Let me explain why people whine about paragon changes

It's got nothing to do with the changes themselves. The AR, the GTFE changes...they are no big deal. The real reason is: there are no real buffs ever.
Nobody really cares about nerfs to some powerful skills paragons have, it is just annoying to nerf the core skills used, when there are no buffs as well.

Other professions have a huge power creep, paragon has none. Elementalist gets a few damage buffs every single patch. So does mesmer. Paragon has bunch of skills that could use the same, but they never get touched.

For instance, now most professions have easily obtainable 33% speed boosts. Dervish gets a signet with long lasting 33% speed boost. Elementalist gets a long lasting 33% speed boost(flame djinn haste, storm djin haste), ranger gets natural stride etc...paragon has "Lead the way!" which is 25% speed boost that is dependant on number of allies present. Now this is fine...but why the hell does it cost so much?

Or another power creep case. The "For Great Justice!" shout was buffed from 50% adren gain bonus to 100%. What about the paragon? The elite Focused Anger has a bug that caps it at 100%. A bug that is known for quite a while, yet anet won't fix it. Then we have the complete sack of crap that is Natural temper(1 extra adrenaline every 9 sec, if you happen to be non-enchanted that is, a real slot winner there) and the overpriced ghetto "To the limit!" in form of "Make your time".

Do these ever get buffs? No. And they are not the "let's make 6 paragons and abuse it" type of skills.

I've tried to make most skills work, but it's impossbile. I've tried tons of motivation builds with "It's just a flesh wound" and Song of Purification, and they are impossible to make work. Hell...if "It's just a flesh wound" had functionality of "heal 50 HP", I would consider it a huge improvement. But as it stands I've got no motivation to use motivation.

So in conclusion, I'd like to say...the problem is not the nerfs, but lack of buffs. That makes nerfs hurt, however deserved they may be.

Quote: Originally Posted by Spura For instance, now most professions have easily obtainable 33% speed boosts. Dervish gets a signet with long lasting 33% speed boost. Elementalist gets a long lasting 33% speed boost(flame djinn haste, storm djin haste), ranger gets natural stride etc...paragon has "Lead the way!" which is 25% speed boost that is dependant on number of allies present. Now this is fine...but why the hell does it cost so much? You could maintain Lead The Way! on two allies at once, it can't be removed, lasts for 20 seconds, can be used on anyone unlike the examples that you listed which are user only, and can't be interrupted. I think the extra 5 energy warrants that.

Quote: Or another power creep case. The "For Great Justice!" shout was buffed from 50% adren gain bonus to 100%. What about the paragon? The elite Focused Anger has a bug that caps it at 100%. A bug that is known for quite a while, yet anet won't fix it. No, it's not a bug. Adrenaline is capped at 100% gain, just like attack speed is capped at 33%, speed boosts 33%, armour now at +25. The difference is they allowed speed boosts and +AL that give more than the cap with a single skill. Go try using Weapon of Fury and For Great Justice! and you'll notice you're gaining just as much adrenaline if you just had FGJ!.

Well, the reason paragon nerfs annoy me is because they seem to be based on pvp only and therefore pve paras get screwed. Unfortunately the only way I think they could fix this would be to make skills act differently in PvE and PvP :/. PvE only skills help, of course, and naturally those are very good skills.

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Paragons are still ridiculously viable, but most people fail to see all the possibilities to be had. A lot of paras simply run SY and TNTF because it's easy, spammable, and effective. Hell, those two skills tend to be a major part of any vanquishing I'm doing, just because they are so effective. Boring, but effective.

However, Motivation has taken some major hits that have made it much less desirable. I would be willing to sacrifice some healing ability for more frequent uses of the skills involved, as well as sacrifice the fairly cheap cost of "Incoming" for a shorter recharge or longer duration. As it is, SY sometimes feels like ANET compensating for the "Incoming" nerf.

Perhaps Leadership should be the last para nerf, and then ANET could start buffing skills again. As it is, It's kind of like paras get the best primary att ever, but no awesome non-pve only skills to use with it.

Perhaps a dividing factor of more than two? One energy returned for every 3 ranks in Leadership? That would lower the maximum energy return to 5, making energy management something paras may actually have to pay attention to again, making powerful high energy skills worth buffing again.

Quote: Originally Posted by Omniclasm

Paragons stink. Assassins are better! LoL J/P Para's do suck, but sin's aren't better... or are they... o_O

Quote: Originally Posted by The Phantom

All professions have plenty of weak skills that never see the light of day. I don't see why paragon should be any different. Also, Song of Concentration sees use in HA.

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Quote: Originally Posted by Omniclasm Yeah, I knew it did, but very remote uses for one very remote thing. And yes, all professions have crap skills. But in the case of the Paragon, they have 80% crap skills, 10% mediocre skills, and 10% overpowered skills. http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/User_...powered_Skills

I believe paragon has the fewest underpowered skills on that page, whereas single trees from other professions have more. Granted 'Motivation' was addressed as a whole, in practice it is still very useful in a PvE setting.

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Monks for instance, can have vastly different bars but still be relatively effective. As can most other professions. Even Dervish with the same amount of skills as the Paragon can have some variance in their builds. Paragons can have very little variance in their build. As far as I know that is a bad thing? Imagine if there was only 10-12 skills that other professions could use. Monks have maybe three viable elites, RC, LoD, SoD. Then you're going to have RoF, SoA, Aegis, Prot Spirit, Spirit Bond, Dismiss, Guardian, Remove Hex/Veil/Cure Hex, Dwayna's Kiss, or Glyph Lesser in some combination. I may have missed one or two skills, but honestly with three chapters + expansion those are the only monk skills I would consider taking. Paragon... I've used every elite except for Soldier's Fury (because AR is still better), Incoming! (made my paragon after the hits), and the other command elites (they're more practical in a PvP setting). My paragon and his two heroes all run different builds, the only skills appearing on all of their bars would be Aggressive Refrain, Signet of Return, and Spear of Lightning.

Paragons have got a PvE buff, in the form of Hayda.

She allows Paragon players do the 3+ Paragon combos like they do in PvP.

If Anet did release PvE only skills as a compensation for skills being nerfed as a result of PvP usage, then I think the implementation is flawed.

They should release PvE only skills that are the previous effects of skills that are nerfed solely because of PvP usage (some skills needed to be nerfed for both).

Quote: Originally Posted by Racthoh No, it's not a bug. Adrenaline is capped at 100% gain, just like attack speed is capped at 33%, speed boosts 33%, armour now at +25. The difference is they allowed speed boosts and +AL that give more than the cap with a single skill. It is a bug.
Like you said it yourself there is a cap on stacking up effects, however you can gain more then the cap from a single skill ... "save yourselves?", "ward against harm" ... any many many more.
By the way, the cap for movement speed is not 33% but +50% and -90%.

So how comes this doesn't count for adrenaline if the skill description states otherwise!!! And that is the point ... the skill description doesn't fit the game mechanic = bug

On topic:

I assume this is a psychological thing, because people usually don't see the big perspective aka game balancing but just their little character suddenly struggling with a build they got used to. A buff to the paragons would be most likely a gesture of stroking their heads. The class itself has been overpowered by concept from the start:

- Ranged Deep Wound;
- Unremovable stacking (unlike weapon spells) partywide buffs (Defensive Anthem etc.);
- Primary attribute allowing to actively hide energy in recharged adrenaline skills -> one of the best e-management options in the game;
- High base DPS - up to par with close ranged mele professions - from mid range
- High base armor capabilities: 80 base + 16 shield (+ 10 centurion with possible +10 against *type of damage* on shield)

And even after those billion "nerfs" aka balancing paragons are out there and pawning. None of the skill changes made my paragon less accepted in pug groups pve- and pvp-wise (this is assuming we are not talking about wammo pugs in early nightfall ... where you don't wanna end up anyway).

"There is nothing to Fear!" and "Save Yourself!" packed on a paragon is god mode in pve.
And the motivation line is charming with two paragon heroes, Song or Restauration and Song of Purification work great with Finale of Restoration.

Don't get me wrong ... I am always in for more alternatives to design builds ... but buffing paragon skills sounds weird to me at the moment.

Just my 2 cents,
Timebandit

i believe with the addition of the Paragon PvE skills, Paragons are in no need of any further buffs.

this is only good for PvP, too.

i guess this is why so many have the mentality that Paragons are bad now, but who cares about what bad players say anyways?