Playing a single class vs best in slot

[Mell.4873]

I feel like all the Gw2 forum complaints are based on this dynamic. For example I'm a Mesmer main and Support Chronomancer is not as good as HB support so I can either complain how bad Chronomancer or I can just play HB (which isn't going to happen). 

This extends to almost all classes, but I feel the true solution to this problem is to not compare them so much. I love Mesmer and if I have to play a worse HB to be a Support Mesmer, I would choose that any day over asking every class to match its standard. 

[LadyKitty.6120]

Thing is:

1. People want things to go smooth so they choose cookiecutter builds that are known to make things easy.

2. People want efficiency and, in case of GW2, are quite hellbent on that and that obviously leads to comparing cookiecutters versus builds with weaker kits for same role (even if said builds actually bring more to the fight in particular due to cookiecutter's specialties not being needed there).

3. People don't know better as not many know the full extent of their own class' capabilities (there's often some obscure interactions), not to mention knowing what all the other classes and their specific builds and how they interact with each other, often not even all the effective combos for their own build.

As such, they resort to the sites with info about the builds but since people mostly look at a certain speedrun guild which only lists what they specifically have use for which in this age of broken meta leads to people just comparing everything to what's on those sites and if the build is not on those sites, "it is trash" as Kitty's seen some say in the past since if a speedrun guild doesn't have an use for it, it's not effective. After all, effectiveness is all that matters, bosses must die before any mechs happen and for those that can't be avoided, hardcarry is needed through role compression. And since people don't want to waste time, bosses must die with 2/3 left on the enrage timer so squad gets to stand and wait for ready check faster after wiping to inadequate support 'cause DPS which wasn' t enough to skip all mechanics/killing the boss and waiting at next since people need to swap gears and characters for best in slot builds. (Note: Kitty's ridiculing that mentality, she personally is sick of it)

But with that mentality, not comparing isn't a solution and that mentality doesn't seem to change no matter what even if people knew better. The only way to increase accepted build variety with that mentality is bringing builds to same ballpark with equivalent advantages and trade-offs to what they can bring. Currently the subpar DPS builds (and esp. weapons) lack advantages and sometimes have massive trade-offs on top of that (abysmally low DPS, no support, melee range, hard rotation and supports low healing+hard trade-offs for dealing with mechs vs healing/booning, if there's even stab/aegis/projectile block available to begin with). Meanwhile some have advantages without trade-offs (DPS builds with big DPS, no skill needed, built-in support and long range and HAM+HB with massive support without meaningful trade-offs).

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

Play what you like. I carried tons of fractals with Transfusion power reaper which was anything but meta. What you play well > meta.

[Mell.4873]

32 minutes ago, LadyKitty.6120 said:

People want things to go smooth so they choose cookiecutter builds that are known to make things easy. 

Long post but I get the idea, honestly I think the game in its current state is still better than before EoD since Scourge and Firebrand dominated most end game content in terms of damage and support. 

The only room was Alacrity which had a tied pick with Mirage or Renegade. Anything is and improvment on that and I hope they keep improving other specs. 

[Mell.4873]

6 minutes ago, ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

Play what you like. I carried tons of fractals with Transfusion power reaper which was anything but meta. What you play well > meta.

Yeah my point exactly, very few people can commit more that two/three mains to muscle memory. 

I mean people laughed when I said it took me a full year to learn Mirage and then another year to learn Chrono (on and off playing) 

[GWstinkt.6094]

There are reasons to compare and complain. Builds need to be at least viable. You might be fine with playing a build that's worse than others, but when it gets so bad it becomes unplayable, that'll be an issue for you 😛

The top performing builds may also set the scene for content. If some builds can reliably push x amount of damage, healing or boons, then content may be designed around reaching those benchmarks. And weaker builds may fall behind newer content.

Lastly it does kind of ruin to fun for a lot of people. I agree that we shouldn't be hell bent on matching everyones numbers or pick rates. But performing well in combat is a big fun factor for a certain group of players and it ruins their fun if their ability to do well is tied to picking specific builds over others.

Personally I'd just like to see every elite spec at least support 1-2 builds that are genuinely good and viable. Doesn't really matter if they are top performers. Just need to be good enough and not too far behind.

[LadyKitty.6120]

1 hour ago, GWstinkt.6094 said:

Personally I'd just like to see every elite spec at least support 1-2 builds that are genuinely good and viable. Doesn't really matter if they are top performers. Just need to be good enough and not too far behind.

What Kitty personally wants to see is every spec being useable and also each weapon to have enough damage or support capabilities to be useable on some relevant build. Currently hammer on Guardian, Revenant and Warrior is so bad that Kitty's making legendary rifle, longbow and shortbow first even though hammer has twice as many potential users. Mace, rifle and off-hand sword on warr, daggers on spellbreaker, shortbow, sword and main-hand pistol (through dual-wields) on thief and greatsword on vindicator are some that sorely need a boost to their damage to become useful. If it tells anything that simply camping longbow on Berserker is better than using those aforementioned weapons.

And the saddest thing is that EoD specs literally copied some of those warrior weapons (Mechanist, Untamed) and thief's main-hand pistol (Harbinger) and essentially doubled their power while also getting big deeps profession mechanic.

Edited August 8, 2022 by LadyKitty.6120

[DanAlcedo.3281]

Maybe people like me are part of the problem. 

I'm the type of guy who plays what's effective rather then what's fun and then complains that the thing that is fun is not effective. 

So for me, when other people just play something for fun when they have the option to play something much better is not really understandable for me. 

Like, why make things harder then it needs to be? 

Especially when you also make it harder for everyone else too? 

For example. If I play support Tempest in Wvw, I know I will not give people stab. Something people want and need to survive. So I see no reason to play it over Firebrand. 

Doing things worse by choice. 

 

 

Edited August 9, 2022 by DanAlcedo.3281

[CraftyK.9062]

To me it's a problem of "Am I doing anyone a service by playing xyz?"
 

I really like playing both Power DH and Condi WB in Fractals, though I really grew to like the DH more. I usually play with pugs so I can't always tell if the people in the group care/don't care about being very efficient. 

 

Am I going to have more fun playing pDH? Probably. Would the team do better if I played a build that does more DPS and has some more utility? Also likely.

 

For all that I care, I don't really like playing things that are S-tier busted levels of OP as I think it kind of takes away from a game. Though, in an environment where there are xx people I haven't known before that try to get some piece of content done, do I play something that I like more but that underperforms or something that does better? And while I can't complain about WB as I find it really fun, I really don't like Firebrand as much.

[Karagee.6830]

 

On 8/8/2022 at 1:04 PM, Mell.4873 said:

Long post but I get the idea, honestly I think the game in its current state is still better than before EoD since Scourge and Firebrand dominated most end game content in terms of damage and support. 

The only room was Alacrity which had a tied pick with Mirage or Renegade. Anything is and improvment on that and I hope they keep improving other specs. 

And yet, we have more concentration in a handful of professions and worse representation than at any time durinv PoF, despite 9 extra specialisations.

Bizarre isn't?

[Karagee.6830]

On 8/8/2022 at 1:06 PM, Mell.4873 said:

Yeah my point exactly, very few people can commit more that two/three mains to muscle memory. 

I mean people laughed when I said it took me a full year to learn Mirage and then another year to learn Chrono (on and off playing) 

I mastered the afk 0 apm mechanist build, aka solar's deranged and twisted wet dream in 1 second (the time needed to make sure autoattacks are automatic).

And because the afk build was too easy and only required you to figure out how to set 1 skill to go off on its own, now they have decided to increase the complexity...by making you set also pet's skill to automatic.

Edited August 9, 2022 by Karagee.6830

[Mell.4873]

8 hours ago, Karagee.6830 said:

I mastered the afk 0 apm mechanist build, aka solar's deranged and twisted wet dream in 1 second (the time needed to make sure autoattacks are automatic).

And because the afk build was too easy and only required you to figure out how to set 1 skill to go off on its own, now they have decided to increase the complexity...by making you set also pet's skill to automatic.

I don't think this build will be around forever at least in its high damage form. I want to start maining Engineer over Ranger soon but I'm waiting to see how Mechanist turns out.

11 hours ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

For example. If I play support Tempest in Wvw, I know I will not give people stab. Something people want and need to survive. So I see no reason to play it over Firebrand.

Honestly this is a problem, I mean I'm not allowed to play Longbow Ranger in any form in high-level WvW groups since for some reason I'm not playing the most effective role. I normally get kicked when I don't follow the group closely enough since I'm trying to snipe people from the back.

Edited August 9, 2022 by Mell.4873

[Ashen.2907]

9 hours ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Maybe people like me are part of the problem. 

I'm the type of guy who plays what's effective rather then what's fun and then complains that the thing that is fun is not effective. 

So for me, when other people just play something for fun when they have the option to play something much better is not really understandable for me. 

Like, why make things harder then it needs to be? 

Especially when you also make it harder for everyone else too? 

For example. If I play support Tempest in Wvw, I know I will not give people stab. Something people want and need to survive. So I see no reason to play it over Firebrand. 

Doing things worse by choice. 

 

 

I understand this approach.

For solo, OW, or story chapters I will play whatever I feel like in the moment. Sometimes that ends up being a high performance meta build, and sometimes not.

But when I play with a group I try to bring my best so as to not be an anchor holding the group back from its full potential. I tend to not hold others to the same standard as I set for myself though. So, if that bearbow longbow wielding ranger is at least trying to contribute, more power to him.

[Jski.6180]

I think you should be able to do any content on any class and any class should be able to fill any roll. Its the gear and build that should dictate the roll you play in a group not the class. The class should only be the flavor of how you play NOT the roll.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

Well, Mell, you hit the nail on the head.  There are a variety of reasons why players don't want to alt.  Maybe they don't have the time for it, the gold for it, maybe they hate how the spec looks or plays, maybe they're personally attached to how that toon looks and feels, etc. and so on.  This phenomena is far more common than you'd think.  From their perspective, their toon is being nerfed and now nobody else will play with them unless they roll mechanist #6 in the group.  

In large part it is the duty of the balance team to make sure everyone can be welcome.  It's not like having an unbalanced game has no consequences.  People leave when their profession is nerfed, and they don't come back.

[eXruina.4956]

its not really that, its not that there is a gap between power levels, its that the gap is too wide to compete with each other, some classes are just too good and/or can do almost everything better.

 

in pve this is all fine and good, as long as a class' kit is enough for it to be relevant or to make a clear.

 

in competitive the gap becomes glaringly obvious.

 

foremost problem is meta-crafting (so many possible traitline and skill combinations yet so few actually competitive or even viable builds)

 

then there are bad balance decisions, refusal to go back on those bad balance decisions, slow action or inaction to update and address problems. this all contributes and stacks up over time.

[Mell.4873]

18 hours ago, Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

Well, Mell, you hit the nail on the head.  There are a variety of reasons why players don't want to alt.  Maybe they don't have the time for it, the gold for it, maybe they hate how the spec looks or plays, maybe they're personally attached to how that toon looks and feels, etc. and so on.  This phenomena is far more common than you'd think.  From their perspective, their toon is being nerfed and now nobody else will play with them unless they roll mechanist #6 in the group.  

In large part it is the duty of the balance team to make sure everyone can be welcome.  It's not like having an unbalanced game has no consequences.  People leave when their profession is nerfed, and they don't come back.

Very true, honestly Mechanist I will agree is a Specialization that does need some adjusting. In terms of over all balance, I believe we are living in the golden age of everyone having at least one or two options for content.

I mean Necromancer, Warrior, Guardian all have 30k DPS Quickness Support. That sounds so much better than before EoD where it was just Guardian and Engineer.

 

1 hour ago, eXruina.4956 said:

foremost problem is meta-crafting (so many possible traitline and skill combinations yet so few actually competitive or even viable builds)

PvP is complex and i think we suffer most from this complexity, I notices a huge drop in players once EoD launched. Most complained about the new elites being to strong, which has since gotten better.

I never dropped gold and still play Soulbeast the whole time.

Edited August 11, 2022 by Mell.4873

[Infinity.2876]

Every time I play a sub-meta (like dagger/dagger Weaver) I feel like I'm doing good but then I look hard at my overall dps and I'm like "hm, dissapointing"

 

I just don't like the feeling when I feel like I'm doing well and then find out in doing poorly and all that effort expended feel insubstantial.

 

Also the try hards and the elitists don't like it when I do that very much

[eXruina.4956]

3 hours ago, Infinity.2876 said:

Every time I play a sub-meta (like dagger/dagger Weaver) I feel like I'm doing good but then I look hard at my overall dps and I'm like "hm, dissapointing"

 

I just don't like the feeling when I feel like I'm doing well and then find out in doing poorly and all that effort expended feel insubstantial.

 

Also the try hards and the elitists don't like it when I do that very much

 

most try hards and elitists are all bark anyway, pay them no heed, they're as small in-game as they are in person.

 

i feel the same when i play berserker opposed to bladesworn. moreso when i try to play something like core war or spellbreaker in group pve. 🤣

 

being self-critical is all well and good, finding things we have to improve, is an enjoyment of it self, but foremost we are playng for gratification and enjoyment. doesn't matter if its cheap thrills, or that the player isn't good at all, win's a win, people don't give an f* how they win a war, winning the war comes first.

 

shouldn't have to play at 100% capacity or competitiveness all of the time, thats so kitten stressful. if that were the case i'd rather just make more money irl instead of playing gw2.

 

[eXruina.4956]

4 hours ago, Mell.4873 said:

PvP is complex and i think we suffer most from this complexity, I notices a huge drop in players once EoD launched. Most complained about the new elites being to strong, which has since gotten better.

I never dropped gold and still play Soulbeast the whole time.

true, there are too many variables, can't liken a 1v1 to a 5v5, pvp to wvw, smallscale to largescale. too many variables to account for not accounting for a gap in skill or uneven odds.

 

that said i still believe that balance should be stemmed out from the micro first, than from the macro, balanced individually, i think the domino effect from this would be closer to ideal.

 

but thats just my opinion and perspective. 

[Obtena.7952]

Play what you want ... 

Play with people that have the same philosophy ...

never had a problem here.