5+ years without any new Sigils or Runes...are new ones on the way? (or at least rebalance of the old ones)

[PolarBear.3961]

The only rune i use on all of my characters is fireworks... 25% movement speed and esentiel boons are a must for me. Now if they add the movement speed to every rune or make it baseline for everyone then i will for sure check out all the other runes.

 

Edited April 10, 2023 by PolarBear.3961

[prototypedragon.1406]

They could balance it real quick and give everyone the stats from the old Magic find gear from years ago  and combine them to be the only superior rune 😉😂 with all the different superior runes  being only 1 rune even if they tried to balance them all the poor person that has to figure that  all out would probably leave the company immediately 🤷‍♂️

[Virtuality.8351]

#Removed for double posting.

Edited April 15, 2023 by Virtuality.8351

[Virtuality.8351]

On 4/10/2023 at 12:50 AM, JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:

Hey Virtuality (your name looks familiar, and I'm pretty sure we are old friends) I have looked into the balance problem for many years now on a rigorous academic level and you are at this moment stumbling on the same issues I had gone through when thinking about the problem.

Well hello there o/

I think we had some discussion on Tempest and Soothing Mist in WvW about a couple years ago, if you still recall? (By the say, glad Tempest is back to meta in WvW now!)

I agree with you. The complexity induced by the endless combination of parameters make balancing a truly daunting task. This is also why most balancing are more often than not ad hoc—something adds up to unusually high DPS over time or burst potential, or something provides way too much damage mitigation, etc. And most of the time one just could not foresee these things.

And by moving to the new paradigm, we are actually adding further more parameters into the equation, making balancing even more complex. I can relate if the developers might not be willing to do this for how limited the resources they have are.

On 4/10/2023 at 12:50 AM, JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:

So there is no hope for balance, it’s dead in the water and you should just straight up drop the idea that you could ever think balance can be done in any mathematically rigorous or human way.

However, I still believe that mathematics could still shed much light on balancing. Take this thread I just made for example. The idea of Attribute Point Equivalent provides a platform for traits to be compared with one another, and to calculate opportunity cost since the maximum possible attribute point count is finite.

It is not rigorous as different attribute types do different things hardly comparable or even quantifiable. Nevertheless, it still somewhat serves the purpose.

Edited April 15, 2023 by Virtuality.8351

[Xenesis.6389]

On 2/26/2023 at 1:19 AM, Virtuality.8351 said:

On the other hand, the lack of gameplay difference provided by different runes can potentially be addressed by letting Runes provide access to features you would not be able to access otherwise.

Take Trapper Runes for example. The set provides, upon deploy a trap, Stealth and Superspeed, both of which are otherwise difficult or impossible to access for Ranger or Dragonhunter. The set provides a significant mean to disengage and drastically changes how you would play.

I'd say we could use more designs like this.

I agree, there's so many useless runes sets in the game, and most of it comes down to just stats and the 6th bonus becomes the real reason to run the rune, but again so many of them are not very good, and a lot are just giving you boons, in game play where boons are spammed already.

As you say, the really interesting ones are like trapper runes, which add something that maybe your spec wouldn't have, or maybe add a different effect of the skill lines. What if we had a rune that cut Well damage in half but heals the caster for 10% of damage, or what if we had one that triple Well damage but it only hit single targets per pulse, or what if I dunno... if the well rune added shadowstep when you cast the well. 🤭 Or hey maybe change something like Rune of the mesmer to turn signet of humility into a 3 target aoe moa skill instead, I mean anyone cares about 33% daze duration and 10% damage to dazed targets, that's super situational and you're better off running, ahem scholars.

These type of skill bonuses are typically reserved for traits, but runes could give the option to expand into more interesting game play instead of the typical moar stats, moar damage, moar boons spam. There's a lot of room to get creative with runes.

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

16 hours ago, Virtuality.8351 said:

Well hello there o/

I think we had some discussion on Tempest and Soothing Mist in WvW about a couple years ago, if you still recall? (By the say, glad Tempest is back to meta in WvW now!)

 

Ya, buffs like soothing mist can bypass the target cap (effect up to 13) and their are similiar buffs on revenant and a few others that can do this too, i think it was on this topic in how we met. I haven't played the game in a while now, but it's nice to bump into u again bro.

 

Quote

 

I agree with you. The complexity induced by the endless combination of parameters make balancing a truly daunting task. This is also why most balancing are more often than not ad hoc—something adds up to unusually high DPS over time or burst potential, or something provides way too much damage mitigation, etc. And most of the time one just could not foresee these things.

And by moving to the new paradigm, we are actually adding further more parameters into the equation, making balancing even more complex. I can relate if the developers might not be willing to do this for how limited the resources they have are.

 

 

Quote

However, I still believe that mathematics could still shed much light on balancing.

 

On the topic now, Ya man. Thing is that it's not just the complexity scaling with the number of elements (even though this totally adds to the issue), but what the problem reveals is something a lot deeper... something a lot more godel's-incompleteness-theorm's-esque type of problem. This idea that any formal system (mathematics) can not be both consistent or complete... which ultimately points to the notion that mathematics is arbitrary (it's either not consistent if its a complete theory, or it's consistent but can't be proven to be consistent (incomplete)).

 

What this really means for us in this balance problem, is that with respect to godel, you can never devise a truly objective balanced system...and that even if you did, you could never prove that you did so. The problem illustrated on the first page is very much in the spirit of Godel and it points to a series conclusion: That mathematics is arbitrary.

 

Now is mathematics useful to some degree...yes, but only in a subjective sense. I think it is this property of math that allows us to build multiple consistent theories of theory-craft, but it is for this same reason, for why we can never have a single objectively true theory-craft for a sufficiently complex game like gw2.

 

When I realized these facts related to the balance problem, I was just as shocked as anyone else, that would hear the same. Most of us go throughout our lives believing in an objective reality, where mathematics could prove things. But how can mathematics be this deeply flawed? But I've come to realize this isn't a flaw, this is a flaw about us as human beings and our understanding about what is actually important. 

 

Quote

 

Take this thread I just made for example. The idea of Attribute Point Equivalent provides a platform for traits to be compared with one another, and to calculate opportunity cost since the maximum possible attribute point count is finite.

It is not rigorous as different attribute types do different things hardly comparable or even quantifiable. Nevertheless, it still somewhat serves the purpose.

 

 

And I think what was  said above wraps around into this, that there is no way to prove that things could ever be perfectly balanced...and in that same vein, i would say that... we shouldn't be caring about balance. cause like you said here, it's not quantifiable.

 

About that in this particular problem with attribute points, it boils down into another flavor of the original balance problem: 1000 power, 1000 ferocity, 1000 healing power...might not be equivalent to 1000 condition damage, 1000 vitality and 1000 toughness. 

 

Sure they have the same number in their attributes but the attributes are operationally different, and when they become correlated with all the traits and systems in the game there is no longer a way to quantify the stats and their interactions anymore in an objectively meaningful way. Whether the stats are equal, either in distribution, or up to a maximal number as described in a budget no longer matters, and this balance problem rears it's beautiful and ugly head.

 

Just to back up what I said in guild wars 2 language...1000 power, 1000 ferocity and 1000 healing power would to us humans...be an awful attribute set to play (without traits) but 1000 condition damage, 1000 vitality and 1000 toughness would be a good attribute set to play (without traits). When you add in traits, the entire story might completely change...some classes and builds might be able to make an OP build using 1000 power 1000 ferocity 1000 healing power by boosting the critical hit chance (a similiar strategy used in celestial style builds).

 

So...Because of the arbitrary and subjective nature of mathematics and numbers...I think what matters is just plain and simple the game's design...is it fun and exciting? or is it stale and boring, are they useful and can people make unique and interesting builds with them and I think this has more to deal with the ruleset the game operates on, rather than the numbers. The numbers just have to "make sense" to us as humans and honestly, you could design systems/games and what not that don't use numbers at all. 

 

I strongly believe that there is an unbounded region of possible ways to not only analyze a game (or the world for that matter), but to also construct one.

 

Everything I've said here is of course with good intentions, and i mean well, with good wishes. For me, the pill was indeed hard to swallow but seeing past it...it makes much more sense that it works this way than it does any other. Cheers,

 

 

Edited April 16, 2023 by JusticeRetroHunter.7684

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

Still waiting for our Eod E-spec runes. 😥