Thw world after tommorow - bringing PvE into the balance equation.

I still find it amusing that there are SO many people cursing that NOBODY wants non-ursan groups.

I could go through and count, but I'm guessing at least 4 or 5 people in this thread alone have claimed this. Add in 3 or 4 heroes, and you've got yourself a party right there...without any use of ursan.

Maybe someone should set up a sticky thread where "URSAN H8TRS" can go sign up so they can all find each other more easily. Hell, I don't even have GW:EN, so it's all the same to me.

I've said it before, and I'll reiterate just in case: people who say things like "LOL NO WE ONLY WANT R6+ URSAN 4 FOW CLEAR" are IDIOTS. You do not want to play with these people, ursan blessing or not. In this situation, ursan is helping you spot these idiots in advance, so you don't party with them.

If they were forced to use normal skills, you might not know they were idiots until you'd paid your entrance fee, loaded up, and found they'd already leeroyed into the biggest mob of monsters they could find and dragged them back to the nearest NPC.

See: ursan can be your friend..of sorts.

My wife plays the game and it is not because of the fancy graphics and setting up skill bars and managing her inventory is not what she consideres fun. I do those thing for her and she is the typical casual player. Unfortunally most casual players don't have someone like me updating their skill bars for them once a week before weekend play.

QFT, I hate dragging this thread into more ursan debate but I think he/she just nailed it with, "ursan is helping you spot these idiots in advance."

my 2 whatevers worth.
First I think there is more to the 'revert on May 1' than we are getting here.
Could it be that they arent sure that the skills they are nerfing are indeed the problem causers and would like to 'test' this out before they make it final??

Seems logical to me to do this in a tournament type play so they can see how the changes are being utilized before they make them finalized (yeah they can say they will revert back, but I have this itching feeling that some of those changes are going to be back after May 1). They have done this before with the temporary skill changes....so why not on a higher level this time?

Secondly...for that poster.....not everyone in pve uses ursan...I dont even have the skill and I have rarely played with any one who does. Please leave that to a different thread it has not connection to this discussion here.

The outrageousness of Ursan's Blessing detrimental effect on PvE gameplay is so great that I am almost at a loss to understand why it hasn't been balanced.

What previous skill, with the (possible) exception of Resurrection Signets has been so prevalent in every single skillbar of every single profession (except healing monks) in every single PvE area in the GW universe?

This is the best I have come up with so far:

1) ANet thinks PvE is beneath contempt.
ANet Devs love PvP so much they decided to break PvE or at least reduce the PvE skill requirement to an infantile and contemptible level.

2) ANet needs the player base to go away!
ANet want to bore the PvE community into wanting GW2 and ensuring long term players get the h*ll off their GW1 servers. Maybe if they make all the players gods they'll finally get their titles and fissure armour and stop playing on free servers?

3) EotN is compulsory for Elite Areas.
ANet wanted everyone to require (read: BUY) EotN in order to remain viable players in GW.

All, some or none of the above?

no offense to all the PvE players here, and i do play PvE aswell, but there is no such thing as "PvE balance".

When you're fighting foes above levelcap, with unique skills, environmental effects, ... there's no such thing as "balance". Therefor i think it's laughable to even consider taking the PvE-side into account when balancing skills.

A ton of skills have been changed over the course of GW, and every time the PvE crowd went nuts for about 2 days untill they found something else to do the exact same thing.

PvE doesn't need balancing, nor should it be included in the skill balancing.

RotteN: balance means something slightly different in PvE.

The idea is to have all character classes equally able to contribute to a party: at the moment, mesmers are ok, sure...but you'd probably do better if you just ditched them and took..well, anything else.

And for people who care about doing "better" more than having fun (which is a lot of people, apparently), this results in being quite detrimental to PvE mesmers. Likewise for assassins and (apparently) ritualists.

So a balance would bring all the classes more into line: you'd still need to use highly different tactics with a mesmer-heavy team than you would with a warrior-heavy team, but you'd be JUST as successful with either.

In an ideal world. But hey, even PvP still isn't perfect, and they've been working on that for ages. It'd be nice to think they were at least TRYING for PvE, anyway.

And Rene: SURELY you overexaggerate. I, like cosyfiep, have never encountered ursan users in the vast majority of GW PvE areas. HM endgame missions and elite missions, yes. Everywhere else? No. There's a HELL of a lot of game you can wander around without ever seeing an ursan spammer.

Such as the Ring of Fire Islands. I finished Prophecies this week and, guess what? I was the only player with Ursan (a measly r4) in the PUGs (which weren't in any way tuned or balanced, though I did get lucky in that there were good pullers and a couple of experienced players in each of them) I completed them with. And, except for Hell's Precipice (mainly because we were moving fast enough from mob to mob that it didn't have time to run out ), I didn't even Ursan for more than a couple of spots in Ring of Fire (the bridge) and Abbadon's Mouth (the Wurm and one or two other spots)...

EDIT: Oh, and my Party Search ad didn't mention the Ursan at all ("LFG W/R axe/bow for Seals"), yet I still got PUGged within 10 minutes for the first two (didn't need to for Hell's Precipice since the Mouth PUG did it without changes).

*awaits the inevitable cries of "Well, everyone knows Prophecies is absurdly easy, so it doesn't count"*

im sorry but you're just wildly incorrect here... please refer to the other 4 pages of this thread or http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...0280273&page=5

for more info on what we're talking about..

I agree. For this one shining moment, there is this glimmer of hope that maybe PvE will finally see some real dev attention. If they're serious, we may finally see the game mode that most players actually play finally take a front seat. Or, at the very least, some actual consideration of the PvE impact of skill balances. And maybe, if we're really lucky, that damn timer will finally be removed from soul reaping.

I have the same preference. I want a good, well-taken-care-of PvE game, maybe with PvP on the side. Moreover, I want that from GW1. I hate to say it, but there's pretty much no chance in hell that I'm buying GW2 after the terrible things that have been done to GW1 PvE in the name of "balance" and out of neglect because the devs were too busy with PvP nerfs and/or GW2. Without a very strong sign that GW2 PvE will really be the devs' top priority, I'm just not interested in getting on the same rollercoaster again. Really taking major steps to fix GW1 PvE would be that sort of sign. (Hint: Start by removing the SR timer.)

I've often said something similar, but it's not quite accurate. There is a need for "balance" in PvE, but it's not the same animal as "balance" in PvP. PvP balance is about balancing skills so that the range of equally dominant strategies stays somewhat broad and interesting. PvE balance is about balancing classes, and, to a lesser degree, skill lines, so that every class/skill line is roughly equivalent in effectiveness and therefore roughly equivalent in desirability when forming parties.

That's where Ursan maybe comes into the discussion. We often hear "whether other people use Ursan or not has not effect on your ability to complete zones any way you like, so do as you like and let others do as they like." In general, this is true. The only way Ursan could affect your non-Ursan play is if Ursan began to steal players who would otherwise be available for non-Ursan PUGs. Now, despite the large number of "R10 Ursan LFG" that can be seen in towns, I' don't think that's what's happening. I have the impression that most Ursans are pretty bad players who would not be attempting zones like UW at all without Ursan -- and you wouldn't want them in your group even if they were. So Ursan isn't really diminishing the pool of skilled players available for balanced groups in "elite" zones, just adding another avenue for (numerous) unskilled players to get in.

That's my current impression anyway. I could be persuaded to change my mind by a deluge of "I used to play in balanced groups (that successfully finished the zone), but now I play Ursan" indicating that Ursan really is stealing players that balanced groups would want.

I think this is an excellent post (well, actually two posts I've cut/pasted together) that does an excellent job of capturing what's wrong with letting PvP "balance" take absolute precedence over PvE and how frustrating it is for PvE players.

This statement is somewhat alarming. It is important to note the last few words: will not impact PvE at all. This is a very strong statement. It does not mean that the nerfs will be mild so that the impact on PvE is minimal - they say there will be no impact at all.

Recent update had many modifications that involved skill effects on GvG NPCs. These changes do not influence PvE at all. Is that where the future focus will be? I hope that future skills changes will balance both skill function and, if necessary, their function in relation to the NPCs. However, how would it be possible to change a skill without affecting PvE unless you separate functions for PvE and PvP?

I think that statement means exactly the opposite. We're all in agreement that 99% of skill balance changes in the past came from PvP. If they're not making those 99% of changes, do you think they'd double Izzy's workload and have him balance PvE, or do you think they'd completely ignore it since every PvE skill change sparks flamewars?

To me, this means that all skills and rules in PvE are now set in stone, while PvP will only receive the most minor of changes.

Although PvE can be done completely with Ursan (and easily too), I know that not everyone plays Ursan all of the time. You suggest that all PvErs do is use 6 Ursans/2 HBs and that is definitely not the case. By blaming everyone that PvEs for using Ursan all the time, you are continuing the sterotype that all PvPers look upon PvE with disdain. Stop. You are outnumbered firstly, and secondly there are plenty of both smart and dumb people that regular play on one side (PvE or PvP). PvPers also do the "same" by creating the meta after an important skill balance and by next week, 30-50% of teams in HA/GvG are running the same build. So please, before you blame PvEers for using "the same skill most the time", realize that PvPers do "the same build most the time".
The problems of PvP started ever since people began creating metas. The problems of PvE started about with the inclusion of HM. Which came first?......
Note: I am not blaming you for this mindset, but this is the reason why we need to completely separate PvE and PvP. This interconnection by way of the skillset destroys relations between the two. I hope Anet has some good means of figuring out the best way to do this.

<thinks for a moment> Well.... that would be better than the status quo, but I still would not be happy. There's a few things that really need to be fixed in PvE <looks at the soul reaping timer> before it can be just left the way it is.

QFT. I am PVE only and tbh i wish they would just seperate PVE\PVP and end

this ENDLESS debates,rants and winnings. let us play are game and let the pvpers play theres. each would have there own skills balances

The more I think about this situation and read some of these posts, the more frustrated I get.

These recent changes from Anet have nothing to do with balance. If Anet is going to continue manage their games this way, I have no hope for the future of the series. Let me explain.

Anet has taken the policy of doing whatever it takes to not cause backlashes in the PvE community, regardless of the effects it has on their game.

The statement that all these changes are going to be reverted because of PvE purposes really blows my mind on so many levels. This policy is only made to prevent people complaining about the changes (which clearly hasn't worked). The scary thing is the changes hardly affect PvE whatsoever, and the biggest problem of all in PvE (Ursan) still exists.

Now once in a while I see a sprinkle of PvE players who post that they care about balance. They post that all classes should be equal. Well I hate to break it to you, but you are the big minority. The majority of PvE players HATE HATE when any nerf whatsoever takes place. This is evidenced in the hundreds of threads over the years (and I will pull many of them out if asked). You NEVER hear PvE players complaining about buffs, only nerfs. This is the exact reason Anet will not touch Ursan, because of the backlash it will cause.

And that is why these recent "we won't affect PvE" comments are beyond stupid. The heart of the matter is that this situation has NOTHING to do with balance, and everything to do with appeasing the majority.

GW PvE doesn't need balance it needs to be nuked, then completely rethought. As that isn't going to happen, let it rot.

"let it rot".

wise words for the $200 i spent to play this game...

Yeah, 'cause all the times "half activation speed, double damage" bosses get BUFFED it's just lovely, right?

I think "you rarely hear PvE players complaining about buffs" would be more accurate.

Still, your point is fair enough, given that for the most part in PvE either you can exploit the stupid AI and whomp em, or the supa-cast double damage whomps you before you can do anything. Never in PvE does a superbly crafted 'exploit' build kill you over and over and over to the extent that you pretty much never see "class X" using anything BUT that build, so the experience of 'overpowered skills' is very very one-sided.

Nerfs on the other hand usually have a direct effect on a player's own ability to do stuff, so will obviously lead to more complaints. You don't really notice enemy rangers doing more or less damage with a given skill when you're not fighting enemy rangers ALL the time, and are also taking damage from a great many other sources. You DO however notice that YOU'RE not doing as much damage with a skill you use on ALL monsters, ALL the time. It's sheer frequency as much as anything.


This, to be honest, confuses me. To date, I would say...what, 90%+ of any and all skill balances have been based entirely on PvP, on the principle that PvE is theoretically easy enough to permit players to adapt no matter what, whereas PvP is cutting-edge enough to make regular skill tweaking necessary to avoid gimmick builds overtaking. And this has always been going on, and yes, there has been much "QQing" from the PvE community. Who have all, nonetheless, stayed around.

So really, this is one of the first actual examples I've ever seen of them actually STATING that they're trying to avoid backlashes from the PvE community, rather than something that they've always done.

So if you're saying that "ANET has NOW STARTED taking the policy of doing whatever it takes to not cause backlashes in the PvE community..etc etc", then it makes a little more sense, but is still woefully overreacting. As noted above: this is the FIRST example of this sort of thing being stated outright. It may indeed be the last (if the QQing from the vocal PvP community is sufficient, for instance), but either way, it's far far too small a representative sample of behaviour to base a DOOOOOOM-based polemic on.

Yes this is the first example of them doing this, but I am not convinced people are overreacting. The statement in itself is a huge deal. They are basically doing 3 things at once:

1. Sacrificing PvP to prevent PvE backlash
2. Giving up the quest for PvP balance
3. Lying that they are doing it for PvE balance, because Ursan exists

I think my main point was that this update isn't about balance at all, but something else more sad that is disguised as a balance update.