Dev Updates Today!

We all know how useful Paragons can be in PvE... its just the useful builds for them are so insanely boring. PvE Paragons are either reduced to extremely boring spear chucking w/ GftE spam so they can use the energy attacks or resigned to Command/Motivation w/ Leadership to keep in Mending Refrain or something boring. Almost nobody wants to play them. They are purely for heros now. Morgahn doesn't complain about the fact all he gets to do day in day out is spam Motivation/Leadership skills till the cows come home.

When is this update suppose to go live? End of this weekend event?

gaile said 'later in the week' on tuesday....I would assume that it has to be today...the major updates are almost always on or before thursday...I can't remember the last time there was a major friday or weekend update, I guess mostly because most of the programmers are home for the weekend, so they don't want to take a chance and release a buggy patch that close to the weekend. I still say it's today...don't forget, it's still not even 4:00 PM Anet time yet.

lol, a mod needs to go /mo with Extinguish and kill this flame war. Roflcoptering your epeen gets you no where if all you do is obsmode and think that tells you enough about high end PvP to have a solid understanding of it. And no, Rank 9000 gvg is not high end PvP.

To the couple of people that semi-responded to me regarding my comments on Arcane Conundrum becoming better than Migraine with this update, you are almost certainly right that if all you could bring on your bar was one skill, then yes Migraine is better. However you have to understand that with this update, you can run Arcane Conundrum in combination with a different Elite and do the same job better. Shit, even Mantra of Recovery would be pretty sweet, but most likely you'd do a Mantra of Persistance with it to make the duration lengthy enough to cover the recharge. Toss in the buffed up Conjure Phantasm as a pressure/cover hex, and it's a fat bitch. Sig Humility, Ineptitude, Clumsiness, OSHI~, it's a build!

Please try to consider the broader profession and skill selection capabilities when comparing skills beyond "BUT BUT LOL IT'S SHORTER DURATION"

Hopefully there's more updates to waiting in the wing to be rolled out right after this one is finalized. I'd like to think this is the beginning of the "more frequent" balances.

I also want to give a special thanks to all the posters who tested these changes before they were implemented. What would the world do without people like you...

Tobasco... calm down before they nerf you!!!

Migraine was inferior to Arcane Conundrum before and giving it a slight AoE property is completely inconsequential. If Cry of Frustration was an Illusion skill, it might be different, but it's not. Migraine still does the job of both pressure and shutdown while Conundrum is still only shutdown with a higher cost and recharge. Since when did casters ever ball up in (intelligent) PvP anyways? Even in PvE, enemies still spread out quite a bit more than they used to.

Yeah that was the point, monk have powerful 5e spells O.O they're spammable too, unlike necro spells...
i guess solo farming builds don't count.... because they're just plain fubar altogether?
and yeah this is better than once every 5 seconds, but it definitely still needs some fixes.... the 3xSR cap instead of 3 activations cap being the most likely...

ok im going to try put this as simple as possible.

the hex dominance took its tole on the health of gvg before the ATS were implemented. The length of time it took for the ATS to be implemented just perpetuated the dismal state of ladder based gvg. Hex builds did dominate even though you dont see this now... eF won their gold cape running a very very powerful version of the hex build which they had run throughout the season prior to the introduction of ATS.
The HAnD guild also rose to the top of the gvg ladder prior to ATS launch running a similiar hex build.

it is entirely possible to run a build that counters hexes, thats not the point. The point is... if i run a perfect counter to 1 particular build i expose myself to weakness against other builds. And this is build wars... the exact opposite of what pvp should be about. The outcome of a fight should not be decided upon ONLY by the 8 skills no your bar or the other 56 skills in the team, if this is how gw gvg works then you might aswell roll a dice at the start of the battle or play rock paper scissors to decide who wins.

The issue of hexes has taken its tole on the gvg community. Its old news. The results of its imbalance have already been felt. Its been 4-5 months during which this issue has not been addressed. Just because you have not felt the taint of its effects on the gvg meta nor been witness to it recently matters not to me sir...

As for why hexes arent on obs mode, since you rightly point out that if they were THAT overpowered everyone would still be running them.

The new ATS system has effectively taken out one of the conditions of randomness that made the hex build so dominant during the old ladder seasons. We know what maps we are going to fight on... and we can design a build in accordance to the map. Although saying that... watch the matches on burning isle... i know for a fact that [HAnD] the infamous hex guild... still run variations of their hex build on that map. Fortunately on other maps the hex build enjoys less dominance because of splits.

Yes thankfully ATS have in a roundabout way solved the dominance of the hex build because gvg is no longer about fighting on home or away maps.

However... as i said... its all far too little far too late. Significant portions of the gvg community just lost all interest in playing the game waiting for the ATS to be implemented. I wrote about recent comments being a slap in the face to the pvp community because Anet have not shown the willingness to acknowledge this problem to its full extent... it was such a big issue for gvg. Nothing was done to remedy the situation. And only now its too late do they even seem interested in seeing whats wrong.

The ATS tournies may have reduced the dominance of the hex teams. However its just a cosmetic coverup of a much more fundamental flaw in the skill balance as far as pvp goes.

Just another reminder that skill balancing still remains as infrequent and ineffective and irrelevant to the concerns of the players actually playing the game.

The same is happening with ritualist spike in heroes ascent... dont ask me to run a build that counters ritualist spike. This is not meant to be buildwars... i should not have to design a build that counters every possible gimmick build... its just impossible. We run as diverse balanced builds as we can possibly manage, as many have experienced, running balanced builds in HA under current Kill Count meta is not an easy thing to do. There are strong limitations placed onto the balanced build if it is to be successful in HA atm... the first step would be to unshackle these limitations and then to reduce the amount of gimmicks that are run.

I realise there will always be a gimmick... but when the gimmick builds are resultant from clear imbalances in the skills they are unnecessary gimmicks.

What happened to GvG is now happening to HA.

Nothing in the published update notes shows any recognition of this state of affairs.

I wouldnt be suprised if they came out and asked us to show them whats wrong with HA in a special week where lots of Anet attention is being focused on HA issues.

There is no need... it takes a few hours of observation during peak GMT play times to witness in entirety what is going on.

So you see my friend... you really should make sure you are fully aware of the issues before you make such comments.

i hope i have in some way helped to enlighten you to the issues at hand. If you require further information im sure other posters will gladly fill you in.

The search function is your friend is all i can say finally.

Lorekeeper

it "hasn't been addressed" over the last 4-5 month's, because it was addressed when the game first came out.... the answer is, was, and always will be the Mesmer - and if your guild is too Fin stupid to bring one to shut the necro down, you deserve to get owned by em.

the ignorant/nieve devs have already been coned into crippleing the necro because of you whiney ass, pos, pole smokeing PVP crybabies once already- it's not going to happen again just because ya'll refuse to bring a core character class into battle with you.

ask the hex necro what to do to shut him down compleately? - the answer is bring a mesmer - have a nice day.


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(check out mouse's zodiac clearence sale http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...03#post2893103)

No, because they're played in a completely different environment. A solo build will not be a viable PvE build.

I personally would like to thank the dev teams for their many recent changes to GuildWars.

To those that are whining over the adjustments in this patch, such as warrior and ele skill updates being useless, you obviously have not played much of the game. For example, the buff of warrior's endurance could result in alot more energy based warrior builds as the one thing stopping warriors from spamming attacks has always been the lack of energy. Similarly for the buff in Dwarven Battle Stance. These are all very useful skills that you ignorantly assume to be useless.

On the other hand its a shame though, the armor cap is gonna hurt alot of solo tanking eles

err, last I checked, farming IS PvE... pretty much THE endgame PvE unless you can get a decent DoA group together...

oh, and on another note, I just saw a 55 Mo/D tank varesh while his 3 heroes beat her down fast enough to get masters... 4 spots open, charged 2k a person, 8k for 4 minutes of 55 tanking... ah the joys of protective spirit and mystic regeneration.

Then I'll be more specific:

"No, because they're played in a completely different GAMING environment (think PvP). A solo build will not be a viable in a GROUP PvE build."

And where's this stuff about endgame coming from? I'm in support of farming. What the hell are you going off on??

If they can do that on a mission that's not the easiest mission in the whole campaign, I'll be impressed.

Maybe if hex heavy teams ran only a single necro and not multiple hexers, you'd have a point. As it stands, you look like a clueless idiot. A lot of top guilds do run a mesmer in their builds. Go watch HaND vs Gr on Burning Isle. Gr is running Expel Hexes on a para, a mes with Power Block, and 3 monks, two of which are using Veil (not that I agree with it, but meh). Gr loses at VoD, even with those counters in place. If it were so simple to shut down as you seem to think, they'd have won easily. Please grab a clue before posting about part of the game you don't even play.

As far as the necro being crippled goes, lots would disagree. Especially since you've so nicely generalized all PvP'ers into being crybabies, when you're the one who's been QQ'ing about your necro being ruined since the first "nerf" to SR.

I ask again: What exactly do you expect a debate to be, other than quoting someone and responding to what they said? Perhaps not quoting them and making up strawmen like the following is more like a debate?

And again: I never said that. I said that if you really want to make an arguement based on statistics (common usage and what's going on around the servers in the big picture), you aren't going to win when the people you are disagreeing with have a bigger picture view than you. If you want to disagree based on meaningful reasons, feel free.

And again: I never said any of that. I said that I'm waiting for those who disagree with this particular point (SR was providing rediculous energy in PvE) to come up with reasonable counterpoint that doesn't rely on faulty reasoning. Thanks for another obvious strawman.

So if you write a huge post, and I simply respond to each point, you poke at me for writing a long post? I suppose I should simply write a one liner addressing each point? Or perhaps people who disagree with you simply shouldn't post lest they be accused of engaging in "quotewars" a term I still would love to see a definition of. Or maybe just not quote you and instead make up stupid arguements, attribute them to you, and then make up a name for you and criticize my silly version of you instead of the real one? And thanks for another obvious straw man, where you ignore every point I actually made in favor of easier ones to criticize. Ignoring what I actually said and arguing against strawmen doesn't make what I actually said disappear, no matter how much you might wish it so.

Who's telling you to shut up? Who's trying to quote you to death? Again, how do you expect anyone to discuss points with anyone else except by taking something that was said, quoting it, and then presenting the reasons they believe differently? How is that a quote war or suppression of any kind? And at what point did I even suggest that ANet saying something makes it right? I simply havn't seen a good answer to what they said, and I'm not willing to make the assumption that they are wrong without an actual reason.

Personally, I think dependency is the worst kind of imbalance, and that the entire game is imbalanced by a total dependance on dedicated healers. Most people don't seem to know that there are other forms of healing than Monks, so Monks are by far the most in demand profession. In my experience, Necros are second place and was way ahead of third until SF brough fire elementalists into the same realm of silliness. Since NF, I've seen a switch from total domination by Necros to total domination by a combination of Necros and SF eles. The fact that first place is imbalanced (Due to the nature of the game itself) does not imply that second place is not also imbalanced (Due to raw steamroller power).

Do you have *ANY* idea how many exceptionally solid builds are not commonly used in this game? There have been numerious posts in the other thread by people talking about their solid healer N/Mos and N/Rts that you apparently ignored. Regardless of how common they are, they fill the mandatory healer role just fine (even post cap), thank you very much. How many reports of people actually witnessing this in action will it take to convence you that it is a real, if small, portion of the player base? How am I the one ignoring the player base when I accept their reports while you seem to think you know what everyone's up to while you ignore them?

But since my post was more than a paragraph long I suppose the best I can expect is to be called more names and see you put up a few more strawmen to knock down instead of actually answering it. I really wish someone would actually address the the point sometime.

Here's the short version without a dev quote: When I log into GW tonight, possibly with the worst version of the cap still in place, I am going to log onto my Necro and steamroller my enemies because that's what Necros do. I know it's possible because I did so last night. I have powerful spells a huge energy supply with which to cast them, which consistantly allows me to just walk over nearly everything in the game. Tell me why what I'm seeing in game does not match reality if you want me to believe the SR cap breaks Necros.

Wow. That's quite a lot of ad-hominem hostility you've got going on there. You seem to have missed the point where people explained the difference between "can be countered by a fully specialized build that is worthless against anything other than full out hex offense" and "balanced".

There are plenty of mesmers in PvP. Mesmers can certainly do a reasonable job of slowing down a hex offense via interuption and hex removal. And they currently often do in many builds. But many of the hexes involved have shorter cooldowns and lower energy costs than our interupts and removals, and even if a Mesmer could fully shut down one hexer you would still need a fully dedicated hex shutdown Mesmer *per hexer* to not be horribly crushed. Guess what happens when a team with 4+ fully dedicated anti hex Mesmers meets any team running anything but hexes as offense?

The fact that something can be countered in some theoretical world where you fully know what each opponent will bring does not imply that it is balanced.

Frankly, I'm very happy with this new version of Soul Reaping. Its better than the initial nerfed version because it works with how things are killed in pve: quick bursts. I would also say that since the SR nerf I haven't really had much of an energy management issue so long as I used signet of lost souls and didnt load up on 8*15 energy skills.

I'm also looking forward to using the revamped well spells, but I'd like to see a few more of them changed.

And I also feel that Quantum Duck has horribly owned TabascoSauce and WildmouseX .

if 1 mes can shut down 1 necro - then a team of mes's can shut down a team of necro's -- it's not rocket science here bub. there's a difference between crying beccause you don't bring the proper team build to counter the tatics being used aginst you, and explaining to the devs that they made a change to a core character class that reduce's it to just useing wands in frequently occuring situations.


a mesmer fully set-up to shut down a necro with interupts that increase cool down, drains energy, and/or does damage (or a mixture of any of those) - is not only effective in stoping necros... ele's, monks, other mes's, paragons, and rit's are all high profile, eaisly shut down targets useing the exact same skills.. hence why those skills interupt "SPELLS" not "NECRO ONLY SPELLS"... so if you got more mes's then there are necro's to hit, then the build is still top notch for shutting down pretty much anyone else in the enemy group.

and bringing one character that shut's down a character on the other team is not a waste - esp. if the character you're shuting down is whipeing your team out.. it's how you turn the balance of a fight to your favor.

if team a has 1 necro, and your team put's one mes to counter him, then both teams have a character that isn't otherwise contributeing to the fight...likewise, if team a has 3 necro's and your team has three mes's shuting them down, then both teams have 3 characters not otherwise contributeing to the fight - that is what you call ballance..... if the guilds you are fighting are not bringing ballanced team( i.e. 1 of each type), then the answer is to unbalance your team to counter them - not to go whineing and bitching about it everywhere you can find to put a post. i have no sympathy for a guild that gets wasted by a three necro team, when they refuse to bring three mes's to stop it from happening in the first place - the counter to the tatics being used aginst you exsists, and you are not useing it - your fault that you lose.

I find Paragons a very fun class. Probably because the spear is my favorite weapon in Guild Wars. Echo management is fun as well.

I know how to defend against it the thing is that most people dont use it so you dont prepare for it so youre screwed.

This has already been argued on MANY other posts so keep it there. bottom line is that necros energy skills suck. Only somewhat decent one is an Elite.

You dont need to play it to know what its going to do. Ive already described a really bad scenerio. Read above post.

Lawl build wars.

Please, go state that on the QQ forums...

It's not fun when a match is decided based almost purely on build, with skill having little to do with it.

I mean come on now, isn't that what serious pvp is about? Skill?

Right now it's pretty much "Lawl I gots paper, it keels your rock." unless you are playing the same build, which gets really boring after a few matches.

The only way to have a match purely on skill with build playing no part is to limit each profession to 8 skills. Is that what everyone wants because that's where it's headed. Pretty soon only the 8 skills that anet want you to use to make the game balanced will be useable all the rest will have been nerfed so bad that they'll be useless so all builds will be the same and all matches will depend on skill. How boring would that be and it would make most pve professions unplayable.

Woah there, let's not go overboard here.

All I'm saying is you shouldn't need to go scissor on their rock.

A single build should not force the metagame into stagnating, making people need to directly counter it in order to win.

Stick a fork in this thread, it's done.