JusticeRetroHunter.7684

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Would it actually be better to watch a recording, by yourself, several hours/days after the event? There's alot to be said for the hype and communal feel of watching a match with a large group of other people 'live', with commentary, banter etc. Pretty much every sport is best watched live. As long as there are streamers actually streaming, this setup is fine. Sorry but not everyone likes a bumbling streamer to yell and scream their coverage of a match, only watching X guys for 3 seconds then switch to other x guy for 3 seconds and then talking about stuff that you don't really care about or need to hear. The key difference between gw1 and gw2 obs systems is essentially choice. I can choose to watch player A or player B the entire match...I can choose to watch this match, that match or that match, and i can choose to watch said match at any time. Gw2 choice hierarchy is the opposite really...You have no choice and you are at the mercy of what someone else decides they want to show you, if they decide to do it at all.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Yeah, and if you come to me for an apple, and I present you an apple, and you say "but it doesn't have the exact same quantum state as the apple I meant" I'm going to tell you to get lost. Heh, and that would be a funny joke because I'd tell you that such an apple doesn't exist anyway. > > And I never suggested that the current state of balance was perfect. Merely that it is possible to reach a state that is functionally balanced "enough" for us to be happy with. This is what I'm trying to say here...that balancing for equality kills player choice (aka build diversity), for the reason that as Anet tries to make the elements in the game equal, the description of differences between skills and classes are lost in the attempt to make them balanced via this equality. When applying nerfs and buffs in the attempt to balance the game, that is what happens...the heat death of player choice. Because like i mentioned before, numerical nerfs and buffs that are made, are made in the interest of trying to make the elements of the game equal, and the mechanisms I described from now pages ago is the reason why it happens. But, there is more then one kind of "balance." Rather then balancing for equality, you instead balance for diversity, and this is where evolution and complexity science come into play. It's not like balancing for equality is the only kind of "balance." Real world systems in nature like evolution are balanced via a different mechanism...which is that the system is highly diverse... which is essentially the complete opposite of balancing for equality...it's a balance of differentiation. It's a completely different mechanism at play but it's the same mathematics we've been discussing that allow it to work, and it's the reason we see real world systems exhibit diversity rather than equality...because the mathematical mechanism is efficient, or rather that complex systems tend towards being highly diverse because they are more efficient. It's like swimming in a river. Swimming uphill is like balancing for equality, while swimming downhill is balancing for diversity. Gw2 is a mimicry of evolutionary systems and we see it play out in real time. Builds are made, builds compete and cooperate, builds die and go extinct, builds exist in consort with other builds. It's the players that are the driving force of this adaptation, and Anet fights this by trying to homogenize the game with nerfs and buffs, when really the opposite of these actions should be taken, to spur on heterogeneity like every other complex system in the universe. I mean seriously when was the last time you saw a perfectly balanced homogeneous ecosystem? It doesn't exist, and there's a good reason why.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > No, I can put an equals sign between guardian and warrior, if I'm defining my metrics and stating what is being approximated and what is not. Just as I can say that Apple = Orange, if I qualify that the metric is monetary value. And that's how approximate your evaluation will be...it's monetary value and nothing more, if you come to me selling me an apple when i ask for an orange, I'm gonna look at you funny. Say if you were to use DPS Benchmarks as your metric for equality in SPVP I wonder how far that will actually get you...well A-net kind of already did this once upon a time so we can "see" what the consequence of using such broad metrics actually do to the game. >We can take a black-box approach and simply observe the resultant performance in games, leaderboards, tournaments. This approach, incidentally, has the added bonus of also covering several other factors which are not directly part of the builds themselves, such has how players approach playing them, how they interact with maps, objectives, etc. CMC 'probably' uses performance in AT's as a metric for his balancing in SPVP...that's gotten us pretty far this past year hasn't it...If you think that this is the best balance in the history of every game ever because of his usage of this godlike metric then...okay whatever that's your opinion if you think this is remotely a healthy state of the game. > And no, we don't need to go to the level of each individual skills, down to every minute detail. This is what I basically said. It's non-sensible to try to balance every metric of every skill into equality because it leads to the inevitable conclusion I've said many time before now, that a perfectly balanced game is the heat death of player choice in a game like gw2 which survives at it's core, on player choice. Balancing using broad. mediocre metrics like AT performance is at best, throwing darts at a dart board, especially when the only changes that can be made are numerical ones, which are by proxy of the already mentioned concepts are meaningless to the balance of the system as a whole.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > By this logic, no 2 warrior builds are the same, since they're equipped at different times by different users in different locations etc etc. Even if they select the exact same traits, equipment, utilities, they're still not equal to each other. > There you go! Now your catching on. Even in a perfectly balanced, completely deterministic game of stick wars 2, because agents exist in a world governed by real world physics, you can NEVER have a perfectly balanced game there will always be near infinite amount of variables and metrics that you can not evaluate, like player skill. This is why it is important to understand why you can't just insert an equal sign willy nilly into whatever equation you want to create, especially in complex systems and games like gw2. > Now, I ask, is it really useful to go to this level of detail, or can we grow up a bit and use a sensible approximation? Newtonian physics is a suitable approximation for day-to-day usage. I don't need to define the exact quantum state of every particle in the universe to make a statement on GW2 PvP balance. I mentioned this earlier but DPS Benchmarks is the metric Anet and other game companies use to determine balance between classes that are different to one another. It is merely an approximation based on repeated observation and experiment, much like the real world. So now when you talk "sensible" you have to define your metric. You want Warrior to equal Guardian but by what metrics? By their DPS benchmark on a golem? By their performance in AT's? By their individual skills and their coefficients...There are an infinite number of metrics you can attempt to define the equality between the elements in a system, and it doesn't stop at the level of classes...it goes down to skills and their mechanics... How do you evaluate the equality between Thief dagger autoattack and Elementalist staff autoattack? How do you evaluate the equality between Stability and Immobilize? The truth is that it is non-sensible to attempt to equalize things based on metrics at all. Such mechanics are so estranged that they can't be compared in any truly meaningful way, and therefor changes in the coefficients or whatever other numerical changes in an attempt to make them equal actually becomes non-sensible.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > The notation of "warrior" and "guardian" there is obviously representative of their strength. > > Oranges and apples are bought and sold with currency. If both are valued at 1$ I can write an equation that states Apple = Orange, where those terms are representations of their values. It is obviously not meant to imply that an apple is actually the same thing as an orange. I thought you were smarter than this? > > You're the one that invoked algebra. Now you're saying it's not possible to employ it in this scenario. Make up your mind. We are just getting started, don't worry. You've taken your first step. In order to define one thing to be equal to another, you define that equality with a common metric, in the case of the apple and the orange, it's monetary value. But now, you know that the apple and the orange even though they have one metric that is equal, you know they still aren't the same right... Do they have the same weight? The same shape? The same color? The same composition? The same malleability? The same mass? The same Buoyancy? To define the equality of two objects, you further and further evaluate it for an infinite number of metrics, which you will eventually find that the two objects are never and can never be equal. This is because if they were, the two objects would have to be in the same exact quantum states, which by no-cloning theorem is impossible to have. This is why the apple will NEVER be equal to the orange, because down to their very atoms they can never occupy the same quantum state. This is the hallmark of why chaos theory exists. Any small difference between elements in a system, even if it's a deterministic system, cause the system to become chaotic and unpredictable to due those said infinitesimally small differences between each element. In addition, even if many of those metrics are equal, their equality further determines that the two objects become closer and closer to being the same object. If they are both red, both made of carbon, with the same mass, have the same buoyancy, and shape...the description of the objects converge to being the same object. Therefor, apples and oranges are never the same, and the equal sign is an approximation based on the number of metrics used to define that equality. In the case of Warrior equals Guardian, this is the exact reason why the two classes aren't equal, and in fact are inherently different. You simply can not say that Warrior equals Guardian because it's simply not true, and when you do say Warrior equals Guardian, you are using in your case just a single metric to define that, which is like again saying that the apple is equal to the orange. If you wanted to say the two are the same, then you have to go down skill by skill, metric by metricto see if both are equal to make such a determination. If every metric is equal, then the guardian is infinitely non-different then the warrior, where the two are no longer considered to even be different classes...again because if all metrics define that they are equal, means they are descriptions of the same object.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Since you like algebra, here you go: > > Guardian = Warrior + 1 > -> > Guardian + 1 = Warrior + 2 > > Adding +1 to both sides results in no change to the relative strength of guard and warrior. > > Guardian = Warrior + 1 > -> > Guardian = Warrior > > To make guardian=warrior, we have to add +1 only to the right hand side, (or -1 to the left and shift if across). Which, of course, is not something you can do in an equation. > > However, GW2 is not an equation. It is perfectly within the devs power to +1 to warrior without also +1 to guardian. Idk if you are trolling or serious right now. But like I thought, I think you're just not ready to have a conversation about how diversity and balance in systems and games like gw2 actually work. I mean you don't even understand the significance of the equal sign or why you can't just willy nilly use it for everything because you think you can. Listen to what I'm bout to say very carefully. You have an apple, and an orange.**..just because you put an EQUAL SIGN between them does not make the apple and the orange the same.** Do you understand that concept? Go read up on chaos theory and understand why perfectly equal ordered systems don't exist in reality. Everything is different and nonlinear down to the very atoms or bits of data they are made of. This is true in all systems, even perfectly linear ones, in both reality and in computer games...it doesn't matter....why? Because it's a feature of mathematics...not science. In simple terms, your algebra is complete nonsense, because Warrior does not equal guardian...am I being clear enough?

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > It's as relevant as anything you've brought in. Funny cause i actually remember that book. Look if you want to actually talk about diversity and balance, then you got to at least show me some shred of evidence that you know something about nonlinear dynamic systems, Thermodynamics, or Evolution...if you don't then you won't get past the first couple sentences...because surprise surprise, diversity is FROM the understanding of evolution, and "balance" comes from study of thermodynamics and complex chaotic systems. If you don't have at least a basic grasp of those things then you can't really talk about any of those subjects without being total nonsense derived from your experiences in gw2. Newsflash, just cause you play gw2 doesn't mean your actually able to talk coherently about diversity and balance.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > > @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said: > > > @"Ragnar.4257" said: > > Look buddy you can cop an attitude all you want, but you're stubbornness is not my problem. This is all stuff you can do research on and figure out on your ownbecause it's it's mathematics that you can learn online or in school. I'm doing you the favor of explaining it to you in simple terms so that you don't have to go and do years of research into diversity and complex systems which I've done. > > > > So ya, people like you that think you know it all and have it all figured out without going into the books and doing the work is your issue and I don't have to deal with that snarky-ness. > > > > I don't have to deal with your inferiority complex. As I've said to you before, you aren't the only one capable of reading a book. lol and what book have you read exactly cause i think you should start with 101 Algebra

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: Look buddy you can cop an attitude all you want, but you're stubbornness is not my problem. This is all stuff you can do research on and figure out on your ownbecause it's it's mathematics that you can learn online or in school. I'm doing you the favor of explaining it to you in simple terms so that you don't have to go and do years of research into diversity and complex systems which I've done. So ya, people like you that think you know it all and have it all figured out without going into the books and doing the work is your issue and I don't have to deal with that snarky-ness.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: Read my comment above, there's more that i added there.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > If Guardian and Mesmer are +/- 5% strength of each other, that's a better scenario than if they're +/- 50% strength of each other. These are not equally good situations. if A and B are within 5% "Strength" of each other (where A is 5% stronger then B ), then they are closer to a perfectly balanced state then if A is 50% stronger then B to each other. This is correct. Both states of this system however are imbalanced, and this is what I said. It's either a perfectly balanced state, or it's not. Any player looking for optimal strategy will by default choose A in both scenarios, and even at .000001% strength, A will still be the most optimal choice until A becomes equal to B. This is why it's either perfect balance or failure, there's no middle ground, if the goal is to reach a perfectly balance state (through equality). It's like looking at the difference between an attack that does 9 damage and an attack that does 10 damage. You're always gonna pick the attack that does 10 damage. You're always gonna pick the class that does 10 damage over the class does 9 damage. The differential between what players will choose to play, is always going to be down the path of most optimal usage of what they have available to them...Whether that's 5% or 50% doesn't actually matter until we look at how these paths of optimality are spread out between richer and richer variety of choices. If something does 50% damage but punishes you by taking away 50% of your health, is that a better attack then something that does X damage from 600 range and is a slow projectile. The question of whether it's stronger or not becomes harder to solve. This is one of the key components of what diversity really establishes. It's the differences between the two attacks that make it harder to quantify if the two skills are actually imbalanced or not. I warned you that the topic on diversity goes deep i don't know if your exactly ready for that conversation.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Yes, you can achieve the same result by either buffing or nerfing, I've already agreed with that several times. > > But if mesmer < guardian currently, i.e. the game is not balanced, then you can either buff some of the numbers on mesmer, or nerf some of the numbers on guardian, to make mesmer = guardian. The fact that they are numerical changes does not make them meaningless. How is that so difficult to grasp? Great, this is better question. **Why exactly are numerical changes meaningless?** They are meaningless in the sense that all changes are the same as any other change you can make in the system, thus no change is more significant than any other change to the system as a whole. Like you said, you can either buff Mesmer, or nerf Guardian, by any set of operations with any scale and you'd still get the same result state of the balance in the system...it's either perfectly balanced, or it's not. If it's not perfectly balanced, then what is the point of that change if it wasn't to perfectly balance the game...then the end result is that any and all changes HAVE to be changes that make things equal (to set the state of the system to be equal) in order to be "balanced." This is a flawed procedure because if all things are equal, then there is no diversity in player choices. Now we can move on to the other half of the conversation...which is about build diversity, and how it's an additional level of complexity that further tears apart the idea of balancing for equality. The question : How do you get Mesmer equal to Guardian? What operations do you have to do to get them equal to one another. Do they have to do the same amount of auto-attack damage? Do they have to have the same range? Is 600 range more op then 300 range if this does X amount more damage then Y. Every metric you adjust can be broken down into components similar to the first example proposed at the start of this conversation. You have a skill with some number of metrics, being weighed against some other skill or set of skills with some other number of metrics. If you want to make the two classes equal, start by making the metrics on these skills equal. Start making those things equal, and you quickly find yourself in the same situation as before. That any number you change on one skill can be done inversely on another, and at that point the amount of damage each skill actually does, doesn't matter. If you wanted them both to be equal, you'd give Skill A 100 damage, 300 range, 500 projectile speed, with 10 second cooldown, and Skill B 100 damage, 300 range, 500 projectile speed with a 10 second cooldown. Any change you make to any of these metrics, if they are not equivalent, result in an imbalance...and thus how do you reconcile two metrics that aren't alike in any way? Like Projectile speed and range. Does 100 projectile speed justify 100 more damage and 100 more range? You can go on and on and realize that in order for these two skills to even be balanced via equality, they need to be exactly the same across all of their metrics, otherwise it is just guessing between what one believes one metric is balanced to another. This form of guessing is CURRENTLY how most games like gw2 balance their games when it comes to numerical changes. And there are all sorts of more and more clever ways to do this kind of thing. You're probably also familiar with DPS benchmarks. This is essentially what ANET looks at, as a general form of trying to see how different classes and builds do damage against a golem to see if they do the same DPS. If one build is "underperforming" they give it some more damage or whatever until they observe it doing the same benchmark damage as everything else. This is basically how sciences approach problems through repetitive experiment. Because of all the variables and differences between things in a system, one can only guess and estimate what things in that system are doing with a finite level of accuracy, and this accuracy is determined by repetitive observation and experiment. This applies to gw2's current balance regiment and many other games that test player choices. So the point here is that this form of guessing is what current balance models are based on, because you simply can not make Class A equal to Class B, without them being the same class with the same skills and the same XYZ attributes. This is why Build Diversity comes into the fold here. If Class A and Class B were to be equal in everyway, they would HAVE to be the same in every way possible...again because it is impossible to make two things that are different equal to one another. One thing is always going to be stronger then another thing in one situation or another until all elements in the system become equal to one another, and when those elements are equal, they are just the same class, with the same skills with the same metrics. Diversity itself as a topic is a huge can of worms, that goes into why nerfs generally are worse then buffs, which i briefly allude to in one of my first comments here about barrier for entry for build variety. Diversity is a very complex topic and it's intricately connected to balance...in many ways they are one in the same thing. In fact the many reasons you are misunderstanding the key concept of balance for equality is because diversity is literally the other half of that concept that is required to understand why the two are both the same and also incompatible (They have what's called [complementarity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complementarity_(physics)))

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Buffing damage by 10%, yes, you CAN offset that by also buffing healing by 10%, but if you don't buff healing by 10% then you've not kept it equal. Exactly, you are not making the game equal therefor you are NOT balancing the game. What is so hard to understand about that? You are literally pushing numbers around and that is all it amounts to. >Just because you "could" have buffed healing by 10%, doesn't mean that buffing damage by 10% has a net-zero effect. It only has a net-zero effect if you actually DO buff healing by 10%. No that's exactly what happens. It's net zero. Buff damage by 10% or nerf healing by 10% gives you the same result. Nerfs and Buffs are cut from the same cloth, one gives you power creeping, the other gives you power dipping, and applying both give you a universal increase in power level, or a universal decrease in power level or no change in power level at all, which is NET ZERO. That's what it really means to make things equal to each other, both sides of an equation have to cancel out.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > You said add a bunch of 0's to the end of each skill. I've bolded it in the quote for you.Each skill. Each skill. As in, every single one. In that case, yes, you've not changed any balance. But that is not the scenario being discussed. > > What if you only change one skill, and none of the others? > You keep talking about scenario's different to the one I've posited. Why don't you let me know when you're ready to actually address even a single one of the points I've made instead of making up points of your own to argue against. Dude i keep saying this, you need to go back and just re-read what I keep saying because you clearly do not understand this basic math here. Buffing ONE skill is just as meaningless of an operation as any other, because you can do the same inverse operation to SOMETHING ELSE and get the same result. If what you are doing makes the two things EQUAL then you could have made them equal at a lower power level or a higher one, and this is now relative to their HP, to their toughness, to their whatever attributes you can list in the game. If even one thing is not equal to everything else, you purposefully imbalance the system. Therefor balancing using nerfs and buffs to make things equal means nothing. Again even further you cant even make things equal without stripping the game of build diversity. That's the other half of the topic but you haven't even gotten past the first one. > For the millionth time, I am not positing a scenario where you universally adjust all attributes by the same amount. I am positing a scenario where you change ONLY ONE attribute, Again, read above, very slowly and use your thinking cap.

> @"Ragnar.4257" said: > Let's imagine that there are only 2 classes, mesmer and guardian, each with only 1 build. And lets say that guardian is twice as strong as mesmer. > > You're actually saying that there are no number tweaks you could possibly do to make them equal to each other, either by nerfing guardian or buffing mesmer. > > Just..... what?? I'm saying that whatever nerf or buff you make to this system are meaningless. Because whatever Nerf you introduce you can instead give it an equivalent Buff to the other. Thus nerfs are no different then buffs. If you do make both of them equal (which realistically you can't without removing what makes both classes different) then you are just pushing the power level of both classes either up or down.