Rework the Boon System

[Cyninja.2954]

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of greater benefit to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the spot goes to a support.

If boons are of less a benefit to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the spot goes to another damage dealer.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

[Turkeyspit.3965]

@"IndigoSundown.5419" said:To my mind, this would transition boons from a strategic necessity in organized play to a tactical option in certain circumstances. This would make gameplay more appealing to me.

I'll take a brief tangent, but I promise, it will be worth it (at least I think it is).

I remember many moons ago when I was a dedicated raider in WoW, a conversation one of the Blizzard devs had with the community. It's a bit fuzzy given it was a decade or so ago, but the gist of it was, when they design an encounter, they have no choice but to assume your group has an ideal comp containing every potential buff available to the group. To not do so would allow groups to stack specific buffs that would simplify if not outright trivialize the encounter. The downside of course was anyone who didn't have an ideal comp would walk into the same encounter at a disadvantage.

This was at a time in the game where specific classes were brought for specific abilities / buffs, and if you didn't have that class/spec, you might not be able to kill the boss. Many at the time would recruit anyone who played that class, and as long as they weren't a potato, would be invited to raid because without them the fight would fail.

So, the problem from a design perspective is, how do you balance the encounter? Do you assume the group will have 25 stacks of might, or not? If you don't, those who are able to maintain 25 stacks of might will have an easier time defeating the boss, so rather than learning mechanics or rotations, the key to victory becomes what build to bring that will stack might the best?

If boon uptime is consistent and the encounter is designed around such, and well practiced group that maintains boon uptime will experience the level of difficulty intended by the designer; poorly comped or skilled groups who don't maintain that uptime will have a harder time, the solution to which of course, would then be to git gud.

But if boon uptime is made inconsistent, how do you design the encounter? Do you assume 100% uptime knowing that is very hard to do? Sure the best players might pull it off, but the average player will have a harder fight, and may not be successful, but not because of boss mechanics. If you assume uptime is less than 100%, what then happens when players find a way to get it to 100% (and players ALWAYS find a way)? Then the fight becomes trivialized. You see this all throughout WoW's history, where some guilds figure out that "x" spec or "y" mechanic has a larger impact on the fight than it should, which opens the debate of "exploit" vs "creative use of game mechanics".

TLDR:It is much easier in PvE for the designers to balance based off optimum group comp and boon uptime.PvP is a different kettle of fish.

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

[zealex.9410]

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:

@"IndigoSundown.5419" said:To my mind, this would transition boons from a strategic necessity in organized play to a tactical option in certain circumstances. This would make gameplay more appealing to me.

I'll take a brief tangent, but I promise, it will be worth it (at least I think it is).

I remember many moons ago when I was a dedicated raider in WoW, a conversation one of the Blizzard devs had with the community. It's a bit fuzzy given it was a decade or so ago, but the gist of it was, when they design an encounter, they have no choice but to assume your group has an ideal comp containing every potential buff available to the group. To not do so would allow groups to stack specific buffs that would simplify if not outright trivialize the encounter. The downside of course was anyone who didn't have an ideal comp would walk into the same encounter at a disadvantage.

This was at a time in the game where specific classes were brought for specific abilities / buffs, and if you didn't have that class/spec, you might not be able to kill the boss. Many at the time would recruit anyone who played that class, and as long as they weren't a potato, would be invited to raid because without them the fight would fail.

So, the problem from a design perspective is, how do you balance the encounter? Do you assume the group will have 25 stacks of might, or not? If you don't, those who are able to maintain 25 stacks of might will have an easier time defeating the boss, so rather than learning mechanics or rotations, the key to victory becomes what build to bring that will stack might the best?

If boon uptime is consistent and the encounter is designed around such, and well practiced group that maintains boon uptime will experience the level of difficulty intended by the designer; poorly comped or skilled groups who don't maintain that uptime will have a harder time, the solution to which of course, would then be to git gud.

But if boon uptime is made inconsistent, how do you design the encounter? Do you assume 100% uptime knowing that is very hard to do? Sure the best players might pull it off, but the average player will have a harder fight, and may not be successful, but not because of boss mechanics. If you assume uptime is less than 100%, what then happens when players find a way to get it to 100% (and players ALWAYS find a way)? Then the fight becomes trivialized. You see this all throughout WoW's history, where some guilds figure out that "x" spec or "y" mechanic has a larger impact on the fight than it should, which opens the debate of "exploit" vs "creative use of game mechanics".

TLDR:It is much easier in PvE for the designers to balance based off optimum group comp and boon uptime.PvP is a different kettle of fish.

Inceonsistent as in pressing the button to grand the boon gives diff durations of said boon each time? Coz if not then i dont see how moving from ideally 100% to ideally 20% or smth uptime would be inconsistent.

Good groups would be able to achieve the ideal 20%, commu icate and reap the rewards and bad groups wouldnt be able to do so, just like it is now.

On the subjects of having ideal comps for diff encounters, i think its to be expected its very hard to introduce bew and unique fights but making sure no diff class or comp will be stronger than the other without basically rereleasing rhe same fight over and over. We see this with fights that favour immunities, ranged over melee, isntant skill over casted skills etc.

In general its much easier to balance around team dps regardless of means that they achieve that (unless they way overshot the target dps at which poit u look to find either exploits or if you didnt balance a fight properly). Besides anet doesnt balance around the optimal comp, not when some bosses can be killed without weapons and others can be killed without even understanding the fight.

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ignored from a composition perspective.

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

[Emberheart.8426]

The problem with boons is that they are simply way too strong. They were designed around not having 100% uptime, but now it is expected for them to be up all the time. However, boons having 100% uptime is not a problem by itself, since it makes it easier to tune raid and fractal encounters. The problem is that the effects of the boons did not get nerfed when their uptime was increased. Only alacrity got its nerfs and I think that more boons need nerfs now. The difference between having boons and not having them is much larger in GW2 than in any other MMO that I can think of. This leads to many issues, especially in competitive modes.

[Lord of the Fire.6870]

No quickness got also nerfed and alacrity got nerfed twice at least. Besides other game haver similar powerful boons the only real reason to go directly against boons are pvp and wvw .

PvP it is just luck to get some boons .(meaning an FB joins your group or someone has a built that gives something)

In Wvw you are only getting might and fury as offensive boons which comes from Revs Glint Elite which all criticize for being able to do that without a piece of diviner gear. Yes the Glint Legendary Elite is broken. (and the developer nerfing Impossible odds LOL) FB can put up defensive boons but they have a short duration and can't re supplied easily. More problematic are Roamer or Pvp built which gives you an endless supply of stabi and cc skills. (The last Mirage built was just the peak of the iceberg)

In PvE the only exception are the Fractals especially because of the ability to reset your skills and then overstack your boons by giving them twice or giving them and then switch to DPS and then reset the CDs with the mistlock. This is also completely broken

[Sobx.1758]

@"DonArkanio.6419" said:

1. Best Raid scenario used permanent Boon uptime which is unacceptable to think of - relying on the external support 24/7 in order to achieve best results is bad for class design.

What? How exactly is this "bad for class design"? That's just wrong.

2. The PvP scene is filled up with renewing, spammable Boons that are frustrating to play against and can be very confusing for newbies.

"Being very confusing for newbies" is not an argument. Pretty much anything can be "confusing for newbies" and it's not what the game should be balanced around.And honestly, I'm not sure what possibly is so confusing about that btw -feel free to explain.

3. Classes having access to the maximum cap of Might on their own is a bad design. Balancing a class around external boons is unhealthy.

How is this a bad design? Because you don't like it? Not an argument.

4. Single skills are capable of providing 3 or more boons with single use - again, external support that has to be balanced around.

Again, I don't see what exactly is wrong with that?

I want to highlight the issue.

You didn't really highlight any issue here, it seems to me that all you wrote is "I don't like it so it's unhealthy/bad for class design".

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

Yes, it will make the rift larger, as I have already stated.

First off, boons make up a huge part of the current setups damage. So if they are made less useful AND encounters are not rebalanced or classes are not buffed, all encounters will get more difficult. I already mentioned this.

Second, the fact that some groups can upkeep boons better than others alone is no argument as to why boons should or should not be changed. They are a mechanic and diversify this games builds and combat (at least in pve). If you are of the opinion that a more simplistic group setup is beneficial, then you need to explain why dumbing down the game is good.

Finally if we assume that boons get reworked and made less useful or more difficult to manage and the damage loss is compensated for by rebalancing encounters or buffing classes, thus resulting in:

• more simplistic group setups
• easier pve encounters

then why not cut out the middle man? Simply rebalance encounters to make things easier.

You are actively arguing that making this games combat and build system more simplistic is a good thing. I simply can not agree. At least not with the so far arguments given. This too was already stated by me in my initial response to this thread.

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

Yes, it will make the rift larger, as I have already stated.

First off, boons make up a huge part of the current setups damage. So if they are made less useful AND encounters are not rebalanced or classes are not buffed, all encounters will get more difficult. I already mentioned this.

Second, the fact that some groups can upkeep boons better than others alone is no argument as to why boons should or should not be changed. They are a mechanic and diversify this games builds and combat (at least in pve). If you are of the opinion that a more simplistic group setup is beneficial, then you need to explain why dumbing down the game is good.

Finally if we assume that boons get reworked and made less useful or more difficult to manage and the damage loss is compensated for by rebalancing encounters or buffing classes, thus resulting in:

• more simplistic group setups
• easier pve encounters

then why not cut out the middle man? Simply rebalance encounters to make things easier.

You are actively arguing that making this games combat and build system more simplistic is a good thing. I simply can not agree. At least not with the so far arguments given. This too was already stated by me in my initial response to this thread.

How am i doing such thing? First i realise that to rework the boons is to rework the combat system at large so im speaking about changing boons to be low upkeep high potency in the context that further changes to classes and mechanic of the combat would be made.

Secondly, how does going from having the goto be 100% boon upkeep to not having 100% is dumbing down the combat? the raid compositions are already fairly simplistic, take classes the bring the boons and damage dealers.

Making the encounters easier due to boons not being there all the time assumes that 1. the encounters are balanced around your group having 100% boon uptime, 2. changes to the dmg of abilities and such wouldnt be made to compensate.

I state in my original post on this thread that you cant have a boon rework without changes other parts of the combat as well, such as skills, combo fields, cds of abilities etc.

The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg. There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

Rn there is no choice, u just bring the boons and the dmg.

[zealex.9410]

@Ganathar.4956 said:The problem with boons is that they are simply way too strong. They were designed around not having 100% uptime, but now it is expected for them to be up all the time. However, boons having 100% uptime is not a problem by itself, since it makes it easier to tune raid and fractal encounters. The problem is that the effects of the boons did not get nerfed when their uptime was increased. Only alacrity got its nerfs and I think that more boons need nerfs now. The difference between having boons and not having them is much larger in GW2 than in any other MMO that I can think of. This leads to many issues, especially in competitive modes.

Fairly good opinion, but i dont think encounters arw baalnced around 100% uptime, if they were 1. it would be much harder to do them with subpar results 2. they would be harder.

I think they are balanced for a fairly lower bar which makes sense because the majority of players prob dont reach 100% consistently.

[maddoctor.2738]

@zealex.9410 said:The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

Using full buffs from a Druid and a Chrono, the 3 dps players left in the group do around double to triple damage the normal. Let's say that every player in the game does 1k and the supports do 0 (for simplicity). With the current system, taking 5 dps would give you 5k group dps. If you take the 2 supports instead, the group will do 6k-9k dps, plus all the extra benefits of having support builds in the first place, like healing, tanking and so on. Even with just x2 damage, it's worth getting those supports for their buffs.

Now let's suppose they nerf boons, by reducing their duration, their effectiveness or both, as has been suggested here. How much damage will they offer to the group? If it's not higher than what 5 dps characters would do then supports will be simply deleted from the game. Maybe you'd need one in Raids to tank those bosses that require a tank, but anywhere else no more support will be played. Variety would die and everyone would just bring practically nothing but dps.

I'm confused.

There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

That's exactly what is happening now, as you explained right before that sentence:

I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg.

2 or 3 slots per raid are chosen for their team buffs, the rest have good personal dps to compensate.

[ButcherofMalakir.4067]

@DonArkanio.6419 said:

@Ayakaru.6583 said:

I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

External support meaning boons, not class buffs.No class should be able to Max-stack on its own - this is unhealthy. No class should be mostly reliant on external support that isn't part of the class itself.

I am bothered by Boons functionality as atm it works as if it was a built-in class feature which it isn't. Boons sit on top of every class buff and work with it making some builds very unfun to play against. It's something that is treated as granted along the skills, so without much effort boons are thrown all over the place.

Raid groups rely on the permanent boon uptime and I don't think that should exist. This makes the fight dependant on the the external mechanic rather than profession themselves.

Also, I perfectly figured out what I want to say, and if you don't understand the process of my thoughts, you can simply ask rather than calling this a rant. Thanks for the comment that doesn't bring much to the discussion other than sticking to the words I use to describe the issue.

We have roles in raids because each option brings something to the table. If no class could stack alone then we might get 10 times same spec. Its similar to DH/fb/power chrono comps now where quickness is stacked by dps builds.Boons are like 70 percent of dps so every comp will want some way to stack them.I feel like boon system is what makes raids enjoyable so dont rework that please

[Emberheart.8426]

@Lord of the Fire.6870 said:No quickness got also nerfed and alacrity got nerfed twice at least. Besides other game haver similar powerful boons the only real reason to go directly against boons are pvp and wvw .

PvP it is just luck to get some boons .(meaning an FB joins your group or someone has a built that gives something)

In Wvw you are only getting might and fury as offensive boons which comes from Revs Glint Elite which all criticize for being able to do that without a piece of diviner gear. Yes the Glint Legendary Elite is broken. (and the developer nerfing Impossible odds LOL) FB can put up defensive boons but they have a short duration and can't re supplied easily. More problematic are Roamer or Pvp built which gives you an endless supply of stabi and cc skills. (The last Mirage built was just the peak of the iceberg)

In PvE the only exception are the Fractals especially because of the ability to reset your skills and then overstack your boons by giving them twice or giving them and then switch to DPS and then reset the CDs with the mistlock. This is also completely broken

Quickness only got nerfed as soon as it got converted into a boon. When it first became a boon it was incredibly hard to share any of it. The difference in quickness uptime between back then and now is insane, and I do not believe that boon has any right to be as powerful anymore. It is the strongest boon in the game by a large margin.

The main problem with boons in competitive modes is not about supports providing them. It mainly has to do with some sidenoder and roaming specs getting free boons for no reason, such as holosmith quickness or easy 25 might on several classes. The classes that get easy selfish boons have a significant advantage when supports are absent just because. This is probably the biggest balance problem in competitive modes, but there is also a smaller support balance problem. Since boons are so strong, everyone prefers boon support to healing, which makes firebrand miles better than other supports such as scrapper and tempest.

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

Yes, it will make the rift larger, as I have already stated.

First off, boons make up a huge part of the current setups damage. So if they are made less useful AND encounters are not rebalanced or classes are not buffed, all encounters will get more difficult. I already mentioned this.

Second, the fact that some groups can upkeep boons better than others alone is no argument as to why boons should or should not be changed. They are a mechanic and diversify this games builds and combat (at least in pve). If you are of the opinion that a more simplistic group setup is beneficial, then you need to explain why dumbing down the game is good.

Finally if we assume that boons get reworked and made less useful or more difficult to manage and the damage loss is compensated for by rebalancing encounters or buffing classes, thus resulting in:

• more simplistic group setups
• easier pve encounters

then why not cut out the middle man? Simply rebalance encounters to make things easier.

You are actively arguing that making this games combat and build system more simplistic is a good thing. I simply can not agree. At least not with the so far arguments given. This too was already stated by me in my initial response to this thread.

How am i doing such thing? First i realise that to rework the boons is to rework the combat system at large so im speaking about changing boons to be low upkeep high potency in the context that further changes to classes and mechanic of the combat would be made.

A full rework of the combat system is off the table. The chances of this happening are 0 given Arenanet resources. This thread is about boons and their current implementation in the current combat system. If you want to deal with hypothetical but nearly impossible scenarios, sure, everything is possible.

@zealex.9410 said:Secondly, how does going from having the goto be 100% boon upkeep to not having 100% is dumbing down the combat? the raid compositions are already fairly simplistic, take classes the bring the boons and damage dealers.

You are having a hard time seperating team composition with player performance. Maddoctor explained what I have been trying to explain to you again.

I can't explain this better than I already have if you don't want to rationally take a moment to think about the results without applying some wishful thinking.

What you want is: strategic use of boons at given points in time.

What I am trying to explain to you: this will never happen given the current boon and combat system.

@zealex.9410 said:Making the encounters easier due to boons not being there all the time assumes that 1. the encounters are balanced around your group having 100% boon uptime, 2. changes to the dmg of abilities and such wouldnt be made to compensate.

No, you have that backwards. Encounters are already balanced around no boons being present (that should be very obvious given the lax damage requirements and long timers). Boons currently allow players to make encounters easier than designed (with as far as skipping many mechanics on bosses). That's why most experianced raiders call boons nearly cheating.

Removing boons and the benefits they bring would immediately make encounters closer to their intended difficulty which in this case means a lot harder.

@zealex.9410 said:I state in my original post on this thread that you cant have a boon rework without changes other parts of the combat as well, such as skills, combo fields, cds of abilities etc.

The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

Sure, if a full rework were done. Still with boons being equally useful as no boons means teams without boons are benfitting of not having to build or manage boons. Net result: boons are not being used any longer.

@zealex.9410 said:I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg. There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

Rn there is no choice, u just bring the boons and the dmg.

There is a ton of choice. You are simply ignoring it. The main choise right now is in the lax approach and the 6 damage dealer spots being able to get filled with nearly any class. The limit is only in class design and which boons are available from which class. As such 6 spots in raids enjoy the most choice and flexibility available. Stop focusing on only 4 (or 1-2 in case of fractals) spots going to supports but take into account the entire composition.

[zealex.9410]

@maddoctor.2738 said:

@zealex.9410 said:The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

Using full buffs from a Druid and a Chrono, the 3 dps players left in the group do around double to triple damage the normal. Let's say that every player in the game does 1k and the supports do 0 (for simplicity). With the current system, taking 5 dps would give you 5k group dps. If you take the 2 supports instead, the group will do 6k-9k dps, plus all the extra benefits of having support builds in the first place, like healing, tanking and so on. Even with just x2 damage, it's worth getting those supports for their buffs.

Now let's suppose they nerf boons, by reducing their duration, their effectiveness or both, as has been suggested here. How much damage will they offer to the group? If it's not higher than what 5 dps characters would do then supports will be simply deleted from the game. Maybe you'd need one in Raids to tank those bosses that require a tank, but anywhere else no more support will be played. Variety would die and everyone would just bring practically nothing but dps.

I'm confused.

What variety? U hring the 2 or 3 same boon bots and only the dps role gets to e joy diversity.

About boons, im not saying nerf them, im saying make it more of a teamjob to coordinate and get the most out of.

There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

That's exactly what is happening now, as you explained right before that sentence:

I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg.

2 or 3 slots per raid are chosen for their team buffs, the rest have good personal dps to compensate.

And thats every composition.

[zealex.9410]

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

Yes, it will make the rift larger, as I have already stated.

First off, boons make up a huge part of the current setups damage. So if they are made less useful AND encounters are not rebalanced or classes are not buffed, all encounters will get more difficult. I already mentioned this.

Second, the fact that some groups can upkeep boons better than others alone is no argument as to why boons should or should not be changed. They are a mechanic and diversify this games builds and combat (at least in pve). If you are of the opinion that a more simplistic group setup is beneficial, then you need to explain why dumbing down the game is good.

Finally if we assume that boons get reworked and made less useful or more difficult to manage and the damage loss is compensated for by rebalancing encounters or buffing classes, thus resulting in:

• more simplistic group setups
• easier pve encounters

then why not cut out the middle man? Simply rebalance encounters to make things easier.

You are actively arguing that making this games combat and build system more simplistic is a good thing. I simply can not agree. At least not with the so far arguments given. This too was already stated by me in my initial response to this thread.

How am i doing such thing? First i realise that to rework the boons is to rework the combat system at large so im speaking about changing boons to be low upkeep high potency in the context that further changes to classes and mechanic of the combat would be made.

A full rework of the combat system is off the table. The chances of this happening are 0 given Arenanet resources. This thread is about boons and their current implementation in the current combat system. If you want to deal with hypothetical but nearly impossible scenarios, sure, everything is possible.

@zealex.9410 said:Secondly, how does going from having the goto be 100% boon upkeep to not having 100% is dumbing down the combat? the raid compositions are already fairly simplistic, take classes the bring the boons and damage dealers.

You are having a hard time seperating team composition with player performance. Maddoctor explained what I have been trying to explain to you again.

I can't explain this better than I already have if you don't want to rationally take a moment to think about the results without applying some wishful thinking.

What you want is: strategic use of boons at given points in time.

What I am trying to explain to you: this will never happen given the current boon and combat system.

@zealex.9410 said:Making the encounters easier due to boons not being there all the time assumes that 1. the encounters are balanced around your group having 100% boon uptime, 2. changes to the dmg of abilities and such wouldnt be made to compensate.

No, you have that backwards. Encounters are already balanced around no boons being present (that should be very obvious given the lax damage requirements and long timers). Boons currently allow players to make encounters easier than designed (with as far as skipping many mechanics on bosses). That's why most experianced raiders call boons nearly cheating.

Removing boons and the benefits they bring would immediately make encounters closer to their intended difficulty which in this case means a lot harder.

@zealex.9410 said:I state in my original post on this thread that you cant have a boon rework without changes other parts of the combat as well, such as skills, combo fields, cds of abilities etc.

The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

Sure, if a full rework were done. Still with boons being equally useful as no boons means teams without boons are benfitting of not having to build or manage boons. Net result: boons are not being used any longer.

@zealex.9410 said:I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg. There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

Rn there is no choice, u just bring the boons and the dmg.

There is a ton of choice. You are simply ignoring it. The main choise right now is in the lax approach and the 6 damage dealer spots being able to get filled with nearly any class. The limit is only in class design and which boons are available from which class. As such 6 spots in raids enjoy the most choice and flexibility available. Stop focusing on only 4 (or 1-2 in case of fractals) spots going to supports but take into account the entire composition.

Im taking ino acount the composition and every composition looks like this: x buffers and x dds.

Between the dds there is diversity yes because their numbers are relatively close but in terms of how the entire comp looks like theres a set formst that has been followed since the release of raids.

[maddoctor.2738]

@zealex.9410 said:What variety? U hring the 2 or 3 same boon bots and only the dps role gets to e joy diversity.

Druid, Chrono, Alacrigrade, Quickbrand, Bannerslave are all support options. Boon Thief, Hand Kiter are also options for specific encounters (Matthias and Deimos respectively). What diversity does the dps role enjoy exactly? On a per boss basis they are as limited as anyone else.

The alternative won't increase the diversity of dps roles, it will simply remove the supports from the game.

[Cyninja.2954]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:

@DonArkanio.6419 said:I want people to discuss the issues about Boon System and whether it is in need of rework or not. I'm not a game designer - I want to see what people have to say on this subject.

Fine, here is the short of it for a pve setting:

If boons are of

greater benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to a support

.

If boons are

of less a benefit

to the party on a slot over a damage dealer, the

spot goes to another damage dealer

.

Here is your future raid/fractal composition when boons are made irrelevant (no there is no inbetween in a game where no trinity is hardcoded):For fractals:5 dps (or 4 dps 1 healer for less experienced groups)

For raids:9 dps and 1 healer (or 8 dps and 2 healers for less experienced groups). Healer support would likely take on the role of tank as they are doing now on some encounters.

If encounters are not redesigned, the overall pressure on damage dealer performance will increase. For people who don't know what that means: you need to perform better or get kicked.

As if the diff that a build that only relies on dmg and a build that only relies on utility and everything in between cant be balanced.

That is insignificant. Either boons are worth it, or they are not worth it.

Hybrid builds bringing boons would be even stronger than support builds bringing boons right now. But again, that is not of concern balance wise since before you even consider how to bring boons it is importent to decide if it's worth bringing them.

Considering whether or not its worth bringing heavy boon builds over less so build is the main concern of balance.

there will always be something that better but if the diff is small and you arent a speedrunner or someone whos gonna claim world first x it doesnt really matter what u play. (what u play that makes sense, im not talking about bringing a bearbow here)

I'm not sure what you are getting at. Either boons provided are worth sacrificing party spots and/or performance on classes, or not.

Let's for a moment assume that boons are perfectly balanced to be right in the middle: aka bringing them is of equal value as not bringing them (or slightly above) which is insane to achieve but let's assume nonetheless. In that case no boons wins out due to the lower organization required.

Not perfect balance, it doesnt need to be so, if it did we would never seen anything other than the meta picked at any given time.

Its up to the group to decide what they will roll with, if someone wants to play a class that buffs but has lower personal dmg because of it they may do so, if someone wants to bring a class that doesnt bring utility but brings alot of dmg they may do so.

We to an extend already see that with builds that bring cc/utility vs classes that dont. As i said again meta exist, does that mean everyone follows it? Does everyone play the meta comp at any diff boss or do ppl bring what they like so long as its strong and they can perform with it? The answer is that both are happening.

Like, the best examble i can provide would the dps benchmarks, theres bound to be a best build in terms of dmg and a worst and a bunch inbetween. Do we only see the best build being used?

What are you talking about? This has nothing to do with performance of individual classes. This has to do with composition and composition has always been for EVERY version it went through: minimum support, maximum damage dealers.

You should know this as a raider. It is insane to even have to argue this.

@zealex.9410 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:There is no either or with boons. This is best seen with defensive boons in pve. They are brought if possible but completely ingnored from a composition perspective.

Defensive boons are w/e since they basically compete with already the healer of the group as well as everyone in the group who has a healing skill and a dodge, plus encounters arent that deadly to really warrant them. In that regard its similar to damage, no particular encounter at this point in the game poses an immense dps check to warrant going for the bis options.

So your solution is: make offensive boons similar to defensive boons. If they are there, great but there won't be compositions built around them. That is exactly what I said is it not?

@zealex.9410 said:To make clear my position, i dont like the perma upkeep nature of boons, i believe it tunnel visions certain builds into only ever doing that and removes strategy and posibilities for communication related plays in a group.

This has nothing to do with boons being permanent or not. Arenanet could cut boon duration in half or make them not possible to upkeep permanently. The result is exactly as I predicted:If boons are a damage increase -> they will be provided during damage phases in encounters (no reason to have them up 100% of the time, it's just conveniant to do so currently)If boons are no damage increase -> they will not be provided and the composition will be built without them being provided.

This is not rocket science. Boons provide only 1 thing: damage increase. The only offensive boon which deviates from this is alacrity which allows certain skills to be available faster like cc and which makes certain rotations possible but even that is mostly a damage increase. If the offensive boons are not useful enough as damage increases, they are useless.

@zealex.9410 said:Would changing them to be low dur high potency buffs make them harder to use and require more coordination? Yes. Could that push boon play to be used to its fulled potential by statics while pugs rely on easier tactics? Prob. Is that any diff from having a good player play a build thats really hard and complex to perform well at vs a worse player using something more straight forward and easy to do the job? I dont think so.

All this would do is make the rift between high performance groups and casual groups even bigger. Yes, a great idea. /sarcasm

Theres already a big diff in groups around boons changing the availability of said boons duration wise and class wise will basically change the rift that is the diff from having groups that dont get the most out of their boons and groups that do to groups that dont relyon boons because they are harder to coordinate and groups that do.

Yes, it will make the rift larger, as I have already stated.

First off, boons make up a huge part of the current setups damage. So if they are made less useful AND encounters are not rebalanced or classes are not buffed, all encounters will get more difficult. I already mentioned this.

Second, the fact that some groups can upkeep boons better than others alone is no argument as to why boons should or should not be changed. They are a mechanic and diversify this games builds and combat (at least in pve). If you are of the opinion that a more simplistic group setup is beneficial, then you need to explain why dumbing down the game is good.

Finally if we assume that boons get reworked and made less useful or more difficult to manage and the damage loss is compensated for by rebalancing encounters or buffing classes, thus resulting in:

• more simplistic group setups
• easier pve encounters

then why not cut out the middle man? Simply rebalance encounters to make things easier.

You are actively arguing that making this games combat and build system more simplistic is a good thing. I simply can not agree. At least not with the so far arguments given. This too was already stated by me in my initial response to this thread.

How am i doing such thing? First i realise that to rework the boons is to rework the combat system at large so im speaking about changing boons to be low upkeep high potency in the context that further changes to classes and mechanic of the combat would be made.

A full rework of the combat system is off the table. The chances of this happening are 0 given Arenanet resources. This thread is about boons and their current implementation in the current combat system. If you want to deal with hypothetical but nearly impossible scenarios, sure, everything is possible.

@zealex.9410 said:Secondly, how does going from having the goto be 100% boon upkeep to not having 100% is dumbing down the combat? the raid compositions are already fairly simplistic, take classes the bring the boons and damage dealers.

You are having a hard time seperating team composition with player performance. Maddoctor explained what I have been trying to explain to you again.

I can't explain this better than I already have if you don't want to rationally take a moment to think about the results without applying some wishful thinking.

What you want is: strategic use of boons at given points in time.

What I am trying to explain to you: this will never happen given the current boon and combat system.

@zealex.9410 said:Making the encounters easier due to boons not being there all the time assumes that 1. the encounters are balanced around your group having 100% boon uptime, 2. changes to the dmg of abilities and such wouldnt be made to compensate.

No, you have that backwards. Encounters are already balanced around no boons being present (that should be very obvious given the lax damage requirements and long timers). Boons currently allow players to make encounters easier than designed (with as far as skipping many mechanics on bosses). That's why most experianced raiders call boons nearly cheating.

Removing boons and the benefits they bring would immediately make encounters closer to their intended difficulty which in this case means a lot harder.

@zealex.9410 said:I state in my original post on this thread that you cant have a boon rework without changes other parts of the combat as well, such as skills, combo fields, cds of abilities etc.

The goal is to alter the way boons play to make combat on the mid to high end teambased while balancing alternatives for groups who lack such coordination (by buffing personal dmg and such). The relative group dmg should be similar with the mean to get the most out of it requiring more teamplay and coordination.

Sure, if a full rework were done. Still with boons being equally useful as no boons means teams without boons are benfitting of not having to build or manage boons. Net result: boons are not being used any longer.

@zealex.9410 said:I dont find having 2 or 3 classes per raid or fractal be there just to spam boons while the others bring practically nothing (well maybe some cc) except for dmg. There should be choices to be made, bring classes tbat bring team buffs or bring classes that dont but have good personal dmg to compensate?

Rn there is no choice, u just bring the boons and the dmg.

There is a ton of choice. You are simply ignoring it. The main choise right now is in the lax approach and the 6 damage dealer spots being able to get filled with nearly any class. The limit is only in class design and which boons are available from which class. As such 6 spots in raids enjoy the most choice and flexibility available. Stop focusing on only 4 (or 1-2 in case of fractals) spots going to supports but take into account the entire composition.

Im taking ino acount the composition and every composition looks like this: x buffers and x dds.

Between the dds there is diversity yes because their numbers are relatively close but in terms of how the entire comp looks like theres a set formst that has been followed since the release of raids.

Great, now explain to me how this is inferior to: 1-2 healers and 8 dps?

No, between the dds there is diversity because the benchmark is low. Maybe you are not up to date, but there is a huge damage disparity between meta and non meta builds and classes currently (aka bringing a proper class to each boss), again.

@maddoctor.2738 said:

@zealex.9410 said:What variety? U hring the 2 or 3 same boon bots and only the dps role gets to e joy diversity.

Druid, Chrono, Alacrigrade, Quickbrand, Bannerslave are all support options. Boon Thief, Hand Kiter are also options for specific encounters (Matthias and Deimos respectively). What diversity does the dps role enjoy exactly? On a per boss basis they are as limited as anyone else.

The alternative won't increase the diversity of dps roles, it will simply remove the supports from the game.

This.

[FOX.3582]

@phokus.8934 said:Makes post about wanting boons to be reworked but offers no suggestions. About par for these forums.

Boon output is fine with the exception of maybe FB but it's a support spec.

Actually, no one should ever give suggestions about this game. The Arenanet development team is all about “look at us and how good we are and everything created is because of us”. If you have a good idea they will never implement it just because it’s not their own idea, simple as that. Yes they are that sad, look at the history. They almost never listen to great ideas and let their game become an utter joke (useless chairs so people can show of how baddæss they look, raids that only a couple of people play, and creating visual chaos while they think it’s challenging content, etc). NEVER write down your good ideas in the forum, or else you know for sure they will never be implemented.