Shield gens bugged

[DeadlySynz.3471]

I actually find the game mode far better basically without the use of Shield Gens. T3 structures are actually being attacked now.

[Victory.2879]

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:We'll change this is the nearish future so that siege weapon attacks are blocked.

Nearish..oh no, the dreaded 'soon' wasn't long enough, now we're going to have to wait until 'nearish'!

[googel.3278]

Shield gens work absolutely fine. The only problem is the flame ram that is bugged, i cant even ram walls. Ramming walls would definitely knock down the foundations and make it crumble, fix flame rams please

[misterman.1530]

Sooo...the Shield Gen doesn't actually...you know...shield anything? That would be like releasing a patch and no siege hits anything. I mean, the whole point of a Shield Gen is to Shield stuff. How does one make a bug like that? I mean, the protocode for a shield gen is something like:

If BubbleUp

IF Projectile = True

CaseWhen Projectile <> unblockable

HITWhen Projectile = unblockableMiss

I mean, I would use something other that that kind of statement, but that's the simplest representation. I mean, come on.

[Ben Phongluangtham.1065]

@misterman.1530 said:Sooo...the Shield Gen doesn't actually...you know...shield anything? That would be like releasing a patch and no siege hits anything. I mean, the whole point of a Shield Gen is to Shield stuff. How does one make a bug like that? I mean, the protocode for a shield gen is something like:

If BubbleUp

IF Projectile = True

CaseWhen Projectile <> unblockable

HITWhen Projectile = unblockableMiss

I mean, I would use something other that that kind of statement, but that's the simplest representation. I mean, come on.

That's basically what the script looks like. Except that we check for whether the the source of the missile is friendly or not, so we can allow friendly missiles to go through. What we aren't checking right now is if the source of the missile is a siege weapon, in which case, even if it's unblockable, we're now going to block.

[Warmachinez.8710]

So let me understand this. A few years ago Siege HP was doubled so players could crit and put condis on them, yet the damage that Siege vs Siege does was not doubled or increased in anyway. Now ACs have had their damage reduced by 50% against all Siege. ACs can be damaged/destroyed via burn on block traits/runes and the like. Things like Siege disablers are not unblockable and can be blocked by players aegis as well as Shield Gens/Cata bubble as well as incur a 45 sec cooldown regardless of a successful disable. Proxy Catas dmg was never lowered in fact a fully charge shot does double normal damage. Most towers/keeps have exploitable weaknesses that make defending next to impossible via Siege, not to mention things like Siege damaging walls from awkward positions i.e. Catas splash damage hitting walls through the rock cliffs/mountains like at Klovan, Jerrifer, Langor, Air Keep to name a few. Rams ignore siege caps to some extent i.e. when tossing the blueprints down you can have 6 Rams on a gate and then 5 Shield Gens/Other siege within 900 range from one another, go ahead try it out.

Yet this bug to a piece of Siege equipment, that I honestly feel should not exist, is a problem? Shield Gens in general make siege virtually immune to any damage and are better suited as a tool for offensive purposes. This bug almost feels like this is how Shield Gens should naturally be, not actually to stop incoming siege damage, but to protect allies from enemy players ranged damage and AC fire.

I look back to when Hardened Gates was nerfed from 100% player dmg reduction against gates to 50%. I suppose that was not fun doing zero dmg, well from a defensive standpoint, being helpless against a siege is not fun either. Watching your treb shots get stopped after every shot is not fun. The Cata shield 5 ability is frustrating enough as every other shot is essentially blocked, add Shield Gens in the mix and its depressing trying to defend. It use to not be this way and Shield Gens ruined defensive gameplay for WvW. I'm not asking to solo defend against a blob, I use to do defense before HoT often, but even then there was about 10 or so others defending with me and we could hold out for at least 10-15 minutes before the structure fell if no backup showed up.

I feel like ranting a bit here, I'm curious as to what the arguments are when it comes to defensive siege, as time has gone on it takes longer to destroy enemy siege with siege, hazing siege on walls is much easier and faster, AC dmg is not nearly as potent against players considering the introduction of elite specs freely tossing protection and healing around. Yea its tough taking a T3 structure, but should it not considering it can take up to several hours to get the damn thing to T3 status? I mean I've seen structures take 9+ hours to upgrade, yet you want to burn it down in just a few minutes? I don't think so... And then considering the stupid nature of how things upgrade, Tower takes the same amount of yaks as a Keep or as SMC. This makes no sense.

What did you people do before HoT when WvW was a much more popular game mode with less rewards?

I say consider this bug as a permanent change to Shield Gens. Defensive gameplay could use a one up.

[MedievalThings.5417]

@DeadlySynz.3471 said:I actually find the game mode far better basically without the use of Shield Gens. T3 structures are actually being attacked now.

Yes, by the blob that is out ktraining. The treb is on the 3rd floor of smc, and when you go through the outer of smc, the blob appears with twice your numbers, kills you and puts the wall back up. That is how T3 structures are being attacked...0 skill.

[sephiroth.4217]

@Ubi.4136 said:

@DeadlySynz.3471 said:I actually find the game mode far better basically without the use of Shield Gens. T3 structures are actually being attacked now.

Yes, by the blob that is out ktraining. The treb is on the 3rd floor of smc, and when you go through the outer of smc, the blob appears with twice your numbers, kills you and puts the wall back up. That is how T3 structures are being attacked...0 skill.

I'm so confused...Is it skillful to throw 5 trebs down with 3 shield gens and sit there waiting for 5 players to hold 2?

I dunno I'm bias... I like how WvW is right now with people using tactical placements and zergs coming out to fight the players on siege instead of mass building shield gens and siege weaponry.

Once the fix comes through I'll head back to solo/duo roaming but till then, zerging is kinda fun again with all these fights

[guildabd.6529]

Can you also address the issue that invulnerable buff blocks unblockable piercing projectiles?

[Kaiser.9873]

Personally I feel that the best way to resolve all of this is to make the siege cap within range of one another smaller. For instance with gates. I see sometimes as many as 5-6 rams per gate, a couple shield gens, and an AC or two. I get you want it down soon, but wowzers. Within X distance from gate/wall no more than 4 pieces of siege. Include rams, ACs, shield gens, etcetera, and make that for both attackers and defenders. You want an extra shield gen? Gotta give up an AC. Want a gate treb, one less shield gen for you.

This would be easier than all of these damage modifiers, and other weird siege rules.

[Spurnshadow.3678]

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:We'll change this is the nearish future so that siege weapon attacks are blocked.

Nearish future? Unacceptable.

Look, I appreciate the little things you guys are doing for WvW, but this is just unacceptable. Why don't you guys test this stuff? It's just one thing after another. WvW is a competitive match that occurs over time. You guys keep bugging stuff and it affects the match and fun. Revert the change with a hot fix right away. It is obviously not tested so do this now. I just don't get it. Make EotM a public test server. Whatever it takes to stop screwing things up. It's one step forward and two steps back with y'all. I'd love for there to be just a string of good stuff, mostly balanced, with no bugs coming out of this game for WvW for a year. Just sick of it.

[juno.1840]

This is second very serious defect that was introduced into WvW in the last 3 weeks.

Retrospective please to fix the process to minimize future defects -- maybe a standard set of automated tests that verify core mechanics are not broken.

If that doesn't work, maybe improve the critical defect turn-around time.

[Astralporing.1957]

@LetoII.3782 said:

@morrolan.9608 said:This is simply laughable. They clearly intend unblockable projectiles from player abilities to pass through shields but they don't check whether projectiles from other types of siege are coded similarly to unblockable player projectiles. And where is the testing? Simple testing of treb shots should have shown the bug.

Shield gens are a one-off mechanic not seen in the rest of the game.I suppose it's little surprise some.. shortcuts were taken in their ImplimentationThey've run into the very same problem with Xera bubble (that seemed to utilize the same/similar mechanic), didn't they? Xera attack happened to be unblockable, and thus ended up going through the bubble (that was supposed to protect raiders from this very specific attack) like it was not even there.Well, that one got fixed right away though.

[volpenvieh.3201]

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:We'll change this is the nearish future

I would've thought a bug like this qualifies for a hotfix.

[Aeolus.3615]

Maybe catapults need to loose their bubble.....

If ya want bubbles... get shield gens or engies ;)

[Tiny Doom.4380]

I'm al in favor of siege in principle. I see WvW as primarily a PvPvE siege warfare simulator rather than a PvP mode. However...

When the game started Shield Generators didn't exist but player skills like the Guardian's Shield of Absorption worked against siege projectiles. If you wanted to shield your catapults at Bay from trebs in inner you had to get players to co-ordinate their skills to keep a dome up. It was entirely in keeping with the milieu and required organization and some degree of ability to implement effectively. It was also fun.

At some point, someone at ANet decided it was inappropriate behavior and projectiles from siege weapons were altered so that they were no longer blocked by player skills. For a period there was no way to block incoming treb or cata shots at all and that appeared to be how it was meant to be.

Then, out of nowhere, the Shield Generator appeared. It did exactly the same as the old player skills had done, only more reliably, more effectively and for longer. It also required considerably less organization to deploy (other than having the blueprint and supply) and could be operated by any class, not just the couple of classes that had bubble skills.

How this was supposed to represent an improvement in gameplay always escaped me. It was far more immersive and involving when players were blocking the projectiles directly with their class abilities than using siege to do the same thing only more easily and with less excitement. I understood (although I never liked) the idea that no-one should be blocking the projectiles at all, but to replace player agency with a mechanical device seems counter-intuitive to say the least.

Shield Generators have never been fun to operate. They are clunky to use and boring to run for extended periods. Get shot of them and give the work back to Guardians and whoever else it was that used to do it. Mesmers? I forget.

[Aeolus.3615]

@Tiny Doom.4380, engie shields still work

The issue with shield gen is cata shield + shield gen stack, imo like i said bedore cata shield needs to go :).

make a oil thing to be throwed in catapult players with fire skills, or treb/mortar fire could ignite it xD and burn the wall/players.