Is PvP as bad as everyone is claiming it is?

[aserian.1734]

I am coming back from a bit of a hiatus. Originally I got to 80 (about a year ago) and just did some casual PvP. I never really got into it enough to know if it was good or bad, but life circumstances meant I ended up stopping for a while right after hitting 80. I am coming back to the game and I am mostly just interested in PvP. I might try PvE, but PvP will generally be my main focus. A lot of the threads I am reading since End of Dragons say that PvP is just completely ruined and terrible.

 

I was just wondering if it's overblown by forum trolls or if it really is that bad? I don't have a ton of time on my hands so I'd prefer to start a game where the PvP will be enjoyable.

Thanks for your time

[SlipLihte.1307]

As with most things, it's the most frustrated people that have the most reason to speak up, and as a result a lot of the most vocal communication tends to be quite negative.

 

Generally and technically, the game mode is fine, has a lot to enjoy, and can be quite interesting and challenging to learn. Along with instanced PvE content and open world meta events, it's some of my favourite personal content type. That said, there are currently two issues with the game mode.

 

Firstly, the sPvP player base is not that big. As a result, and due to the way the matchmaker works, you do get some games that are very poorly balanced. During prime hours it's not that bad, but outside those hours you could end up in matches that are extremely frustrating by how unbalanced (either for or against you) they are. It's not that extreme, and I would say I have about 3-5 well balanced games for everyone one that feels like this.

 

Secondly, it's generally felt that the current professions and elite specs are poorly balanced, with the new necromancer and guardian elite specs cited as being overtuned (which I personally agree with). There is a hope that in a major balance update planned to launch 28 June this will be rectified a bit. However, in a game with 9 professions, 27 elite specs, and varying skill levels, balance will always be a moving target and you may feel frustrated by not being able to play a profession you want at a very high level due to the profession's inherent balance limitations. That being said, your personal skill level is still a very big determinant in how far you can get, and some very good players are known to still play undertuned professions at high levels for fun.

 

If you can deal with these frustrations, and if you can get yourself to take a break form the game mode when it gets to you, it can be a lot of fun. However, I would not recommend it if you feel these issues are going to frustrate you a lot.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

Most people have two things to say about GW2's pvp:

1. Mechanically the GW2 pvp combat engine feels great to play. It might actually be the best pvp game of its genre when considering just the game's mechanics and general design.
2. However, Arenanet has allowed GW2 to become a den of cheaters and no longer tends to the competitive balance in the way that they should. Cheaters of all forms go unpunished and states of great imbalance will remain for months or years before anything is done to address these issues. They also just plainly haven't done any development for pvp in half a decade now. <- These 3 things are what people are talking about when they say the game is ruined.

Make of it what you want.

[lysico.1297]

Ranked is as bad as they say.    I still play it but it is full of cheaters, bots, and afk’ers.     Not to mention you have to completely overtuned classes in harbinger and willbender 

 

that said no other mmo has pvp combat like this.  So.

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

2 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Most people have two things to say about GW2's pvp:

1. Mechanically the GW2 pvp combat engine feels great to play. It might actually be the best pvp game of its genre when considering just the game's mechanics and general design.
2. However, Arenanet has allowed GW2 to become a den of cheaters and no longer tends to the competitive balance in the way that they should. Cheaters of all forms go unpunished and states of great imbalance will remain for months or years before anything is done to address these issues. They also just plainly haven't done any development for pvp in half a decade now. <- These 3 things are what people are talking about when they say the game is ruined.

Make of it what you want.

Yeah, this

Its got great potential and the best combat for MMO pvp

Pretty much zilch on the competitive side though because of the above-mentioned cheaters and very minimal dev attention.

 

If you were to quit PvP now and come back at the end of the year it would probably have barely changed since you last played it.

But if you enjoy what's there its easy to hold out through the content drought. Especially when you get hopelessly addicted and start logging in at reset every day for daily matches.

[Aodlop.1907]

4 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Mechanically the GW2 pvp combat engine feels great to play. It might actually be the best pvp game of its genre when considering just the game's mechanics and general design.

Nah. World of Warcraft has more depth and room for niche outplays and the skill gap between an average player and a great one really shows.

I love GW2 don't get me wrong, but it certainly does not have the best PvP combat out there. The fact that so many core rotational abilities feature a baked-in dodge also contributes to this since you can RNG dodge a big enemy cooldown by simply performing your normal rotation.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

there is still plenty of fun to be had as a new player, but walk into the situation with two eyes open.

[Tescao.3042]

57 minutes ago, Aodlop.1907 said:

Nah. World of Warcraft has more depth and room for niche outplays and the skill gap between an average player and a great one really shows.

I love GW2 don't get me wrong, but it certainly does not have the best PvP combat out there. The fact that so many core rotational abilities feature a baked-in dodge also contributes to this since you can RNG dodge a big enemy cooldown by simply performing your normal rotation.

 

The only paradox is that pvp is also "dead" there. People have become hostages of knowledge. RBG is still not played in two tanks (the second tank for pressure on the raid and guidance).

There is depth in gw2, it's just that the condi game and combo game are not fully disclosed. The power is graceful.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Tescao.3042

[Aodlop.1907]

1 minute ago, Tescao.3042 said:

The only paradox is that pvp is also "dead" there.

PvP is dead in general in MMOs. 

As for WoW, there are multiple reasons as to why it's currently dead when it could be thriving: class design has been immensely dumbed down since the release of Legion, and for the past few expansions, PvP players have been forced to engage in PvE activities multiple hours a week in order to stay relevant in PvP.

This has deterred a lot of players who would otherwise be playing WoW PvP right now, such as myself (hence my presence here) and my entire guild.

 

WoW PvP has thrived from WOTLK to MOP. Now it's gone severely downhill, and the Demon Hunter class is the embodiment of everything that is wrong with the current design philosophy of the game.

[Tescao.3042]

10 minutes ago, Aodlop.1907 said:

PvP is dead in general in MMOs. 

As for WoW, there are multiple reasons as to why it's currently dead when it could be thriving: class design has been immensely dumbed down since the release of Legion, and for the past few expansions, PvP players have been forced to engage in PvE activities multiple hours a week in order to stay relevant in PvP.

This has deterred a lot of players who would otherwise be playing WoW PvP right now, such as myself (hence my presence here) and my entire guild.

 

WoW PvP has thrived from WOTLK to MOP. Now it's gone severely downhill, and the Demon Hunter class is the embodiment of everything that is wrong with the current design philosophy of the game.

I'll tell you as the DK main, DK has become much more multi - faceted, most likely this applies to everyone. Now people don't know what Shadow Cleave (affli,unholly,Rdru) is, people don't understand that there is now a chaos play setup (dh, destro, healer), they don't even want to try it because such setups are different from the "popular" spam versions. In general, people know less than half of the possible setups.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Tescao.3042

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

1 hour ago, Aodlop.1907 said:

Nah. World of Warcraft has more depth and room for niche outplays and the skill gap between an average player and a great one really shows.

I love GW2 don't get me wrong, but it certainly does not have the best PvP combat out there. The fact that so many core rotational abilities feature a baked-in dodge also contributes to this since you can RNG dodge a big enemy cooldown by simply performing your normal rotation.

Gw2 pvp is bad, but wow pvp makes it look like a masterpiece.

[Lucentfir.7430]

6 minutes ago, Aodlop.1907 said:

Nah. World of Warcraft has more depth and room for niche outplays and the skill gap between an average player and a great one really shows.

I love GW2 don't get me wrong, but it certainly does not have the best PvP combat out there. The fact that so many core rotational abilities feature a baked-in dodge also contributes to this since you can RNG dodge a big enemy cooldown by simply performing your normal rotation.

The skill gaps are not absent here and often the gap is wide between average and very high skill players since skill here is attributed between: actual game knowledge, mechanical skill, reading people/animations, positional awareness, quick time micro decision making, mentally tracking resources(CDs, dodges, boons, build type). 

It's always going to be subjective on the topic of "Best pvp combat" because everyone has a sort of different combat taste, but Gw2's combat is one of the best if not the best amongst MMORPGs from play experience( for me at least).   I took a break from Gw2 for about a a year+ and played WoW, starting around the Naz'jatar release all the way to Shadowlands Season 1 end. WoW's PvP combat for me is some of the worse pvp I've played and I did my best to try and get into it and enjoy it, I gave it more than enough of a fair shake.  Between gear imbalances and combat style it just isn't for me, not to mention people have addons for pvp  that keep track of enemy CDs for them for things like Gladiator Medallion and what not.

Funny enough people whine about one shots and CC spam here, but probably don't know what it feels like to get bodied by a Ret Paladin Via Wings+ Templar's Verdict, Sub Rogue'd, Druid Convoked, etc in SL, or getting incapacitated for a long time (Some last about 10s in a game with Diminishing returns). 

[Tescao.3042]

I forgot to add that I don't even consider 2s how pvp, it only inflates the ego.

[Aodlop.1907]

51 minutes ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Gw2 pvp is bad, but wow pvp makes it look like a masterpiece.

Check this clip for literally 5 seconds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N65LuZsxcjo&t=185s

In this 5 seconds clip, the Priest uses a fear effect on the DK. To break this effect, the DK uses Lichborne, which temporarily gives him the "Undead" status. Noticing that the DK is now considered Undead, the Priest casts "Shackle undead" - a form of CC which can only be used on Undead. Quickly reacting, the DK manually removes "Lichborne" before it expires, thereby losing the undead status and preventing the Priests' CC effect from landing.

 

I miss this kind of stuff every day. Few games have as much niche interactions and outplay potential as WoW. 

Edited June 12, 2022 by Aodlop.1907

[Arveleg.2364]

PvP as a pure gameplay is great, but:

1. Community is toxic. In the past it wasn't that bad, I don't know why it changed that way, but people are doing kitten talk almost every match. It's really frustrating and I really wish there was some kind of control over that, something similar to FFXIV, maybe a little bit less harsh. Report function is in its state forgotten by Aneta. You could also argue that PvP as a whole is forgotten.

2. Matchmaking can be really annoying, especially nowadays with smaller player base in pvp. Its core design is bad, duo queue or class swapping should not be allowed. People are also queue dodging , win trading. There are many ways to abuse it.

[Tescao.3042]

3 hours ago, Aodlop.1907 said:

Check this clip for literally 5 seconds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N65LuZsxcjo&t=185s

In this 5 seconds clip, the Priest uses a fear effect on the DK. To break this effect, the DK uses Lichborne, which temporarily gives him the "Undead" status. Noticing that the DK is now considered Undead, the Priest casts "Shackle undead" - a form of CC which can only be used on Undead. Quickly reacting, the DK manually removes "Lichborne" before it expires, thereby losing the undead status and preventing the Priests' CC effect to land.

 

I miss this kind of stuff every day. Few games have as much niche interactions and outplay potential as WoW. 

Currently, people don't even seem to know that with the help of Lichborn, you can close hex, polymorph, rouge sap, but only a predict.

Blood DK has a pvp death chain for 3s. People don't know how to play in Blood DK, although I assume it's played with Shadow Priest(Representative of the Void Lords) for the Vampiric Cleave
Blood DK is what Nathrezim is.

Imagine how many opportunities are lost because of "knowledge"

Edited June 12, 2022 by Tescao.3042

[Fueki.4753]

GW2's sPvP really is as bad as people claim.

Match Manipulation, Cheating, afk'ing, botting and many other bad things flourish due to Arenanet refusing to regulate the mode.

Rather than trying to balance the mode, Arenanet makes sure that their favourite professions (Guardian and Necromancer) stay on top, while they keep Warrior bad on purpose.

The lack of players causes the match maker to be unable to assemble fair matches, causing 99% of matches being heavily lop-sided.

The best use for sPvP these days is to use it for dailies and to grind reward tracks for PvE rewards.

There's nothing competitive left in there, so if you want to compete properly with others, this is the wrong game.

[Ovark.2514]

sPvP is a game mode that lives and dies on having build diversity. Anet thinks "As long as there is a (1) build usable in high-end play for each class, PvP is in a healthy state." Consequently, there are anywhere from 33-66% of skills and traits on classes that are simply so bad for sPvP that no one will ever get out of gold with a build that uses them. This is why I think sPvP is, and has always been, in a downward spiral. Power politics means that Anet will only ever care about the PvE aspects of the game because those players are the ones that spend the most on the cash shop. No incentives=no change for sPvP.

[Tescao.3042]

1 hour ago, Tescao.3042 said:

Currently, people don't even seem to know that with the help of Lichborn, you can close hex, polymorph, rouge sap, but only a predict.

Blood DK has a pvp death chain for 3s. People don't know how to play in Blood DK, although I assume it's played with Shadow Priest(Representative of the Lords of the Void) for the Vampiric Cleave
Blood DK is what Nathrezim is.

Imagine how many opportunities are lost because of "knowledge"

In this setup, the enemies will put pressure on Priest.

Shadow Priest under pressure can swap health with Blood DK and send him to Purgatory for healing. Thousands of scenarios, a million possibilities.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Tescao.3042

[Cuks.8241]

So when people say spvp is full of win traders, bots and afkers I am a bit sceptical if they even play this mode.

Bots are present in lower tiers. I've seen a few when I started this game in low silver but now in higher tiers I dont see any bots. Its similar with afkers. Yes sometimes player will go afk. This is the case in any game. But repeated afkers will not climb the ranks. 

So if you intend to play spvp and actually improve yourself you will probably out rank bots and to some extent afkers very quickly.

Win trading is on the other end. Players in gold dont win trade. This is supposedly an issue at the top of the ranks. So unless you intend to push for the top this will not be an issue for you at all.

Matches can be lopsided. But the truth is, this is not uncommon for any game. People sometimes connect this with class balance or matchmaking too much. Games can snowball. If a team get initial advantage and knows how capitalise on it, the final score can be very lopsided but in truth the tipping point could be very close. 

As for comparison with Wow arena. Its a much different game. Wow is slower paced but more tactical, gw2 is faster and more action. I just got bored of arena quite fast, death match all the time. And I quit wow just when rated BGs came out. Dont know how that turned out. 

Also if now using stuff like shackle undead or scare beast on druids (I think I remembered the skill name correctly) is considered high skill...huh

Also Wow just gives you way more info and tools. And if you use addons you get even more. You have target and focus, can macro skills so you dont need re-targeting, the game gives you info what is the enemy casting... There are addons that can track CDs which I considered downright cheats and much more. You barely have to look at the animations. Gw2 you actually have to read the play. SO naturally in a vacuum the Wow play will sound much more tactical but in truth the game also plays itself much more.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Cuks.8241

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

3 hours ago, Cuks.8241 said:

Also if now using stuff like shackle undead or scare beast on druids (I think I remembered the skill name correctly) is considered high skill...huh

wow pvpers think item level = skill, so using situational cc must seem like genius level play.

[Downstate.4697]

Play it and form your own opinion because despite all its flaws I still enjoy pvp

[Khalisto.5780]

i still rate it as 6/10

 

-2 for reporting not working at all, so lower rank you are more afkers you get, they afk cuz they know nothing gonna happen

-1 patch frequency, you gonna fight those op builds for 6 month at least

-1 for not removing duo q that has been the main source of all match manipulation

 

-2 for the rport thing cuz in my experience this is the main thing making ppl quit, when they play 3 days in a row with the same afker and come to forums and find out that their report is doing nothing they just quit.

[Gibson.4036]

I’m a mid silver player, for context. YMMV

PvP on a random Tuesday morning is terrible. 500-75 matches, so many afkers.

PvP prime time weekend nights is awesome. Lots of 510-485 matches, edge of your seats fights, clever comebacks with good rotation.

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

I don't think it's bad to the point of being unsalvagable, or that it's not subject to a bit of hyperbole when it comes to class balancing.

 

A lot of the frustration comes from the fact that:

1. the satisfying combat system is constantly undermined by 2-3 classes that have some obvious fixes needed. 
2. the communication between patch notes is almost nonexistent, and when patches are pushed the language and direction used often do not target current issues, or create new ones altogether through reworking functionality that wasn't an issue beforehand.

I'm not going to go full toxic and say it's the worst it's ever been, but the balance team (if we even have one) definitely has some work to do, and they need to talk where we can hear them/be sturdy enough to tolerate critique when it's well-founded. 

 

Also make the roulette wheel for stage select dismissable. 99% of pvp vitriol is because we can't close it, guaranteed. The backend already chose the match, you don't need to screengrab for like 20 seconds to make us see what stage we're going to. I'm going to scream.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Azure The Heartless.3261