Don't Nerf, Just buff

[Avatar.3568]

Yes Willy and harbinger are a Bit Stringer, but can we Just lift the Rest, Here and There maybe 1 Point in sustain for atm Not playable traits/specs or 4-5 Points in DMG, so we don't Shift in Bunkers, let us Go ham Not lam(e). The Points are more in a symbolic way, Just give buff to non guard necro classes

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

*cough* warrior *cough*

[Skoll.8650]

No keep nerfing the overperforming things, there's still so many unhealthy design and overpowered things in this game that still need to come down, but fly under the radar because the now hip hot things are taking the spotlight. Screw buffing, it makes the game awful and powercreeps things. Right now Willbender, Harbinger, Vindicator, and Ranger should totally get nerf bat into the dirt the next patch and there will be more work to be done after that.

[Zekent.3652]

Stop, nerfs and buffs are both needed at the same time.

Only buffs isn't the way to go, no one likes pvps with overtuned things everywhere LMAO.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

3 hours ago, Skoll.8650 said:

No keep nerfing the overperforming things, there's still so many unhealthy design and overpowered things in this game that still need to come down, but fly under the radar because the now hip hot things are taking the spotlight. Screw buffing, it makes the game awful and powercreeps things. Right now Willbender, Harbinger, Vindicator, and Ranger should totally get nerf bat into the dirt the next patch and there will be more work to be done after that.

A proponent of nerfing everything I see.

[Kuma.1503]

7 hours ago, Skoll.8650 said:

No keep nerfing the overperforming things, there's still so many unhealthy design and overpowered things in this game that still need to come down, but fly under the radar because the now hip hot things are taking the spotlight. Screw buffing, it makes the game awful and powercreeps things. Right now Willbender, Harbinger, Vindicator, and Ranger should totally get nerf bat into the dirt the next patch and there will be more work to be done after that.

Just give Willbender the Mechanist treatment. 

Make the virtues traitline not work on Willbender virtues... and this is the important part...

Don't add any tooltips that would imply that this is the case, so players can be extra confused if their traits not working is intentional or bugged.

And make their traited stunbreak not stunbreak. 

Also if you take willbender one of your heal skills doesn't work. It's a "trade-off" you see. If you want to use it, just don't run Willbender. 

None of these changes would be in any way detrimental to the health of the game If any problems arise  Just nerf everything else the same way. 

Powercreep reduced succesfully. 

 

(for legal purposes this is sarcasm)

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[Skoll.8650]

4 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

A proponent of nerfing everything I see.

Yes, because no one wants to agree, and everyone else thinks their main is the epitome of balance and fine at the same time crying broken about others so hack away at everything that's broken, overpowered, unhealthy design. When everyone is complaining how bad their stuff is because it was brought in line, that's a good indicator of there being actually balance. Then ofc we nerf whatever else that pops up being stupidly strong. 

 

 

18 minutes ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Just give Willbender the Mechanist treatment. 

Make the virtues traitline not work on Willbender virtues... and this is the important part...

Don't add any tooltips that would imply that this is the case, so players can be extra confused if their traits not working is intentional or bugged.

And make their traited stunbreak not stunbreak. 

Also if you take willbender one of your heal skills doesn't work. It's a "trade-off" you see. If you want to use it, just don't run Willbender. 

None of these changes would be in any way detrimental to the health of the game If any problems arise  Just nerf everything else the same way. 

Powercreep reduced succesfully. 

 

(for legal purposes this is sarcasm)

 

 

 

 

 

Shouldn't be sarcasm, Willbender is stupid broken and really just is pure powercreep. Virtue traitline should only be giving 1 or 2 seconds of boons at most and the condi cleanse should only be 1 and only for the willbender, their F3 and F1 should be getting damage cuts and increased animation wind up.   

Edited May 24, 2022 by Skoll.8650

[Kuma.1503]

26 minutes ago, Skoll.8650 said:

Shouldn't be sarcasm, Willbender is stupid broken and really just is pure powercreep. Virtue traitline should only be giving 1 or 2 seconds of boons at most and the condi cleanse should only be 1 and only for the willbender, their F3 and F1 should be getting damage cuts and increased animation wind up.   

Uhm...

I'm just going to assume you skimmed through my post because you went on to suggest changes that, while harsh, could at least be justifiable. 

To rephrase what I said. I'm not suggesting Anet nerf willbender numerically or mechanically. None of those would actually bring in "in-line" with some of the weakest skills or traits in the game. And since fixes or buffs are out of the equation...

That means breaking willbender as well as the Guardian core spec on a fundamental level.

Not in the "this is so OP kinda way" in the "Whoops I accidentally coded in a 1 where there should be a 0 and now interacting with a plant causes everyone in a 2000 unit radius to crash sort" of way. 

...Slight exaggeration of course, but you get my point. 

After 2 years of hacking away and overnerfing, sometimes to the point where things don't  function as they should. The only way to make everyone equal without buffing or fixing any of these problems (because that would be powercreep) is to break everyone equally. 

Soulbeast's smoke assault should fizzle like Unrelenting Assault

Ranger longbow and weaping shots should miss moving targets like poison dart volley

All projectiles should go on full CD when casted without line of sight like Sevenshot 

Traitlines not working with the Elite spec despite not stating that they should in the tooltip. 

Some skills and traits simply not working with the elite spec. Or sometimes just not working. Period. 

Mallyx with it's broken Resistance synergy should be the new gold standard. People killing themselves by sucking in guardian burns for trying to use their kit as intended should be standard gameplay design for all classes. 

Nerfs until all are equal. 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

3 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Uhm...

I'm just going to assume you skimmed through my post because you went on to suggest changes that, while harsh, could at least be justifiable. 

To rephrase what I said. I'm not suggesting Anet nerf willbender numerically or mechanically. None of those would actually bring in "in-line" with some of the weakest skills or traits in the game. And since fixes or buffs are out of the equation...

That means breaking willbender as well as the Guardian core spec on a fundamental level.

Not in the "this is so OP kinda way" in the "Whoops I accidentally coded in a 1 where there should be a 0 and now interacting with a plant causes everyone in a 2000 unit radius to crash sort" of way. 

...Slight exaggeration of course, but you get my point. 

After 2 years of hacking away and overnerfing, sometimes to the point where things don't  function as they should. The only way to make everyone equal without buffing or fixing any of these problems (because that would be powercreep) is to break everyone equally. 

Soulbeast's smoke assault should fizzle like Unrelenting Assault

Ranger longbow and weaping shots should miss moving targets like poison dart volley

All projectiles should go on full CD when casted without line of sight like Sevenshot 

Traitlines not working with the Elite spec despite not stating that they should in the tooltip. 

Some skills and traits simply not working with the elite spec. Or sometimes just not working. Period. 

Mallyx with it's broken Resistance synergy should be the new gold standard. People killing themselves by sucking in guardian burns for trying to use their kit as intended should be standard gameplay design for all classes. 

Nerfs until all are equal. 

 

 

This is why you see me harp so much on tradeoffs and how light some specs got off on them.

But yes, it extends even to this sort of borked up balance. I really wish Anet could afford a larger balance team to go through and take a hard look at the classes in detail and give them all a good polish while getting rid of all the extraneous 'tradeoffs' since they have proven unable to levy them equally.

[Bazsi.2734]

The thing is though, the powerlevel we want for the game to have(we includes the devs, and not all players obviously), willbendy and harbi are way above that. 
Just one example, is deadeye as strong a combat presence as willbender? No? Then buff it's damage, since thats pretty much all it has going for it anyway. Buff it some more! Still not good enough? More! Oh look it can oneshot again. Game is ruined. We cannot go this route.
 

[Khalisto.5780]

I think the level of dmg is ok when talking about wb e hb, their sustain is a bit overtuned and i would not like to see all classes matching those numbers

[JunkJunk.8971]

no no no.. this is how we get power creep.. Nerfs are good..  Looking at you harbi and willy

[Kuma.1503]

Tbh both extremes are bad. We need a balance of both. The last 2.5 years balance has been heavily skewed towards nerfs and that creats just as many balance problems as the dreaded powercreep everyone is afraid of. 

There are a lot of things in the game that need work. 

Staff ele, core engi, core mesmer... If we genuinely brought everyone down to this level, the population would drop off even more than it already has. 

I say this as someone who still plays core engi in spite of how terrible it is. Nerfing everyone down to that level would mean I can play my favorite core class competetively again... 

But at what cost?

Edited May 24, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[semak.7481]

31 minutes ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Staff ele, core engi, core mesmer... If we genuinely brought everyone down to this level, the population would drop off even more than it already has. 

Imagine if they actually buff classes that are bad, and these who continue to play their class year after year, wouldnt these facerollers who swap to WB/harb/whatever class is broken wouldnt weep in tears that these became OP when they are in the hands of the someone who plays it for like over 7 years 🤔

[Wyrdern.4092]

While I love elementalist staff, I feel like It would be a balance nightmare to make it a viable weapon choice without a pretty heavy rework due to the amount of AoE vomit it can produce.

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

2 hours ago, salogel.1869 said:

While I love elementalist staff, I feel like It would be a balance nightmare to make it a viable weapon choice without a pretty heavy rework due to the amount of AoE vomit it can produce.

Yep. If staff got buffed we still wouldnt see ranged dps eles, it would just become the weapon of choice for support tempests since they are the only build that can make good use of it. The thing needs a rework. But sadly this is the state of most things in gw2. Buffing and nerfing coefficients just shifts things over to the next degen meta.

[UNOwen.7132]

Yeah, right now we need to stop nerfing and start buffing. The game is in a hilariously powerdipped state. Classes havent been this weak in the entire history of this game pre-february megapatch. Its sad. 

[Shao.7236]

They made the choice of nerfing, bringing new things in line is more logical than having to make everything else play catch up.

 

Not saying anything doesn't need buffs/tweaks but let's not ask to have things even more convoluted given the track record of anet at balancing, it is going to only make things worst if they start buffing randomly everything.

Outside new things, prior to EoD we had a fairly balanced game with a few broken things that could have used attention, which is still the way to go if we want something reasonable.

Edited May 24, 2022 by Shao.7236

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

9 hours ago, Bazsi.2734 said:

The thing is though, the powerlevel we want for the game to have(we includes the devs, and not all players obviously), willbendy and harbi are way above that. 

They really aren't, they're just the defacto strongest in the current meta because everything else has been nerfed too drastically.

Clearly our benefactors agree, that's why they didn't touch them both last balance patch.

9 hours ago, Bazsi.2734 said:

Just one example, is deadeye as strong a combat presence as willbender? No? Then buff it's damage, since thats pretty much all it has going for it anyway. Buff it some more! Still not good enough? More! Oh look it can oneshot again. Game is ruined. We cannot go this route.
 

This seems a bit dishonest. Deadeye is a terrible example because deadeye is annoying to fight against regardless if its strong or weak.

Pretty much everyone will probably read that and go "Ohhh, they're right. I don't like fighting deadeye. Nerfs all the way."

Even though that even with damage buffs, deadeye probably wouldn't be all that overpowered. Making DJ blockable was the best change without being a crippling nerf, and that's all we ever needed.

2 hours ago, Shao.7236 said:

Outside new things, prior to EoD we had a fairly balanced game with a few broken things that could have used attention, which is still the way to go if we want something reasonable.

Prior to EoD the game was whittled down to a bunker-filled slogfest.

Without a doubt, the worst period in PvP(and WvW from what I hear)'s history. It was neither balanced, nor fun in the least. 

If you played a bunker build just before EoD it was not uncommon to go ~5 matches straight without a single death. 

This is highly UNreasonable and brings us closer to a bunker meta which have historically been the worst and most outwardly rejected periods of balance over this game's history. IE bunker chrono, post-rework bunker scrapper, launch-state FB/Scourge. I feel the need to fetch my pillow just talking about them. 😴

[Bazsi.2734]

11 hours ago, Multicolorhipster.9751 said:

Clearly our benefactors agree, that's why they didn't touch them both last balance patch.

Clearly our "benefactors" have no time or resources(and arguably no desire either) to maintain this gamemode. If we were to extrapolate this logic that they are fine with whatever they do not change... that would be quite insulting to their intelligence.
 

12 hours ago, Multicolorhipster.9751 said:

This seems a bit dishonest. Deadeye is a terrible example because deadeye is annoying to fight against regardless if its strong or weak.

Pretty much everyone will probably read that and go "Ohhh, they're right. I don't like fighting deadeye. Nerfs all the way."

And here I thought I was making an appeal to consistency, turns out I was just being dishonest. What a crushing defeat. BUFFS ALL THE WAY!

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

3 minutes ago, Bazsi.2734 said:

Clearly our "benefactors" have no time or resources(and arguably no desire either) to maintain this gamemode. If we were to extrapolate this logic that they are fine with whatever they do not change... that would be quite insulting to their intelligence.
 

Is it still just 1 person handling PvP?

Golly, I hope they don't take it that way. 😦

I thought it was actually smart to take the new things that actually do damage and to let them keep doing damage while they try to bring some of the ticklers up to par. That's what I assumed they were going for by not touching it despite everyone telling them to touch it and I respect that.

3 minutes ago, Bazsi.2734 said:

And here I thought I was making an appeal to consistency, turns out I was just being dishonest. What a crushing defeat. BUFFS ALL THE WAY!

Amen

Anyone can change, you've seen it here.

[Vancho.8750]

On 5/25/2022 at 3:03 PM, Multicolorhipster.9751 said:

Is it still just 1 person handling PvP?

Golly, I hope they don't take it that way. 😦

I thought it was actually smart to take the new things that actually do damage and to let them keep doing damage while they try to bring some of the ticklers up to par. That's what I assumed they were going for by not touching it despite everyone telling them to touch it and I respect that.

Amen

Anyone can change, you've seen it here.

When, the 2020 patch dropped I thought to myself, they finally made a tool to control all the skills numerically with ease so they can roll changes faster since the patch was huge. But by the looks of it they kittening hard coded that kitten and it probably took the same time to go over everything by hand that could have been made futureproof with some basic CRM tool so a single person can change the numbers every week if they want to.

It seems that at the time of the lay offs anet lost the people that knew how the profession gameplay mechanics worked and how they could be changed, so there is only numerical changes and Arenanet never bothered to fix and streamline the gameplay systems.

So buffs or nerfs will not change much, since it is all numbers and it will just change just to the next 2 op builds and will not address the real issue with mechanical creep. People give good example as DE since no amount of number tweaks will make it fair, it will either be OP or garbage since the main mechanical gameplay loop is degenerate by design.    

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

Largely in agreement, save for this bit.

13 minutes ago, Vancho.8750 said:

So buffs or nerfs will not change much, since it is all numbers and it will just change just to the next 2 op builds and will not address the real issue with mechanical creep.

It most definitely will change things, just not in any sort of profound way.

For example, my cortisol levels have seen a steady increase ever since the 2/2020 patch.

 

Our benefactors might be limited to making no sort of mechanical changes, but they can still somewhat control the pacing of the game through damage nerfs and CD increases. Oh, and deleting amulets, sigils, runes, almost forgot.

Which; personally, I wish they wouldn't do. They don't have to buff either. If they can't make any sort of mechanical changes then i'm already uninterested and would prefer to just play with what's there already instead of being even more miserable.

Hands-off balance is the best sort of balance. When the devs of a game start negotiating with e-terrorists, then everyone involved starts to head down a slippery slope.

13 minutes ago, Vancho.8750 said:

People give good example as DE since no amount of number tweaks will make it fair, it will either be OP or garbage since the main mechanical gameplay loop is degenerate by design.    

I think this is a much better example of DE. Whether DE sees some damage nerfs or even buffs; heavens forbid, its always going to be annoying.

Damage nerfs/buffs just determine for how long their opponent is annoyed.

[SlayerXX.7138]

On 5/25/2022 at 1:33 AM, Multicolorhipster.9751 said:

This seems a bit dishonest. Deadeye is a terrible example because deadeye is annoying to fight against regardless if its strong or weak.

It only crystalize the issue. Lets stay at thief, what would you give a daredevil brawler as buff to be in line with willbender. A 2k health plate wearing Dps machine who has ports for days. Also blocks and a ton of self buffs. Don't forget the invulnerability if the situation gets dicy. It would be absurd. Tons of more damage. At least 1k Heals on successful evade etc. Also the balancing nightmare that occurs as there are ton of interaction that cant be foreseen.

Also what do you buff? Only the meta builds or everything? Does my daredevil brawler build get some love or will it be death as the buff wave end up cherry picking 2 meta builds per profession?

The whole idea of buffing everything does fall apart if you think 1 minute at what could go wrong.

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

2 hours ago, Albi.7250 said:

It only crystalize the issue. Lets stay at thief, what would you give a daredevil brawler as buff to be in line with willbender. A 2k health plate wearing Dps machine who has ports for days.

If I was in charge of balancing; and i'm not, the first thing i'd probably do is revert a lot of the nerfs to daredevil and core thief over the past 2 years.

Specifically:

-The CD increases to their healing and and utility skills. Some of them were made ludicrously long to recharge with CmC's glorious and safe balancing.

-The initiative cost of some skills like [Infiltrator's Arrow] so that thief can teleport and do damage at more even amounts with willis, and decreasing the likelihood of getting caught by willis with low initiative. This would also help thief perform their role better in general.

-Undo CmC's Signet of Agility nerf of +25 endurance back to the original +50. That would help out DD specifically a lot.

-Spider venom count back up to 6 for the utility skill slot version

-New traits to replace those ugly 300s CD traits

-Increase Escapist's Fortitude heal slightly. Maybe not back to the original value, but also not just barely in the triple digits.

 

There are some things i'd keep that I think CmC actually did right.(if i'm even thanking the right person here) Those would be changes like the one to black powder that made it an evadable attack. Changes to the functionalities of skills to introduce more potential counterplay while hardly changing the effectiveness of the skill itself. If adaption fails, that's the only time where nerfs might be necessary.

As to what buffs to give to DD/core thief, that would really be up to people that play either. I don't. The last time I played thief in PvP in any capacity was 5 years ago, not counting the EOD beta test.

I feel like it would be a bit disrespectful to introduce a kitten ton of buffs or nerfs to a class that I don't play without any sort of community feedback. I guess that is the difference between the nerf father and I.

2 hours ago, Albi.7250 said:

Also what do you buff? Only the meta builds or everything? Does my daredevil brawler build get some love or will it be death as the buff wave end up cherry picking 2 meta builds per profession?

First of all, at least 2 meta builds per profession actually sounds pretty dope. We haven't had anything remotely close to that in 2 years because nerfing and removing build options is objectively detrimental to build diversity. 

Really, the entire concept of 'balance' is the antithesis to build diversity and creativity itself because 'balancing' entails making everything more 'fair' and samey.

 

Buff/rework the weak though, I say. The strong should serve as examples of what went right at best, or what not to do a second time at worst.

That should go beyond just how 'balanced' something is too. Fun & enjoyment should also be considered, moreso than just how strong or weak something is. If something is widely considered unfun to play as or against, then that should always be looked at first.

2 hours ago, Albi.7250 said:

The whole idea of buffing everything does fall apart if you think 1 minute at what could go wrong.

So does pretty much everything else in life.