JTGuevara.9018

The old trait system from release to 2014 was much better, I think. Here's why.

The old system allowed you to put up points into any line you wanted. It was reminiscent of the old WoW system and gw1. The new system, however, you have to take a full spec line and ditch the rest. It took away build diversity, in a way. On top of that, that's where the powercreep _really_ started. The old trait system allowed for only _two_ full lines plus the leftover points which you can spec wherever you wanted. The current system, however, gives you three full trait lines. That's giving away 10 more points.

I am not scared if the class that I play takes a hit. I could care less about the gutting of skills and traits as long as the flow and health of the game is sound. Contrary to popular belief, nerfs are _good_ for games. They keep powercreep in check. That being said, I agree with you on damage caps.

_Definitely_ go with any hybrid stat of your choice to put up complementary direct damage: (Grieving, Rampager, etc). Pure condition warrior builds in wvw will get _completely_ nullified, especially in large group settings. Any Scourge/FB combo will gobble up those warrior burn stacks with ease.

> @"grouchybhaal.4275" said:

> Alliances wont fix anything.

>

> -Youll still have the bandwagon mentially

> -Still have guilds that instead of challenging themselves, they go for the hard carry to 'alliances' instead of servers with the most population.

> -Still have the same coverage gaps

>

>

> Alliances announcement has been out for too long now and expectations are way to high

>

For all I know, they might be scrapped for good. Even if they weren't and we were fortunate to have an actual release date, I'm convinced we would have the problems you mentioned in some form. Honestly, the sad state of wvw doesn't only fall on the developers, it also falls on the _community_. I remember players _immediately_ gaming the system at the release of gw2 with the "Titan Alliance". People transfered and stacked servers since the start. Sure, it made for epic battles but....how long was this going to hold up? You also had the usual gankers and trolls in roaming environments. The wvw tournaments really screwed the community, I feel. Looking back, wvw was destined to decline with how it was designed and made. The system relied heavily on coordination between time zones, a luxury that not all servers had.

I mean, even the concept of server pride was ridiculous. Still is! How the hell can you have server pride when nothing in the system stops people from getting together and plotting to cough up gems to transfer and go against rivals? I shake my head at how some people look through rose-colored glasses at the old wvw era. It wasn't as great as people make it out to be, although it was better than today!

> @"TheGrimm.5624" said:

> > @"Killthehealersffs.8940" said:

> > I prefer this video , where the ppl used to spamm it in these forums :

> > Pre-2016 it was a strange era .... we dont talk about it ...

> >

>

> Also a good watch.

To that video I say: Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

Balance has a specific definition: two things equally distributed in order to maintain stability. How you get to that equal distribution involves both increases(buffs) and decreases(nerfs). Yes, even severe ones. In competitive games, it's an ideal yet to be reached and always in progress. Still that mean we shouldn't attempt it.

The reason people say we should just buff instead of nerf is because it's _popular_ among players, nothing more. Nobody, in the history of gaming, likes their class or character having their toys taken away. But you know what, it's for the good the game in the long run so people need to suck it up! If all you have is buffs, then you just get powercreep. If the bar is raised so high where everyone has a nuke in their hands, then what is even the point of playing? I'm sorry, but that doesn't seem "fun" to me.

I'm a bit surprised people don't see the feature-creep and discrepancy in display with the LFG window. To reemphasize OPs point, there are so many options...yet noone is using them....I can easily cut the spvp/wvw ones from the list. Throughout my entire history of playing this game, I have never seen the pvp LFG being used once. Those can easily go.

> @"LucianDK.8615" said:

> Anet should not have let it be useable in PvE, leading many to not really understand that its a pure wvw mount.

In all honesty, I agree

> @"Sovereign.1093" said:

> > @"JTGuevara.9018" said:

> > ...sigh...It's amusing how wvw still takes their gvgs soooo seriously that guilds and such are trickling away from this game

> >

> > If anything is going to improve wvw is dedicated, sustained development, love and attention not BS like "content makers". Social media is nothing but noise.

> >

> >

>

> i for one focused on wvw because of red guard and gvgs. there are decent if not average commanders like me who was influenced to do this mode by earlier gen content makers like ogro and watching gvg by agg hope nightshift.etc.

>

> dont dismiss this, this is free advert.

>

> good youtubers should be paid by anet for advertising their game.

I will most certainly dismiss this. Streaming culture and social media in general is nothing but glorified attention seeking. Streaming to me is nothing more than the equivalent of Instagram "influencers". It's just...not needed. People would be better off without it. It's also as you said 'free advert'. And who the HELL wants to see a 0:30-1:00 hr long a or stream?! Not me!

...sigh...It's amusing how wvw still takes their gvgs soooo seriously that guilds and such are trickling away from this game. The fact that people think that ganking someone on 5v1 is "streamworthy" is nothing short of hilarious.

If anything is going to improve wvw is dedicated, sustained development, love and attention not BS like "content makers". Social media is nothing but noise.

> @"XenesisII.1540" said:

> Lack of imagination, pretty funny considering the people who can't wrap their heads about the alliance system and what it will do.

>

> They currently don't have a system in place for auto transfers to boot anyone to another server to reset population or if they afk for months, it's done per request from a player. Yes you can create a new side server and dump everyone there and they will also have to develop the system for this, it's the logical answer to just booting a person, but I wanted to see what Sovereign had in mind because his statement could also be taken as booting everyone off all the servers to reset them too. I've asked him 5 times he still hasn't clearly stated what he wants other than follow diablo seasons which uses a different system of server and population altogether.

>

> It's also not a simple fix that will fix everything about having a server as your team, this isn't going to magically balance populations, it isn't going to help with bandwagons, and booting people also runs into unwillingly separating players from their guilds and friends, something people also complain about. Nothing wrong with throwing out ideas? nothing wrong asking questions about them either, and if you can't answer the question then why should we or even the devs take it seriously?

>

> They are already creating a new system to handle everything everyone is complaining about, maybe you guys need to use your imagination as well and and understand what it is going to accomplish instead of trying to offer 100 other minor ways to fix the problems which won't really fix the problems.

>

I can wrap my head around the alliance system if I can remember what it is! How long has it been since the announcement, almost two years? People bring up other issues because this proposed alliance has no signs of release or completion. People are still in the dark about this as of current days, _that's_ why there's all this speculation.

First off, you can wipe out 3 of the choices: human, charr and asura. There already exists racial transformation fractals for them. However, I do like that you put other requested races with the high probability that they'll never be playable races. If anything, it's a great way to "unofficially" put other races in the game! Still, I'd rather finish off the remaining two playable ones!

> @"Svarty.8019" said:

> > @"JTGuevara.9018" said:

> > It's like people talk about server pride in wvw, but honestly, that never really existed as much as people think. People just wanted to go where people went thanks to the fact that they could, at least at first, transfer for FREE. All that really mattered was guild pride, to be honest.

>

> Ahh... this old chestnut.

> As I mentioned above, players transfer around the servers. More prominent are guilds transferring around the servers. It seems to me that independent players are less likely to transfer around the servers (I'm guessing here, is there any evidence for or against this?). If that's true, then it means that the "community" of independent players grows separately from the guilds, many of whom move around servers when they can't find the playstyle they want on their current server.

> That's why the server communities exist in a different, yet connected way to the guilds. Yes, it's perfectly feasible for a player to be in both of these Venn diagram circles, but the guilds are less likely to stick around when the server drops tiers.

> As for Server (World) Pride, it very much exists in a form that forum warriors fail to recognise. A lot of this failure of recognition goes back to the days of the, "we only play for fights" people who write off the objective-oriented gameplay that makes WvW fun. It's easy to say there is no World Pride, but there are many servers with a community guild. There are many servers who DO give a monkey's if they're losing their stuff, who DO NOT want to lose their Tier 3 objectives, who DO turn up for a massive scrap at Garrison. Losing these things is a poke in the eye. Players SHOULD be saddened about losing them - and this sadness SHOULD happen on a collective level. Players should NOT just log off or transfer away when the going gets tough. But they DO, because it's EASY.

Players transfer around servers? Players transfer around _guild politics regarding_ those servers, you mean. And again, I reiterate this point: _Players transfer because they want to play with friends/guilds and don't want to lose._ The system allows for this, you just need to cough up the dough. Also there was no failure of recognition of anything then, wvw players figured the nature of the system. What was even the point of server pride where you were allowed to switch? It just didn't make any sort of sense. Tiers don't mean much either since, again...you can switch!

Example: I remember the early days of "Titan Alliance" back when I first bought this game and played wvw in the beginning. Server pride lasted all but for.....a day.

_"Players should NOT just log off or transfer away when the going gets tough. But they DO, because it's EASY."_

Exactly. But that's what happens anyway! Where is this "server pride" people keep talking about then? Also, it's the forum warriors who actually push the concept of server pride in the first place. As far as ppt goes, that's just part of the game itself. It's got nothing to do with servers. People ppt because they want to win, simple as that. Of course, there's not much point in that these days.

At this stage of the game, I say yes to ending transfers. Time after time, it has been shown. Players simply _cannot_ be trusted to do the right thing and not break the system. They will always bandwagon to the winning servers creating imbalances because people hate to lose! Also, transfers pretty much encourage political and manipulative shenanigans among players and guilds. Just blow it up completely. Either make it like gw1, as others have said, or have more frequent server relinks but still allow you to keep your guild and play wvw with them. Come to think it, isn't the latter the whole point of this alliance system? Eehh...it's been so long I completely forgot what this proposed "alliance" system was really about! XD

It's like people talk about server pride in wvw, but honestly, that never really existed as much as people think. People just wanted to go where people went thanks to the fact that they could, at least at first, transfer for FREE. All that really mattered was guild pride, to be honest.

> @"Vasdamas Anklast.1607" said:

> They don't care about fighting but as soon as they see their friends comming they just turn back and fight likea a cocky team speak/discord camping blob cattle they usually are.

> If you want some fights you should just stick to spvp nowadays. It's kinda boring though but there is still more fight in there

Honestly, yeah....the fight culture in wvw has changed. You rarely get fights, you get trolls, skittish players, cowards and opportunists. This especially goes when roaming. An example, people will go and attack with 5v1 but as _soon_ as 4 more show up they flee. Yeah, wvw gets lousy support, but the community shares some of the blame with shenanigans like this.

And spvp you say? Nope, not even that! The culture in spvp has changed as well. Except that in spvp, the trolling takes on a different form. Since people can't run away in a closed instance....just go AFK or throw the match! PUGs are notorious for this.

Honestly, either nerf elite specializations and their boon output or put in damage and boon caps. Damage and sustain as a whole is ridiculously out of control and has been causing the game to bleed players for years.> @"Bish.8627" said:

> I would really like of block actually blocked, seems every profession can bypass it and even CC it now

Yes, there's also way too many AoEs or skills that bypass blocks, and not just the condition stuff either. It's like what is even the point of blocking an attack?

I do admit, I like what I'm hearing, although I am skeptical as others. Powercreep in this game is a shit show. 1 hr, 13 min piqued my interest: "We have skills that do too many things at once....". Too many skills function mainly as "oh s---!" buttons. I'm sorry, but that just promotes not only bad gameplay, but a bad community. You just end up attracting players who want to run troll builds or those that just want stuff handed to them. Enough of this faceroll damage, high-boon spam!

> @"TinkTinkPOOF.9201" said:

> > @"Knighthonor.4061" said:

> > > @"TinkTinkPOOF.9201" said:

> > > The reason people ask these questions about direction and updates is because WvW or PvP as a whole never get them. However, a PvE post about something super minor in upcoming PvE content, with maybe 5 posts, will get a anet reply, often times more than one reply from anet, however WvW/PvP questions about just general direction and ANY kind of information on whats actually going on, that will stretch page after page of replies, won't receive a single response from anet.

> > >

> > > Which honestly, speaks far greater to their plans for PvP than any reply they could have given.

> >

> > That's because the WvW community and SPvP community don't really know what they want. They ask for non tangible requests like better Balance, which can't really be measured.

> >

> > People out there keep cosigning Anet's statement about how 5v5 Conquest is the best thing since sliced bread, which is why we still won't get anything bigger than 5v5 in SPvP outside private non queue matches.

> >

> > Same with WvW, you people don't know what you want. All I hear is cries for Mounts to go and Firebrand to be nerfed. Well WvW was dying before Firebrand and Mounts. That's not going to save it. The WvW need new PvPvE Features and most of you all rather WvW stay as is but with No Mounts, nerfed Guardian and some Alliance system that will kill the last bit of Faction pride in this badly designed game mode.

>

> The community knows what it wants. Now, if a specific person knows how to get there is something else, however most people know there is a balance problem, even if they don't know the cure. And to state balance is not possible is a slap in the face to any number of extremely competitive games that do balance. The problem is that it SEEMS impossible with GW2 because WvW and PvP have not had any serious balance teams in many years. So, over all they have been listening to the masses, and not the top end players, who are the ones they should listen to. A fight with lower skilled players who don't know or understand all mechanics, can have random outcomes, and the person on the stronger class can actually lose or be a coin toss, however that doesn't happen in the upper levels where fights have known outcomes based on class/build and not lack of skill. To say balance can't be measured is just plain wrong.

>

> Yes, WvW was shrinking before FB/scourge and mounts, but not at the rate we are now, however having a shrinking population is normal for a game of this age, for a game mode that has not seen any new content in years. And FB is a problem, this is from someone who mains guard class, however FB is part of the power creep that started long before PoF, just on the sustain side, both boon/sustain AND DPS/condi need to be toned down. If you don't reel in both, you end up with bigger issues, and since we have not had a balance team in years that power creep has gone on for so long with nothing in it's way, it will be a serious task to get it under control. However, the boon/sustain that has come along because of the DPS/condi somewhat works right now on the larger scale, but ends up with lots of "one shot" builds in 1vs1 because health pools have not changed, and unless you have a pocket support friend, it can become pretty annoying game play. You also have the reverse of that where those boon/support builds can be close to unkillable in 1vs1 and the delta between the two has all but removed the viability of bruiser builds with few exceptions. We have always had DPS and support builds, but the delta between the two has never been so large, as today a bruiser build can't DPS through a bunkers HP, but is still in range of having 80-90% of their HP gone from a single burst. This delta can be seen in how far behind many core classes are to HoT or PoF elites, and the core classes that do stand out, are often in very specific cases and give up lots of other utility of a PoF spec.

>

> Part of all that is no change in meta, builds or classes used, even in games that have good balance over all will move the meta around, this makes things fun and changes up game play.

Ehhh....no....Devs need to balance the game independently of the players. From what I've experienced in this game, players simply cannot be trusted with class balance issues, top end or low end. If we just hand over power to the top end and balance it for them, stuff won't change. They'll get to have their cake and eat it too. It reminds me of past ESL shenanigans back when it existed, top end players throwing tournament tantrums and ANet caving in and banning amulets because of it. That's not good for this game. Balancing for low end isn't any good either, especially if you're new. That being said, feedback should be considered but any class tinkering should be left up for the devs. However....this entire conversation is essentially pointless because for any of this to even happen, developers and ANet need to start freakina CARING about pvp, speaking of which as a player of 7 years myself, I don't ever see happening. I've moved on from pvp in this game.

pvp

/end...this....thread

Hello, OP! As someone who has been in this for 7 years, I can only give my honest opinion. The general community is pretty solid as a whole. I'm mostly talking about pve. However, if you're into pvp, stay away. pvp is a lost cause. It's been neglected and mismanaged in development for years and most of that community left a long time ago. What's left of that community is nothing but pure bitterness, I didn't want to be a part of that so I left to other games for my pvp needs. Honestly, pve is where it's at now: raids, fractals, etc. The old content alone is also worth it as a new player. You also have the two expansions.

However, I will caution you as well as any new players to not get too invested. gw2 is legitimately struggling, even in pve, due to mismanagement, politics and internal company changes. The game is unstable and its future is in doubt.

Of COURSE you buff scourge...this will work WONDERS in wvw! Increasing the targets for shades? Seriously?! ...Well...I'm glad I've made the choice to leave pvp in this game far behind.

> @"PirateSpice.8735" said:

> > @"Madja.1369" said:

> > If announcing an unprecedented event a month in advance (by a company not exactly known for their communication), renting out a theatre and inviting hundreds of people for the audience, having a 38 hour countdown to their live stream of it, doing giveaways in celebration, calling it a "Special Announcement Event" (despite there being no real announcements) and even hiring a MC isn't hyping something then I don't know what is. Nobody expected anything besides talk about next season, but we expected the next season to be something out of the ordinary to warrant all the hype they created. Instead we got around 15 minutes of talk about actual content (which seemed like standard season stuff), 15 minutes of lore and 15 minutes of merchandise talk. It's true that they hadn't promised anything, but no company ever promises anything - what they did was purposefully raise expectations. There was no way that this should have had an event of this scale. A 3-minute trailer and a blog post could have told us what they did.

>

> Of course they hyped it. Nobody is disputing that. But they didn't overhype it. That was the community. They didn't oversell anything. They set expectations with the hype and they met them. You can try to paint it poorly all you like, but you're being disingenuous. No real announcements? That is just flatly untrue. Also, I'm getting really tired of people overstating the time they spent on merch talk. It was not 15 minutes. Go watch the video again. The VP of Marketing was literally on stage for less than 4 minutes.

>

> You are letting whatever negative feelings you have about this cloud your perspective of the facts. Go back and take a more objective look at what they did to hype it, what the community did to overhype it, and what Anet actually delivered. It's not the dumpster fire people are making it out to be. Not even close.

FALSE. They _did_ overhype this supposed big announcement. The new stuff they announced besides the living world(which we already knew about) did not justify a live event with a countdown. People rightly assumed that something of that magnitude would bring with it an expansion or equivalent content, which it was clearly not! _This_ is why people feel cheated, because ANet failed in communicating this stuff properly. I'm sorry, but living world(again, which we already knew) and strikes and build templates, while good things, are not expansion-level content that justifies a gathering such as this.

That people continue to defend this fiasco is just downright mind-boggling.

> @"Ashen.2907" said:

> > @"JTGuevara.9018" said:

> > > @"Zephire.8049" said:

> > > I'm quite happy with it. It revealed the setting and (very) general theme of what LW5 would be. There was talk about lore. No one saw the faux-raids coming. Nice cinematic, nice cut scene, and the devs were hilarious and enjoyable to watch and listen to.

> > >

> > > People keep saying Anet overhyped it but that was really the community's doing. It's been stated for _months_ that there would be no expansion this year (and possibly next). Announcing specific things that mostly veteran players or people who only play certain gamemodes now would just be weird to do at a convention rather than on the forums. Anet never even mentioned new elite specs. All Anet did was set a timer, send an email, and reveal the logo and hint at snow. And people forget if anything Anet always under-hypes things—PoF didn't get much of any marketing when it was announced, and never forget AAAAHHHH!!!!

> > >

> > > Would it have been nice to get more of a roadmap or something? For sure. But the only things they ever hinted at was LW5 info and how they were going to change up the formula they had set for LW3 and 4. Them stating that there would be a lot more charr and norn development because neither has had much of any was actually a big and welcome thing. As was officially stating build templates would be out Soon™ in front of a live audience. Rolling HoT into PoF was also new info.

> > >

> > > Though definitely could have done without the marketing push at the end.

> > >

> > > If Anet had gone around putting up massive billboards, made cryptic posts online, sent out packages, etc. for months beforehand and revealed what they did today I would agree that they overhyped things. But a timer and a graphic? Temper your hype to match what a company puts out. If it's an awesome announcement, you get to feel an excited rush. If it's good but not great, you can still enjoy it. If it's bad you won't feel bad for wasting your time and energy waiting for it.

> > >

> > > This is nowhere near the Canvas Bag level of letdowns, but you would never guess it given how much of a backlash there is because people assumed everything.

> >

> > FALSE. The community did not overhype this, ANet did. This whole thing could've just been done in blog post like always, it did not justify a live event.

>

> ANet told us in advance what the focus of the event was. Anyone expecting more did that to themselves.

The point is the event didn't need to happen in the first place!

> @"Zephire.8049" said:

> I'm quite happy with it. It revealed the setting and (very) general theme of what LW5 would be. There was talk about lore. No one saw the faux-raids coming. Nice cinematic, nice cut scene, and the devs were hilarious and enjoyable to watch and listen to.

>

> People keep saying Anet overhyped it but that was really the community's doing. It's been stated for _months_ that there would be no expansion this year (and possibly next). Announcing specific things that mostly veteran players or people who only play certain gamemodes now would just be weird to do at a convention rather than on the forums. Anet never even mentioned new elite specs. All Anet did was set a timer, send an email, and reveal the logo and hint at snow. And people forget if anything Anet always under-hypes things—PoF didn't get much of any marketing when it was announced, and never forget AAAAHHHH!!!!

>

> Would it have been nice to get more of a roadmap or something? For sure. But the only things they ever hinted at was LW5 info and how they were going to change up the formula they had set for LW3 and 4. Them stating that there would be a lot more charr and norn development because neither has had much of any was actually a big and welcome thing. As was officially stating build templates would be out Soon™ in front of a live audience. Rolling HoT into PoF was also new info.

>

> Though definitely could have done without the marketing push at the end.

>

> If Anet had gone around putting up massive billboards, made cryptic posts online, sent out packages, etc. for months beforehand and revealed what they did today I would agree that they overhyped things. But a timer and a graphic? Temper your hype to match what a company puts out. If it's an awesome announcement, you get to feel an excited rush. If it's good but not great, you can still enjoy it. If it's bad you won't feel bad for wasting your time and energy waiting for it.

>

> This is nowhere near the Canvas Bag level of letdowns, but you would never guess it given how much of a backlash there is because people assumed everything.

FALSE. The community did not overhype this, ANet did. This whole thing could've just been done in blog post like always, it did not justify a live event.

> @"Obtena.7952" said:

> > @"Tinnel.4369" said:

> > Prove to me the income discrepancy is as big as you imply

>

> I already did ... if it wasn't big, WvW would have the same level of development as PVE. If Anet didn't understand the market, this game wouldn't exist at all; the sole reason it's successful is Anet's observation that there was an underserved portion of the market that didn't want games like WoW, etc...

>

> Besides, I don't really care if you are convinced or not. The fact is that WvW simply doesn't get the attention people want it to have and it's not even close to how much happens in PVE. It's not unreasonable to think it's because there simply isn't enough business to put that level of attention in it. What you attribute to malice and incompetence, I'm attributing to sound business practice. I think i'm right because if Anet were so incompetent, this game wouldn't exist, or their other games either.

Sound business practices? Like the marketing team? ROFL Like the over-hyping of an event and under-delivering? Like the secretive and non-transparent interaction with the community? Like the layoffs? Like the cancellation of their non-gw2 projects?

You know, you could've just spared the corporate shilling in the above paragraph and simply said to the rest of the wvw community: "Get out--we don't want you here." It would have got the point across much more clearly and spared us the supposed wisdom of the "experts". I mean...they probably will anyway...Alliances or not, I am at an end in spvp/wvw, it is a dead mode walking. The only thing keeping me here in gw2 is my guild, otherwise I would already be gone.

> @"Defias.1892" said:

> > @"Frostchant.1523" said:

> > Why not touching this topic during the announcement?

>

> Cuz it was a Living World announcement

>

> > @"JTGuevara.9018" said:

> > Too little, too late.

> >

> > I am hanging on this game by a THREAD thanks to the good will of my guild and my friends, otherwise I would've been long gone. Still, I think it's telling that this post happened merely hours after the "big" announcement. gw2 has lost its way.

>

> Its a living world announcement

Yeah, an "announcement" that confirms what we already knew! (season 5)

Come on bruh, I wasn't born yesterday...