Massively.com: The great nerfbat of '10 (or why ArenaNet didn't fail)

They did fail, imo. Just not to the extent most probably think. I'm thinking if theres new farming builds out the day after the nerf, and it STILL includes the skills they nerfed,something is still "wrong." I think all this is gonna do is balance out who's "top farmer" now...who knows maybe that was the intent.

Im giggling to myself like crazy over the Obby Flesh "nerf" -2 e degen? LOL. costs 25e? oh noez...really. come on....for any ele that knows what they're doing, this is just to laugh at. And to top it off with taking the movement penalty away...every ele that ever used to farm like mad, should be rejoycing.

it's the symbolism that it carries, one would hope they continue to change speed clear builds and keep farming in line with normal game play in terms of effectiveness.

Yes! Buffed drop rates all around! (Without that, farming will always be more effective than straight grinding)

Yes! Buffed drop rates all around! (Without that, farming grind will always be more effective than straight play grind, by definition)

Gotta love playing a dervish.

You have it wrong. The game was being played exactly as Anet designed it and intended. SF was not permanent from day 1. However, at some point, Anet themselves rolled out a massive skill update that completely buffed solo farming, the one where SF was made perma and other skills like Ether Renewal too.

Anet themselves created the design of Perma SF intentially to allow solo farming because people enjoyed playing that way. This was the way that Anet intended people to play the game if they enjoyed doing so.

Now the issue is that Anet intentionally allowed this kind of gameplay for such a long time, and even said that they had no problem with people solo farming, those who enjoyed playing this way made their solo characters and builds and began playing how they enjoyed.

Then a few years later, Anet comes along and says, 'This kind of solo gameplay that we fully and intentionally allowed so that plenty of players could have fun is now suddenly wrong and we are nerfing it'.

They pissed off their own player base of people who originally enjoyed either playing SF or 600 smite when they had already intentionally allowed it for such a long time,
Such treatment of the people playing your game is going to cause complaints. Completely bouncing around and pointlessly buffing skills to intentionally allow solo play, then nerfing them later on is a complete piss take on the community playing this game, and by doing this people are going to get annoyed and want to leave because they cant play as they enjoyed anymore.

Just for the record, I dont play a sin and have hardly done much farming on my monk, but it doesnt bother me in the slightest if someone else loaded up a solo farming build and played however they wanted to.

Hope, maybe...
But fact being it took this long to come out with a subpar "balance". I don't see much hope for a continual balance.

And symbolism isnt going to change the fact people will still find a way to abuse those skills.. They said it themselves...they cant foresee what clever ways people will find in order to make the next uber farming build. Trying to balance the people that q.q about everything is a task I would not want. It's either the elitists that wanna be the only ones in obby armor, chaos gloves and have "rare skinned" weapons, while looking down there nose and calling everyone else noob...or the people that dont have the time to (or are too lazy to) actually work on things like rank etc..so they complain about the people that do..Ursan anyone??

I dont honestly care either way. And I would be willing to bet money that most of the gw population feels the way I do. If everyone would just shut up...play the game...gw would be a much better place. This game is approaching the 5 year mark..you should know by now...
Ya dont like it..find another game

Better game = Diablo 3, but its not out yet .

People feather farm with a monk? rly? That statement alone made me instantly think the author was talking out of his ass. It reeks of "paid endorsement" funk.

Every time I hear some development news about D3, it sounds worse and worse. Involuntary, automatic stat point distribution... No weapon swapping because it's too complicated for noobs...

SF and 600/Smite became the breaking point for have-all or have-none in Guild Wars economics and farming. Even Pugging was affected. It effectively helped shutdown most of the PvE community. Dont give the 'I never used SF and still had fun' reason to backup that it wasn't just that. Arena Net attempted to appease the masses here, but it was too little too late. That is why it was nerfed, not that nonsensical babble about 'A-Net just randomly decided to nerf and buff shit cause their mean.' Just because you dont see it a certain way didn't mean they dont.

Solo or Duo farming with any build does nothing to affect pugging or the PVE community.

People who want to pug still pug. People who want to farm will farm. Taking away methods of farming isnt going to suddenly make the people who farm start joining groups, they will just find new ways to farm, farm elsewhere, or even quit the game if it cant be done anymore.

The nerfs were far from random, Anet simply did them because the people who do play in groups and dont like farming whined and complained until farming builds are now getting nerfed.

Cosiderig what happens if you give people choice (check pvx low rated builds), they did right thing to make game playable in groups ...

They sure did! I live in America, but apparently some mods don't. It is a sad day indeed when our voices have been silenced because some people don't wish to listen to our views. At least on GW Online, the mods there have american values and allow everyone to voice their opinion, even if they do not agree.

Off:
I feel the same way!
Just regarding GW2!
GW2 was it it's best when the drawn part of the trailer 1 was. And then it just downhill from that.

So now the "golden age" of GW2 is before it even comes out?

I was very very happy BEFORE the upgrade. I've thinked: "now we finally can play a 8-man balanced team".

I am very very sad AFTER the upgrade. Too many people is watching for a way to use again Shadow Form (and only this skill).

ANet wants to make people playing 8-man balanced teams? They must DESTROY COMPLETELY SF/OF/SB. Immunity from spell is too much overpowered.

So, why SF has 5 energy cost and OF 25? I am thinking that ANet didn't want to stop this. Just say that and I'll be happy. But, please, don't say a thing, and doing another.

We clamp down on the QQ because it serves no purpose. ANet knew they were going to piss a load of people off if they did anything to SF. Threads upon threads of BAWWWWW doesn't accomplish anything, takes up space, and looks terrible.

P.S. I'm an American.

Take 500 people who are solo or duoing because its so much more effective. Thats 500-1000 less people to run the mission together, thats 8/800 = 100 instances that need to be made for balanced teams. Thats 800 to 400 instances that need to be made for duo/solo teams. Now take that nobody will pug because there is such a widely accepted 'farmerz!!!111' build out. You effectively destroy pugging, you destroy the economy for non-SF users/600/smite users, and you generally make it a steep learning curve for new players and some classes become completely useless in PvE further killing the experience for some. An Online MMORPG usually involves more then single player instances lagging everyone elses game.

Thats all I'm saying, and thats all that should need to be said on the subject. You all cried wolf at SF/600 Smite, and then the wolf came and ate that shit. Its not completely dead, you just refuse to find ways to work around it because you take a videogame so serious that you feel that 'YOUR' way was attacked. Be for real.

I agree with the "takes up space" and "looks terrible" statement. I disagree with the "doesn't accomplish anything" statement. One only needs to peruse the threads here on The Riverside Inn to see overwhelming evidence that QQ does accomplish things.