Initiative Cost Balancing

[ixon.2496]

Over the course of thief balancing, its became more and more common to see initiative costs increased rather than balancing then weapon skills functions.

 

This has made Preparedness almost mandatory to get the best use out of weapon sets, I get the idea is to reduce spamability of skills, but this was the one advantage over having cooldowns, at this point Preparedness should be baseline, or Initiative needs a rework since they cant balance Cost vs Reward.  

 

 

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

It's worth noting as well that the base initiative regen rate is not affected by alacrity or quickness, unlike other classes who get faster cooldown times because of alacrity (Rev is the exception, but given that uses Charged Mists in PvE to get extra energy it kinda proves the point). This is probably part of why thief tends to end up spamming autos in any sort of group play. 

[Dadnir.5038]

2 hours ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

It's worth noting as well that the base initiative regen rate is not affected by alacrity or quickness, unlike other classes who get faster cooldown times because of alacrity (Rev is the exception, but given that uses Charged Mists in PvE to get extra energy it kinda proves the point). This is probably part of why thief tends to end up spamming autos in any sort of group play. 

 

While the init regen is not affected by alacrity, it's not affected by chill either. There is 2 side to the coin.

 

Overall, it's very difficult to balance the weapon skills with just initiative cost, there is just to many way to abuse this mechanism. It might have been better for the thief if ANet's devs gave up and added some CD on top of lower initiative cost just like they did to revenant.

[Tails.9372]

7 hours ago, ixon.2496 said:

I get the idea is to reduce spamability of skills

 

Well "getting the idea" behind it is not hard but I do think that in some cases it disincentivizes self improvement (on multiple levels) among other things and ultimately does more harm than "preserved" good. 

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

8 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

 

While the init regen is not affected by alacrity, it's not affected by chill either. There is 2 side to the coin.

 

Overall, it's very difficult to balance the weapon skills with just initiative cost, there is just to many way to abuse this mechanism. It might have been better for the thief if ANet's devs gave up and added some CD on top of lower initiative cost just like they did to revenant.

Yeah, for sure. We don't get hit as hard by chill, but we also don't benefit from group alacrity either, it's fair but it's worth noting if we're talking about group compositions etc. I don't really agree with the cooldowns part, as that's more a flavour thing for rev than anything, frankly you could take the energy cost away from weapons on rev, rebalance the upkeep on the utilities and not much would change. 

[Shinjiko.1352]

I've been maining Engi for a while but my original class was thief. Decided to jump back on it for a bit and noticed this problem too since I last used it. Especially in pvp based game modes.

 

I actually couldn't believe how high a cost SB 5 was in WvW and it just makes thief feel bad to play compared to other classes since every skill just eats 6 or more initiative to use. 8 in the case of SB, that means you can barely get 2 off back to back which removes a lot of the utility that weapon always had.  It was especially notceable when moving back to pve and it feeling much more smooth to play.

Trickery line just feels like a must in every build you just can't not take it because thief skills are just so hungry lately.

[NorthernRedStar.3054]

High risk, average/mediocre reward. Wonder why the non-ini based backstab builds remain the most relevant of the bunch, hmm.

Imagine if the actually telegraphed "burst" skills didn't hit like a wet noodle - unlike stealth skills (which should be utility/setup based imo, not burst - safe for DE.).

[Terrorsquad.2349]

I quit the game for about 3-4 years ago and returned just a week ago. Im mostly playing thief and wow, thief def got hurt over the years. The Initiative cost is insane. I can understand it's spammy class but right now, I notice too much of a difference vs other classes. High risk = low/medi reward indeed.. 

Should be looked after. Thief does not play as fluent as it was before, which is a shame. Same for Warrior which I also main so it kind of hurts me to return to the game..

[Cynz.9437]

Worst part those changes always affect core builds that haven't been strong since.... well HoT? I still don't understand why core have to be punished for things that elite specs can do.

Edited July 22, 2021 by Cynz.9437

[Vidit.7108]

I think that a lot of PvE initiative cost balancing is a hold over from before they started splitting PvP/WvW from PvE. Like does infiltrator's strike really need to be 3 initiative in PvE? And then another 2 to go back?

Speaking just about PvE. Every backward evading weapon skill costs 4 even though I at least rarely use them over a dodge. Bola shot barely does any damage, and while I guess I could see it being too strong if i took deadly aim that's really only going to happen if I'm a condi build. A lot of changes to skill damage were made as a reaction to elite specs, especially because they wanted power rifle to be a thing. That has left core thief with weapon skills that have too high a cost versus the utility they actually offer you and weaker auto-attacks almost across the board since 2017.

If the new elite spec is not a 2h weapon, that specialization will be at the mercy of whatever weapon it brings in to provide really good skills that compete with staff/rifle. A better way to balance some of the core weapon skills would be to lower their current initiative cost and if you select their trait raise the cost.

Edited July 24, 2021 by Vidit.7108

[AikijinX.6258]

I kinda don’t want this to be swept under the rug either. Because this topic needs to be looked at. Initiative cost rebalance needs to happen and be reassessed. If this new elite spec happens to have anything in regard to faster initiative generation tied in with the spec that alone won’t even be enough. We gotta make preparedness baseline, and cut some of these initiative costs down.

[Nezekan.2671]

I feel like the trickery trait should become baseline and then give another trait to trickery. There is just too little initiative. Its fine for thief to be hit and run style, but you don't have enough oomph to hit and you are run run, unless you have trickery.

[Tails.9372]

Just do what other action RPGs with similar "MP esque" systems do: add initiative gain on AA based on how fast the initial attack speed is (fast hitting weapons should gain 1, weapons with slower AAs should gain more). This would solve the issue while also giving some use for the one weapon skill people usually try to avoid. Additionally they should also change the activation condition of Signets of Powers bonus effects from "on kill" to "on crit" which would bring it more in line with the theme of "Critical Strikes" and allow crit focused builds to regenerate additional initiative though Infiltrator's Signet.

Edited August 25, 2021 by Tails.9372

[Salvatore.3749]

On 7/13/2021 at 4:40 PM, Terrorsquad.2349 said:

I quit the game for about 3-4 years ago and returned just a week ago. Im mostly playing thief and wow, thief def got hurt over the years. The Initiative cost is insane. I can understand it's spammy class but right now, I notice too much of a difference vs other classes. High risk = low/medi reward indeed.. 

Should be looked after. Thief does not play as fluent as it was before, which is a shame. Same for Warrior which I also main so it kind of hurts me to return to the game..

 

Same here. I quit for 3 years and came back two months ago. Thief, Ranger, and Rev were my main characters before I left. When I left, core thief had more damage output & sustainability than Reaper due to it's mobility (especially with DD). Didn't play DE much because thief took a nerf on pistols before I left and retaliation used to eat my thief alive in HoT maps. So I switched to Reaper, DH, and Engi before I left to try out different stuff.

 

Now, I came back and primarily PvP, with my thief. I recognized sharp differences in PvP where core thief outplays both DE and DD for node capping whereas DD is good for 3v3/2v2 and DE is good for everything except node capping in PvP. (just can't get around fast enough). 

 

Played my Necro/Reaper and Guardian/DH again, and it felt like I was playing GW2 on EZ mode. Engi/Holo/Scrapper were wonderful before I left, but recently suffered a slight nerf and then got buffed. Before I left Core ele wasn't stable, and now it's my second option for 3v3 and 2v2 for so many kills. Rev is still OP and I love my Herald for when I want some complexity in PvE. 
 

In short, yeah, they somehow managed to remove retaliation and weaken thief yet again. I look at it this way, with rising initiative costs, you either have to play smarter or play something else. I'm holding out for EoD because I am excited for a new specialization and utility skills, but if I have to make the switch, I'll just focus on my mesmer who has collected dust for almost 7 years lol.  

[AikijinX.6258]

I won’t let this thread die, because the devs  need to know that it is a very important issue.

[babazhook.6805]

The rise in initiative costs across a number of the skills has greatly narrowed the number of viable builds that can be used.  High INI skills when used just cripple anything else you can do with your build making you over reliant on the #1 skill and the utilities. On one hand they claim they want a thief to be able to stick in battle then remove that possibility by jacking up the costs forcing even more resets. A thief can not stick in battle relying on their #1 skill.

 

What they could do is a sort of blend between INI and the ability to use a skill multiple times in a row and the more traditional cool downs. Lower the INI costs but give each of the skills an ultra low cooldown. (2 seconds tops seems reasonable). Allowing an ability to gen INI through AA might also work. Infiltrators boosted, preparedness baseline might also do it. There a number of ways to address this and the designers have just picked the easiest and least workable solution when they decide just to boost the INI cost of a skill.

[Zacchary.6183]

55 minutes ago, babazhook.6805 said:

What they could do is a sort of blend between INI and the ability to use a skill multiple times in a row and the more traditional cool downs.

You gave me an idea:

1. Initiative incrementally boosts weapon skills instead of acting as a universal cooldown.
2. All skills can be used regardless of remaining initiative. However, they will get put on a cooldown.
3. Weapon skills have a base cooldown of 2 seconds when initiative costs are not met. Using weapon skills in this manner costs no initiative.

In this way, thief can be left at its subpar level its at now and then anet could add decent buffs to weapon skills when they are used at full initiative.

Edited September 6, 2021 by Zacchary.6183

[Tails.9372]

2 hours ago, babazhook.6805 said:

What they could do is a sort of blend between INI and the ability to use a skill multiple times in a row and the more traditional cool downs. Lower the INI costs but give each of the skills an ultra low cooldown. (2 seconds tops seems reasonable).

 

No, the main reason I like playing thief is because it offers an "MP like" system instead of a CD based one for the weapon skills. There are ways to force people into combat for high ini reg which also prevent utility skills like Infiltrator's Arrow to be spammed (like the aforementioned ini on AA or ini "on crit" instead of "on kill" for Signets of Powers bonus effect).

 

It's even in the class discription:

 

"Weapon skills cost initiative points, but they have no recharge time, so thieves can use them back-to-back. This allows thieves to stay flexible and responsive in combat and unleash a rapid flurry of powerful attacks."

 

Which can only truly be realised if thieves have an abundance of initiative while on the offence but right now for many thief builds you constantly have to hold yourself back in order to stay "flexible and responsive" which directly contrasts with the stated goal of the class design and the "fast and fluid" combat they're seemingly so proud of.

Edited September 6, 2021 by Tails.9372

[shrew.3059]

11 hours ago, Tails.9372 said:

Which can only truly be realised if thieves have an abundance of initiative while on the offence but right now for many thief builds you constantly have to hold yourself back in order to stay "flexible and responsive" which directly contrasts with the stated goal of the class design and the "fast and fluid" combat they're seemingly so proud of.

 

As others have suggested, a possible solution is to have more Unload-type bonuses for skills, refunding INI for successful hits or in certain circumstances. They could be clever about this, rewarding INI if a skill was used in a certain or after a certain skill. They also go the other way; set the initial cost low but have an increased cost each time a skill is used consecutively, to dissuade the spamming of certain skills and encourage the chaining of others.

[Felices Bladewing.3914]

1 hour ago, shrew.3059 said:

 

As others have suggested, a possible solution is to have more Unload-type bonuses for skills, refunding INI for successful hits or in certain circumstances. They could be clever about this, rewarding INI if a skill was used in a certain or after a certain skill. They also go the other way; set the initial cost low but have an increased cost each time a skill is used consecutively, to dissuade the spamming of certain skills and encourage the chaining of others.

isn' the initiative-system exactly the designed tool to be able to "spam" if you are feeling that a perticular skill is the best for the situation at hand?

 

I mean if you want to encourage the chaining/cycling of the whole 1-5 abilities, then ini can be thrown away and be replaced by the same mechanic everbody else got - which is a CD

it just simply can't be the case that one skill of the certain weapon or weapon combination is outperforming the rest. if you want to play P/P in PVE you have to spam Unload, if you want to play condition damage on D/D you have to spam Death Blossom. might be some extreme showcases here but the issue is if you give (or want to do so) the players freedom in choise, than spamming an ability might be the result as boring and one-sided this sounds.

 

back in the beginning initiative wasn't meant to be a ressource to perform your to go skills to keep up damage-wise but to manage and limit the burst potential (because back than the skills dealt a good amount of damage) of a thief which then got obliterated over several patches.

[shrew.3059]

15 minutes ago, Felices Bladewing.3914 said:

isn' the initiative-system exactly the designed tool to be able to "spam" if you are feeling that a perticular skill is the best for the situation at hand?

 

I mean if you want to encourage the chaining/cycling of the whole 1-5 abilities, then ini can be thrown away and be replaced by the same mechanic everbody else got - which is a CD

it just simply can't be the case that one skill of the certain weapon or weapon combination is outperforming the rest. if you want to play P/P in PVE you have to spam Unload, if you want to play condition damage on D/D you have to spam Death Blossom. might be some extreme showcases here but the issue is if you give (or want to do so) the players freedom in choise, than spamming an ability might be the result as boring and one-sided this sounds.

 

back in the beginning initiative wasn't meant to be a ressource to perform your to go skills to keep up damage-wise but to manage and limit the burst potential (because back than the skills dealt a good amount of damage) of a thief which then got obliterated over several patches.

 

I agree that there is some mismatch between what INI is supposed to be for and the consequences of it being used that way. This is on ANet. It seems Thief isn’t really as interesting to them as other professions. l

 

I do understand the concern though: there is a fine line between controlling burst and spamming skills, and P/P is a good example of that line being crossed. If skill costs are too low then there is an incentive to spam one skill over and over. The right balance is achieved by providing situational options, and maybe that’s why D/P is so popular, it has really good utility and damage options through skill synergy.

[Tails.9372]

9 hours ago, shrew.3059 said:

As others have suggested, a possible solution is to have more Unload-type bonuses for skills, refunding INI for successful hits or in certain circumstances.

 

Well like I said the ini on crit for the CS trait example would do exactly that, you would only get ini back if your attack is successful and you would have to make multiple concessions in your buildcraft and gameplay to make it efficient but in return you can keep the flow going as long as you're on the offensive. This would also take care of things you don't want to be limitlessly spammable as CC skills cost way more than they would bring in and utility skills like Infiltrator's Arrow wouldn't generate initiative at all.

 

 

9 hours ago, shrew.3059 said:

They also go the other way; set the initial cost low but have an increased cost each time a skill is used consecutively, to dissuade the spamming of certain skills and encourage the chaining of others.

 

This would go directly against the core idea of the initiative system as it is designed for a "toolbox" instead of a "rotation" type of approach.

 

 

7 hours ago, Felices Bladewing.3914 said:

it just simply can't be the case that one skill of the certain weapon or weapon combination is outperforming the rest. if you want to play P/P in PVE you have to spam Unload, if you want to play condition damage on D/D you have to spam Death Blossom. might be some extreme showcases here but the issue is if you give (or want to do so) the players freedom in choise, than spamming an ability might be the result as boring and one-sided this sounds.

 

There is no problem with one skill on a weapon set outperforming the other skills on a given task, it's actually quite common for "MP" based action RPGs to take this approach and they all found a way to make "spammability" a non issue without restricting it which shows that there are no inherent flaws with this system. The actual issue comes from redundancies in the skill set which is a failure from the developer to provide a proper "toolbox" and to a degree proper encounters that push people to make use of the toolbox as well (the "DPS golem" type bosses are the worst offenders in that regard).

 

 

7 hours ago, shrew.3059 said:

there is a fine line between controlling burst and spamming skills, and P/P is a good example of that line being crossed. If skill costs are too low then there is an incentive to spam one skill over and over

 

You got it exactly backwards, the reason people only spam "3" on P/P is because the initiative costs on it are too high (why bother breaking the break bar with "4" when you can't make use of the downtime afterwards so spamming "3" it is). Well that and the fact that this "toolbox" just sucks in general outside of it.

 

Furthermore I wouldn't call a skill that does less damage than several ranged AAs a "burst" skill. The skill is almost exclusively used for continuous single target damage. It's basically an AA with an initiative cost that starves the entire weapon set of initiative.

Edited September 7, 2021 by Tails.9372

[shrew.3059]

2 hours ago, Tails.9372 said:

You got it exactly backwards, the reason people only spam "3" on P/P is because the initiative costs on it are too high (why bother breaking the break bar with "4" when you can't make use of the downtime afterwards so spamming "3" it is). Well that and the fact that this "toolbox" just sucks in general outside of it.

 

Furthermore I wouldn't call a skill that does less damage than several ranged AAs a "burst" skill. The skill is almost exclusively used for continuous single target damage. It's basically an AA with an initiative cost that starves the entire weapon set of initiative.

 

Not sure I agree on these points, but I’m especially curious about the second as my napkin math doesn’t quite sync up with that. Unless you’re not comparing Vital Shot to Unload?

[Salvatore.3749]

I honestly wish there was something else for thieves like mirage runes or actual chain skills within our attack bars that provide more initiative regen. For example, a mechanic on death blossom that says each time you evade an attack regain 1 initiative point. That would be pretty cool in PvE and PvP.  Since it's for each attack, if you are getting 2v1ed, you're being rewarded for staying in combat. 

Example of mirage runes:

For PvP.  currently, I'm using a condi core thief build with mirage runes that allow me to apply torment on evade. I'm using deadly arts, trickery, and shadow arts. The build's traits have the dual attacks apply poison and deadly art traits apply even more poison. Then of course, apply venoms in stealth, and vemons siphon health. I use D/D and P/D for all sorts of poison and bleed applications, plus dagger 4 out of steal and with sigil of doom is nice to apply poison, cripple, and torment. DB in combat applies torment, bleeding, and poison. In pvp, it's fun to watch a warrior try to out tank me with multiple conditions when I can use P/D to retreat, apply a lot of bleed while immobilizing them. Torment deals more damage to stationery foes so roughly 5-10 stacks of torment, bleed, and poisons kills multiple professions quickly.  

Would like to see something that each time you evade an attack, you apply confusion or bleeding, or even reduce the cool down of utility skills. Reduced CD would be awesome for DD utility skills and Core Elite Skills. 

[Tails.9372]

40 minutes ago, shrew.3059 said:

Unless you’re not comparing Vital Shot to Unload?

 

The phrase "several ranged AAs" already necessitates as much.

 

Vital Shot is part of an issue I talked about earlier: redundancies. "1 and 3" and "2 and 4" do essentially the same things (and a weapon set doesn't need 2 skills for continuous single target damage / single target CC) with 5 being quite useless as you generally want to keep your distance anyway so a skill to disengage would have been way more usefull.

 

The root of the problem here is A-Nets rather lazy way to design the dual weapon combos for which the number of dual skills should have been based on nessesity rather than "only weapon skill 3".