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[etiolate]

Because it gives players the illusions of choice.

WoW struggled with this for the longest time until they decided to scrap talent trees altogether, because there was no point in trying to balance different trees when the playerbase numerically calculated which one was better within a week of any major changes.

For Arena you're kicked up with everything unlocked, but for WvWvW your skills and straits are whatever you had in PvE.

You can't compare a deck system to WoW's system. There was an illusion of choice in WoW because the talent trees always progressively improved in an obvious way. Deck systems and horizontal progression works totally different. It is actual choice. It allows counters.

edit:
Yanger,
There were no best traits. There may be one single trait in a tree that is useful to your build and thus only had to spend 10 points to get it. That one trait wasn't better than the rest, just better for what you're doing. Say for example you have filled out two trait lines and are looking to spend 10 points somewhere to help your build. One trait line has a major trait that would boost your damage, but another trait line may give you more utility. It's a choice on how you want to play and which you'd prefer. Tiers remove that choice by placing those single choices beyond reach, forcing people towards the cookie cutter issue.

 

[Ferrio]

Pure balance is a pipe dream, you get MORE balance this way, and MORE realistic choice. I'm still never going to choose trait A over trait B if trait A is not as good, but if I can't get trait B because I'm not 30 points into that trait line, then it's irrelevant, and now trait A is an actual choice instead of an illusionary one. Get it? In the original method, trait A may as well not exist. In the new one it serves a purpose.

Then you balance the individual trait, not the system.

 

[Haly]

WvWvW is, I think, supposed to be a replacement for PvE for people who want to fight other people rather than mobs, which is why they don't unlock everything for you from the start. Siege weapons requiring gold is evidence of this, and IIRC players complained about not getting enough money in WvWvW to support playing in WvWvW.

Which is why they decided to include the same treadmill in WvWvW, since players, generally, like having something to look forward to.

 

[Ferrio]

WvWvW is, I think, supposed to be a replacement for PvE for people who want to fight other people rather than mobs, which is why they don't unlock everything for you from the start. Siege weapons requiring gold is evidence of this, and IIRC players complained about not getting enough money in WvWvW to support playing in WvWvW.

Which is why they decided to include the same treadmill in WvWvW, since players, generally, like having something to look forward to.

What? WvWvW didn't have everything unlocked for you to start. There was no treadmill for skills in EITHER WvWvW / PvE

 

[TheYanger]

You can't compare a deck system to WoW's system. There was an illusion of choice in WoW because the talent trees always progressively improved in an obvious way. Deck systems and horizontal progression works totally different. It is actual choice. It allows counters.

That's still not true though. Every 'choice' you make can be summed up easily: You are comparing an option against all other possible options. While you have more possible options with the 'all skills at all levels' method, you probably make LESS viable choices because the skills that are more suitable to high end play will overshadow those that are less suitable. You can't have abilities that are more or less fun or powerful than others, it's impossible to balance. It's not about 'counters' or not, I'm not even sure how you mean that. If you mean the metagame shifts over time as builds wane and gain in popularity, sure that's true, but that's true with any system (even wow's). It doesn't mean you're ever going to take certain traits over others, and it doesn't mean it's suddenly NOT going to happen because of this change. Metagame shifting will occur regardless. Builds will still exist. The sky is not falling.

Then you balance the individual trait, not the system.

You cannot inherantly balance every individual trait. That's not realistic and it's not going to happen. You say it, but you haven't done it. Abilities do different things, barring them making them all vanilla and stale, there will NEVER be balance. That's the ENTIRE flipping point.

How do you balance say, movement speed vs damage output vs survivability vs condition removal vs...ETC ETC. you don't. You can't.

 

[Haly]

There were best traits within each trait tree. That's the reason Anet moved the traits into tiers. People were going 10 deep just to grab the good ones and then they ignored the rest of the tree. In effect, it became "choose whichever major traits you wanted", because minor traits were so negligible.

Not that there's anything wrong with this but it meant a lot of their work on the trees themselves and the less popular traits went to waste.

By splitting the traits into tiers, they reduce the total number of choice the player can make and therefore make balancing significantly easier.

 

[Ferrio]

Fine okay you guys win.

Yay for Arenanet's ability to break the mold by creating talent trees. A brave new step.

 

[Proven]

That's still not true though. Every 'choice' you make can be summed up easily: You are comparing an option against all other possible options. While you have more possible options with the 'all skills at all levels' method, you probably make LESS viable choices because the skills that are more suitable to high end play will overshadow those that are less suitable. You can't have abilities that are more or less fun or powerful than others, it's impossible to balance. It's not about 'counters' or not, I'm not even sure how you mean that. If you mean the metagame shifts over time as builds wane and gain in popularity, sure that's true, but that's true with any system (even wow's). It doesn't mean you're ever going to take certain traits over others, and it doesn't mean it's suddenly NOT going to happen because of this change. Metagame shifting will occur regardless. Builds will still exist. The sky is not falling.


You cannot inherantly balance every individual trait. That's not realistic and it's not going to happen. You say it, but you haven't done it. Abilities do different things, barring them making them all vanilla and stale, there will NEVER be balance. That's the ENTIRE flipping point.

How do you balance say, movement speed vs damage output vs survivability vs condition removal vs...ETC ETC. you don't. You can't.

Here's the thing, you're automatically assuming with the bolded that the number of good traits was previously too low and that trait tiers fixed this. This is just not true. Out of 12, there were a handful in each line that weren't as good unless your build was very specific. Not just one, two, or three that everyone was jumping on all the time.

----

My other big issue with this: Digging into traits affects your stats. Affecting your stats essentially specializes you towards damage, defense, whatever. If traits weren't tied to stats, maybe this would come out differently, but now instead of a game that promoted more balanced builds you're automatically going to put 30 points into power for some awesome trait and then realize "hey, I'm already a glass cannon now!"

 

[etiolate]

There were best traits within each trait tree.

I played a Mesmer. Precise Wrack and Mental Torment were great traits for my PvP because I was doing mind wrack shatters. When I move to survival and confusion, those traits are no longer the best traits in that line for me. If I move towards damage through conditions and interrupts, Mental Torment can still be good but not a necessary trait to use. The Mind Wrack bomb build was popular in BWE2 sPvP, but so was the Staff boon and condition Mesmer. You could take Precise Wrack or Mental Torment in the condition build, but it was not necessary.

They did have traits which were weaker than others and far too situational. These are traits like "on fall damage", which would come into play in only certain situations. These either need to be moved to some separate utility trait line or be improved. You shouldn't be forced into taking them to get something that is better later on. (And again, better is based on what you're doing. I could have a WvWvW siege defending Mesmer build that drops down to create a Chaos Storm on fall damage, ports away and then casts another Chaos Storm aoe.)

 

[gunbo13]

GW1 wasn't balanced in that way at ALL. are you kidding me? When there are tons of useless skills/traits and you have free reign, it is MORE limiting than when there are ACTUAL balanced traits or skills and you have less of them available.

Succeeding in balancing != trying to balance. And there is no way it makes sense that it is "more limiting." You're also making a pretty bad assumption that it would be a failure to balance without tiers. You're just latching onto ANET's design choice like there is some definitive cold-cut reason behind it. When in fact, they could just be taking the easy way out.

This is pretty much always going to happen, but it's easier to avoid with the tiered traits, and they can make traits stronger/more fun while doing it.

No thanks. I'd rather take my chances with balance issues then losing half of my build options.

At the end of the day this is going to have 0 impact on how you play the game, but it's going to have large impacts on how they can balance it.

That's factually wrong.

hm, I suppose one of the good things that come out of this is that, since 'lesser' traits don't have to compete with the high-tier traits anymore, people have more of a reason to actually pick them, so in a way it also somewhat promotes diversity

Dude, that doesn't make any sense.

How is it a bait and switch. You're ALWAYS restricted.

So because the nature of video games have borders, it is OK to remove options when needed? Um...no.

ANet felt the current system warranted a change. We've had ~100 hours with the game. They're creating the game. Something probably came up in internal testing.

There is no way you can justify this by thinking ANET, who is trying to make money off you, is somehow tweaking only for your benefit. Trust players, not developers. It's more likely that balancing is hard and people were whining.

That's nice, however ultimately there are ALWAYS traits that are better. I feel like people who don't get this haven't played many of these kinds of games. THERE WILL ALWAYS BE limited numbers of good builds.

I really don't think you understand what a balancing system is. It's not to take some smear of popular skills and balance them for 5-10 great builds. Balancing can resurrect the useless skills you are touting and I witnessed this for years in GW1. All of a sudden post-buff, useless ranger skills were getting use. Warrior crip slash was viable. Water eles were out and about. The only limit your establishing is what you personally believe is feasible. That is not the same thing.

 

[TheYanger]

Fine okay you guys win.

Yay for Arenanet's ability to break the mold by creating talent trees. A brave new step.

Because it's now different than it was in any meaningful way to the players? What a crock of shit. You act like before it was revolutionary and now it's trash, it's functionally barely any different. It was already just talent trees. Traits are probably the LEAST INTERESTING aspect of Guild Wars 2. Steps they take to make them more interesting are only good.
I didn't realize having evolutionary combat and gameplay improvements wasn't as important as people pretending the trait system was revolutionary when it never was. My bad.

Here's the thing, you're automatically assuming with the bolded that the number of good traits was previously too low and that trait tiers fixed this. This is just not true. Out of 12, there were a handful in each line that weren't as good unless your build was very specific. Not just one, two, or three that everyone was jumping on all the time.

There were DEFINITELY a few that overshadowed most trait lines.

 

[Trey]

Yet that's exactly what it comes down to. Not LITERALLY X and X+1, but X and Y where X is always a better choice than Y. The skills don't have to be similar for one to just be BETTER than the other. Doing more damage is basically always better than walking on water, yet I would love to be able to walk on water without gimping my character. These are the kinds of choices that don't have to exist, there can be interesting traits that don't give you as much benefit in game but are still fun, and you can actually take them now.

Then you can remove the "walking on water" skill and the meta wouldn't change whatsoever, no? If one choice is always better than another, then there is no choice at all.

 

[Proven]

Because it's now different than it was in any meaningful way to the players? What a crock of shit. You act like before it was revolutionary and now it's trash, it's functionally barely any different. It was already just talent trees. Traits are probably the LEAST INTERESTING aspect of Guild Wars 2. Steps they take to make them more interesting are only good.
I didn't realize having evolutionary combat and gameplay improvements wasn't as important as people pretending the trait system was revolutionary when it never was. My bad.


There were DEFINITELY a few that overshadowed most trait lines.

Traits were on their way to BECOMING one of the MOST INTERESTING parts of Guild War 2. Builds were weapons and utilities + traits and armor effects. Weapons and utilities were mostly set, traits and armor effects gave you a grand list of stuff to go with that added more to the horizontal progression of the game.

If only a few overshadowed the trait lines, then those are the only handful you have to balance. They're throwing out the baby with the bathwater here.

 

[TheYanger]

Succeeding in balancing != trying to balance. And there is no way it makes sense that it is "more limiting." You're also making a pretty bad assumption that it would be a failure to balance without tiers. You're just latching onto ANET's design choice like there is some definitive cold-cut reason behind it. When in fact, they could just be taking the easy way out.

How is it a bad assumption? Anet seems to agree with me that it's not a realistic goal, I trust them and myself more than I trust you. No offense.

No thanks. I'd rather take my chances with balance issues then losing half of my build options.

Well, you lose your ability to take that 'chance' because the rest of the world doesn't want a broken game.

That's factually wrong.

Compelling argument.

Dude, that doesn't make any sense.

Yes, it actually does. If X or Y always results in Y, taking that 'choice' away and replacing it with X or Z and A or B when all are valid, actually GIVES you more options. Seems obvious to me, but hey whatever.

So because the nature of video games have borders, it is OK to remove options when needed? Um...no.

Except why is it needed? it has 0 effect on your gameplay.

There is no way you can justify this by thinking ANET, who is trying to make money off you, is somehow tweaking only for your benefit. Trust players, not developers. It's more likely that balancing is hard and people were whining.

Because the devs should waste their time 'balancing' the unbalancable. You're right, I'm wrong. Anet is so good they can do what no developer in history, including themselves, has ever done. OR the more realistic option is that they recognize their limitations, and the limitations of their game, and are opting to making it MORE fun, MORE balanced, and yes, EASIER for them to balance so they can focus on other shit.

I really don't think you understand what a balancing system is. It's not to take some smear of popular skills and balance them for 5-10 great builds. Balancing can resurrect the useless skills you are touting and I witnessed this for years in GW1. All of a sudden post-buff, useless ranger skills were getting use. Warrior crip slash was viable. Water eles were out and about. The only limit your establishing is what you personally believe is feasible. That is not the same thing.

So you prefer a game where they constantly nerf and buff skills for years and years and the metagame changes on the developer's whims, essentially. Nobody else wants that, sorry. All that indicates is that the game was broken in the first place. GW1 is a perfect example of how this CANNOT be balanced.

Traits were on their way to BECOMING one of the MOST INTERESTING parts of Guild War 2. Builds were weapons and utilities + traits and armor effects. Weapons and utilities were mostly set, traits and armor effects gave you a grand list of stuff to go with that added more to the horizontal progression of the game.

If only a few overshadowed the trait lines, then those are the only handful you have to balance. They're throwing out the baby with the bathwater here.

Holy shit. If they only balance the good ones and just pretend the bad ones don't exist, THEN THE TRAIT SYSTEM IS A FAILURE COMPLETELY. You have removed all choice by making those other traits effectively dead in the water and useless. It's not a choice if the choice is completely obvious, all it is is a beginners trap.

To add onto that what was said about metagame 'balance' shifting with patches, just because some skills become useful in a patch and others diminish usefulness doesn't mean all skills are useful, it just means the few that ARE useful have changed with each patch. you change your build to the new 'in' build, and you move on. That's no more healthy than them just never rebalancing the traits in the first place.

Then you can remove the "walking on water" skill and the meta wouldn't change whatsoever, no? If one choice is always better than another, then there is no choice at all.

That's exactly the point. By making the two skills not competetive with each other (by being in different tiers) it brings the choice BACK. By leaving them against each other it's a non-choice because it's obvious.

 

[Trey]

Fine okay you guys win.

Yay for Arenanet's ability to break the mold by creating talent trees. A brave new step.

Don't be like this, man. I would prefer the more open system too. But I would want a non-broken game above all.

There is no way you can justify this by thinking ANET, who is trying to make money off you, is somehow tweaking only for your benefit. Trust players, not developers. It's more likely that balancing is hard and people were whining.

I'm going to take the word of a developer whose stated goal is to make a competitively capable game--which influences their ability to make money and maintain credibility--over a public who have only played a neat slice of an unfinished game for a length of time nowhere near long enough to make a declaration of the viability of a subsystem therein.

 

[Haly]

If the Q4 thing has any merit there's a good chance they'll do another overhaul before the game ships, chill guys.

 

[etiolate]

Don't be like this, man. I would prefer an open system too. But I would want a non-broken game above all.



I'm going to take the word of a developer whose stated goal is to make a competitively capable game, which influences their ability to make money and maintain credibility, over a public who have only played a neat slice of an unfinished game for a length of time nowhere near long enough to make a declaration of the viability of a subsystem therein.

The issue with trusting ANet on this is that ANet has killed their PVP community before by "overbalancing". It wasn't a good choice as it hurt the game in the long run. It may have made it easier for them, but my money is not put forth so they can take the easy way out. People are very wary of it happening again.

 

[Proven]

Watching the VOD, I thought this game punished people not paying attention by level 30. Hell, I was getting my butt kicked at level 10. You should not be allowed to play this badly without more punishment.

 

[gunbo13]

It's not about 'counters' or not, I'm not even sure how you mean that.

You don't understand because your analysis is based on a very narrow point of vision. You are evaluating a static playing field, grading its effectiveness, and then applying linear DPS/condition examples to it. Have you ever played PvP? Because the paragraph I'm quoting is not even close to how it works.

You cannot inherantly balance every individual trait. That's not realistic and it's not going to happen. You say it, but you haven't done it. Abilities do different things, barring them making them all vanilla and stale, there will NEVER be balance. That's the ENTIRE flipping point.

lol Guild Wars 1 had over 1000 skills and they killed PvP by overbalancing it. Nice try though.

There were best traits within each trait tree. That's the reason Anet moved the traits into tiers. People were going 10 deep just to grab the good ones and then they ignored the rest of the tree. In effect, it became "choose whichever major traits you wanted", because minor traits were so negligible.

How are your evaluating a balancing system based on the static state of a beta? Do you know what happens when people all choose the same stuff? You buff and nerf.

 

[Trey]

The issue with trusting ANet on this is that ANet has killed their PVP community before by "overbalancing". It wasn't a good choice as it hurt the game in the long run. It may have made i easier for them, but my money is not put forth so they can take the lazy way out. People are very wary of it happening again.

I'm not blaming you or gunbo for your stance. I can understand lacking faith based on prior occurences. But the "public's" word is literally immaterial at this point. Undeveloped. I don't think a single soul has made it through the entire levelling process outside of the development of the game.

 

[Haly]

Gunbo don't tell me you've joined the hype train, man.

Not like this, NOT LIKE THIS.

 

[TheYanger]

You don't understand because your analysis is based on a very narrow point of vision. You are evaluating a static playing field, grading its effectiveness, and then applying linear DPS/condition examples to it. Have you ever played PvP? Because the paragraph I'm quoting is not even close to how it works.

lol Guild Wars 1 had over 1000 skills and they killed PvP by overbalancing it. Nice try though.

How are your evaluating a balancing system based on the static state of a beta? Do you know what happens when people all choose the same stuff? You buff and nerf.

Again, I know pvp. Different abilities are still going to balance differently and you can't do it easily or effectively. you claim GW1 had a ton of builds and they killed it trying to balance it... NO FUCKING SHIT. That's what would happen in GW2 if they had to try and balance 400+ traits against each other, it's simply not possible, so in an effort to balance they then have to neuter and dumb them all down. That's the only way you can manage it.

Buffing and Nerfing have nothing to do with this. If you buff skill A and nerf skill B, everyone just takes skill A instead of B, you haven't accomplished anything, you've just changed the build from BCDFG to ACDFG and left B out to dry.

 

[etiolate]

Again, I know pvp. Different abilities are still going to balance differently and you can't do it easily or effectively. you claim GW1 had a ton of builds and they killed it trying to balance it... NO FUCKING SHIT. That's what would happen in GW2 if they had to try and balance 400+ traits against each other, it's simply not possible, so in an effort to balance they then have to neuter and dumb them all down. That's the only way you can manage it.

That is not the only way to manage it. GW1 balance wasn't perfect, but it was a lot better than what was out there and most importantly it allowed counters. The only thing "overbalancing" did was kill progress of the meta game. It basically walls it in, leaving you to buff and nerf the same things over and over. The more open, free system allows the players to see what is going on and figure out a way to work against it. If it is shown that there is no way to work against it, then you can specify which trait is causing the imbalance and work on that trait.

 

[TheYanger]

That is not the only way to manage it. GW1 balance wasn't perfect, but it was a lot better than what was out there and most importantly it allowed counters. The only thing "overbalancing" did was kill progress of the meta game. It basically walls it in, leaving you to buff and nerf the same things over and over. The more open, free system allows the players to see what is going on and figure out a way to work against it. If it is shown that there is no way to work against it, then you can specify which trait is causing the imbalance and work on that trait.

That has nothing to do with internal trait balance though. There is always going to be a shifting metagame. Builds will still change, because the traits are still different. The trait trees are still different. In fact, it's MORE likely to happen when you can't just take the 5 best traits your class has in every build. The trees now have more definition from one another, giving more variation between an engineer who focuses on one line vs the other four, same for every other class.

 

[etiolate]

It is more vertical progression. That is backwards. Understand that or just keep to yourself. Stop boondoggling.

 

[TheYanger]

It is more vertical progression. That is backwards. Understand that or just keep to yourself. Stop boondoggling.

My bad, I didn't realize this discussion forum was actually "Acquiese to my opinion or do not discuss"

I don't care if you guys 'get' it or not anymore, I'm just glad that Anet does. Go play something else if it pisses you off so much, the rest of us will forget about this 'atrocity' in a week and still just enjoy the game.

 

[gunbo13]

How is it a bad assumption? Anet seems to agree with me that it's not a realistic goal, I trust them and myself more than I trust you.

You shouldn't be aligning with anyone. Use your own judgment.

Compelling argument.

What you are saying is absolutely impossible. Killing off a ton of options absolutely affects our gameplay whether you acknowledge it or not.

Yes, it actually does. If X or Y always results in Y, taking that 'choice' away and replacing it with X or Z and A or B when all are valid, actually GIVES you more options. Seems obvious to me, but hey whatever.

Nope, he said diversity, not options. You can open up all the options in the world but if they are just different shades of the same color, that is NOT diversity. That's a symptom of overbalancing e.g. the death of GW1 PvP.

Because the devs should waste their time 'balancing' the unbalancable.

Except they did it already.

All that indicates is that the game was broken in the first place. GW1 is a perfect example of how this CANNOT be balanced.

That's probably the worst example you can possibly think of. And the game was never broken. Nor did I see things broken in GW2, which is in beta might I add.

I'm going to take the word of a developer whose stated goal is to make a competitively capable game--which influences their ability to make money and maintain credibility--over a public who have only played a neat slice of an unfinished game for a length of time nowhere near long enough to make a declaration of the viability of a subsystem therein.

You mean the public who aren't given enough glimpse into the situation? You aren't choosing credibility because ANET is your only choice to hug. Locking us out before we have a chance to preview this broken nonsense is step one to killing even your option to formulate your own opinion.

Gunbo don't tell me you've joined the hype train, man.

Not like this, NOT LIKE THIS.

I'm not on any hype train. I've been throwing rocks at the thing since it left the station. And right now I'm looking for boulders after this nonsense.

Again, I know pvp. Different abilities are still going to balance differently and you can't do it easily or effectively. you claim GW1 had a ton of builds and they killed it trying to balance it... NO FUCKING SHIT.

They killed it by "overbalancing" it. You are missing the point. GW1 was reliant on its skills for its composition. By blurring the skills, you basically kill the game. GW2 is not reliant on its skills. ANET doesn't even have to worry as much about meta with all the new mechanics. You can easily keep all the options open and control the system without killing the game.

That's what would happen in GW2 if they had to try and balance 400+ traits against each other, it's simply not possible, so in an effort to balance they then have to neuter and dumb them all down. That's the only way you can manage it.

Yet they overbalanced GW1 with 1000+ skills and all the atts. I'm tired of repeating this. And that is definitely NOT the only way to balance. Fighting game fans would pillage your house.

Buffing and Nerfing have nothing to do with this. If you buff skill A and nerf skill B, everyone just takes skill A instead of B, you haven't accomplished anything, you've just changed the build from BCDFG to ACDFG and left B out to dry.

OK, now I can't take your PvP claim seriously. You are definitely referring to dropping nukes on static AI in some MMO where you choose the highest DPS. Balancing doesn't mean to swap anything. That goes against the definition of the word you know. If you buff skill A and nerf skill B that means both A and B are now viable.

I don't care if you guys 'get' it or not anymore, I'm just glad that Anet does.

Oh we get it. Your opinion and logic though, I do not.

 

[Trey]

You mean the public who aren't given enough glimpse into the situation? You aren't choosing credibility because ANET is your only choice to hug. Locking us out before we have a chance to preview this broken nonsense is step one to killing even your option to formulate your own opinion.

Nobody has a solid opinion of the meta, only the game's mechanics. This system revision suited Anet's design goals better, or else they wouldn't do it. For howevermuch you dislike Anet, you can concede they aren't idiots. Perhaps it is transitory or even temporary. Development is still ongoing. At this point, the most you or anyone else can do is judge the two approaches from an intrinsic standpoint, not how they practically play out. So of course you can say "but open is better!" and nobody would refute you to that point.

You can't even compare this change to their handling of the GW1 meta. As you say, completely different mechanics, mostly because the onus is not on the skills.

 

[TheYanger]

OK, now I can't take your PvP claim seriously. You are definitely referring to dropping nukes on static AI in some MMO where you choose the highest DPS. Balancing doesn't mean to swap anything. That goes against the definition of the word you know. If you buff skill A and nerf skill B that means both A and B are now viable.

No, I'm not. It doesn't have to be DPS as a metric. It can be whatever is the most valuable in GW pvp. It might be runspeed, it might be condition removal, who knows. None of us do. the point is, there are going to be aspects of the game that contribute more to your success than others, and the traits that highlight those aspects will always win out. I used DPS vs walking on water because it's an easy to understand example. It could just as easily be 'endurance regen vs boon applications' and once the game is out we would know handily which is superior, for now we don't know, but it doesn't mean one wouldn't clearly overpower the other. No matter what the 'best' skill is, be it dps, survival, conditions, whatever, it will trump all other traits in that line. It will form the basis of all of your decisions, and by proxy will limit your choices against anything else put against it. This is a manner of not putting traits against each other that cannot compete in utility.

 

[Violet_0]

well, ideally, there would be no restrictions of course. Let's just wait till Friday to see how much this changes up things.

 

[Ferrio]

well, ideally, there would be no restrictions of course. Let's just wait till Friday to see how much this changes up things.

Unfortunately we wont' have a good indicator cause we can't level as much. Lvl 80 PvP will be a good way to test though.

 

[gunbo13]

Nobody has a solid opinion of the meta, only the game's mechanics. This system revision suited Anet's design goals better, or else they wouldn't do it.

It suited ANET better for sure. Not sure about "design goals." I don't care who the developer is regarding this change. With this removal, we now possibly may NEVER have a solid opinion on any meta involving the open system. And switching back to the developer (like I never left), remember when I said ANET didn't let anything bake? Yea well, this is the best example I can give to be fresh on people's minds. All the potential problems are theoretical or hidden. How can you even back something that has no substance?

You can't even compare this change to their handling of the GW1 meta. As you say, completely different mechanics, mostly because the onus is not on the skills.

GW1 was brought up since there was a claim that you can't balance a system with a ton of options. It's also a pretty good example of the effects of buffs/nerfs.

No, I'm not. It doesn't have to be DPS as a metric. It can be whatever is the most valuable in GW pvp..It could just as easily be 'endurance regen vs boon applications' and once the game is out we would know handily which is superior, for now we don't know, but it doesn't mean one wouldn't clearly overpower the other.

Nope, I'm pretty sure I'm not wrong understanding the direction you are taking. The idea that you are claiming what is "superior" still hails to a narrow viewpoint. Build design is not just about the superior DPS attack, best boon stacking, longest snare chain, etc... It's about opening up more possibilities then you can fit on a single bar. You should have burning, snare, warding, nuking, KD, run-away, ganking, etc... eles. If you remove options, then you remove build types. Balancing the most effective utility skill is what you do to balance the build types so they diversify. That is not the same as balancing the game to encourage new build types.

By closing doors, you cut down your build types to a small subset. You are now only in charge of spreading out the choice between those builds as well as balancing the internal skills choices. However, you can never go back and open the doors that are shut. You have killed off diversity but not letting builds exist. It is a completely awful method of "balancing" an MMO. If ANET didn't screw up, then those doors would've never been open and we'd be ignorant to what could have been. But apparently they messed up enough that they had to slam them shut before the second BWE. Yet they should be trusted or whatever.

 

[Smiley90]

Jesus Christ I work for a BIT and you guys go full analyst breakdown fight on this. Hawkian, mind handing me over the popcorn? You not posting makes me think you're sitting somewhere with popcorn waiting for everyone to cool down. Everyone else who wants to do that can join me! -points towards couch-

 

[Emitan]

I just want to talk about the game

 

[RepairmanJack]

This decision is just dumb. At least let people get familiar with the mechanics and the classes before you try to balance theoretical issues.

A decision like this and the few Q&A's I have seen in regards to PvP just makes me think the devs aren't open for any kind of input from a competitive stand point.

 

[etiolate]

I'm cool. I'm always cool.

I like the boons and conditions being moved. They added a outline to them that reflects a countdown timer. This may end up more informative. The new endurance bar looks slicker, but more importantly they added a marker that seems to show at what point of endurance you can dodge again.

And key modifiers are in.

PC Gamer will be uploading videos of their test time. I think there will be PvP videos and I hope those put to test whether the trait tiers are a part of progression feel only or something locked in at max level.

 

[zulfate]

yay! something to talk about again! why doesnt ANET post a freaking blog post with more in depth look at why they did what they did.

i have no problems with this new system, like most games in beta people go crazy when the developer changes something we are used to because we have played it. if we wouldnt have the beta and they just started that from the beginning we wouldnt be here talking about it. i dont know to me at the end of the day when they release the game people will get accustom to it.

 

[etiolate]

Well the populace's focused anger managed to get potions removed from the game before the game even got to beta. In this case, we have experience with the choice in question. What only remains to be seen is if tier restrictions disappear at 80 and how they've moved around those major traits.

 

[Jira]

yay! something to talk about again! why doesnt ANET post a freaking blog post with more in depth look at why they did what they did.

i have no problems with this new system, like most games in beta people go crazy when the developer changes something we are used to because we have played it. if we wouldnt have the beta and they just started that from the beginning we wouldnt be here talking about it. i dont know to me at the end of the day when they release the game people will get accustom to it.

They said they're gonna have a blog detailing changes for the upcoming BWE in a blog soon which means this coming week.

 

[Proven]

They said they're gonna have a blog detailing changes for the upcoming BWE in a blog soon which means this coming week.

Based on that gameplay, one of those changes is probably, "we made the game easier."

 

[etiolate]

At a point in the PC Gamer video where he's fighting that boss at the end, some words splash on screen. It's like a gold splash image with an ability tied to it. One of them said retaliation it seems, another says cleansing bolts.

Is this new?

example: http://i1063.photobucket.com/albums/t515/etiolate1979/pcgamer_demo.jpg

 

[Jira]

At a point in the PC Gamer video where he's fighting that boss at the end, some words splash on screen. It's like a gold splash image with an ability tied to it. One of them said retaliation it seems, another says cleansing bolts.

Is this new?

example: http://i1063.photobucket.com/albums/t515/etiolate1979/pcgamer_demo.jpg

Would that maybe be a new combo UI? If so that's a hell of a lot better than COMBO popping up and you having no idea wtf you even did.

 

[Proven]

Could you give a timestamp?
edit: nevermind. 1:44:00 is about it.

Ok, based on this page: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_guardian_skills

Guardian has Symbol of Wrath on Greatsword, which applies Retaliation.

As for Cleansing Bolts, at that point in the video the necro minions are dead. The only things that were happening due to the Necromancer was the Well of Blood heal, which as of BWE1 doesn't count as a combo field based on the wiki, and the Axe basic attack, Rending Claws.

Considering the retaliation seems to have only been applied to the Guardian, it looks like certain boon and effect applications will show up on top of other characters so that you know what's going on with them. So whatever Cleansing Bolts was, it was done by the Guardian. It could have been a quick combo with two of his own skills.

 

[etiolate]

Yeah, 1:44 mark to 1:44:14.

 

[Vinci]

This decision is just dumb. At least let people get familiar with the mechanics and the classes before you try to balance theoretical issues.

This is my only issue with it. Beyond that, I'm thrilled to have another BWE coming up, even if it's ill-timed for me personally. Any playtime is better than none.

 

[etiolate]

Could you give a timestamp?
edit: nevermind. 1:44:00 is about it.

Ok, based on this page: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_guardian_skills

Guardian has Symbol of Wrath on Greatsword, which applies Retaliation.

As for Cleansing Bolts, at that point in the video the necro minions are dead. The only things that were happening due to the Necromancer was the Well of Blood heal, which as of BWE1 doesn't count as a combo field based on the wiki, and the Axe basic attack, Rending Claws.

Considering the retaliation seems to have only been applied to the Guardian, it looks like certain boon and effect applications will show up on top of other characters so that you know what's going on with them. So whatever Cleansing Bolts was, it was done by the Guardian. It could have been a quick combo with two of his own skills.

Yeah, Cleansing Bolts is the Guardian doing a self combo with the Greatsword.

http://www.ign.com/videos/2012/06/01/guild-wars-2-gendarran-fields-commentary

This is IGN's press test run from today with a Guardian. At 14:55 in, he does the Cleansing Bolt combo and the splash notice shoots up. I imagine the Necro got the notice since the Cleansing Bolt seems to be a whirl finisher combo. A 'cleansing bolt' probably shot off and hit the Necro or its minion.

 

[ChaChaChaChia]

I'm trying to set up the game pad like Hawkian recommended, but can't seems to figure out how to do it. Do I need to get the pro version? I don't really want to shell out $20 for it.

 

[Rad-]

lol Guild Wars 1 had over 1000 skills and they killed PvP by overbalancing it. Nice try though.

GW1 PVP died because Anet didn't balance silly FotM's quick enough. People got bored of facing them everytime and stopped playing.

 

[Violet_0]

GW1 PVP died because Anet didn't balance silly FotM's quick enough. People got bored of facing them everytime and stopped playing.

reminds me of the unkillable Warrior/Monk and nearly unkillable Necro/Ranger builds that were popular during my short time with Factions. Good times, good times.

 

[gunbo13]

GW1 PVP died because Anet didn't balance silly FotM's quick enough. People got bored of facing them everytime and stopped playing.

Considering the most popular FotM's were active during the height of PvP popularity and that FotM was rampant for years beforehand, that is NOT what happened.