Balance Costume Brawl

Costume Brawl was a great minigame addition, and I've looked forward to seeing it for over a month now, and there's still a month left before Halloween.

Unfortunately, it used skills from the actual professions, which means skill balances have changed the way some of these work, causing some builds to be much more effective (Ranger and Necro received all buffs) while some become obsolete (Dervish, Monk, and Assassin had some pretty tough nerfs). A listing of many of the skill changes since last October is listed here, and the original builds are here.

It would be terrible of ANet not to realize something is wrong with some of the builds and not fix them before Costume Brawl is possibly opened again. It's either necessary to develop different builds, change out skills, or make arena-unique duplicates that have their old functions. Costume Brawl needs to be balanced before it is re-opened.

I'm pretty sure your list is complete now.

I really hope Anet is on the ball on this one because Costume Brawl is easily the best part of Halloween in GW, if not special events entirely. Like you said though, it could be an entirely different game this time around due to the bars and/or the changes made to the bars. PLEASE Anet, make this awesome again!

/signed for balance and reopening.

"Balance Guild Wars!"

...

that sounds like something I've heard before...

I think some of those builds need a rethink anyway.

The Ranger bar is absolutely optimum. Why don't the other bars share this property?

The Monk bar. Seriously, what were they thinking when they came up with that?

The Necro bar. I only see two fairly decent skills on there. Faintheartedness and Enfeeble.

The Paragon bar. Why does it not have an IAS?

The Warrior bar. Why no Frenzy? It requires skillful play to be effective anyway.

I would go on but I can't be bothered. The reason I say this is because the only bar that is completely optimum is the Ranger one.


I wholeheartedly agree though. Maybe just adjust the bars anyway?

Tyla, the builds aren't supposed to be "perfect" they are supposed to be mildly balanced with each other, which they are.

The monk bars CAN'T be made to be too good, because a good monk build would utterly dominate in that game type.


Anyway, I don't see how this couldn't be done. They just got to make like... costume brawl skills similar to the polymark skills that only work in that area. They should just recreate the skills from last year and "freeze" them in place.

No special skills needed, just replace the ones that won't work anymore in the given build.

And what's wrong with a smiting monk. Not every monk wants to sit back and press heal occasionally. /joke (in case you missed it)

The Monk bar should at least carry Guardian.

I understand they should be balanced out with each other though, it's just that one bar is practically a perfect variation whereas the others are pretty ugh. Not to mention Frenzy takes a substantial amount of skill to use depending on both your skill and the enemies skill.

Tyla, the bars are fine. Shush.

Anyway, I will admit I am worried. There have been so many skill balances over the year that costume brawl will suffer if they're using their updated counter parts.

On the other hand, having a fresh set of skills this year might be refreshing.

I'd would say they should change the skill bars completely. Not just because of balance changes, but to simply switch up the game so it doesn't get too stale.

I'm interested in hearing the opinions in those who have voted that no change is needed in the arena.

I'd have to agree with Tyla that the Ranger bar is probably the best one for the arena now, considering it's received nothing but buffs since its creation, and it already has the basic framework of builds seen in high-end PvP. I'd say the solution is to improve the bars of other professions by switching out their nerfed skills with stronger skills that are more useful in PvP. If that can't happen, the Ranger build might need to take a hit of some sort.

Of course they will change the builds.

Not doing so would be selseless, they have even changed the rollerbeetle skills.

Of course they will change the builds.

Not doing so would be senseless, they have even changed the rollerbeetle skills.

Thread res to get more feedback before the monthly update comes.

Tyla, the warrior has Tiger's stance.

Costume Brawl actually uses different skills than the PvE/PvP mode ones. This is apparent when it first launched the Priest of Balthazar was bugged and let you buy the copies in the Costume Brawl. These copies of the skills would be "frozen in time" in essence, exactly like they were last year.

Here's hoping cynn will have this bar:

Rodgot's invo
glowing gaze
mind blast
fire attunment
Flash Panties
IMS
glyph of restoration




But yeah, I agree with the OP that some balancing needs to be done.

actually i thought they were just fine. but change or not, i am thinking i might not be around during Holloween again ........

The only real problem I see is with the dervish, they moved Chilling Victory to wind prayers and the build has no points invested in wind. Other then that, as far as "stock" builds go these might be weird but for the arena they're in they're fine.

I literally lol'd.

I still like my option best (which is why I haven't voted, since its not a poll option). Just create "costume brawl" skills just like the PvE/PvP split that have the exact same values as the skills had last year. Bam, you never have to worry about buffing/nerfing them again, and it stays "balanced" forever, w/o a.net having to redesign the arena.

(and god, guardian would be overpowered in that play setting).