Are defiance bars broken?

[ScooterX.1934]

Hey all. Just getting through my first run ever, I was fighting Zhaitan's mouth last night. I observed then, and in recent boss battles in the story, that the defiance bar is present but that none of my abilities affect it. Also I am able to do damage to the boss, bypassing the defiance bar altogether.

I almost wonder if something is broken. Is there an explanation on why a defiance bar is present but ignored?

[Ayrilana.1396]

Are you using abilities that would normally affect the bar?

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Control_effect

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Defiance_bar#Control_effects

[Tanner Blackfeather.6509]

Defiance bars were introduced with HoT (as I understand, I started playing just after), and were at that point retrofitted to earlier bosses as well. This retrofitting hasn't always been seamless - quite a few still have underlying total immunities.

Tl;dr - some breakbars on core bosses are essentially broken, but not the system in general.

[ScooterX.1934]

@"Ayrilana.1396" said:Are you using abilities that would normally affect the bar?

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Control_effect

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Defiance_bar#Control_effects

Yes, I've got fear, chill, blind, weakness, cripple for soft CC, and Wail of Doom, Executioner's Scythe and Grasping Darkness for hard CC.

@Tanner Blackfeather.6509 said:Defiance bars were introduced with HoT (as I understand, I started playing just after), and were at that point retrofitted to earlier bosses as well. This retrofitting hasn't always been seamless - quite a few still have underlying total immunities.

Tl;dr - some breakbars on core bosses are essentially broken, but not the system in general.

Interesting, that. I wonder what technical reason is behind it.

[Khisanth.2948]

Many dungeon mobs are also just completely immune to CC.

[Blocki.4931]

You need to do the fight mechanic for the boss...

[Ronan.9518]

The mouth of Zhaitan (Victory or Death instance) fight changed. In the old System you could damage it the whole time, and throwing an Orb of Fire into its Vortex attack just caused a break in its attacks because of its staggering.This happend without any interaction with the Defiance System of that time that worked with stacks.The change that you only can damage the mouth while it is staggering, came with the revamp of the Defiance System.That doesn't explain why the breakbar doesn't work, but at least why you are able to damage it nonetheless.

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

Last time I played the Orr Missions of the personal story I also noticed this oddity. So I checked the buffs/abilities of those creatures and found a very nasty abomination: Unstoppable. Before you approach a boss, just quickly read through its abilities. If you see this one, the defiance bar is just for decoration.

But why are some creatures still unstoppable? Most of these creatures have the ability and strength to pulverize you within the blink of an eye. The idea behind them was to teach the player to be quick, either with eliminating them or evading their attacks. Making them vulnerable to stun, would pretty much eradicate their purpose and unique role.

[ScooterX.1934]

@"HnRkLnXqZ.1870" said:Last time I played the Orr Missions of the personal story I also noticed this oddity. So I checked the buffs/abilities of those creatures and found a very nasty abomination: Unstoppable. Before you approach a boss, just quickly read through its abilities. If you see this one, the defiance bar is just for decoration.

But why are some creatures still unstoppable? Most of these creatures have the ability and strength to pulverize you within the blink of an eye. The idea behind them was to teach the player to be quick, either with eliminating them or evading their attacks. Making them vulnerable to stun, would pretty much eradicate their purpose and unique role.

Thanks, that makes sense-ish. It still baffles me that any creature would have the Unstoppable attribute but still retain a (decorative) defiance bar. :p