Lessons from Guild Wars

I decided to throw together a summary of Guild Wars development ideas, and the lessons I view as important to be learned for the development of Guild Wars 2. I'd be interested to hear opinions and feedback on my suggestions, and for people to add their own to the list.

This is from the perspective of someone who has mostly played PvP, though there are some PvE concerns mixed in.

PvP Balance Feedback
There should be much better avenues for balance feedback, for which I could make many suggestions but I will leave it at that for now. Balance updates should be much more frequent, and with much more of a delicate touch. Small regular tweaks, rather than bi-monthly dartboard sessions. The skill balancer should play the game competitively.

Expansion Classes
The balance problems caused by trying to wedge the expansion classes into the game have been disastrous.
Examples:

Assassins - If you take an Assassin in your build then you are committed to splitting. If put in a position where you can't split effectively you are pretty sure to lose against an evenly matched opponent, if in a position where splitting is favorable then you have a major advantage. They limit your options and play style, which for ladder play isn't healthy. It makes games more of a dice roll based on opponents build and map, and much less about actually matching skill.
Solution: Assassins, as a melee class, should have had better armor. Dagger damage should have been less variable to make combo damage more consistent and remove the instagib ability. Better armor, no shadow stepping, more consistent damage. That in my opinion is a more interesting class. It's also called a Warrior.

Ritualists - Originally played for use of spirits, which were a pretty poor mechanic in PvP (as demonstrated much earlier by Ranger nature rituals) and were removed. Later the only thing keeping rits in the game was Splinter and Ancestors Rage for VoD farming. The class was largely built around spirits, and (rightfully) removing those from play basically crippled the entire concept. Weapon spells were also a much questioned mechanic, essentially being irremovable enchantments.
Solution: This class really needs redesigning from the ground up. Without spirits it really only has a place as a Restoration Rit, which loses out to a Monk.

Paragons - Since the the horribly broken Motivation line was nuked, Paragons are basically just Warrior damage at range. That is, Warrior damage without the concern for positioning, extension, ability to split, or any kind of advanced play.
Solution: Much like the Ritualist this class really has no clear purpose. It is either better than a Warrior, in which case people wont take Warriors, or it isn't, and people wont take Paragons.

Dervishes - Another poor Warrior duplicate. The Avatars were an absolutely ridiculous idea for PvP, having such a massive swing in power based on the recharge of one skill. Aside from those it was a poorly armored Warrior with AoE, which is fine for PvE, but outside of old VoD farming gimmicks that's pretty useless for PvP.
Solution: Avatars would be far easier to balance as a permanent, irremovable effect. Melandru should have made you immune to conditions, Grenth should have ignored blocking Enchantments, Dwayna should have been immune to Necromancer hexes and Lyssa immune to Mesmer hexes. They should not have had AoE on all attacks, and they should have had better base armor. Still not particularly attractive for ladder play, but much more interesting in tournaments.

The problem with these classes is that they are all narrower duplicates of existing classes. This means Izzy has to give them something stupidly powerful to make people actually use them, and nine times out of ten that results in a gimmick. This problem arises from the fact that the game was designed around the six core classes, which were well designed, well balanced, flexible and had obvious purpose. Anything else tacked on at the end was always going to be a problem.

If Anet plans to follow the same expansion formula for Guild Wars 2 I would strongly advise not adding new classes to the PvP side of the game with expansions. If you cover all of the roles in the initial release then any later class will result in a balance nightmare, if you don't cover all of the roles in the initial release then PvP will probably suck until you do.

Monk, Mesmer, Ranger, Warrior, Elementalist. These are the only classes that have really worked for the game since release. They are all flexible, and all serve a well defined purpose. Defense, Disruption, Flexibility, Damage, Utility.

Solution: Have core classes in the release game, and allow only those to compete in GvG. It's an ugly solution, but I simply do not see additional classes ever getting properly integrated into PvP.

Skills with Exponential Power
A lot of degenerate builds have been based around skills or skill types that only become powerful when you bring multiple copies, and in some cases this has crippled classes, excluding them from anything BUT degenerate builds. Examples:

Hexes - Aside from the few active hexes (where application is more important than duration) hexes are badly implemented for PvP. They are balanced with duration in mind, but in order to make a hex stick you need to stack it. This means that a single hexer is weak, but gets exponentially more powerful when you start adding more.
Solution: Shorten the duration on hexes, increase their power. Remove cheap cover hexes (Parasitic Bond). Consider limiting stack size.

Enchantments - The converse argument to the above. You want to stack them on your own team to make them stick.
Solution: Shorten the duration on enchantments, increase their power. Consider limiting stack size.

Spike skills - Skills that take a chunk of damage will almost always be worked into a spike build.
Solution: Most spike builds have actually been perfectly beatable, with balance updates. In most cases the solution is simply swifter balance updates.

Necromancers are a prime example of this issue effecting a class. Their strengths in PvP? Hexes and spike. A Hex heavy Necro bar is useless outside of a hex build. A spike heavy Necro bar is useless outside of a spike build. For this reason Necromancers have almost always only been used in degenerate builds. Izzy has repeatedly tried to force them into the game with awkward misdirected buffs, but has never really addressed the core reason why they are underplayed.

Searing Flames is a good example of this issue on a single skill level. It both sets people on fire in an AoE radius, and damages people that are on fire already. This means one copy of it is going to be pretty mediocre, but when you have three or four you can all trigger damage off each others burning, and keep pumping out damage.

Elements of Chance
Catapult maps, NPC reactions... Generally any situation where a 'dice roll' can effect the outcome of a game is a bad idea. I don't really think this needs much more of an explanation.

Skill Modifiers
If you are going to balance skills around recharge, casting time and cost then you need to be really, really careful when you introduce equipment or skills which effect recharge, casting time or cost. I can't honestly think of any situations where making a skill cast faster or recharge faster has resulted in anything but a gimmick. Cost is a tricky one because energy management is important to the game. GoLE for example has always been a staple skill in most balanced builds.
Solution: Remove skills or equipment that significantly effects recharge or casting time. It doesn't really add anything to the game, and can cause no end of problems.

GvG Maps
If you are going to have maps that massively favor splitting, shadow stepping,pure 8v8 play or AoE then you really need to think about how that will affect ladder play. All is fair in tournament play when both teams know what is coming, but facing a million Dervishes and Fire Eles on Burning for round after round can be a bit of a buzzkill when playing on the ladder.

I like the idea of having home maps and away maps, and how that mechanic works, and I like having narrower maps to mix up tournament play. I don't think you can restrict those maps from regular use because people do need to practice playing on them.

Solution: When an opponent is found, and you get the final count down, have it display who you are fighting and on which map. In this time allow skill swapping. This will allow you to have pre-planned basic modifications to combat any popular gimmick. It will also add a very healthy and fun element of metagaming to the otherwise completely random ladder play. This is a more complicated solution than I would like, but it's the only way I can think of to address the problem.

PvP and PvE Skill Split
I always saw this as a temporary band-aid fix for balance in Guild Wars. A way to appease the masses and move on. I now think more and more that it is an inevitable inclusion for Guild Wars 2. What other way is there to avoid the issue of stepping on each others toes? Even the plethora of PvE only skills doesn't solve the problem.

Visual Recognition
Cape trims were an amazing addition to the game. A fantastic and well executed idea. Most of the issues people have with cape trims are actually balance related, with the number of gimmick guilds that have managed to obtain a gold. The other issue is the selling of these gold cape guilds, or invites to them, for large amounts of money. Not only does this devalue the reward, but it also encourages scamming on a huge level.
Solution: See previous suggestions for balance. Attach gold capes to the accounts, not the guild. Visual recognition on a player level rather than a guild level would have much more meaning. All members of a winning guild who played in one or more mAT rounds should get a gold cape associated with their account. It should be non-transferable.

I think visual recognition is an underrated usually under developed aspect of games in general, and should be taken much further than just cape trims. Titles and 15k armor are step in the right direction, but focus needs to be put on achievements rather than grind.

Solution: The game needs to be more goal oriented. For example, titles for completing X mission the fastest, or with taking the least damage. Title for being the first to complete a ridiculously hard quest chain... And so on. Base additional visual rewards (armor sets, capes, titles, weapons) off of this. Do not allow rewards to be transferred to other players, as this only serves to devalue them. At the same time keep rewards purely visual, with no power advantages.

Balance Mobs
This has been better since Nightfall, but still not perfect. Mobs should generally have a better mix of classes. A couple of Monks, Warriors, maybe a Mesmer and an Ele or two... It would remove the stupidity of getting teamspiked by a group of 8 level 25 Elementalist monsters, and would give PvE players who hope to move into PvP some better preparation. It would also make gimmick builds in PvE less powerful, requiring people to think more about approach and roles.
Solution: Mix up classes more in mobs. Stop people steamrolling through advanced areas with simple gimmick builds. Put more emphasis on skill and playing as a team in PvE.

Summary and General Themes
Ultimately it seems I am in favor of a greater mechanical divide between PvE and PvP. People could argue that would prevent PvE players from getting into PvP, by making it more confusing and alien to them. I disagree.

I think most of the problems with the PvE and PvP divide in Guild Wars stem from the opposite - the two being too closely linked. This meant the two sides were constantly stepping on each others toes, with basic things like balance updates being hotly debated. This developed aggressive attitudes on both sides, and turned the small gap into a chasm. Most PvP players held so much disdain for the PvE crowd that there was no way they would help them get into PvP, and most PvE players had an equal amount of disdain which discouraged them from even trying.

I don't think having more of a divide in terms of mechanics is going to make people any less likely to get into PvP. I think PvE needs more references to PvP to raise awareness of it, and more incentives for people to get into it. I also think PvE should offer better training for PvP, but without actually forcing people to PvP when they may not be ready for it.

With regards to skill and class balance there needs to be a MUCH greater stress on purpose. Skills need a defined and unique purpose, and so do classes. Without that you get guaranteed balance problems that wont go away until you address the issue of purpose properly. The lack of defined purpose in balancing is exactly the reason why some skills or classes simply never see play outside of gimmicks.

Make the game more rewarding on a goal based level, rather than just adding layers of grind. That goes for PvP and PvE.

Few notes:

* I always thought that spirits are awesome mechanic. Purely because they, unlike other effects, can be countered by pure damage if there is not degenerate amount of them.

* Upping Hex power and Enchantment power as well as lowering durations seems dangerous, making them more intense and making removal less of an option.

I personally feel that the division of skills into pvp and pve versions, and the splitting of the game into pvp and pve players is not a good solution.

I'm guessing that the way things have turned out in GW were not exactly what Anet had wanted, and they're planning on making changes in GW2 that will minimize the differences.

AION (another NCSoft title that Anet is currently tweaking) is a combined PvE+PvP environment, and If it works well (as it seems to be in Korea atm), we could be seeing more, not less, of this mixing in GW2.

My only problem, or question, regarding PvP in a persistent world is ganking or griefing lower level players.

This was one of the few things that EotN got right. Some of the toughest PvE mobs in the game have relatively balanced mob compositions. The EotN Stone Summit and Charr for example have relatively well defined front/mid/backlines. They have midline defence, hard res skills, shutdown, and bars that generally work well together. Their bars have also been influenced by pvp metas past, and they come far closer than any other mob to simulating a balanced pvp environment.

Unfortunately they are still abusable by gimmicks, but nearly everything will be as long as godmode stays in the game.

Goddamn, i wrote a huge wall of text in response to your ideas, and then...Windows update auto restart. Fun fun.

So to keep it short i agree with the majority of your ideas, especially liking your dervish avatar ideas, but i love avatar of grenth (PVE) at the moment.

Sin+Derv armor i think should be left alone because warriors are unique for having their high armor.

Sin shadowstepping i hate due to people fail-spiking you then shadowstepping away and running away if you didn't die, i still think that should be left alone, its unique to that class and therefore it should stay.

Rts should be deleted end of, or buffed in the area of attack but then they'd just become a lesser ele. Spirits are weak in both PVE and PVP, they can be annoying when you run into someone with a full set of spirits up, but unless theyre camping in AB then thats not going to happen.

Really? i personally believe that it couldn't come soon enough, but skills like For Great Justice was all nerf and no balancing and some brain power should be applied when spanking skills with the nerf-stick.

PVE Mob balancing is great, EoTN was enjoyable due to the fact that most of the mobs had well-thoughout builds with second proffessions, but then in hardmode it would seem one group would have 3 monks, 2 protection monks, 6 damage dealers and then made it impossible to take down a group with just H/H.

Also i think it would be nice if the henchmen had their builds fixed, it sucks having the only ele being a stone henchy spamming stonning whatever with no energy management dealing out 30 damage every 5 seconds. And although im against the whole team being heroes, i wish someone would redesign their builds or something.

Since they announced the removal of mandatory parties in GW2, then each class should have plenty of defensive skills to solo the game. Which in turn would mean the removal of the pure healing class (monk). This can be a smart move as it breaks the heavy dependency on that particular class. So far in GW if you don't have a monk or two in the team you're basically not getting anywhere (let aside the farming builds). This has to change if grouping is optional in gw2.

To me the secondary class mechanism seems to be a major balancing woe, as skills that are fine for one primary class are overpowered on another due to the different primary skills and other aspects.

UAX for competitive PvP is an obvious lesson.

IMO this would be a step backward for guildwars. If theyre keeping the whole 8skill bar which i like, and then make less depedency on the monk, you'd have to have 2 good block skills, 2 good healing skills, and that only leaves 4 skills for damage, with widespread attributes and no or little energy management.

But that will give a completely new gameplay mechanic for both pve and pvp. Could be interesting. And I don't see how they can still maintain monk dependency with no h/h.

EDIT: Think of it as an extended AB. When you play that you don't really depend on monks to bail you out and your build is adapted for that situation, isn't it?

but we are forgetting one point, you CAN team up in gW2 and you have the choice ofa companion (hero)

Characters

A character can be used to play any game mode available in Guild Wars 2; PvE, Structured PvP and World PvP. A player may still have multiple characters.
The level cap will be raised. It has been suggested that this could be as much as 100 or even unlimited. There will be a plateau of power, where each level no longer adds as much to the power of the character. A sidekick system has been mentioned which would allow characters of a lower level to play with high level characters without disadvantage.
The skills system will be modified. There will be fewer, less complex skills which may behave differently in different situations, such as if the character is jumping or is surrounded by monsters. As in Guild Wars, characters will have access to only a limited number of skills at a time.
The professions are being designed to be viable for both solo and group play. A primary and secondary profession system will be used. It is currently not known if any professions from the original Guild Wars will return, and the profession count is unknown, however, as of June 2007, all ten professions from the original Guild Wars were under consideration.
Companions

The system of companions and allies is being reworked. Companions will have customization similar to Heroes. Players will be allowed to bring a single companion with them, who will not take up a party slot and are considered an extension of the character. When a player chooses not to bring a companion, their character will instead be buffed so that they will not be disadvantaged by not bringing a companion.

It is also major band-aid for balance as well as it allows to slot in key utility skills without being forced to "waste" full character slot.

Godmode? what is godmode?

Cape thing is a great idea.

As stated the mobs in Eotn were actually challenging unlike the 5 lvl 25 eles etc.

The only thing that EotN did for mobs was to make sure every mob was a high enough level with an appropriate Elite so they could give a max level character some challenge. The builds are fair, but if you look at the monster skill bars, ArenaNet also gave practically every creature a "Monster Only Skill", i.e., a totally ridiculous skill, just to make monsters effectively more challenging.

I don't even know why anybody bothers talking about monster A.I. or whatever. The entire game has been taken over with a combination of PvE skills, consumables, and skill exploits. You could make mobs running the same builds as Rebel Rising in GvG, and would it seriously matter? Whenever you ramp up the difficulty of the monsters, then all this does is pretty much turn the dungeon/mission/quest into a gimmick-only run. It doesn't make the players "better" at any PvP; it just pushes them to look for an exploit.

For example, a warrior running Eviscerate or a knockdown hammer build has its use in PvP. Who's seriously going to run a hammer warrior in Slavers' Exile? And I don't mean that you can't run that kind of build, but nobody would bother doing it except for the extreme challenge. It's like running a marathon with your shoelaces untied on purpose. Yeah, you could do it for some kind of dumb challenge, but why would you?

Are you joking?

I agree with most of what you said, but here is something i find pretty important:

There shouldn't be key skills for any class (i.e. diversion for mesmers, frenzy for warriors, dshot for rangers etc) to begin with. Strong standalone skills like dshot, that don't have synergy with anything and yet work on every ranger bar should be avoided. To increase build diversity, every skill in the game should be fairly bad on its own but have synergies with certain other skills that increase its effect. An example would be making the skill disabling of dshot raise with the number of conditions on the target starting at 0, which would make it good on condition heavy bars, but bad on turrets.

I must be a retard then since I run through slavers with ES hammer warrior and H/H....


At OP: I do not agree with your balancing idea. If the skills would be balanced already at the beginning I think PVP would die. Since there is so much to be corrected every month makes it so interesting. You are forced to change builds after every bigger skill update. I am afraid with your idea we will ended up with guilds running all the time the same builds...

An excellent OP, mainly directed towards PvP and then answered by a thread full of PvE...

I agree whole heartedly with most of the comments in the OP.

As for the guy who said about wanting to even further split things up, so we have different skills for each different mode, I personally think that's a horrible idea, things become far to confusing then, there is to many different skills and different descriptions to learn and then you have to go about remembering where those descriptions apply. At the moment a lot of people are to lazy to learn what 1 set of skills does, nevermind several.

I wasn't aware of that build. So I apologize and admit that I made a mistake.

But I think that my point still stands. Slavers and DOA and other so-called elite end-game areas are pretty much taken over by nothing but cookie-cutter builds and consumables. I fail to see how any PvE area serves as an effective training tool for PvP. The monsters spawn with extemely predictable builds and extremely predictable movement, so that right there makes it completely unlike PvP.

People run the same builds cause the game is imbalanced, not the other way round...

This.

I am kind of surprised you only tangentially touched the sheer amount of skills. I think that is a huge problem. I think the GW2 system (as originally proposed) is a step in the right direction... fewer skills with more situational (and possibly trait-like) modifications.

I agree, and I look forward to hearing more about this system. I wasn't trying to cover every issue in the original post, just those that seemed most crucial to me.

I think GW2 should only have the core professions wich should be made deeper in every expansion. I only seem to have fun with the six cores anyway.

It's not a question of godmode (perma sf ?), monsters just obey a basic AI, and as long as you are smarter you'll find the easiest way to kill them.

On the contrary, this would actually promote more build diversity and less gimmicky play as there would be no clear advantage over running one set of skilsl or one build over another. It would give more teams an even chance, which then falls back on strategy and team play, which is the way PvP in this game used to be.

edit: @JR's post... I agree 100%

Nice read JR..

Aion was not developed by us, it was developed by NCsoft Korea

I tried to keep it to a few bullet points, really I did.

While we're in this topic, I wonder if anyone has any ideas about power creep. This will happen as long as new skills are added to the game, which is almost inevitable. Any of the new skills that are remotely viable will outdate other options. There isn't any way to keep the added power level in check without rebalancing every single skill in response to new skill additions, which is unfeasible. This can actually be worse without expansion classes, since they "contained" some of the new skill additions by seperating them into different classes and attribute lines. CCGs control this through "rotation" where old card sets eventually leave so the power doesn't just keep piling up- I doubt they can do this in the MMO setting.

Also I'd really like some kind of official support for limited-play (sealed or even draft) in GW2, that would add a ton of variety without need for constant rebalances.

yeah yeah yeah...

Agree with OP mostly. Just a few things I question though.

Agree with this, but I question how long you would want the updates to continue. There are a lot of people who want constant updates solely for the purpose of changing the metagame. I don't agree with that. I feel there should be tweaks until the game is in a state of balance where it can evolve on its own. I think the players should be able to evolve the game, not the updates.

I agree with the problem, but I don't like the solution. It is complicated and slows the game down too much for the average player (getting games going is already slow enough). I think if gimmicks exist than they exist...but the balance updates should fix anything degenerate. I don't think a pregame solution would work...now in tournaments I could see best of 3s with a "sideboard" (a la MTG), but in best of 1s I'm not sure what you can do. Maybe completely random maps?

What stops people from buying/selling the accounts? Yea I suppose it would be better than buying/selling the guilds...but I still think the whole situation is pathetic. I'm starting to think buying/selling of these things should be bannable.

Interesting thought. I think we've seen the problems with a CORPG over the years and this is one of them. I have always been against the skill split, because I am of the original idea of the game that PvE led into PvP. Since they used the same skills, it made things easier when a player playing PvP was familiar with all the skills being used already. The split and addition of PvE only skills just made an already complicated game even more complicated. Not to mention the fact that 90% of the PvP skill updates did almost nothing to change the PvE game, and I feel that the split wasn't for the best. But I suppose you are right in that it was/is inevitable.

Everything you want hinges on whether the business model for GW succeeded over the long-term.

Since you mainly PvP. You should be aware that PvP in GW was very inaccessible to people who didnt' pick up the game very shortly after release.

PvP in GW helped the game initially in terms of longevity, but look at where it is today?

A very small group of people, like yourself, were fortunate enough to get into PvP when you did because the rest of us weren't "deemed good enough" to even participate.

If GW2 doesn't address the immediate problem of accessibility for PvP, I'm sure you'll see the same problems all over again.

Why bother with PvP when only a small percentage of your player base even cares.

That I believe is a false statement. Sure you don't get 16 districts of HA anymore, and GvG wait times have gone up considerably, but there is still a sizable community that enjoys PvP in Guild Wars.


Keep this in mind. When the game released there was no UAX, and unlocking took a LONG time. A PvP player had to get elites with Cap Sigs like everyone else. They had to grind for PvE equipment because it was superior to PvP equipment in a lot of cases.

http://guild-hall.net/forum/showthre...hlight=finally

A thread from May 2005, where people were talking about finally unlocking everything. One poster say it took them 767 hours to do it, another says 900 hours. That is 900 hours of grind that PvP players had to go through in order to feel they were on a competitive field.

Then there were the issues with Gaile Gray, which I wont get too deep into. Rest assured the PvP crowd felt persecuted, and had very little representation. Possibly for this reason it took a long time for skill balances and PvP game updates to start arriving in a timely manner.

There were no Automated Tournaments. There were a mere two tournaments (though they were huge) in the years previous to ATs being introduced. There were no cape trims, no reward points, no ZKeys. There was nothing to play for but glory.

So, yes. The PvP crowd for Guild Wars isn't as big as it should be. For every one of the reasons I listed above, and more I don't care to mention, people have left the game and gone elsewhere. If Guild Wars 2 actually does PvP right from the beginning you could see a big swing in those numbers.

Also for every one of those reasons the divide between the PvE and PvP player bases grew larger and larger. I don't think skill separation or not would have had much or any impact on that.

I don't think this is a true reflection either. There are people at the top of the ladder now who were in no way competitive even as little as a year ago.

Accessiblity is still a huge problem for newer PvP players.

If PvP was truely supposed to be "end-game" content for GW, NCsoft failed miserably.

The amount of support for PvP is justified by it's player base. If your player base is basically static for the life of your product, why even bother to support it?

I wont disagree with that.

Circular reasoning. The player base is small because of lack of support.

This would lead to possibly even more abuse with ridiculous combos.

You would turn this into MTG, which I'm not entirely sure is a good thing.

Don't forget the cash.

Right, for the very few guilds who managed to get a spot in the tournament and place well enough, at a time when the game was its most competitive.

I'm talking about the PvP community as a whole here.

Hm. I'm pretty sure I agree with everything in there.

I really want to applaud you for being against the additional classes, though. Sure they were fun but the problems they caused far (FAAAAAAARx1000) outweigh that.

This, for the people who i played with now play other games. The game got boring, lack of any descent update, grinding the ladder, playing against people running the same build over and over or a variation of it.

If the not got the money to fund someone to balance the game maybe they should of cut some of the prize money they was offering and used some of it now...

I just want to say.....

About the Spirits, they were a TERRIBLE idea for PvP, all they did was encourage turtling, Rits would go in, setup a motherlode of spirits in a small area and his team would sit about there.

The other team would either do the same at their end (resulting in a game of chicken) or the non-rit team would be forced to wait it out or try to pick off spirits, with the unlucky sap who gets chosen to do the job getting beaten by any and all ranged skills.

Turtling all day != Good. VoD camping had to be nuked because it encouraged too much turtling.