Power Creep, The game is too easy [Merged]

[Futa.4375]

On 9/27/2023 at 2:33 AM, Einsof.1457 said:

Unfortunately, after 10 years I've decided to uninstall. There is just no challenge anymore. Power creep is insane, all pve endgame is faceroll. Open world is like a afk mobile game. Soto was final nail in the coffin. Also profession and elite identity and fantasy has been obliterated now that all elites can use all weps. It isn't fun and there's no feeling of overcoming challenges anymore. Heart of Thorns  was the peak of guild wars 2. Which is funny because heart of Thorns wasn't balanced at all but it was by far the most satisfying gw2 ever was. This game just isn't for me anymore, sadly. 

I uninstalled today too, I think EoD should have been my wake-up call but the habits, the addiction and the blind hopes of things getting better were stronger, things will only get worse. They know that players will complain but not many will have the will to move on and leave 10 years+ accounts behind.

[IndigoSundown.5419]

When considering the difference between top output players and lesser output players, don't underestimate the importance of rotation.  As an anecdote: when I saw the build for the top DPS Condi scourge build that came with SotO, I donned the build and gear, and spent about 15 minutes on the golem.  I didn't get the build past about 18K DPS, when others were reporting over 40K.

Why?  I didn't practice enough to: a) keep at least one shade up at all times; b) use the right skill at the right time; and c) failed to use the signet at all (sue me, I'm old and forget stuff all the time)

Subsequently, guild members were using the build in strikes.  I believe they had the gear and build right.  Results of 20K+ a bit were common, but nothing higher.  Why?  Maybe for the same reason, lack of practice.

Players producing maximum non-golem DPS in actual instanced combat are running their build on muscle memory.  Players who have to think constantly about what to do next are not getting the most out of that build.

This is why low-intensity builds are in demand by a lot of players.  Less practice, easier to remember and execute.

It's also why players who have learned high-intensity builds are unhappy when a low-intensity build comes close to (or surpasses) their output.  It's counterintuitive to think that lots of practice and effort produces worse (or similar) results to less practice and effort.

[xellink.7568]

On 9/28/2023 at 2:06 PM, Astralporing.1957 said:

No, it didn't. You needed two chronos for that. At some point chrono support didn't even work properly without a secondary, external source of alack and quick, which is why it wasn't really a meta in Fractals even when its position in Raids was untouchable.

Edit: what i meant is that while chrono did give quick and alac to 10 players, it wasn't giving perma upkeep of those - and that it rotation (which means also its boon generation) suffered significantly if it had to depend only on its own quick and alac. For full coverage you needed two chronos.

Even with that, it still doesn't help against the argument of 100%+ which was just unreasonable numbers posted up by the previous person. While saying old chrono didn't do DPS will lead to low peak DPS on the good teams, taking team DPS into account. Chronos does take us away from that individual DPS argument so we need to look at overall team DPS.  I admit that there is a DPS increase in good teams, but the peaks aren't exactly as far as double as suggested.

My argument is that the DPS increase mainly happens at the average level due to better knowledge base and sharing, the improved game literacy of the existing players and veterancy of players. While the game does provide options for the average players to perform and that gaps in performance (between the top and average teams) are narrowing, this will be achieved by veteran players eventually whether divergent options are available. Divergent options does speed up this process but thats irrelevant in the context of long-term sutainability.

[WaifuJanna.9108]

Yes game is easy if you do research on "whats best build, whats meta, and play that".. what you expect...

Thats like saying Calculus is Easy if you use a Graphical Calculator...

 

Meanwhile if you do fractals with normal people who just play the game, its not rare to sit 40-60 minutes in a higher fractal.

You are not supposed to min/max...

 

I can tell you from all the MMORPG's out there, GW2 is definitely one of the more challanging/harder mmorpgs. Specialy HoT  content.. Thats almost Soul Games like.

 

You realise if the game is to hard for casuals, the game will die. (Wildstar) ... Game needs to be enjoyable for casuals too. And reading a Guide or Wiki shouldn't be mandatory.

 

https://streamable.com/dzdesr

This is how fractals usualy feel. And Yes it was nice to finally solve it after almost an hour.. But don't tell "everything is easy".. no its clearly not.

Edited September 29, 2023 by WaifuJanna.9108

[thorrand.6548]

On 9/26/2023 at 9:45 AM, IAmNotMatthew.1058 said:

"I paid 125€ in 11 years for this game and I get less content than in games that cost that much in a year!"

I'm sure people who have played that long haven't invested in any qol features from the gem store like storage, gathering tools, character slots, shared inventory etc... 

20 hours ago, Solanaar.3714 said:

throw away raids, world bosses, fractals, and strikes

They threw away dungeons, two expansions had raids, world bosses are what they are and the revamps just make sponges which is fun doing your rotation for 5 mins like ff14. Didn't get a new fractal with SoTo. You're acting like throwing away game modes isn't the MO at this point. They added two new strikes with this expansion. That's the higher tier content. The rest is mindless farming. I'm fully aware how many people will defend the game to the death but kitten step back branch out and look at the situation from a less emotional perspective from someone who's not completely absorbed in the sunk cost fallacy. 

I want gw2 to get better but the road it's on straight up isn't it. It feels like the end of its life cycle and it's so hard to see. 

[IAmNotMatthew.1058]

2 hours ago, thorrand.6548 said:

I'm sure people who have played that long haven't invested in any qol features from the gem store like storage, gathering tools, character slots, shared inventory etc... 

And other MMOs have cash shop as well on top of sub fees and higher priced expansions and in many cases higher service fees. If you buy and spend 800(10€)-1200(15€ card) gems each month since release you'd still be below those "other MMOs with more content".

For context, if you were to buy all the content for GW2 right now with no discounts you'd spend the amount of money that would get you Dragonflight and half a year(7 months if you use the 6 month pre-paid option) of playtime or all the expansions in FF14 with 6-7 months of playtime. 
As I said, be the cheapest MMO and you'll get the cheapest players.

[Cyninja.2954]

6 hours ago, WaifuJanna.9108 said:

Yes game is easy if you do research on "whats best build, whats meta, and play that".. what you expect...

Thats like saying Calculus is Easy if you use a Graphical Calculator...

So agreed, the game is easy and there are resources out there which help players skip designing their own graphical calculator from scratch.

6 hours ago, WaifuJanna.9108 said:

Meanwhile if you do fractals with normal people who just play the game, its not rare to sit 40-60 minutes in a higher fractal.

You are not supposed to min/max...

Your "Normal" is very subjective here. Your normal seems to indicate players which:

A. never showed any interest in understanding or improving their build

B. never considered to read up or question WHY specific content might challenge them (I get it, dying 20 times to a story boss most often is easier than spending 5 minutes on research)

C. are absolute internet illiterates in 2023

Meanwhile, for someone else "normal" might mean: a player who provides a reasonable amount of performance and/or has a reasonable amount of competency at the game he is playing.

This is not even about min/maxing. If we were actually talking about min/maxing, there is nearly no content in this game which takes longer than a few minutes.

Quote

I can tell you from all the MMORPG's out there, GW2 is definitely one of the more challanging/harder mmorpgs. Specialy HoT  content.. Thats almost Soul Games like.

GW2 has less guard rails compared to other MMORPGs. It's less roller-coaster "turn your brain off at the entrance and follow this trail ". That makes it more difficult to get into but once a player gets past the initial large step, it becomes significantly easier than most other MMORPGs.

Quote

You realise if the game is to hard for casuals, the game will die. (Wildstar) ... Game needs to be enjoyable for casuals too. And reading a Guide or Wiki shouldn't be mandatory.

Casual seems to have different definitions for many players. Yours seems to be: casual player = kitten at this game and absolutely unwilling/incompetent to improve.

I personally would disagree. For me for example casual is directly related to how much time a player can invest into his hobby. Having not a lot of time does not necessary mean a player is incompetent. Even with only 1-2 hours of game play time per week a player can read up and get a build or decent understanding for a class, given he is actively interested in this.

Quote

 

https://streamable.com/dzdesr

This is how fractals usualy feel. And Yes it was nice to finally solve it after almost an hour.. But don't tell "everything is easy".. no its clearly not.

 

Great example: you decided to not read any guides or check up on how the fractal works. As such, success took far longer than if you had done some basic research. Hopefully you've learned enough to make the next run of that fractal smoother. Meanwhile experienced groups rush that step in sub 5 minutes (and given the main danger in that part is not even from enemies but rather environmental effects, this isn't even something which is affected by class power creep to much).

The main difference here: most players don't stick around to improve nor do they show any attempts at improving at the game. You don't HAVE to go out and copy builds from websites or read up. All that can be figured out on ones own. Every player does have the option to do the former though and for players struggling with time, that would be the most reasonable approach.

TL;DR:

Yes, GW2 can be complex for new players, especially ones which are a bit slower, less attentive or disinterested in actual game mechanics. There are resources available though for players to ease into the game. The question thus becomes: should the game be balanced around mere attendance with 0 consideration as to build, gear, skill, etc (which poses the question: why have gear and builds in the first place?), that's where most open world content is currently at.

Should the game be balanced around minimum build, gear, understanding etc? That's where Dragons' End is approximately at open world wise, as well as most  strikes and T1+2 fractals.

The question about actually requiring skill and proper game play doesn't even come up except for 1-2 instanced fights currently.

Edited September 29, 2023 by Cyninja.2954

[thorrand.6548]

8 hours ago, IAmNotMatthew.1058 said:

blah

Irrelevant. Was just pointing out the flaw of assuming players just buy the expansions and not anything else to try and make a weak point of some sort. 

[Sobx.1758]

13 hours ago, WaifuJanna.9108 said:

Yes game is easy if you do research on "whats best build, whats meta, and play that".. what you expect...

Thats like saying Calculus is Easy if you use a Graphical Calculator...

 

Meanwhile if you do fractals with normal people who just play the game, its not rare to sit 40-60 minutes in a higher fractal.

You are not supposed to min/max...

 

I can tell you from all the MMORPG's out there, GW2 is definitely one of the more challanging/harder mmorpgs. Specialy HoT  content.. Thats almost Soul Games like.

 

You realise if the game is to hard for casuals, the game will die. (Wildstar) ... Game needs to be enjoyable for casuals too. And reading a Guide or Wiki shouldn't be mandatory.

 

https://streamable.com/dzdesr

This is how fractals usualy feel. And Yes it was nice to finally solve it after almost an hour.. But don't tell "everything is easy".. no its clearly not.

Yeah, that's the perspective of a new player trying to "solve" -as in get to know- the content, class and game's mechanics. Which would be a bit ridiculous to strictly focus balancing around. If at any point you feel like you're unable to come up with the solution by yourself then -just like you pointed out yourself- there's plenty of help to get around. And it's not about "min-maxing" either.

Edited September 29, 2023 by Sobx.1758

[Solvar.7953]

Something like the Svanir chief world boss is an example of what Anet does to address power creep - just give the boss a ton of hit points - no new mechanics or anything.  So now the boss is basically a boring 5 minute fight.  I get why they did it - before it was dying too fast and people were missing credit, but they went too far in the other direction.  And a lot of the newer bosses in some fractals or strikes seem to be similar HP sponges.  There is some reason to have a fight last a few minutes (skill recharge times and so forth), but many of these are much longer than that, so it is just doing the same thing, and hoping you don't get hit by a lag spike or make some mistake.

So be careful when asking for more difficulty content due to power creep.  Current indications is that if Anet did do something about it, it wouldn't make things any more interesting, it would just make battles take longer and be boring.

 

[IAmNotMatthew.1058]

12 hours ago, thorrand.6548 said:

Irrelevant. Was just pointing out the flaw of assuming players just buy the expansions and not anything else to try and make a weak point of some sort. 

And I'm pointing out that people in other MMOs spend money on things other than sub and expansions, then again, cosmetics and QoL are not mandatory purchases.
If you want to play Dragonflight in WoW you have to buy it and pay a sub fee, you don't need to buy mounts for like 20€ each,  pets or transmogs for 10€ to play the game.
Same how in GW2 you don't need to buy the newest mount skin or infinite tools for however much they are to play the game. You buy the expansions once per character and done.

So, yes, your "I'm sure people who have played that long haven't invested in any qol features from the gem store like storage, gathering tools, character slots, shared inventory etc... " point is irrelevant, because people do that in other MMOs as well while also paying sub fees and more for expansions.

[thorrand.6548]

2 hours ago, IAmNotMatthew.1058 said:

And I'm pointing out that people in other MMOs spend money on things other than sub and expansions, then again, cosmetics and QoL are not mandatory purchases.
If you want to play Dragonflight in WoW you have to buy it and pay a sub fee, you don't need to buy mounts for like 20€ each,  pets or transmogs for 10€ to play the game.
Same how in GW2 you don't need to buy the newest mount skin or infinite tools for however much they are to play the game. You buy the expansions once per character and done.

So, yes, your "I'm sure people who have played that long haven't invested in any qol features from the gem store like storage, gathering tools, character slots, shared inventory etc... " point is irrelevant, because people do that in other MMOs as well while also paying sub fees and more for expansions.

I mean if we continue this conversation it's going to get into the weeds of what exactly qualifies as quality of life vs mandatory. Wow gives you mounts and store mounts are basically just gw2 skins. Gold tokens and trader currency are starting to get into gray areas.  Can you play this game without any of those purchases? Sure. Do people regularly do that in this game? Doubtful. I couldn't imagine playing gw2 with all the collections, gizmos, etc the game throws at you without expanding your bank, inventory, shared storage etc. We could spend all day comparing these purchases to 'other mmo's' but I'm simply not going to do that. That's why I dipped out. I made my point. Disagree if you want. 

Edited September 30, 2023 by thorrand.6548
clarity

[Kate.3679]

On 9/20/2023 at 8:24 PM, Zera.9435 said:

The funny thing about these people talking about doing 45k dps, that's against a golem that does not move away or hit you back or do anything to reduce the damage you do, all while having permanent upkeep of all max boons forever

Bit late to the party but there's literally logs of people doing more than the benchmark against certain bosses. For example there is a 51k dps scourge log on soulless horror.

[AliamRationem.5172]

2 hours ago, Lilas.3648 said:

Bit late to the party but there's literally logs of people doing more than the benchmark against certain bosses. For example there is a 51k dps scourge log on soulless horror.

The more relevant point is that the benchmark is purely a means for comparing performance while minimizing variables.  So, if a benchmark increases by 25% it doesn't matter whether the actual value is realistic across the board.  By the static metric, power has increased by 25%.

[Passerbye.6291]

On 9/30/2023 at 7:04 PM, AliamRationem.5172 said:

The more relevant point is that the benchmark is purely a means for comparing performance while minimizing variables.  So, if a benchmark increases by 25% it doesn't matter whether the actual value is realistic across the board.  By the static metric, power has increased by 25%.

Thank you. I die inside a little every time someone uses "normal players don't hit benchmarks anyway" as an argument against poor balance or powercreep. There is always that one guy who chimes in with an astoundingly low bench as well, one that makes me think, there is no way he set the golem right or he'd do more damage just hitting 3 buttons.

It usually reads like "I hear people hitting 45k dps but I only do 18k, clearly means the class is fine"

Edited October 2, 2023 by Passerbye.6291

[Burnfall.9573]

Bad Design Elementalist Profession 2.0

Laughs at Power Creep + Celestial + Meta

 

Edited September 30, 2023 by Burnfall.9573

[Dawdler.8521]

Berserker stats, 16k hp while alone in enemy territory with no buffs while gear stats show 1300 vitality when buffed in owned territory. Eles truly are magic I guess 🤷‍♂️ 

[Astralporing.1957]

3 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

The more relevant point is that the benchmark is purely a means for comparing performance while minimizing variables.  So, if a benchmark increases by 25% it doesn't matter whether the actual value is realistic across the board.  By the static metric, power has increased by 25%.

That would be true if the increase was linear, which it is not. An increase by 25% at benchmark does not automatically mean an increase by 25% at skill level that previously was 80% of benchmark, for example.

[AliamRationem.5172]

2 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

That would be true if the increase was linear, which it is not. An increase by 25% at benchmark does not automatically mean an increase by 25% at skill level that previously was 80% of benchmark, for example.

An irrelevant distinction unless your premise is that massive power creep is fine because there will always be people who perform poorly regardless.

[Astralporing.1957]

1 minute ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

An irrelevant distinction unless your premise is that massive power creep is fine because there will always be people who perform poorly regardless.

No. Massive powercreep is not fine. Using pure top tier benchmark as the sole factor when balancing (or even deciding whether we have powercreep or not) however is not exactly good idea either.

[Cuks.8241]

11 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

No. Massive powercreep is not fine. Using pure top tier benchmark as the sole factor when balancing (or even deciding whether we have powercreep or not) however is not exactly good idea either.

Ok, which benchmarks, what data should they use than? 

If something overperforms at perfect conditions it has the potential to do it anywhere.

[Astralporing.1957]

1 hour ago, Cuks.8241 said:

Ok, which benchmarks, what data should they use than? 

If something overperforms at perfect conditions it has the potential to do it anywhere.

I'd really hope they'd use a much wider selection of datapoints than just player made benchmarks on golem. I mean, it's their game, they should have a much better access to such data than players do.

As for the second point, "potential" and "reality" need not be the same. There were builds in the past that overperformed on perfect conditions on golem but weren't as good in less than perfect situations because they depended too much of that perfection.

[Cuks.8241]

11 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

I'd really hope they'd use a much wider selection of datapoints than just player made benchmarks on golem. I mean, it's their game, they should have a much better access to such data than players do.

As for the second point, "potential" and "reality" need not be the same. There were builds in the past that overperformed on perfect conditions on golem but weren't as good in less than perfect situations because they depended too much of that perfection.

Completely agree that there should be other parameters than just top dps. Like other utility the spec brings, self reliance, easiness to reach that potential... (the more abstract these, the harder to quantify though). I'm quite sure they do use wider selection of parameters (for example they were nerfing mechanist even though it was far from top at some point).  But top dps potential should also be an important parameter if not the most important for a dps spec.

What I think is wrong when someone writes it shouldn't be balanced around top dps benchmarks but around average player (and yeah you didnt write that, you wrote solely on top dps). First of all there is no average player. And also if someone is far from the potential, the nerfs and buffs are most likely impacting their gameplay much less than they think.

And that is the hard truth. If you are at 20% of the potential you probably need to work on basics. Positioning, always very important both pve and especially pvp. This is one of the main problems in most games in most game modes. Proper positioning will increase you uptime, your boon uptime and decrease dmg taken. The speed at which you mash your buttons. GW2 is fast and spammy and involves a lot of movement. To be able to execute, everything needs to be muscle memory. Looking at the skill bar, deciding what to do next is a huge detriment. Here gw2 is harder than most mmorpgs. I never had a problem being close to the benchmarks in wow (BC, woltk and cata, rotations were quite easy) which is a more stationary game with GCD and lots of stationary casts. In gw2 I am not close to that. I wouldn't change it though because it's what it makes it gw2 and feels more fluid.

It's like when bronze players complain about balancing. But the truth is that if they would go against a platinum player with completely random build and half naked, the platinum would probably still destroy them anyway. And this is not gw2 specific.  

[joerginger.4730]

The number of deaths on my characters, especially my main, disagrees vehemently with the claim that this game is too easy.

[Astralporing.1957]

29 minutes ago, Cuks.8241 said:

Completely agree that there should be other parameters than just top dps. Like other utility the spec brings, self reliance, easiness to reach that potential... (the more abstract these, the harder to quantify though). I'm quite sure they do use wider selection of parameters (for example they were nerfing mechanist even though it was far from top at some point).  But top dps potential should also be an important parameter if not the most important for a dps spec.

My point was they should not concentrate so much on top dps potential, but look more on actual performance, and not just in the more challenging encounters but across a wider selection of them.

29 minutes ago, Cuks.8241 said:

What I think is wrong when someone writes it shouldn't be balanced around top dps benchmarks but around average player (and yeah you didnt write that, you wrote solely on top dps). First of all there is no average player. And also if someone is far from the potential, the nerfs and buffs are most likely impacting their gameplay much less than they think.

You'd be surprised. The PvE survival options nerf, for example, hit the most not the highest tier players, because they could manage anyway (and quite often weren't even running those options, or run them because there was literally no better trait pick available). It hit the most those players that did need that crutch. Similarily, Ele staff nerfs, that were meant to push high tier players toward sword Weaver, had the most negative impact on the lower tiers of playerbase.