Just gonna throw this out there

[AliamRationem.5172]

Just now, Obtena.7952 said:

Well, you know me ... I'm going to argue we have balance because classes are all viable for successful content completion ... unless you play with people that exclude you. 

Barring some sort of game-breaking bug, all classes will always be "balanced" by this metric.  Suffice it to say that I disagree.

 

[Obtena.7952]

6 minutes ago, Daddy.8125 said:

Problem is not that every specc is completely balanced, it's argued in a perfectly balanced game things would become bland as you would have no reason to ever try other things as nothing would motivate such a thing. 

The issue is balance patch's don't happen fast enough. Which makes meta stale, things need to change faster sadly. 

We know every specc will never be perfectly balanced when your pushing meta something will forever win. 

But guardians dominating a meta for 4 years is ludicrous

Patchs and balance changes highlights speccs and proffessions to people which draws attention and makes people want to try it which increases engagement with the game itself. 

That's why they're vital even if every balance patch doesn't "change the meta". 

Like staff mirage. It didn't change the meta even in its weeks of being crazy, but it did get a whole bunch of people messing around with mesmer. 

Scourges buffs, again meta wise it didn't change much however In pugs people started absolutely spamming it because it became rly strong in pugs and stuff. 

I don't think it's possible to balance EVERY spec though. Does anyone?

[AliamRationem.5172]

10 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

I don't think it's possible to balance EVERY spec though. Does anyone?

Like the person you responded to noted: "We know every specc will never be perfectly balanced when your pushing meta something will forever win." The fact that we will never achieve perfect balance is not an argument against balancing.

[Obtena.7952]

29 minutes ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

Like the person you responded to noted: "We know every specc will never be perfectly balanced when your pushing meta something will forever win." The fact that we will never achieve perfect balance is not an argument against balancing.

And yet, Anet does do balancing patches ... so what gives? I'm not arguing against balancing; that would be stupid because it happens. I'm arguing what the balancing target shouldn't be meta. If you believe that it shouldn't, there isn't a problem. if you believe it should, you will never be satisfied. 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

1 hour ago, Obtena.7952 said:

I don't think it's possible to balance EVERY spec though. Does anyone?

No it's just rotational changes rly one thing will always end up better and metas will build 

But if it changed more often it'd feel less punishing for example. 

If you play a elementalist and for 4 months your bottom of the totem pole and then 4 months we see a balance change and it becomes 3rd from the top of the totem pole and then 4 months after that it becomes the flavor of the month. 

As a example only. 

You wouldn't feel like ele is just useless long term. 

Now every balance patch ain't gonna shift a meta, but everytime you buff a specc or change something it will remind players it exists and they will try it out. Now maybe 2 weeks later they go back to their main. But it gives a 2 week breathing space which will help reverse burn out. 

It isn't about "perfect balance" its about changing things up enough to build engagement. 

Getting 3 elites per proffession + core simultaneously balanced will never exist you are correct there it's fundamentally impossible. However there's alot that could be criticed based on how often they actually release balance changes.

WoW has never been balanced yet due to the fact they launch a balance wave every tier of the game changes things up enough to satisfy the majority 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Puck.3697]

1 hour ago, Obtena.7952 said:

And yet, Anet does do balancing patches ... so what gives? I'm not arguing against balancing; that would be stupid because it happens. I'm arguing what the balancing target shouldn't be meta. If you believe that it shouldn't, there isn't a problem. if you believe it should, you will never be satisfied

The problem is Anet do a balance change every 8-12 months. 

Balance changes need to be more frequent. I mean how many balance change patch's has this game seen during PoFs life span?. 

Balancing needs to be happening on a 3/4 month cycle realistically. Like every mmorpg generally aims to achieve. 

Now ofcourse we could say that's because other models don't depend on shop to the same extent I.e wow and FFXIV with sub fees means there's less development on store month to month. 

So the time working and coding new items in shop items / skins / outfits etc etc will eat at their development time. 

However. 

If for example every 3 months they picked 4 speccs to change even. This would have a dramatically positive change onto the game. 

So for example if we see buffs/nerfs (depending where they are) on weaver, reaper, spellbreaker and scrapper once then 3 months later saw changes to tempest, deadeye, scourge, firebrand. Then 3 months later saw dragonhunter, core elementalist, core engineer and holosmith 

People would react positively compared to if 9 months of complaints built uptoo to changes to all 9 proffessions. 

This is because the forums become a echo chamber of problems with nothing altering the problem which builds anger in the community. 

Sometimes small but frequent nets a better reaction then big but yearly. 

The longer a problem exists, the lower population morale drops the more people who reroll, the faster they burn out if your population are just slowly rerolling guardian and they're being left to do so for 4 years, gradually the fact players are playing something they don't rly enjoy, but for QoL burn out becomes rapid and people stop engaging. 

Anet need to experiment with this more and start to edge closer to what keeps the players happy realistically. Because 1 balance patch a year isn't sufficing and the game is paying the price for that. 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Obtena.7952]

1 hour ago, Daddy.8125 said:

The problem is Anet do a balance change every 8-12 months. 

People would react positively compared to if 9 months of complaints built uptoo to changes to all 9 proffessions. 

 

 

 

 

 

 don't see why that's problem, especially if the balance target isn't meta for all classes. That's assuming people's complaints are actually addressed in the patches (which we know that can't happen in the first place)

I actually think that's a terrible idea to increase balancing patches, especially if it's just to mix things up a little. I think proponents of this 'meta mix up' on a 3-4 month schedule underestimate the importance of class integrity and overestimate the importance of meta in how the game works. There is no reason for this more frequent class changes when you realize that it doesn't actually accomplish the things people want. If people want to experience variety in classes, then they can just play another class, as intended. This is the whole reason we have 9 classes and especs. 

TLDR: it's a fallacy that more frequent balance patches create a balance situation people want. If the balance targets don't match some people's desires, NO amount of patches will result in those people being happy. 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Fueki.4753]

2 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

I don't think it's possible to balance EVERY spec though. Does anyone?

That's no reason to have Elementalist and Warrior stagnate in their current pitiful states though.

Even if balance cannot be achieved, closing the gaps between the outliers on both extreme ends should be aimed for.

 

 

[Obtena.7952]

9 minutes ago, Fueki.4753 said:

That's no reason to have Elementalist and Warrior stagnate in their current pitiful states though.

Even if balance cannot be achieved, closing the gaps between the outliers on both extreme ends should be aimed for.

 

 

Well, again, that depends on what Anet's targets are for balancing. We can't assume that Anet comes to the same conclusion about the 'pitiful state' of classes that we do ... because I have no doubt that their approach is based on a more comprehensive evaluation of the game than ours could ever be. 

300 second CD's? CC's that have little impact? Sure we get those things but if they don't affect Anet's measures of class balance, then they don't appear as big a problem in the grand scheme of things as they do for the individual that is affected by them. Maybe that is a problem, but it's not one that Anet seems to be willing to engage with us about. No amount of pouty "fix this" threads will affect that either. 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

9 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

 don't see why that's problem, especially if the balance target isn't meta for all classes. That's assuming people's complaints are actually addressed in the patches (which we know that can't happen in the first place)

I actually think that's a terrible idea to increase balancing patches, especially if it's just to mix things up a little. I think proponents of this 'meta mix up' on a 3-4 month schedule underestimate the importance of class integrity and overestimate the importance of meta in how the game works. There is no reason for this more frequent class changes when you realize that it doesn't actually accomplish the things people want. If people want to experience variety in classes, then they can just play another class, as intended. This is the whole reason we have 9 classes and especs. 

TLDR: it's a fallacy that more frequent balance patches create a balance situation people want. If the balance targets don't match some people's desires, NO amount of patches will result in those people being happy. 

Your missing my meaning here. 

What a vocal minority of players want is a perfectly balanced game. 

What the majority want is just something to change. 

A example:. 

Staff mirage, after it's balance changes even tho it was never used in a meta comp, how many people, how many videos and how much advertising did Anet get from those changes?. 

Huge amount. Not because staff mirage became a meta, but because it changed and with changes came people who rolled mesmers logged into mesmer and more. 

And yes after a while people stopped playing it again because it's not meta. But that split change created a abundance of fun, jokes and memes to be spread across a playerbase of both inactive and active amounts of changes. 

You don't get frequent changes because you beleive Ur gonna see meta changes every 4 weeks. Atleast if your sane u wouldn't think that. 

You get frequent changes to encourage players and motivate players to engage with Alt characters. 99% of a mmorpgs replayability value is built on spike changes which make the playerbase test new things out. 

I'm not fighting for balance here. The games never gonna be balanced and Ur never gonna get every specc into the meta. 

The point is changes = fun. It builds a unknown effectively for the playerbase to retry figure out builds and test it out 

Also on a rotational value where 2/3 speccs were focused on for the balancing patch would defintly increase. 

What most want : 

guardian and necromancer to be nerfed. 

THat alone would effectively be praised and upsell this game. The positive reactions would amass advertisement in itself 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[ScottBroChill.3254]

Here comes Obtena to steam-roll every discussion into "nothing needs to be done because it is the way it is" without any constructive criticism's of the games developement and balance, the main two topics of the forum. Swear she (or he) is a paid Anet troll. 

[Obtena.7952]

9 hours ago, Daddy.8125 said:

Your missing my meaning here. 

What a vocal minority of players want is a perfectly balanced game. 

What the majority want is just something to change. 

 

OK then forget about balance:  Let's just talk about people wanting a change. That's REALLY unlikely ... because class design has integrity. I mean, do you really think people want their favoured classes to change how they work every 3-4 months? I don't think they do. People put LOTS of work into learning and equipping their favoured classes and determining things like meta and how to use the classes. I think changing classes just for the sake of it through patches at the proposed frequency would actually be criminal and extremely undesirable by most people. 

If people want a change of pace that bad, play a different class. That's the intention of what these 9 classes and their 3 especs are there for. 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

4 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

OK forget about balance: People just want a change. Is there is no appreciation for class design integrity? I mean, do you really think people want their favoured classes to change how they work every 3-4 months? I don't think they do. People put LOTS of work into learning and equipping their favoured classes and determining things like meta and how to use the classes. I think changing classes just for the sake of it through patches at the proposed frequency would actually be criminal and extremely undesirable by most people. 

 If people want change that bad, play a different class. That's the intention of what these 9 classes and their 3 especs are there for. 

Not reworked no. 

But u can buff areas of speccs and proffessions to increase how they excel. 

You don't need to rework a specc to increase its power. 

Staff mirage and scourge both didn't require changing only buffs. 

[Obtena.7952]

1 minute ago, Daddy.8125 said:

Not reworked no. 

But u can buff areas of speccs and proffessions to increase how they excel. 

You don't need to rework a specc to increase its power. 

Staff mirage and scourge both didn't require changing only buffs. 

That's a nothing change though. I mean, you see a different DPS number float over your head. It's an illusion; it's not meaningful. Whether I hit a skill and it gives me 300 or 350 DPS ... is not going to satisfy that idea of getting a change.  

Again, people want change, but what does that actually mean? Well, IMO, if it doesn't impact how someone plays, then the change is pretty low value to a player. 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

1 minute ago, Obtena.7952 said:

That's a nothing change though. I mean, you see a different DPS number float over your head. It's an illusion; it's not meaningful. Whether I hit a skill and it gives me 300 or 350 DPS ... is not going to satisfy that idea of getting a change.  

Alot of people play things based on their power actually so no it will motivate plenty. 

It isn't "coincidence" that necro guardian and revenant double any other proffessions playrates statistically. 

It's because their super strong and people play them to win. 

Lots of sites which prove the proffession playrate very much is based on what's strong currently. 

Staff mirage had over 100 videos after 2 days of those "nothing changes". 

[Obtena.7952]

2 minutes ago, Daddy.8125 said:

Alot of people play things based on their power actually so no it will motivate plenty. 

It isn't "coincidence" that necro guardian and revenant double any other proffessions playrates statistically. 

It's because their super strong and people play them to win. 

Lots of sites which prove the proffession playrate very much is based on what's strong currently. 

Staff mirage had over 100 videos after 2 days of those "nothing changes". 

What I'm reading here: Let's power creep to be happy and call it 'just want a change'. 

let's call a spade a spade here. No one want a change in skill parameters just for the hell of it. IF it's not performance-related, people won't care about it. 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

2 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

What I'm reading here: Let's power creep to be happy and call it 'just want a change'. 

Staff mirage didn't power creep at all. It never was stronger then revenant or chrono builds. Mirage power wise didn't change. 

What did change was a ranged option. Thus brought players 

New playstyles are far more hype then "meta" or power, it's only because the metas become stale and dull that people just spam whatevers strongest til burnout 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[SeTect.5918]

19 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

OK forget about balance: People just want a change. Is there is no appreciation for class design integrity? I mean, do you really think people want their classes to change how they work every 3-4 months? I don't think they do. People put LOTS of work into learning and equipping their favoured classes. I think changing classes just for the sake of it through patches at this frequency would actually be criminal. 

95% of rotations and builds stay same even after balance patches. So they wont need to learn a new rota.
Except if people swap class because their class lost 1k dps. - Which should not be the case. Then ofc they have to learn a new rota bc they play a new class.

Now lets say....I play engi, I main engi.
Lets say that they buff explosions and firearms that condi holo deals 37k dps (Just an example) what would change?
Nothing would change, rota stays same. Equip stays same....Where the problem?

People dont want full reworks. They want their class to have good sustain or damage. And not something like power weaver which has 0 sustain and still deals same dmg as all other classes. They would want a sustain increase.
What happens if you buff air traitline sustain in minor traits? Power ele sustain increases. Without increasing dps or making anything else broken. They just get what they want and are happy.
No equip change, no build change, no rota change.
Just more fun playing power weaver without being 1hit everywhere.

Edited January 9, 2022 by SeTect.5918

[Obtena.7952]

25 minutes ago, Daddy.8125 said:

Staff mirage didn't power creep at all. It never was stronger then revenant or chrono builds. Mirage power wise didn't change. 

What did change was a ranged option. Thus brought players 

Of course it was. When Anet changed staff mirage ... it was definitely improved over it's previous version ... I know, I played both. 

Whether it was stronger than something else is irrelevant. I mean, are we talking about changes just for sake of having a change, or have you gone back to talking about changes for performance? Again, we have to stick to the reason we are going to discuss. 

I think anyone who wants change just for the sake of it is fooling themselves; just play another class.

I think anyone who wants change to push to be meta is fooling themselves; clearly Anet isn't doing that. 

So what is left? Changes for performance and changes for theme ... and we see that in what Anet describes in the latest patch notes.

Let's be perfectly honest here: The OP is not just looking for change for 'variety' or 'for the sake of change' ... these kinds of threads are crying out for performance improvements. 

 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Obtena.7952]

9 minutes ago, SeTect.5918 said:

95% of rotations and builds stay same even after balance patches. So they wont need to learn a new rota.
Except if people swap class because their class lost 1k dps. - Which should not be the case. Then ofc they have to learn a new rota bc they play a new class.

Now lets say....I play engi, I main engi.
Lets say that they buff explosions and firearms so hard that condi holo deals 40k dps (Just an example) what would change?
Nothing would change, rota stays same. Equip stays same....Where the problem?

People dont want full reworks. They want their class to have good sustain or damage. And not something like power weaver which has 0 sustain and still deals same dmg as all other classes. They would want a sustain increase.
What happens if you buff air traitline sustain in minor traits? Power ele sustain increases. Without increasing dps or making anything else broken. They just get what they want and are happy.
No equip change, no build change, no rota change.
Just more fun playing power weaver without being 1hit everywhere.

Sure ... but Anet does that already. I'm not saying it shouldn't happen. I'm saying that if we are going to have a discussion about it, we have to honest to ourselves. We see from the patch notes the reasons Anet changes classes:

1. It's not played enough (or it's played too much)

2. It doesn't work like they want it to work

If a class/spec/build works like they want and it's played in the range they are happy with ... then it's reasonable to think it's 'done' and it will get less attention. We have to accept that at SOME point, things settle to a more stable state and are less likely to change. 

People might not be happy with some things that may be in a stable state. People call for change in those situations ... the problem is that they aren't using the same measures that Anet seem to be using to determine if change is needed. 

I don't think it makes sense to appeal to "what would be the harm if THIS change happened" ... if a change doesn't result in affecting how people play, that change is questionable in the first place. 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Jski.6180]

Well we are nearing the 3 year mark for a real balance patch and the game has become more and more meta only classes the last update did nothing in a real way to add more classes to that meta and in a lot of ways we lost classes. Sure there where some add on to classes not in that meta but even with though add on we did not see these classes move to the meta use.

This game is stagnate as that far worst then not being balanced. Every thing anet dose is not mixing things up at all we could call anets balancing a failed at all points from the "perfect" balancing to the "fun" balancing and or imperfect.

The only thing EoD seem to be doing is pushing dps power creep and cutting down on the number of meta classes of use. Sadly these are the same classes that are already the meta making the game look like its moving to a far more stagnate game play.

GW2 is about to become a 2 class game if its not already a 2 class game. Seeing how there are 7 other classes we can call this an objective failed on balancing.

[Puck.3697]

12 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

course it was. When Anet changed staff mirage ... it was definitely improved over it's previous version ... I know, I played both. 

Whether it was stronger than something else is irrelevant. I mean, are we talking about changes just for sake of having a change, or have you gone back to talking about changes for performance? Again, we have to stick to the reason we are going to discuss

Yes but power creep isn't the same as improving. 

For example, if A B and C do 40k DPS and option D is then buffed to also do 40k playing a equally DPS orintated build that isn't power creep. 

If option A B and C are buffed another 5k highef, tbat becomes power creep. 

Power creep is when the power line moves upwards. Not when underperforming options are caught up. 

Providing staff mirage didn't become a better renegade it was never gonna be a power creep. It was merely pushing staff mirage closer to current line of power. 

You have not innately made the group stronger by making staff mirage closer to renegade. Because renegade already has put it's line in the sand realistically. 

Balancing is actively reducing the margin of difference between options. 

For example. Reaper being buffed to say 38k DPS in a power build wouldn't be a power creep. As it isn't increasing the overall DPS of a raid. Or decreasing kill times as there are 40k power builds already accessible and the kill times are already based around those. It's merely adding another option in the same realms of power.

Most games chase a 10% difference between proffessions. 

So as a example, if the top power DPS option does 40k the lowest the DPS options should be 36k. Providing we are talking strictly berserker power builds and not builds which are for other purposes. 

You can't call it power creep if its not moving that bar. Staff mirage was improved yes, but it did not cause a power creep. 

For power creep to occur something has to actively become better then the current options. Which would move the bar of power upwards. 

I.e the exposed mechanic changes were a direct power creep because it increased the bar of Condi DPS across the board

100% boon uptime was a power creep because it was a direct improvement to all available options existing when it became s thing. 

10man buffs were a power creep because it lifted the whole bar of boon expectations across the board. 

These caused major net increases in overall damage and sustain which were not options prior their introduction. Causing a new level of role compression. 

If we want to see power creep driven backwards these things would need targetting and if we are gonna go down that whole I could list a whole lot of things I think need changing to improve those I.E 

- removal of 10 man buffs. 

- remove quickness from Firebrands kit. 

- make aegis self only. Nerf protection to 20% 

- nerf barrier per second for all speccs that access it. 

- increase the hybrid tax on offensive support builds 

- increase the CD on all these instant rezz skills. 

- nerf the exposed mechanic. Maybe change it from a DPS orintated thing to more break the bar to prevent a massive strike hitting as a example. 

These would all help push back the bar of power across the board and would reverse some of the damage it's done. 

I have said this since prior EoD or even the elites being shown. Launching new elites was a bad idea, imho I think reworking the current proffession and speccs and the old weapon kits would have been a far better move compared to launching more elites ontop of the broken mess. 

 

Edited January 10, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Puck.3697]

13 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

We see from the patch notes the reasons Anet changes classes:

1. It's not played enough (or it's played too much)

2. It doesn't work like they want it to work

The issue is there's actual direct proof this isn't the case.

Let's look, statistically. Necromancer, revenant and guardian are the most played proffessions in the game. 

The last major patch we had buffed all 3 of these options in some way effectively. Even tho CMC and more have already stated they know the power creep that all 3 of these are bad for the game and are not what they want. 

The least played proffessions are engineer, thief and elementalist. 

The latest patch's actually nerfed prot holo, buffed and then overnerfed thief hard and buffed Condi weaver to then nerf twice afterwards which bled into a slight nerf to power weaver also. 

These patch notes actually do the direct opposite of what you just stated. 

Necromancer revenant and guardian became far stronger through the changes despite the fact all 3 are overplayed options which the team have spoken against several times as being over the top and not what they want

While they over nerf the other 3 speccs which are barely played at all, which aren't responsible for any of the power creep they are speaking against. 

This would actually promote Anet over buffing popular easier to play options, not making changes based on playrates or what is over performing in their eyes. As they failed on both accounts. 

And before we blame "meta pushing" it isn't. The fastest fractal runs do not run scourge they ironically actually run 3x soulbeasts a renegade and a firebrand. 

And in raids firebrand isn't so strong because it's outdone by 10 man options while firebrand tends to dominant the 5 man content. 

So it isn't "meta" to explain why these proffessions are so highly played their just safe easy to play proffessions effectively. But Anet do nothing to try get the playerbase to expand past these 3 options. And do nothing but continously buff them regardless of popularity. 

There are 2 metas. 

Your top 1% player meta 

And average player meta. 

2x scourge 2x firebrand 1x renegade is the average player meta. And is the more popular meta because how strong these proffessions are success rate wise. 

3x soulbeast 1x DH 1x renegade is a top 1% meta because it's a faster kill but much harder to pull off 

If popularity was a factor in balance changes they would nerf based on the average player meta. But they didn't, they nerfed soulbeast and weaver. Proffessions only played in top player metas effectively. Which would promote actually Anet are nerfing based on the Top 1% meta which is the lower popularity area. 

What they did was buff Condi damage dramatically. Which actually is simply easier to play which increases the success rate. So if anything you could argue the changes were primarily to make competitive / raid / fractal content more accessible to the average player by promoting the overpopulated easier to play options the game already had. 

Which could be seen further as if this is the goal 

Why not spread this. 

Buff power weaver, Condi tempest to give elementalist easier to play speccs if they are buffing easier to play options for the sake of accessibility why not spread this. 

Edited January 10, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

Anets design and balance philosophy seems to have drastically changed a few years ago. They are really pushing for super easy playstyles with classes like scourge, scrapper, staff mirage, renegade, firebrand. Just look how they changed scrapper gyros, mirage staff ambush, mantras. Its all leading to a dumbed down game where everyone can just mash buttons or auto attack and complete all types of content. Its just weird that they seem to repeatedly ignore the fact that warrior and elementalist exist when making these kinds of changes.

 

[Puck.3697]

3 hours ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Anets design and balance philosophy seems to have drastically changed a few years ago. They are really pushing for super easy playstyles with classes like scourge, scrapper, staff mirage, renegade, firebrand. Just look how they changed scrapper gyros, mirage staff ambush, mantras. Its all leading to a dumbed down game where everyone can just mash buttons or auto attack and complete all types of content. Its just weird that they seem to repeatedly ignore the fact that warrior and elementalist exist when making these kinds of changes.

 

Well we say this. But most players can't play necro properly haha 

Tbh warriors also pretty easy to play. The problem with warrior is it's hard locked into banners and lacks flexibility

Id prolly go as far to say elementalist is the only proffession with any difficulty to it (Condi weaver)