Power Creep is Out of Control

[Jski.6180]

1 minute ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Coming from you, I'm not surprised. I can assure there isn't anything arbitrary about me NOT assuming Anet defines support classes to need quickness/alacrity boon sharing just because they gave Scrapper quickness boon-sharing to enhance their offensive support

If you truly think anet balance one class different from every thing else why not balance other classes comply different from each other to the point where there no real balancing. More then likely its an arbitrary point of view only to deal with the argument at hand or can we hold you to each class being balanced as if they are the only class in the game point of view?

[Obtena.7952]

2 minutes ago, Jski.6180 said:

If you truly think anet balance one class different from every thing else why not balance other classes comply different from each other to the point where there no real balancing. 

Well from where I sit, that's exactly what they do.

 

"or can we hold you to each class being balanced as if they are the only class in the game point of view?"

 

Yes ... go ahead and hold me to that, because I don't see why it would be any other way. Why would you de facto assume Anet balances classes together like they are some grouped entity? I have YET to see anything that leads me to think Anet is balancing class X because of what Class Y does. 

Edited May 16, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[HappyHubris.1096]

Remember when the big buff was might and stacking it required a ton of fields and blast finishers?

[Jski.6180]

Just now, Obtena.7952 said:

Well from where I sit, that's exactly what they do.

I get the feeling of that too BUT they dont come out and say it like that. It realty seems anet think support classes need these boons to be seen as useful.

[Jski.6180]

Just now, HappyHubris.1096 said:

Remember when the big buff was might and stacking it required a ton of fields and blast finishers?

I miss that game play SOOO much.

[Obtena.7952]

2 minutes ago, Jski.6180 said:

I get the feeling of that too BUT they dont come out and say it like that. It realty seems anet think support classes need these boons to be seen as useful.

Sure, it's clear that Anet thinks support classes CAN do their job of support by boon sharing ... but that still shouldn't lead you to conclude that all support classes have to support their teams with alacrity and quickness boon sharing. There are LOTS of ways to support a team and we already have some of those ways in the game that AREN'T boons. 

Edited May 16, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Jski.6180]

1 minute ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Sure, it's clear that Anet thinks support classes CAN do their job of support by boon sharing ... but that still shouldn't lead you to conclude that those boons are alacrity and quickness ... or that the way the classes support their teams have to be boons at all. 

It should when they fail to power creep other classes on the same level. A lot of all of this is about anet adding in power creep in a reckless way and point out that they failed to do other classes. Using your antagonist own logic agent them in a way.

[Obtena.7952]

Just now, Jski.6180 said:

It should when they fail to power creep other classes on the same level. A lot of all of this is about anet adding in power creep in a reckless way and point out that they failed to do other classes. Using your antagonist own logic agent them in a way.

No, that doesn't make sense .... there are lots of ways Anet can buff the support a class gives in a team WITHOUT resorting to alacrity and quickness boon sharing. Again, that's just a contrived conclusion because it's the change you want to see, not the change that needs to happen. 

[Jski.6180]

2 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

No, that doesn't make sense .... there are lots of ways Anet can buff the support a class gives in a team WITHOUT resorting to alacrity and quickness boon sharing. Again, that's just a contrived conclusion because it's the change you want to see, not the change that needs to happen. 

This is what anet seems to think if they dont then they lack logic of there own views.

[Obtena.7952]

6 minutes ago, Jski.6180 said:

This is what anet seems to think if they dont then they lack logic of there own views.

No, you don't know what Anet seems to think based on how they changed one class (and you even admitted you don't know what Anet thinks a number of posts back). You can't conclude that Scrapper getting quickness boon share indicates Anet thinks support classes should have alacrity and quickness boon sharing. That's just something you made up and convinced yourself based on the change you want to see happen on ele. 

Edited May 16, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

1 hour ago, Jski.6180 said:

Balancing by anet may have a cost on there player base and there standing but they can do any thing they want for balancing.

 

There a cost to max min for an pve fight is up to the player and should not be something about playing the "right class" that why i am for giving more classes these strong boons.

Sure, you can have better ideas about balancing. Or at least ideas you think are better. Please however, do not try to prop your ideas by arguments that are factually false. It definitely does not help you in this kind discussion (or any reasonable discussion, for that matter).

 

The claim you made i originally responded to was factually untrue (and not slightly, but completely - it did not even lie close to the truth). No matter of dancing about, skirting the issue or redirecting that argument will make it otherwise.

 

You cannot build a solid foundation for a change proposal with such arguments.

Edited May 16, 2021 by Astralporing.1957

[Kodama.6453]

5 hours ago, Jski.6180 said:

 

it hasn't had access to the offensive boons it needs to be truly valuable as a support role in group PvE content

 

I am at a lost what else i can say to you. What boon dose scraper not have access to to make it truly valuable as an support role in pve group content?

Scrapper didn't have any reliable offensive buffs, why don't you get that?

 

Scrapper can't give 25 stacks of might permanently to a group. Having access to might is not enough, to really be a potent might share, you have to keep up 25 stacks of them on your sub group.

 

Our only source of group fury is rifle turret with experimental turrets trait. To keep it up 100% we need 100% extra boon duration and even then it is still not reliable since it is tied to a turret which dies extremely easily. Unlike spirits or other minion types, we can't even heal it with our healing skills, but would have to take tool kit for that, which we can afford to take in a support build.

 

Scrapper also isn't able to pick a unique buff, pinpoint distribution is the only one we have and is in a dps trait line which offers absolutely nothing else to a support build.

 

Stop acting like scrapper had access to great offensive boons just because we can share a little might here and there.

[Ruufio.1496]

This is what pvp used to be - and I kittening miss it so much:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnp1Pgj8GcM

 

Look how slow paced and balanced it is. You try an engineer build like that today and you will almost immediately die. How do I know? Because I recently returned after 2 years and after getting accustomed to the game again tried a similar build in pvp and you know what happens? You know what happens when I'm switching to bomb kit to blind, maybe immobilize into big 'ol bomb, set up some waterfield blasts, maybe blast a light field to clear FFDSFVBGF ANDOMFGIMDEAD because a scrapper (sometimes 2 scrappers) came up to me and spammed a kitten auto attack on flamethrower. And it is like this for every class.

 

Remember hambow warrior? I would personally say that was the peak of balance for this game. Now look at the bullkitten we have today like soulbeasts. Just look at the kitten arsenal that a soulbeast has compared to what a hambow warrior had. It's ludicrous - and it's ludicrous for every class.

 

The combat has become so bad in this game and it makes me sad because it was amazing - but it's so far gone now that we can never see it again - it's just TOO far gone. The slow paced combat of blasting water fields for heals and fire fields for might was sooooooooooooooo gooooooooooooood and how are there even people who defend what we have today? This is like runescape 3 vs osrs where oldschool has the superior combat system.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

I know this is an old thread, but it is something I've seen when looking at the benchmarks for modern builds.  There was a time when 30k DPS was considered passable and builds peaked at 35k DPS.  Nowadays they're scraping/passing 40k and previous builds are now considered bad.  

[Puck.3697]

EoD speccs seem a good backtrack to power creep or the start to it. 

Returning to 5 man buffs. Less overpowered traits and mechanics, the deciding factor will be the changes to existing elites and core speccs that they've promised to come after launch which will decide the success of it overall. 

Hopefully we will see a revert to all buffs going back to 5man and some serious dealing with some of the existing mechanics which are so game breaking. 

But yes currently it is a mess 

[Jski.6180]

It dose feel like EoD elite spec are just power creeped of the old elite spec from hot and pof as well as the core class. I am just not sure we are going to see non meta classes become part of the meta after EoD and we are more likely to see the same old classes but with more power creep end up the meta and then some.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvE:
You can oneshot mobs in lower level areas when the entire game was sold on the downscaling system and the ability to play with friends who join the game without worrying about your "power level".

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in WvW:

You can lose 20v5 just because the party of five is "well played". As in they can literally be unkillable by an entire, uncoordinated zerg. Its not uncommon to see these groups chased across an entire map while picking players off the whole time. Its often framed as blobs being the problem, but they're just a symptom of the exponential effects of having carry builds  (i.e, meta builds) combined with coordination, which is already severe at small scale but gets multiplied many times over in large scale.

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvP;

The entire meta has about three dominant classes, out of nine. That's only a 33% effective balance factor. Not to mention that at least half the subclasses are never taken, even as we're adding more, because why bother when you can just CC players and kill them in 1-3 seconds while being invulnerable?

 

Players say "EoD specs will fix it" or "EoD specs will make it worse". Likely both will be true; it'll fix the problem for some classes , and make the problem worse for other classes. A meta shift, just like always.

 

This is all a result of it being an action game (MOBA instead of MMORPG). You can't truly balance the game when sometimes the gameplay exceeds player's best mental & physical reflexes; when you can even combine multiple attacks into one by using Quickness buff or manipulating cast windows, and so on.

 

Someone griped at me yesterday for spamming CC as an Ele in a PvP match, and said I had no skill, just because I know the cast times on all my skills and know how to overlap them to do 3-4 effects at the same time. Its harsh to deal with, but its what we've ended up with because players just wanted it faster and faster, more and more powerful, they want that speed, those numbers, the ACTION, the POWER. They want to feel ULTIMATE.

 

And that's not balance, balance is slow, careful and precise, and has limits that can't be exceeded. You could slow the entire game down by 50% so players could actually see attacks coming and react to them and the balance would automatically improve by 100% overnight because effects like DPS, CC, etc. could be realistically managed by the enemy, THEN you can start actually looking at things like skill coefficients.

 

How do I know? Because that's how the game was at release, and before HoT in general.

Edited December 24, 2021 by Hannelore.8153

[Jski.6180]

6 minutes ago, Hannelore.8153 said:

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvE:
You can oneshot mobs in lower level areas when the entire game was sold on the downscaling system and the ability to play with friends who join the game without worrying about your "power level".

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in WvW:

You can lose 20v5 just because the party of five is "well played". As in they can literally be unkillable by an entire, uncoordinated zerg. Its not uncommon to see these groups chased across an entire map while picking players off the whole time. Its often framed as blobs being the problem, but they're just a symptom of the exponential effects of having carry builds  (i.e, meta builds) combined with coordination, which is already severe at small scale but gets multiplied many times over in large scale.

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvP;

The entire meta has about three dominant classes, out of nine. That's only a 33% effective balance factor. Not to mention that at least half the subclasses are never taken, even as we're adding more, because why bother when you can just CC players and kill them in 1-3 seconds while being invulnerable?

 

Players say "EoD specs will fix it" or "EoD specs will make it worse". Likely both will be true; it'll fix the problem for some classes , and make the problem worse for other classes. A meta shift, just like always.

The only meta shift we had in gw2 is losing classes from the meta down to the 3 we have now. I just hope it dose not shift to 2 or even 1 class (if that what you mean).

[LucianDK.8615]

On 12/24/2021 at 6:12 AM, Jski.6180 said:

The only meta shift we had in gw2 is losing classes from the meta down to the 3 we have now. I just hope it dose not shift to 2 or even 1 class (if that what you mean).

Firebrands would be that class. 

 

Scourge upon PoF release could do far too much, with high barriers and high dps from shades, which was rightfully nerfed.   But you should have to focus on either healing or dpsto be good at them, which makes the current Scourge  a well balanced class unlike Firebrands, whom I am astounded that they still havent had the same treatment.  Perhaps using a tome should put the others on cooldown.

 

Dont be envious of the Scourge just because it is in a good spot. But they are quite abundant because people have picked up on it being a quite solid choice, as well appealing to the edgelords. If you think current Scourge is OP, youve forgotten how it used to be at the beginning of PoF.  I am currently setting myself up to play a healscourge beside the cdps scourge I already play. Dps or healing should be in two quite different builds, something which the Firebrand badly needs.

 

If anything is needed, its to give help to the classes that needs it. Like Elementalist.

Edited December 27, 2021 by LucianDK.8615

[Axl.8924]

On 5/15/2021 at 7:01 PM, Jski.6180 said:

I am all for taking alacrity away from the classes that have it now mostly the ones just added and on very low cd but i do not think that going to happen. Anet made an active chose of adding these boons to classes whom did not have them before as strong support effects. It was massive power creep for thoughts classes that has comply left the other classes behind in all game types. So i do not see why any class should be with out.

 

Why not have new boons that only specific classes can give then and take away alac off those who don't? i'm all for taking off alac from reaper self alac in reaper shroud and making them want one of the classes who gives alac.

 

I don't know about everyone giving alac anyways since it kinda dumbs down the game while also making every class samey. If i play a chronomancer i want to feel special not like OH there is a harbringer he can throw alac too.

 

  On 12/24/2021 at 6:12 AM, Jski.6180 said:

The only meta shift we had in gw2 is losing classes from the meta down to the 3 we have now. I just hope it dose not shift to 2 or even 1 class (if that what you mean).

Firebrands would be that class. 

 

Scourge upon PoF release could do far too much, with high barriers and high dps from shades, which was rightfully nerfed.   But you should have to focus on either healing or dpsto be good at them, which makes the current Scourge  a well balanced class unlike Firebrands, whom I am astounded that they still havent had the same treatment.  Perhaps using a tome should put the others on cooldown.

 

Dont be envious of the Scourge just because it is in a good spot. But they are quite abundant because people have picked up on it being a quite solid choice, as well appealing to the edgelords. If you think current Scourge is OP, youve forgotten how it used to be at the beginning of PoF.  I am currently setting myself up to play a healscourge beside the cdps scourge I already play. Dps or healing should be in two quite different builds, something which the Firebrand badly needs.

 

If anything is needed, its to give help to the classes that needs it. Like Elementalist.

Edited 5 hours ago by LucianDK.8615

But scoruge has really high DMG almost as high as harbringer and higher than other support specs while also throwing barrier. Harbringer should be the condi dps spec and scourge should be support.

 

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvE:
You can oneshot mobs in lower level areas when the entire game was sold on the downscaling system and the ability to play with friends who join the game without worrying about your "power level".

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in WvW:

You can lose 20v5 just because the party of five is "well played". As in they can literally be unkillable by an entire, uncoordinated zerg. Its not uncommon to see these groups chased across an entire map while picking players off the whole time. Its often framed as blobs being the problem, but they're just a symptom of the exponential effects of having carry builds  (i.e, meta builds) combined with coordination, which is already severe at small scale but gets multiplied many times over in large scale.

 

All that needs to be said about powercreep in PvP;

The entire meta has about three dominant classes, out of nine. That's only a 33% effective balance factor. Not to mention that at least half the subclasses are never taken, even as we're adding more, because why bother when you can just CC players and kill them in 1-3 seconds while being invulnerable?

 

Players say "EoD specs will fix it" or "EoD specs will make it worse". Likely both will be true; it'll fix the problem for some classes , and make the problem worse for other classes. A meta shift, just like always.

 

This is all a result of it being an action game (MOBA instead of MMORPG). You can't truly balance the game when sometimes the gameplay exceeds player's best mental & physical reflexes; when you can even combine multiple attacks into one by using Quickness buff or manipulating cast windows, and so on.

 

Someone griped at me yesterday for spamming CC as an Ele in a PvP match, and said I had no skill, just because I know the cast times on all my skills and know how to overlap them to do 3-4 effects at the same time. Its harsh to deal with, but its what we've ended up with because players just wanted it faster and faster, more and more powerful, they want that speed, those numbers, the ACTION, the POWER. They want to feel ULTIMATE.

 

And that's not balance, balance is slow, careful and precise, and has limits that can't be exceeded. You could slow the entire game down by 50% so players could actually see attacks coming and react to them and the balance would automatically improve by 100% overnight because effects like DPS, CC, etc. could be realistically managed by the enemy, THEN you can start actually looking at things like skill coefficients.

 

People winge too much about things and don't think OH i lost what could i have done better?

Edited December 27, 2021 by Axl.8924

[Nash.2681]

Be it "tune down all boon sharing to 5 man again" or "remove boon x from class y and give it a unique class buff"- don't forget that this coin has another side aswell and it's called class diversity. The more restrictive boon and buff distribution gets, the more strict party compositions will be again (anyone remembering those mirror raid comps?).

Now lower the overall powercreep so everyone deals less dps again and people will even more look strictly for specific classes to provide what they need to succeed. Sure, we already have this to a certain extent, but currently it's more a "what's BiS / easiest to play / just narrow minded players" kind of thing and not an "almost mandatory to win" kind of thing.  

I'm not advocating one over the other, just wanted to point this out. 

[Sigmoid.7082]

2 hours ago, Axl.8924 said:

Why not have new boons that only specific classes can give

This is a direction Anet has explicitly moved away from because it made things mandatory. 

[Jski.6180]

@Axl.8924

The though was to give every one some boon support to add up to a perma effect but give no one the ability to give pema boons by them self. When you have one class able to give out an perma effect you replace the need for bring other classes and exclude other ppl from content because they are not that class.

 

[Axl.8924]

3 hours ago, Sigmoid.7082 said:

This is a direction Anet has explicitly moved away from because it made things mandatory. 

Then The buffs of alacricity need to be able to be given reliably by every class to be desired Since alacricity and  quickness are so desired such as  Engi needs too be able to give reliably the useful buffs 

[Obtena.7952]

11 hours ago, Jski.6180 said:

@Axl.8924

The though was to give every one some boon support to add up to a perma effect but give no one the ability to give pema boons by them self. When you have one class able to give out an perma effect you replace the need for bring other classes and exclude other ppl from content because they are not that class.

 

Except that thought doesn't work because even if you don't have perma 10 man boon sharing classes, we still don't get inclusion. Meta does not disappear if boons are not permanent uptime or 10 man. In fact, if there was a change to classes so they could no longer give perma 10 man boon sharing, then you would see LESS inclusion, not more because teams that want specific boonshares are just going to double up on the boon sharing meta class to get it. In fact, that's how meta team comps used to work to get around not having perma 10 man boons. 

Inclusion is not a result of class design. It's the result of people choosing how to play the game. 

Edited December 28, 2021 by Obtena.7952