Why Guild Wars 2 Especially Needs Low Intensity Builds

[Raffrey.5271]

14 minutes ago, anduriell.6280 said:

If that is your understanding fine. 

How would it fare  Qadim  against 80 peeps? so stop whining about difficult content in an 80 peeps instanced content,

Do you get my drift? 

That's the point.

You can only have up to 10 people against Qadim. While Shadow Behemoth, far more. Qadim is a raid boss, and should be treated as such. If you alone want to treat Shadow Behemoth like a very real raid boss, well, why not? Forcing it down everyone's throat is not okay.

[Kastagir.2146]

12 hours ago, KeoLegend.5132 said:

eso DESTROYED its leveling system because everything is so ridiculously easy that you just run on a dungeon, agro everyone, kill, get Skyshards and quest done, then leave and repeat ad nauseum.

 

GW2 for one has some challenge. You can't easily solo a Champ, you have a hard time against an Elite, you can't take Veterans lightly, etc. That makes content actually challenging. Also i love how difficulty slowly ramp ups from lv 1 to HoT and then other expansions. Players NEED to LEARN how to play and get better and better, thats the real progression and im very happy with the current difficulty of the game in Open World.

Yeah try ESO in regular gear instead of legendary. If ESO is so wrong then why is it's player base bigger than GW2. It's a known fact that the people that say ESO is so easy are the same meta type players that are here. They are the reason GW2 is struggling to keep new players. ESO caters to both the casual and meta players. The meta players have the raids and dungeon content. The overland content is for the real TES players that like to quest and explore. The overland content has the meta player complaining that its not catered to them. The meta player get the best gear in the game from the group content. Then they complain that the overland content is to easy.

Edited March 4, 2022 by wmtyrance.3571

[solemn.9670]

What is your profession.

I can find you a broken build that will make open world a complete joke for even the most crippled gamer.

This is a non-issue, Guild Wars 2 balance has never existed.

[Ashen.2907]

Luckily GW2 does have, has always had, LI builds.

[LKEY.9567]

Fortunatelly, every build can be low intensity build if you read your skills & traits description.

[Seraphis Zurvan.6839]

On 3/2/2022 at 7:55 AM, Gibson.4036 said:

The "massive" in MMO means a broad and diverse player base. In order to have the population everyone wants you have to have a mix of low and high skilled players, people who can play hours every day and people who log on for an hour or two a couple times a week. That means developers have to carefully thread the needle between challenging players with more skill and play time, while still accomodating players with less skill and playtime.

In the traditional MMO model, the gear treadmill and steadily increasing level cap actually help this happen.

It seems counterintuitive. Many casual GW2 players praise it for its static level cap and lack of gear treadmill. I'm one. I love that I could take a many year break and come back and not feel drastically left behind.

BUT

In other MMOs one of the main ways players with less time and skill manage content that is still challenging for players with more time and skill is by overleveling and overgearing content. A plyaer can hang out in an zone, doing every possible sidequest, maybe even farming mobs for XP if the game is built that way, until they are significantly higher level than the next area they need to explore. They can go deep into crafting, making the strongest possible armor for their level while more skilled players breeze through content on lower quality drops. They can wait until they are well past the level where a dungeon first opens to them and come back to do it.

GW2, with its downscaling, hard level cap, and lack of loot treadmill doesn't offer these options. That means builds are where players find the ability to scale the game to what they can do. And that's why low-skill, low-playtime players are disappointed and maybe even a little panicked. They currently don't see an alternative way to make their favorite game accessible again.

I have a feeling some of the reaction to the nerf to the "training wheels" builds will die down over time. This is because friendly high-skill, high-time investment players are even now exploring the new stat sets and e-specs. They will eventually find new builds that help them solo very hard content. They will share those with the community, and the low-skilled players will use them to cushion ordinary content so they can play again. Finally, if the HoT pattern is any indication, ArenaNet will at some point realize they're losing a decent portion of their players and adjust somehow. All of these things will help players play at their comfort level again.

IF they are still around.

This moment is a test on patience though. A low-skilled player, excited by all the previews of a new land, suddenly finds themselves having to rethink their builds instead of jumping into the new content they bought. On top of that, the build sites are challenging to deal with right now due to the API being down, so it's even difficult to go look up alternatives. Add to that a handful of players sneering "you can autoattack open world content and do fine" at them, which is blatantly false.

You do realize how many stat sets there are right? You do not have to follow what is on metabattle and snowcrows to be valid. They are templates recommended for certain content. They are by no means required to complete said content. The only time this is really necessary is in very high end PvE content, namely Raids, certain Strikes, and Tier 4 fractals. These are meant for the hardcore playerbase. And for raids, the only reason is because there is enrage timers, which means you need to kill your target quickly. It's not necessarily a matter of impatience, but rather because you are time limited.

I've been running open world entirely on Celestial Stats on Elementalist because of the difficulty. I swapped stats and build a bit, made myself far more defensive, and the problem was fixed. I was enjoying the content and killing targets in reasonable time.

People need to be willing to utilize the tools they are given and change a little. This game is all about adaptability and has been since before HoT. The whole berserker meta was because people are impatient, but it was not required to actually complete content. No need for complicated rotations and all that. If a player criticizes you for your choices of build in *open world*, they are about as dense as the words they say.

Also I really, REALLY, don't want to grind for more gear and all that. I spent a lot of time earning legendary gear so I wouldn't have to keep buying stuff. I work full time, I don't have the time to constantly play content just to reach the minimum level required for content.

[AoAkinari.9248]

On 3/2/2022 at 3:55 PM, Gibson.4036 said:

"you can autoattack open world content and do fine" at them, which is blatantly false.

There are builds doing exacly that, power staff thief, condi mirage with staff etc. Sure, wanna squeeze more then you do more, but with autoattacking you're doing 80% of benchmark so its kinda true. 

[Svarty.8019]

On 3/2/2022 at 6:28 PM, wmtyrance.3571 said:

ESO got this right. It's to bad that the devs here listened only to the hardcore player base and ignore the casual players. They would have a bigger population if they had. They could fix it if they really wanted too.

Indeed. The political will has to be present, and it's not.

[Seremela the Elf Mage.1748]

I think LI builds have a place in open world solo play, chill farming, unwinding doing some metas, world bosses, bounties
but not raids, not t4 fractals, not cms
Role requirement is more strict there and should be because there are limited number of slots and certain party compositions to make things go quickly and smoothly. If you're taking a slot where you're expected to provide full uptime of a buff, please do, dont bring 40% uptime or say on joining you're "quickness" or "alac" but actually on a dps build that doesn't provide the boon at all. If you're joining as "heals" don't swap to something else partway through because it's too intense and say nothing. Don't join as a low intensity "dps" and pull less damage than the supports. I'm not asking for benchmark numbers here, just for players to put in the effort to carry their own weight on their role when joining groups for raids, cms, and fractals. If you want the rewards, learn your job for the encounter instead of joining groups and expecting to leech off everyone else working even harder to carry deadweight.

[Svarty.8019]

On 3/2/2022 at 2:55 PM, Gibson.4036 said:

The "massive" in MMO means a broad and diverse player base. In order to have the population everyone wants you have to have a mix of low and high skilled players, 

I've been saying this for years to cries of derision and the usual infinite confused faces. 

Suffice to say, I agree with the OP.

[mythical.6315]

I don't believe that the game needs more of these "low-skill" or "lazy" builds.  There are already more than enough.

Edited May 8, 2022 by mythical.6315

[Teratus.2859]

Should check out Mukluk's youtube channel, he's got currently 8 videos showing off low intensity high DPS builds that a lot of people can pick up and play with ease.

If i'm not mistaken he mostly makes these to help people with physical limitations be able to play even the hardest content in Gw2 while being DPS viable.
Most of the builds rely mostly on Auto attacking with a few skills here and there and are still hitting between 20 and 30K dps range.

Here's one of the builds, he has a whole playslist setup which is easy to find.

 

Edited May 8, 2022 by Teratus.2859

[Hesione.9412]

20 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

Should check out Mukluk's youtube channel, he's got currently 8 videos showing off low intensity high DPS builds that a lot of people can pick up and play with ease.

If i'm not mistaken he mostly makes these to help people with physical limitations be able to play even the hardest content in Gw2 while being DPS viable.
Most of the builds rely mostly on Auto attacking with a few skills here and there and are still hitting between 20 and 30K dps range.

Here's one of the builds, he has a whole playslist setup which is easy to find.

 

I'm finding these videos helpful because I have a disability that means I can't play the 1 to 0 keys like a piano.

 

Not in response, to you, simply generally: I would love to know the overlap between players who complain about others having low DPS and the players who hate the LI builds.

[Teratus.2859]

On 5/9/2022 at 5:05 AM, Hesione.9412 said:

I'm finding these videos helpful because I have a disability that means I can't play the 1 to 0 keys like a piano.

 

Not in response, to you, simply generally: I would love to know the overlap between players who complain about others having low DPS and the players who hate the LI builds.

Missed this, sorry to reply so late.

 

I'm not sure tbh.
I know both players do exist, although i've personally not had many encounters with those who hate LI builds.
Plenty with the other though XD

If I were to guess I would say that people who hate LI builds probably feel like those builds diminish their own efforts.. basically they have to try hard to get their DPS numbers up where as someone else is just autoing and still doing high DPS.

Maybe they think it lazy.. or that players who are not putting in the same effort they are shouldn't be able to play the hardest content.. I can't say for sure.

 

The way I see it though Gw2 is not a hardcore MMO for the hardcore MMO player..

It is pretty much universally agreed by this community that Gw2 is a casual focused MMO.

And by being a casual focused MMO, I believe there should simply be no bar's (be they mechanical or player enforced) that prevents anyone from playing any content in this game, nor prevents them from playing it how they want to play it.

 

LI builds are imo exactly in the spirit of what Gw2 represents and has always encouraged.
Playing the game how you want to play it!

And the accessibility they provide to many people just makes them even more awesome and welcome in this game as far as I am concerned.

So I can't agree with anyone who would complain about LI builds, regardless of their reasons.

[ArchonWing.9480]

On 5/7/2022 at 5:15 PM, mythical.6315 said:

I don't believe that the game needs more of these "low-skill" or "lazy" builds.  There are already more than enough.

Well it does.

There are too many trait/utility choices in this game that don't do anything and causes a huge disparity of performance out of the gate. It's effectively just a trap.

At the very least it will rule out build issues so people can actually focus on mechanics and learn fights without being completely useless.

It would also make it easier to party up and get stuff done.

I would even go as far to suggest  making the game default to one of these builds with a level 80 boost, as it already tries to point them to something usable. Some people just don't care about the build side of things enough.

Edited May 31, 2022 by ArchonWing.9480

[Caliboom.3218]

Are raid players really that toxic?

"Noo, you can't just bring LI builds, your DPS will be "bad"! 30k dps isn't enough!" Crap like this is why I don't touch raids at all, because the raiding community is a toxic cesspool.

On a side note, I think rotations are a dumb mistake and I'm pretty sure that wasn't what Anet originally intended. Each skills is supposed to be used in certain situations, you're not supposed to use them in a super-specific order in order to maximize your DPS, that's just stupid. In fact, you can do raids with like 15k dps, it's just that it takes longer, but your average raider wants to do everything fast.

Edited May 31, 2022 by Caliboom.3218

[Linken.6345]

1 hour ago, Caliboom.3218 said:

Are raid players really that toxic?

"Noo, you can't just bring LI builds, your DPS will be "bad"! 30k dps isn't enough!" Crap like this is why I don't touch raids at all, because the raiding community is a toxic cesspool.

On a side note, I think rotations are a dumb mistake and I'm pretty sure that wasn't what Anet originally intended. Each skills is supposed to be used in certain situations, you're not supposed to use them in a super-specific order in order to maximize your DPS, that's just stupid. In fact, you can do raids with like 15k dps, it's just that it takes longer, but your average raider wants to do everything fast.

Problem is alot of play how I want player are 1-5k dps so yea and they still think that everything should be possible to complete for them.

I had a 2.5k dps warrior in whisper of jormag back in the day when it first released.

I told him his dps as a dps person needed to be about 6 times what he was doing or we wouldent make the time.

His answer was but I am surviving so what is the problem.

I told him you see that clock over there ticking down?

When it ticks down to zero we all die no matter how well we are surviving untill that time.

So continuing this fight is pointless at the present time, replaced him and did the fight after a couple of more trys learning to not murder people with chains.

[AliamRationem.5172]

2 hours ago, Caliboom.3218 said:

Are raid players really that toxic?

"Noo, you can't just bring LI builds, your DPS will be "bad"! 30k dps isn't enough!" Crap like this is why I don't touch raids at all, because the raiding community is a toxic cesspool.

On a side note, I think rotations are a dumb mistake and I'm pretty sure that wasn't what Anet originally intended. Each skills is supposed to be used in certain situations, you're not supposed to use them in a super-specific order in order to maximize your DPS, that's just stupid. In fact, you can do raids with like 15k dps, it's just that it takes longer, but your average raider wants to do everything fast.

The only way to get rid of rotations is to get rid of buttons to press.  If every build consisted of pressing 1 over and over there would be no rotations.  The moment you add buttons, however, you have a rotation (e.g. auto-attack, but then press 2 off cooldown).  The rotation represents the specific order in which skills can be utilized to maximize damage.  Having multiple skills is obviously intended and rotations are a natural consequence of that.

You're correct that you can do raids with less than maximum DPS, but you're missing the point.  Higher damage is desired because it increases your group's chances of succeeding at difficult content.   Lower damage subjects your group to dangerous mechanics more often and for longer periods of time thereby increasing your chances of failure.

That's not to say that the only way to play it is full on meta builds with perfect rotations.  However, I think there is quite a bit of space between that scenario and random stats, random build, and pushing buttons at random.  In my opinion, it's okay to set the bar higher than that for some content, in particular content that is specifically designed and fully intended to challenge players and expect more than that from them, as raids and challenge modes are.

[mythical.6315]

3 hours ago, Caliboom.3218 said:

Crap like this is why I don't touch raids at all, because the raiding community is a toxic cesspool.

I’ve seen more toxicity outside of the raiding community from those criticizing it. 

[Astralporing.1957]

9 hours ago, Linken.6345 said:

Problem is alot of play how I want player are 1-5k dps so yea and they still think that everything should be possible to complete for them.

Having players be given default builds that allow for higher dps would thus be a massive improvement.

Quote

I had a 2.5k dps warrior in whisper of jormag back in the day when it first released.

I told him his dps as a dps person needed to be about 6 times what he was doing or we wouldent make the time.

His answer was but I am surviving so what is the problem.

I told him you see that clock over there ticking down?

When it ticks down to zero we all die no matter how well we are surviving untill that time.

So continuing this fight is pointless at the present time, replaced him and did the fight after a couple of more trys learning to not murder people with chains.

Ironically, i was lately doing WoJ, and ended up having to kick the player with the highest dps. Because they could not be persuaded to stop killing everyone with chains. We ended up doing that fight with only 3 decent dps players (one was me on condi ranger, one was renegade alac, one was qfb). The rest was either subpar or tragic (or heal :P). We ended up clearing that fight without anyone dying however.

DPS helps, but in WoJ i'd prefer someone that can deal with mechanics well even if their dps isn't great over someone with much higher dps but failing those.

Unfortunately, many encounters are very much not like that. Often you do need that dps, so the existence of many, many players that are not only running builds with below-heal dps capability, but are completely unaware of this (or are aware, but have no idea how to change it) hurts the game deeply. And is one of the primary reasons why most of the OW has to be an afk-fest.

Basically, after nearly 10 years of this game's history, it's clear that if we want the game content to become more challenging, and for players to improve, just pushing them to do so is not enough. We would have to come up with methods to let them more easily improve on their own. And easy access to low intensity builds would be one of such mehods.

Edited June 1, 2022 by Astralporing.1957

[Gorem.8104]

1 hour ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Having players be given default builds that allow for higher dps would thus be a massive improvement.

Ironically, i was lately doing WoJ, and ended up having to kick the player with the highest dps. Because they could not be persuaded to stop killing everyone with chains. We ended up doing that fight with only 3 decent dps players (one was me on condi ranger, one was renegade alac, one was qfb). The rest was either subpar or tragic (or heal :P). We ended up clearing that fight without anyone dying however.

DPS helps, but in WoJ i'd prefer someone that can deal with mechanics well even if their dps isn't great over someone with much higher dps but failing those.

Unfortunately, many encounters are very much not like that. Often you do need that dps, so the existence of many, many players that are not only running builds with below-heal dps capability, but are completely unaware of this (or are aware, but have no idea how to change it) hurts the game deeply. And is one of the primary reasons why most of the OW has to be an afk-fest.

Basically, after nearly 10 years of this game's history, it's clear that if we want the game content to become more challenging, and for players to improve, just pushing them to do so is not enough. We would have to come up with methods to let them more easily improve on their own. And easy access to low intensity builds would be one of such mehods.

Yeah, literally swap DE meta for an event that opens up your talent tree and explains in detail what each trait option you have picked does for your class, would have done more to improve players gameplay. 
The first time a player asks in chat for a build for their class, and someone links one in game, that player is now tankier and doing more dps then they ever would have managed themselves. 
Forcing non-consensual raiding to casuals who wear random stats as they put on whatever gear suits em, using random traits, was just such a bad move to "teach" players to get better when you can get by through the entire games story without ever needing to improve anything. 

Also true on actual raid mechanics - I played Rift during its prime when it was a sub based game, a person who could do mechanics was wanted in the raid guilds so much harder then someone who did good dps but failed mechanics. Doesn't matter if your the top dps in the world if you can't do mechanics. Very different in GW2, where you can just outdps mechanics. Where we have seen the games "hardest" instanced content, be solo'd. Or when you have classes like Scourge who were face-tanking bosses and ignoring mechanics while facerolling over their keyboard and outdpsing people.

Couldn't do that in Legion for sure, you had to play your role, though that content was true you needed both great dps and at the same time pass all mechanics. GW2 has never been a raid game. Its a game that truly should have low intensity builds that stand the test of time. 

Edited June 1, 2022 by Gorem.8104

[standardFoe.2983]

There are so many LI builds already. I am disabled and find many builds have rotations that are beyond me, but I still have multiple classes for open world.

 

Both Metabattle and Guildjen have tried and tested builds for every class, spec and game mode. There are almost always difficulty ratings for the build as well as rotations examples and alternative gear options.

 

Also Hardstuck guild just had a competition for LI builds, there are two vids on mightyteapot's youtube available that are all about pressing as few keys as possible while offering good DPS.

 

Anet could do much better job with tool tips in-game but the devs don't need to go out of their way to make cheesy content since a minority of players can't research builds on their own and find one that works for them.

[Astralporing.1957]

2 hours ago, standardFoe.2983 said:

Anet could do much better job with tool tips in-game but the devs don't need to go out of their way to make cheesy content since a minority of players can't research builds on their own and find one that works for them.

Except it's not a minority of players, but a majority of them. Most players not only have never seen Metabattle, snowcrows or Guildjen, but probably never even heard about those sites. that's the reality this game has to deal with.

Basically, any teaching has to happen ingame, and all the informations given to players in order to help them improve have to also be given ingame (and in easy to access form). Without it, you can forget about thinking about improving the skill levels of players in the community.

[Gehenna.3625]

28 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Except it's not a minority of players, but a majority of them. Most players not only have never seen Metabattle, snowcrows or Guildjen, but probably never even heard about those sites. that's the reality this game has to deal with.

Basically, any teaching has to happen ingame, and all the informations given to players in order to help them improve have to also be given ingame (and in easy to access form). Without it, you can forget about thinking about improving the skill levels of players in the community.

Also there might be a majority of players that are not interested in improving their skill levels because they simply don't care about that aspect of the game. They just want to roam around the world and have fun (as they see it but that's also legit). And throughout this game's history that's been possible, especially since these players avoid structured group content like the plague as it is.

So why Anet is trying to get these people to raise their skill levels by making more difficult content in OW is beyond me. Or, for example, doing Strikes to get some things (turtle, tier 3 jade bot flight mod) that you can only use in OW is also beyond me.

They don't want to learn because they don't care about it. They want to keep playing the game their way and not be forced to do something they don't care about. And just because some people can't fathom people being like that doesn't mean there aren't a whole lot of them out there.

So I get that there are people with disabilities of some sort (I have a limited disability myself, causing me to have builds with higher survivability), but there are also a lot of players that simply don't care about the combat system. So in a game that has allowed them to play in a way to want them to be more involved in the combat system, is a bigger thing than many suspect.

[Astralporing.1957]

1 hour ago, Gehenna.3625 said:

Also there might be a majority of players that are not interested in improving their skill levels because they simply don't care about that aspect of the game.

That's a second thing.  You are right, of course, but that's a byproduct of the game design. In order to be able to expect an average player to keep improving, that improvement has to happen organically. Be something that just happens when you keep playing long enough. GW2 design does not allow for that. In here, improvement is something you need to specifically pursue along a path that is completely separate to the path you pursue for your gameplay.