GW2: How2Ballance without making PvE people whine.

That would probably be a good move at this point. It gets messy when you have to balance one skill for one aspect of gameplay and having it affect every other format, especially when the different game types become more and more varied.

If you dropped PvP, you'd have WoW. If you dropped PvE, you'd have Fury.

Easy...Split PvE/PvP skills from the get go. Just the last update had me wonder wtf they're doing again. PwK nerf for PvE? Castigation sig overpowered in PvE? Ele spells and Ranger attacks OP in PvE, when HM monsters have like 150 armor vs elemental and physical?

In the same time, stuff that can be justified for nerfing in PvE are completely untouched because they don't affect PvP. Not that I want them to because whenever Anet actually decide to have a PvE specific nerf it becomes Smiter's Booned even more so than PvP (Prot bond, Seed of Life and many many previous "farming skills" nerfs)

So perfect decent and balanced skill in PvE gets hit for no reason, and waste casual player's time to hunt/pay for another skill (Yes, not everyone are UAX), while we have a bunch of totallly useless skill can't be buffed because of PvP, and a few OP skills that is meant to compensate for all the useless and randomly hit skills....

This is pretty much the real issue here - in GW, the differences between the formats are such that what's balanced in one often isn't in the other. There are two possible ways to resolve this - balance them separately, or make the two formats close enough in behaviour that what works in one does in fact work in the other. (Working from Guild Wars 1, this would mean, among other things, keeping down the rate at which monsters die and removing some of their protections against shutdown so that shutdown-based classes like Mesmers remain useful.)

Note that I say balance them seperately, and not to avoid balancing PvE at all. When high-end PvE coalesces to a handful of builds, at that point it's become silly. While I'd admit there are some changes I'd selfishly prefer to happen after I'd achieved certain objectives than before, the free experimentation with new builds is one of the things that I like about Guild Wars, and it's somewhat lost when there are a handful of templates that will win everything. Just make sure that every profession has something they can meaningfully contribute to any given mission or area.

Besides, I do feel a certain thrill whenever I get to play my Mesmer as such and not as some Assassin Promising, cry-of-paining assassin summoning thing... (hello Hard Mode Thirsty River priest shutdown!)

Great post. The low level cap and the ability to jump in and contribute right away were some of the things that drew me to GW in the first place along with the no monthly fee thing (however that is a double edged sword). If Anet would come out and say there will only be 20 levels or less in GW2, I'd be a happy chocobo.

Here are some other things I think will hurt or help balance in GW2 depending on how they play out:

1. Number of levels. Let's say GW2 has 200 levels (a number I remember being thrown around). It's going to be a lot harder to balance 0-160 than 0-16. It could also result in heck levels, where you are gimped for several levels until you can hit the next break point for your skill. It's also going to make it more likely that some classes will be easier to play earlier on and some better later on because of how the break points and skill growth work out. For instance, when AoC came out rangers were OP for the first 40 levels and junk for the next 40. When you have to test 160 skill levels, it's going to also take longer to get the balance at the higher end as it'll take longer for everyone to get there and test out all the skill combos.

2. Number of skills. I think GW showed that Anet has the ability to manage only a few skills at a time. I can't remember seeing a balance that affected more than about 20-30 skills at once. However, not all balances tested their full capacity to balance and some skills either went unbalanced or took too long to correct when they were OP. Eventually Anet got to the point were they nerfed a skill so much it pretty much wasn't used in PvP again and they left it like that so they wouldn't have to keep dealing with it. As newer skills were introduced, it further complicated the mess.

3. Going back to what you said in your post, there is also the developer preference. If the developer likes a certain skill or tactic being used, even if it is a little unbalanced, they might leave it that way or unbalance it further for the sole reason they kind of like it. Take the power creep that came along, particularly with NF. It was bad for the game, and lessened the value of the older games, and ended with a lot of nerfing all around (tactics anyone) yet someone at Anet thought more powerful skills was a good idea.

4. Play the game more and see what other people are playing and aren't playing. Ensign made a good point about it being hard to see what is people whinging about making their playstyle more powerful and what is a general imbalance. In other words the balance devs need to become good at the game themselves. They need to see for themselves what is played a lot so they can see if those skills are good for the game or not good for the game as is. They also need to see what skills are too underpowered or aren't being used and why so they can make them a little more worth bringing. If those skills were overpowered and nerfed to the point no one uses them anymore, then they need a small tweak or change in the upward direction. If Anet takes my advice and keeps the skill list a lot smaller (say half or less), then NAF tactics (Nerf And Forget) won't be as viable because the players won't have as many skills to turn to.

There's one BIG thing that PvE balancing and nerfing needs -- that is SPEED!

It's a FACT that if something in PvE is badly imbalanced it's visible and clear right away! In PvP actions don't need to be taken fast except extreme cases, because metagames evolve and players can adapt.
But mobs won't learn!
AI won't update builds and strategies and will just get abused over and over and over again.

So why not nerf the PvE imba right away? There's nothing to wait for! QUICKLY say "sorry, this was a mistake" and nerf before players get used to the imba!

Don't let the Ursan run untouched for a whole year when it's OBVIOUS it's stupidly overpowered. Nothing to wait for... oops, forgot that in this case it was about selling as many copies of GW:EN as possible

But things like Shadow Form were also obvious almost immediately, 1 week was enough to clearly see how absurdly imba it is. Update QUICK ffs, don't let players attach to it as something normal.

The sooner it goes the less QQ

I really cannot belive players already wants to balance a game that is due in 2010/11, I am not trolling or tyring to discredit this thread or anything, I simply cannot understand the claim that pve players are whining when the pvp players wants to balance everything even when the game isn't even in the market yet. This thread just show you why you would think pve players are whining, we do not whine for the sake of whining its because you want to balance things even theres no need to, just think about it, you are attempting to balance something that hasn't even materialise.

Why does everyone think PvE players all want to be imbalanced?

uhhh because thats when you get the most stuff in the least time??

The entire point of PvE is to find exploits and pattern abuse and gain as much gold/items as possible before other people figure it out, and when other people figure it out, you get the Devs to nerf it so you still come out on top.

duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

SF was intentionally made easy to maintain perma. If devs made it on purpose, can we really expect them to "take swift action" once people go "oh, i c wut u did thar" and start to abuse it?

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I take it back, original idea would probably end up in skill split anyway and intentional imba stuff.

Because this idea would be worthless if it was brought up after release, now wouldn't it.

I enjoy nerfing because it changes things around. I hope they continue this in Guild Wars 2. Keeps things fresh.

The answer is less skills, and not adding anything to it later that wasn't already "Pre-planed" from the very start.

All you need to do to balance GW2 is have a PvE level cap higher than the plateau for PvP levels (something already confirmed.)

You can then balance skills for PvP at that level, with attribute point caps, and have them do whatever the shit you want at the higher PvE levels.

Simple.

Won't work, PvP needs constant balancing unfortunately. It's best to either integrate them to the point of people being able to dual in the persistent areas, or just completely split them.

And those people should be shot. That'll fix the problem, and Anet won't lose since they got the people's money already.

To be on a serious note, there is NO way to prevent QQ'ing. There is NO way to fully balance PvP. There is NO way to fully balance PvE. Best thing that can be done is not have any blantantly overpowere, or underpowered, things from the get-go and from release on monitor the gameplay, prefered builds, etc. with a team instead of a single damn person. Because, clearly, Izzy is losing any touch he had.

Edit: Another thing, remove PvX wiki so that people would actually think instead of using the exact same build. Maybe then the nerfs and balances would be better placed.

I am not saying your idea is worthless or trying to critising them. I know you have the best interest for this game we obviously love, otherwise we wouldn't bother talking about it.

to answer your question:
Its no, because how do you balance something that you don't know would be inbalance? Have yout thought about players who play both PvP and PvE? What about players who wants to casually play PvP?

As I am made to understand that Guild Wars 2 is one game, not 2 games. How do you seperate a game that tells you that everyone can jump in to play PvP, world PvP anytime they want? What about the sidekick (someone of low level able to join in PvP) system? Those will all be destroy if we try to seperate the game into 2 parts.

What we know now is Guild Wars PvP and we are trying to balance Guild Wars 2 with that knowledge, which simply is not feasible.

(asking for examples of PvP'rs getting PvE skills changed

From the recent skill 'balance'.

Mirror of Ice, Steam, Castigation Signet, Peace and Harmony, Word of Healing, Foul Feast, Lingering Curse, Hunter's Shot, Melandru's Shot,
Keen Arrow, Protective Was Kaolai.

All DIRECTLY nerfed in PvE purely based on thier (ab)use in PvP. The skills were not overpowered in any way shape or form, but just got adjusted in PvE thanks to the PvP'rs, for the most part making PvE even easier still (as monsters use the same skills remember).

And that was only the most recent change, heck almost every balance since the beginning of the game has been due to PvP, and DIRECTLY affects PvE.

Just have separate copies like now and be done with it.

Everyone wins this way.

Now that's very different. That's PvP getting "balance" changes while at the same time affecting PvE. The example I was looking for that Bhaav stated in his post was PvPers having direct influence on PvE, either exclusive or not, balance.

Nerfing a skill in PvE because of its implications in PvP (which are often very different from the same in PvE) is pretty much what you were looking for verbatim.

Skills not being overpowered in pve as well is simply due to bad design and limitations in AI.
If AI and pve were both designed optimally, no nerfs would be "unfair" to either part.

Also, that bhaav guy totally cracked me up.
Most hilarious thing I've seen in a while.

I was looking for statements of PvPers asking for skills to be nerfed in PvE because of their implications in PvE.

The way Bhaav worded it may've messed up my head a bit, dunno.

The skills should not have been separated, pvp & pve should have stayed together. The only problem is that ANET idea of balance is to either nerf it beyond belief or buff it until everyone is required to run the skill. That seems to be the only way ANET knows how to balance.

The reason for the split was because they were making a lot of PvE (the silent majority) mad because they could not learn how to balance a skill.

Now how many feel that ANET knows how to balance skills? (Look at the last 3 months if you need the answer)

Now how many of you feel that ANET will somehow wave a magic wand and become balance gurus when Guild Wars 2 ships?

Didn't Anet say that PvE and PvP would be separate in GW2? Like, a year ago?

Well, they said something.

I wonder what foul compromises they are going to make to appease everyone.

I.e. unlimited levels, with a superflat powercurve (begs the question if minimal "progression" for progression's sake is not just superfluous), PvE being kids friendly, so that young kids and my grandma can play it safely, too. More races, racial abilities like morphing into an "Ursan", Perma-Asuran-Shadow-Form. New pay-to-play mechanisms and tons of new payment options for the store. Titles for everything and achievement hunt and better items and blabla... and there will be PvP of course. World Battles will be Alliance Battles, just cooler as they are named World Battles! :> There will also be High-End PvP of course, but it will feel like a pimple on an already ugly arse. Basically, turn GW into just another standard fare MMORPG with excessive Micro-Transactions. *

This is the worst case scenario, of course.

We have not heard anything new since that PC Gamer interview in ... 2007, 2008? Besides that ANet staff is playing GW2 every Wednesday or so.


Many people have great confidence in ANet, but I second R. Shayne and would like to point out that the success of GW despite totally failed premises like chapter releases every 6 months and people pickung up pvp as the endgame does not necessarily mean that GW2 will become as successful.

There are competitors out there, working on "next generation MMOs", while GW2 rather seems to take a turn back to standard MMO and the currently very popular Micro-Transaction model instead of going ahead.

* I forgot the ongoing trend to add more grind of all kinds into the game. Ensign is quite right that GW's initial premise ("low level cap, flat equipment curve and skill restrictions") was one of the selling factors, it seems to have been forgotten over time. Or people just bought it because they thought it's WoW for free? I do not know.

Since the game will have more of a focus on gear and levels, it seems safe to assume PvE will be based on those things and you'll need to gear up to do dungeons. The important question for me is, how many people will you need to do the top content in the game? I absolutely hate raiding, and I hope GW2 does not introduce anything like 25 man raids. Leave that market to WoW, which already does raiding very well (for those that like that kind of thing).

I would be really happy if you could do the hardest content in the game with a cozy team of somewhere between 5-8 people.

Also, if sealed deck play is built-in from the start (please?), that will help keep PvP fresh without everyone running the same build for months at the time, or having to introduce random nerfs to skills to stir up the metagame.

The problem with this is then, are the rewards the same if you are a 2 man team (running the dungeon scaled for 2 man) or a 15 man (with appropriate scaling)? It sounds to me that everyone looking for groups will just be 2 manning everything then.

Here's what I'm hoping for:

If you're solo, let's say you get 100gp for a certain kill.
But if there's two people, you'll get 250gp, giving 125gp for each.
And so on and so forth. The same could apply to rare drops: normal chance if solo, 2.5x the chance if two, etc.

This debate has been around for over 4 years now and it will continue forever...

The reason is simple, you can never please everyone and each time Anet has tried they have failed. There is a general pattern that Anet is striving for and I think this is the breakdown;

PvE Normal Mode = Easy
PvE Hard Mode/Elite Dungeons = Challenge
PvP Random Arena/FA/JQ = Unpredictable
PvP Team/Hero's Ascent/GvG/AB = Balanced Competative Play

To achieve all of these goals they have tried skill changes, consumables, Heros, skill splitting, environmental effects, loot scaling, map rotations, party sizes, tittle effects and NPC/Monster changes.

They could make a dozen more changes and there will still be people on both sides ready to argue to the death(of the game) that the changes are perfect/horrible.

If my team had permasins and imbagons and the like and the other team was stuck to using PvP skills? Probably.

(Okay, maybe not the permasin, since real people would be smart enough to ignore it. But you get my gist.)

Including another kick to the proverbial shins to PvE mesmer primaries, for whom it was often hard enough to find groups for within a few months of release and from whom about every third balance update takes something away from because of the effect it was having in PvP...

Fortunately, these days there's always PvE skill abuse. *rolls eyes*

I'd prefer PvE to be balanced than otherwise - but that balance goes both ways (buffing weak things as well as nerfing overly strong things) and sometimes that requires something different to what PvP requires.

More pvp ers complaining about those pesky pve ers existing in their universe, bringing them down.

You have to realize most GW players are just here for a mmo with no fees. If it had fees 85% of the player base would not play a mmo at all (like me) or play wow because it's better for pve.

First, I'll invite flames by welcoming micro-transactions. If 6 month expansions "failed", then Anet will need an alternative to make money.

I've already bought the character change and pet unlock upgrade, as well as many character slots. I'd probably buy unique armor too, if they offered it (although everyone would have it, so it wouldn't be that unique anymore).

I can't exactly explain WHY I enjoy Guild Wars more than any other MMORPG (and I've tried a lot of them), I can only say I've cancelled all my subscriptions, and now play Guild Wars exclusively. As long as they nail that certain "magic" that Guild Wars has, I predict GW2 will be even more successful.

The "PvE in HM is far harder than PvP" is simply one of the funniest statements I have seen made on this forum

honestly,what drugs are you smoking and do you hand them out for free as I would love my sense distorted that much at times

I am a PvE player and play a little PvP (well HA anyway) and totally sympathise with what the PvP players are saying, the way the game is balanced at present is completely wrong and splitting skills pve/pvp does not work.

IMO, in GW2 they should balance all skills based on PvP requirements only and tbh at least 30% of the PvE population wouldn't give a damn what skills are available as long as they have a Godmode Skill + Uber powernuke farming for teh win Skill (sorry but it's the truth)

PvE in GW has degenerated to either
1: SC "elite" areas with OP skill bar (see pve skills required above)
2: Having everything in the game run for you by either perma or 600/smite variant
3: Meeting up for daily ZQ
4: H/H titles as very few people even think of pugging anymore

What they need to do in GW2 is address these issues in PvE otherwise the same will happen and quickly, start of on the basis of balance via PvP across the whole game and do NOT seperate the skills, if it affects PvP then it affects PvE, if you want a difference add PvE only skills just don't go ape crazy on the OP of them

The unforunate side effect of splitting skills between pve/pvp is that pve'rs find it very difficult to make the transition to PvP because of the way the skills act differently, from reduced dmg/heals to totally different skill effects.

I hope that A-net learn from their woeful balancing attempts of the past year and come good but I am afraid that GW is beyond fixing and as I said before can see Aion becoming the predominant game for NCSoft which doesn't bode well for GW2

PvE and PvP are 2 completley different things though, in PvP you have other players with coordinated tactics, while in PvE there are huge groups of enemies with higher levels and double damage and cast speed bosses.

If you played from day one you'd notice that, in that mesmers never got groups in PvE since their spells where ineffective(the strongest direct damage was Energy Surge which they didn't get until the last few missions), while in PvP they were frequently used in teams due to E-denial,interupts and diversion.

GW2 really does need a split for PvE|PvP skills(especially if there are racial skills).

In my calculations that means 70% would give a damn and that is a large majority of people who now play the game.

The real problem was that Mesmers are built around single-target shutdown. Great in PvP. In PvE there are few things dangerous enough to warrant that sort of shutdown, and many of those who are have protection against it, leaving a very short list of locations where classic Mesmering works. (Most of them involve monk bosses.)

I do question, however, whether it really is easier to make the transition when some skills simply aren't used in PvE because they're just that bad compared to them being useful in both formats, just with a lower effectiveness in one.

That said, the Aegis change is... errrm...

All we have to do is get Arenanet to /delete the pvp portion of the game and everything will be fine.

The big issue is this:

Skill changes make negligible changes in PvE. You might have to tweak skills every once in awhile (which you should have to do depending on zones anyways), unless you're running a gimmick that takes a hit (in which case PvE deserves the nerf too). Skill balances have practically never really hurt my PvE play.

Skill changes make massive difference in PvP, and if things aren't balanced, the entire gametype falls apart.

The best compromise would for PvP to get near-total control of skill balances, but to not have lazy nerfs that eradicate skills entirely from playability.

ORRRRR...just use the current system with the PvE/PvP split which has everyone happy? I must say, if the Weapon of Warding nerf was PvE also, instead of PvP only, I would have been hella pissed.

Tell me one reason why WoW should have been nerfed in PvE also, as according to the old PvP > All system.

I'll repeat my earlier statement.

Pve needs to have AI that compares to a fully functional team working together on surviving and killing their enemy, being you.
Ai should have good, synergizing skillsets etc. etc.
Make them a challenge the right way, meaning not the superhigh levels and stats, maybe a max of lvl 24 if we're to compare it to the current game, the exception of course being bosses.

If that would be true, the skills wouldn't need seperation as you'd need to use bascically the same tactics for both gamemodes to succeed.

Well yeah, that would work too. Shame what PvE separation did to the game overall, but surely ANet would have learned from their mistakes, right?