted in the Halloween patch(Scourge mostly) but it was said to be not the balance pass which was supposedly coming soon, which was supposed to address the heavy nerfs caused by that patch to necro in PvE. Such things should not occur if you want to keep the balance patches 4 months apart. Either ditch the current system of balance coming slowly or make no changes at all to the balance between. And I quite frankly think the current system should be ditched and the frequency of balance patches needs to be atleast monthly.