Ursanway ... vanquish PUG annoyance?

Yes, it really wasnt too much of a nerf but you'd have thought otherwise judging from the outraged reactions of many. Many of which are probably the same people who think Ursan is just fine.

You know, I was going to somewhat agree with you that removing UB at this point won't change much. GW is pretty much on it's way out and since UB was introduced at the tailend of the last of the new content, the damage it's doing is minimal. (But I'd like to point out that a lot of those issues you listed have nothing to do with UB, with or without it)

But then you go on and went too far with the nonsense here:

Yeah so you lost me here with the absurdity. It's just ridiculous.

Carl, the point was, if Ursan goes, people would still find another goat to blame for what's wrong with GW. The problem people attached to Ursan will be again attached to another issue.

BTW, How would you "balance" Ursan?

Umm the only way for there to be nothing wrong to be found with GW is when it hits divine status and is completely perfect. That's not possible with anything. Are you saying that people should never point flaws out for fear of there being another flaw popping out later?

And we arent just randomly "blaming" UB for no reason here. We've explained all the reasons, I think you should go read some of them.

I can't answer that now since it would take some thinking about .... it's not something that you just nerf mindlessly since people will then complain how useless it would be.

It's true, players will always find something to complain about what other players are doing. A lot of Anet's nerf mistakes (?) have come from giving too much credence to those screaming for a particular nerf.

It's obvious that Anet knows exactly how powerful Ursan Blessing was when they put it in the game. Why should they now nerf it because SOME players don't want OTHER players to have it.

This is simply another case of some players wanting to interfere with how others play the game. Get over it.

Im all for pointing out flaws. I've read the arguments, would you believe? Have you read what people say on your side about people who use ursan? I wish more people would stay on the issue, and the argument on points of relevance, not turn to clashing egos and saving face in a public forum.



Exactly, my sentiments. Pivotal word is, mindless. One-liners, funny pictures, funny avatars, is not a solution. Actually, there ae 3 possible things I have in mind that can happen with Ursan:

1) Take Ursan out of the game completely.

2) Make Ursan totally unusable.

3) and the Middle ground, which would take more thinking and idea-sharing than bashing from both extremes.


Personally, it doesn't matter. I use Ursan but it's not a big part of my gameplay. I would be extrenely happy if people would accept a Spirit Strenght Rit in a regular party but that never happens unless I H/H.

It so easy to point out problems. But it's a bit tad hard to point out problems and, at the same time, offer a solution.

My take.


EDIT: Carl, I will wait for your suggestion how ursan can be "balance". And I'm not being sarcastic.

i must have missed those reason can you please state them again because all im seeing is "ban ursan its unbalancing GW" without any further explanation into how or why


and yes i enjoy ursan. ive been into the UW 6 times this week. thats more than i ever did in 2 years before ursan came out.

If you hate nerfs so much, why are you playing an MMO where one of the main features is balance between the hundreds of skills? Nerfs occur in all MMOs. Get over it.

Right. In one breath you screaming about ANET constantly making mistakes and in the next breath you declare how ANET could have never done any wrong when they put UB in.

The fact is that skills arent always balanced when they're introduced. The many previous skill balances are proof of that.


Because it's imbalanced? Because they've done so before? And why SHOULDNT they nerf it just because SOME players don't want it nerfed?

There is nothing simple about this. Except maybe your thinking. Games NEED balance whether or not you like it. Get over it.

Anyway, off to bed. I'll reply to the rest of the angry mob tomorrow....

The game was broken before Ursan, get over it. (fyi I didn't read any other post I just saw Ursan and assumed )

Sorry just one more post before bed....

If you didnt even read the thread why the hell are you even posting? Another lame standard post of "get over it" isnt helping anything at all. Thanks.

Decrease its power to reflect its ease of use. Make Ursan in line with other button-mashing builds.

Interesting discussion. Totally pointless though, since they'll never nerf UB - too many lower-IQ-individuals would get angry, spamming the support with their anger ("WTF!?! Why do I have to use my brains in game! Why do I have to make a proper 8-skills-build!?!"). Although I hope AN will not make the same mistake in GW2's pve, implementing hundreds of skills and causing ppl to use only 1, changing quite a good game into kindergarten.

I have a simillar idea. But the decrease of power is conditional.

Let me put it in detail:

A lone bear will retain all the benefits of current Ursan rank. But as the number of party members in bear form increase, Ursan Skills gets penalty

URSAN STRIKE: For every party member in bear form, Ursan Strike damage is reduce by 5.
URSAN RAGE: For every party member in bear form, Ursan Rage damage is reduce by 5


BTW, 5 is just an arbitrary numbers.

A lone bear or two isn't really a game breaking problem. I have the feeling some people are uncomfortable when an group of 6 ursan "steamrolls" an area. I am yet not sure if I want to touch on the "hp and armor" bonus because it provides a good buffer for ursan casters. But the "damage reduction" in an ursan party's ability to steamroll would have lesser "steam".

My take.

I'd say limit it like other PvE-Only skills - only 3 elite pvp skills in a team. This way people would have to invite non-ursaners to PvE groups.

Wraithe - see that little ,,Log out'' sign on the brown field? Click it and gtfo, we don't need you here. If your only argument against ursan-haters is ,,stop acting childish'', then I guess you are either a moron or/and under twelve.

If people just accepted all things the fate throws at us, my country wouldn't survive longer than to 16th century, as after it we were ravaged by Russia, Germany and few other nations. If something isn't fine for us or it takes away our freedom (I can't go to pugs/with alliance groups to UW/FoW/DoA/Vanquish/anything), we have to fight against it.

V Leave already, we don't need you. The world doesn't need you either. And I already logged out and not coming back to Grind Wars: Blessing of the Ursan until they make some changes to go back to skill > time. Maybe then people like me will come back and people like you will leave. So just gtfo or write a valid argument, like we people-against-Ursan did.

If you think they should nerf "Ursan Blessing", you should also say they should nerf the following:

- 55hp Monk
- 600hp Monk
- E/Me Terra Tank
- W/E Obsidian Tank
- Permant Shadow Form A/Me (or Me/A)
- ...

All of these builds make Hard Mode/Elite Areas a lot easier to do. I think the important question is why do you have a need to feel better than others? It's not that difficult (skillwise) to achieve the Vanquisher title, it's mostly a very time consuming achievement (I have a friend who vanquishes with hench/hero). When I see someone with the Legendary Vanquisher title, I don't think "Wow, that's a really skillful person.", I think "Wow, that's a person with a lot of time on his hands.". I don't mean this in a negative way, I'm actually impressed at the person's dedication to spend so much time and energy into getting those titles but I don't think of that person as particulary skilled. PvE is mainly there for having fun, if it's that important to you to feel better than others then I'd suggest you play PvP and get some PvP titles that actually reflect, at the very least, some skill. And yes, you do care that you are better than others otherwise you would not care so much about this skill since it hardly affects you. And no, the whole ursanway is the only build played argument doesn't count since it's a gross overstatement (I rarely see ursanway teams in the european district, excluding DoA since I never play it so I can't judge).

I agree that "Ursan Blessing" is overpowered compared to other skills but I don't see this as a bad thing. Ursanway allows the more "unpopular" classes to be able to do elite areas (i.e. DoA) rather than the need to have a specific class/specific skillset to be able to do it. As well as that ursanway closes a huge gap between the relatively few skilled people and the large amount of morons (I'm sorry to call them that but that is what they are) that make up the GW world. For those of us who aren't lucky enough of finding good PUGs or fortunate enough to be in a good guild "Ursan Blessing" is a true blessing. If UW, DoA, RoT and several other areas were properly balanced so that a "normal" team allowing any class to participate could do it, I would agree that there wouldn't be much need for ursanway. And most of the elite areas are severly improperly balanced, in particular Realm of Torment and Domain of Anguish. And finally why would I do something the hard way if there's an easier and less time consuming way of doing the same thing when I'm confidend enough in my own skill that I could do it the hard way? That's just having your ego getting in the way of what is practical. I'll always bet on the easy but maybe cheap way of doing something in GW rather than hoping/praying/offering-to-build-several-temples-in-that-deity's-name that I finally end up with a half decent PUG that has some skill.

And in the end the game is about having fun not about elitism.

55 doesn't allow you vanquish areas or play in DoA/Urgoz/Deep.
They already nerfed 600 monk once.
Terra tank too.
Obsi is no longer used.
Perma Shadow as Me/A is nerfed, A/Me version is very very hard to use.

And just because build is durable and it's possible to survive long with it, it doesn't mean it's a viable build. I mean, sure you can for example survive 50 mobs in Shadow Form, if ursans would kill them faster?

And I don't think you were thinking. You said ursan is overpowered, but you don't think it's bad thing?

And yes, it's not about being an elitist in the game, but about fun. There is NO fun in farming level 10 ursan/level 8 lightbringer, then use a 1-2-3 C-Space build.

Oh, and DoA/UW/FoW/RoT (why this last one is even mentioned? it's easy, really) can be ALL run in balanced build. It was never required to use Ursan. For example, one time I went to FoW with a group 1 paragon, 1 warrior (not tank), 4 nukers and 2 monks. We didn't prepare more than 15 minutes, explaining roles, we didn't even use TS. And we easily did every quest for the Forgemaster without any difficulties.

They already nerfed Ursan Blessing once. Argument over?

They are still in use and are used in a simular way as ursanway is used.

Just because something is overpowered doesn't mean you have to dislike it. Some elite areas are poorly balanced hence an overpowered skill like Ursan Blessing nicely compensates. As well as the many other reasons I gave why I like Ursan Blessing.

It's your opinion that farming the Norn title to rank 10 isn't fun someone else might think otherwise. Regardless of which you don't need a very high Norn level to make ursanway work, rank 4-5 will mostly do. And the small amount of effort is well worth the increase of fun you'll have with the ease of ursanway.

I don't find FoW very imbalanced, it's fairly easy hence why I didn't mention it in my previous post. Some of the UW quest are inproperly balanced (i.e. the Four Horseman quest is nearly undoable with a standard team without a gimmick like Ursan Blessing or someone tanking one side). DoA was very particular about what classes were accepted in groups, you would have a lot of trouble in finding a group in DoA if you were a Paragon, Mesmer, Assassin, Ritualist before Ursan Blessing. And most used a cookie cutter build to do DoA anyway. So what's wrong with replacing one cookie cutter build with another one? Atleast Ursan Blessing is available to all classes. RoT is imbalanced IMO sure it's doable but that doesn't make it balanced, for one the groups are cluttered to close to each other.

Doesn't really affect my game play.
However it is alarming when i see PUGs spamming "UB group for ... r8+ self invite". I never PUG with anyone so it doesn't affect my game play as i said.
But yeah i understand for the people doing it the legitimate way, trying to find groups, worrying about the skill input in the game etc.

Uhm. But 600 hp used to tank infinite amount of monsters without having to worry about anything. Ursan wasn't really nerfed, as people were close to monsters anyway... They just have to, OH NO! ENGAGE MONSTERS!!
Read again that bolded part. Again. And again. Still don't understand? Again. Read till you understand that Elite Area means that player must be better than what was during normal storyline.
Sure it will do. But PuG's take ONLY r10. And ONLY r8 lightbringer. Wasting 8 hours (or more, if someone farms both titles from the beginning) a day so I can... Enjoy? Ursan? I was with my guild using Ursanway to clear FoW. Yeah, it was stupid, but we used 2 monks, 1 paragon (me), 1 nuker, 1 DS/Whirlwind and 3 ursans. GOD!! That was the most boring time I've been in FoW ever! I can't imagine what would be with 5 ursans, it would be even faster and even more boring... I mean if someone is excited about pressing 5 buttons blindly (no tactic at all, no skill used or required), then it's something not right with him.

Paragon's could use TNTF + SY build, to make tanks out of whole team. Mesmer could be a smiter in a trio/duo or farm in Stygian Veil solo. And as a fast-cast nuker. Assassin's could try farming solo in UW too or use SY + DB/Moebius combo. Ritualists have even a Team Build in PvXWiki, plus their Shelter, Recuperation, Life and other spirits have an advantage over Monk enchantments, as they can be only interrupted by certain skills, but can't be removed as easily. Plus Weapon Spells are unremovable (Weapon of Quickening for tank/monks).

You mean DoA or RoT? Realm of Torment IS NOT imbalanced, I could easily play there as an elementalist, a mesmer and a ranger. And DoA once was too imbalanced, but then they lowered some numbers there, making it better. Still, it's an ELITE area for a reason. And don't forget that maybe UB is available to all classes, but not all people. Some of us don't have GWEN or just don't like playing there. Or we want some CHALLENGE. Those areas were challenging, now everyone goes there as Ursan, because it's easier than to vanquish Shadow Passage or Tahnnakai Temple with the right quest.

Don't forget - Elite Areas were putted for a REASON, that is for good players to complete them, not ursan buttonsmashers.

That had nothing to do with 600hp, it was a result of Spirit Bond. You could be a 55 with SB+HB, overkill as it was. Just felt like clarifying.

This is a good comment. I'm not sure why players want a game they can roll through without challenge, especially as it's easy enough already - it seems like making the game easier would simply reduce the amount of time spent playing before the player moves on to a game with more depth.

Well duh. I think that anyone talking about knows how 600 hp's were nerfed (I call them 600 hp, but it's just 600 monk...). Oh, and btw, they were nerfed a bit worse than Ursans. Why? Before I could (I mean I COULD, but of course they nerfed it 5 days after I finished leveling monk to 20 level on trolls) put Prot Spirit + Spirit Bond + IW and some stances (Elemental Resistance to lower armor, Mantra of Concentration/Resolve) and solo the smites + aatxes + probably few other monsters, as long as they hit hard. Now solo 600 is worse than 55 and requires a smiter.

Okay. Think about it like this. We all grew up playing videogames, or at least a large majority of us did. When you beat Mario or Sonic or Goldeneye, whatever game you loved back then, did you not get a sense of accomplishment? Didn't you have a great time doing it? Yes?

Many would argue that skills like UB take away this sense of accomplishment. For both the people who use the skill, and those that don't. I think that this is just ignorant. Every game has a cheat mode of some kind. For some games its a game genie, and others its a code you enter or achievement unlocked. Yet until now I have never seen such a heated debate about something, that you don't have to use, making a game easier.

I keep seeing the, "if you dont like it dont use it." and that is the truth.
If you didn't like the game genie... you didnt use it. Did knowing that there was a game genie out there take away from your enjoyment of a game? no.
Whats the difference here? ....besides your epeen.

It's already been discussed that the "if you don't like it don't use it" point is false, since you can apply that to any major glitch, exploit, or overpowered skill. "There's this glitch that makes you get a billion k in one second. ANet doesn't have to do anything about it because if we don't like it we don't have to use it."

It's much deeper than personal choice. This is an online game, it affects people.

You could do all that + Terrorwebs as a 55, but that's just nitpicking. The bigger impact was making the monk more vulnerable by relying on SoA (and knocking out a number of /Mo builds), which crippled farms like the Shiro'ken run which were vulnerable to interrupts.

Between prophecies and now the 55 monk template has continually gotten better.

How many online games have them available to players? If this is also the case, why are exploits/duping punished? Exactly the same logic applies to them - they don't hurt you, if you don't want them don't use them. The answer is logically because games are ideally meant to be fair, which means all players are on the same level. This is a problem in a game like Guild Wars where build design and tactics are so closely related in giving the game depth.

Don't try the 'because ANet intended Ursan' logic either, because what ANet intends and what is actually working/good for the game don't always stand together.

- You don't apply it correctly. Glitches, exploits and overpowered skills when it affects more people than just user are unfair, since they give advantage over others.

There was a bug that allowed some teams to get 12 players in GvG. This was unfair, because not everyone could have 12 players. If you start a GvG match with 6 people against normal teams with 8 people, this is fair, since you're only gimping yourself and not taking away from others. This is a very standard principle in ethical concerns.

Which completely ignores his point about the 'billion k' style of thing. Other examples: outpost warping, Mallyx exploit, and duping. All provide considerable advantages but don't directly affect other players.

- Not everyone can have billion k, warp to outposts that don't exist and dupe items. Thus those things are unfair.

If it exists in the game and is intended, why does someone have ethical concerns about it? Is someone coming here to say that zoning outposts is "completely against the spirit of game" and "we should walk by foot everywhere"? I don't get it.

seriously if you dont like ursan go find your self a group to do it the good old fashion way i dont understand why anyone requests a nerf of ursanway. if your that opposed of doing it find 8 ppl who hate ursan too and pug everything with them. ursan makes doa fun.

zoning has nothing to do with the matter at hand. thats really a pointless comparison. Try comparing Ursan to some other powerful build.

Ursan is very imbalanced compared to other builds. It has an efficacy that denies all other builds because it outshines them all.

Losing gameplay diversity and relegating staleness is bad for any game.

Anyone could do those things, it was just that the methods to do them weren't widely known.

It's generally the fact that this skill goes against the original spirit of the game ANet had originally intended.

I do not know how to argue with this statement as it blatantly disagrees with reality.

I don't see how walking or zoning has any connection to skill determining success.

There are a lot of connections between using overpowered, pre-made grind Builds and the lack of skill, especially in a game built on the concept of skillbar setup and skill balance.

Go back to page 1 and read everything again. Or don't post in this thread.

Aapo: You know what not everyone can pay $30 for a game? Many choose GW because it doesn't have monthly fee. So what should I understand - Use Ursan, but if you dont have GWEN, then you are screwed, sorry, go play other game? Someone worked hard for 2 years, now he can't afford 4th game and suddenly he can't do anything in PuG's anymore?

This is something I agree with and have stated previous times, as well: Ursan Blessing doesn't help player discrimination. It may help class discrimination, but instead of no longer being divided by class ("mesmers? no thank you") people are divided by accounts ("no GWEN? no thank you.")

Personally I think you're 100% right. Ursan is the killer feature of GW:EN.

Power creep is the very business model of Guild Wars - you're supposed to buy the expansions to get access to the new and more powerful skills... and skills don't come any more powerful than ursan. Hence, balancing ursan could well hurt sales of GW:EN.

Actually it would be ridiculously easy to balance ursan: change the AoE knockdown to a single-target knockdown.
The reason that would balance ursan is because it'd remove the damage-mitigation-through-perma-knockdown.
By making the knockdown single-target, ursan no longer synergizes with itself, and there's no longer any real reason to have more than one ursan in the team.

By this logic the trinity build was over powered too.

By his Aapos logic, ursan would be player harming exploit:

Not everyone can have ursan, just like not everyone can have factions and access to 12 man mission (which was necessary for 12 man GvG exploit.) (hell, not everyone has more than 6 people they can play GvG with, do we lower max party size for it?)

(But so would be anything except core skills and classes. And even that ...)

The difference is that even if you see the trinity as overpowered, you can prove that false by simply using Ursan to show how crappy the trinity is.

Theres very few builds that work in DOA. And those that do are still difficult. Ursan bulldozes through the shit. Thats not overpowered?

The trinity build was risky and for pugs was hella slow. Tanking in this game is as reliable as lockpicks. Not to mention that you still have a large amount of concerns to worry about. With Ursanway, you have to worry about much less.

Which part are you quoting by the way? Both my messages in that quote are applying to two different points.

This would be true if not for the fact the trinity build is flawed and inefficient when compared to straight damage dealing on a backbone of passive defense. This is why few 'good' pve teams run it anymore.

And you can use lots of other builds to prove it even without Ursan.

Trinity is crappy build that forces players to become better because it is dull and fragile. People not choosing to become good players can play it at cost of being less effective.