Einlanzer.1627
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Posts posted by Einlanzer.1627
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> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:
> Don't pretend that the armor piercing effect of conditions is negligible. There are countless times where Anet has put enemies into the game with high armor just to be vulnerable to conditions. Vale Guardian, Bristlebacks, Scarlet's blue hologram, Mordrem Husks, etc.
Well, yeah, but the point is that conditions don't rely on this to be effective. It tends to be better than power even against low armor mobs.
> @Astralporing.1957 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > Condition damage should not outdps direct damage in a fight with a low-armor target no matter how long the fight lasts.
>
> Why? Because you think it should?
>
> You seem to be basing all your thinking on an assumption, that the main point of condition damage is to ignore armor. Unfortunately, that assumption is faulty.
>
> If it was the one main point of condition damage, then it wouldn't be a Damage over Time effect. Instead, you'd have something similar to the Blood attribute line of GW1 Necros (or Mesmer's Illusionary Weaponry). Based on that, we can clearly see that it is, in fact, _not_ the main point. The _DoT characteristics_ is. And Anet explained time after time that for DoT to be usable at all, it has to be at least slightly better in longterm fights (if not, everyone would always pick the frontloaded damage over it).
>
> Now, the condi burst _is_ a problem that should be somehow dealt with, and i'd be happier if the difference between the damage types was smaller, but i do not believe that what you propose is a good solution to anything. Especially since it's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, because it's a problem based on your apparent mistaken understanding of Anet's design goals.
>
>
Because it objectively should if you expect to ever have balance between the two. Let me see how much simpler I can make this for some of you. You have two game modes - one in which fights tend to be long (not balanced around), and one in which fights tend to be short (balanced around). So, if the primary balancer for condition damage is time, then condition damage will always be the primary meta in PvE, unless Anet decides to start balancing around PvE, and then condition damage will become useless in PvP.
Condi burst is a made up term that represents an academic hoop to rationalize why condition damage is so strong. Conditions were always intended to be applied quickly, because their original design schema was to bypass armor. The dot format was just thematically worked for that. That's why their durations tend to be in the 3-4 second range instead of the 30 second range. They are not comparable to DoTs in other games. Sorry to burst your bubble.
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> @DeceiverX.8361 said:
> It's a combination of problems. Power is weaker because of permanent spammable protection (something which used to not exist) and other permanent power damaga reduction effects, long cleanse cooldowns relative to very short mass condition application cooldowns, and how a lot of cleanses aren't meant to cope with so many concurrent DoT and cover conditions all at once.
>
> There's just too much damage and too many anti-power walls in the way while no real mitigation to conditions aside from a very binary, short-lived boon that also takes top priority in removal.
>
> I still think the biggest guilty party is dire/tb gear in respects to WvW, since it's effectively full tank stats and absolutely stupid amounts of damage.
Yeah, I've made the case in other posts that a lot of the problem with condition damage is that it's weighted too much toward one attribute, which gives it way more flexibility. But this is another problem that would be solved by just reducing condition damage across the board. Viper should be competitive with Berseker. Dire/Rabid/Rampager should not be - they sacrifice some offense for better defense or utility.
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> @thrdeye.1028 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > It's a bad paradigm. Power damage **should** be expected to outperform condition damage against targets with low armor, _no matter how long the fight lasts_. High armor should translate into it taking more than 4 seconds to kill someone, which swings the balance in favor of condition damage.
>
> Why? Armor isn't the only factor here. Condition damage also has a ramp up time and damage mitigation skills can be used reactively. Power damage can take advantage of smaller windows of opportunity and those defending against it need to use their damage mitigation proactively. Condition damage needs to be higher to compensate for these disadvantages or there would be no reason to use it.
>
> Edit: I should clarify that power builds in general need some love. I just don't think armor should be the primary factor in balancing the two damage types.
Condition damage has short ramp up time, as it should, and mitigation skills have exploded since condi became OP two years back. There weren't nearly as many of them before. Armor should be the primary balancer. We have too many boons and reactive effects, and it needs to be scaled back.
> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @thrdeye.1028 said:
> > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > It's a bad paradigm. Power damage **should** be expected to outperform condition damage against targets with low armor, _no matter how long the fight lasts_. High armor should translate into it taking more than 4 seconds to kill someone, which swings the balance in favor of condition damage.
> >
> > Why? Armor isn't the only factor here. Condition damage also has a ramp up time and damage mitigation skills can be used reactively. Power damage can take advantage of smaller windows of opportunity and those defending against it need to use their damage mitigation proactively. Condition damage needs to be higher to compensate for these disadvantages or there would be no reason to use it.
>
> True, condition damage is like a bet on the future. Your opponent could condi cleanse after you stacked 5 sec+ conditions on him, transfer them right back into your face or use resistance.
> With power dmg you get instant feedback, hit or miss. Condition damage is (or should be) like a risky but under the right conditions, more rewarding long term investment
No, it shouldn't. It should be good in some situations (heavily armored foes) and worse in others. They should both be rewarding.
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> @Verenhimo.3296 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
>
> > In fact, I feel so strongly about this that I'm just going to start using the terms Malice and Spirit ubiquitously on the forums until the habit gets passed to around to other denizens.
>
> It won't - you're exaggerating how these things are pronounced in casual conversation, the current stat names are blunt and convey instantly what these stats do, Condition Damage instantly conveys exactly that, that the stat will improve condition damage, as does healing power, literally improving the power of heals.
>
> Clarity of purpose is much more vital than having a edgy or whimsical sounding name for a stat.
>
> Also barely anyone I've run into bluntly calls things "a condition damage build" it's always come with the armor prefix as the descriptive term, which tells far more about what you're trying to say than just bluntly saying "condi damage" which could refer to 4 common types of gear, all serving different purposes.
>
>
That's exactly the point. The problem with your assertion is that "malice" is in fact much clearer and to the point than "condition damage" once you know what it does because it's a _specific term that references a specific game mechanic_, which isn't exactly tricky to figure out if you spend any length of time whatsoever playing the game. It's also silly to have to type out or say "condi damage" to refer to the attribute that increases condition damage. In some cases you actually have to specify "the condition damage attribute" which is even more retarded.
Their original decision to replace specific names for attributes with generic names was misguided and should have never happened.
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> @TexZero.7910 said:
> Problem with that is those terms are either actively used or part of defunct systems
>
> Malice is used for Deadeye and Compassion was previously used for the Flavor Emotion System.
No, you're thinking of Ferocity, which they actually hijacked from the personality system to use for a new attribute tied to critical damage.
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For those who don't know, before launch, all of the secondary attributes had flavor names similar to the primary attributes, and they were changed to be descriptive sometime around launch. I have no idea why, because, apart from being less interesting, it removes clarity rather than adding it. Over time, Ferocity, Expertise, and Concentration all made their way back due to the need to have a secondary attribute influencing a derived attribute. Only Healing power and condition damage are left (and the profession attributes, sort of.)
Condition Damage was Malice, and Healing Power was Compassion, though I could think of terms that work better than Compassion (like Spirit)
I think it's time for Anet to formally change them. The flavor names roll of the tongue more easily, they are faster to type, and they are less ambiguous in discussion. - you can easily distinguish between the attribute Malice vs. a condition damage build, which involves more than just the one attribute. Likewise, you can easily distinguish between the attribute Spirit vs. a healing build, which involves more than just the one attribute.
In fact, I feel so strongly about this that I'm just going to start using the terms Malice and Spirit ubiquitously on the forums until the habit gets passed to around to other denizens.
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> @otto.5684 said:
> I think that the path of least work is remove resistance, but make condis subject to all damage reduction mechanics like power (toughness, protection, any and all damage reduction class specific skills). Also, make condis deal no damage to distorted targets. I generally, think that HP pools are due for a buff. People may not remember, but we went through two stages of damage power creep, before HoT with becoming able to equip 3 full trait lines. Then with HoT, with the introduction of elites. Slightly larger health pools will reduce condi nuking impact. I think they should increase HP pools for larges pools by 2K, medium pools by 2.5K and small pools by 3K.
>
> This will require some work on warrior and rev, but most other classes do not have access to resistance anyway.
I used to advocate something like this, but, I'm not sure. There are a lot of reworks they could potentially go with, but considering how the damage types were originally designed, I'm not sure this is the path of least resistance.
I do support a health buff, though. Even in PvE, one-shotting is way too much of a thing.
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> @Funky.4861 said:
> Assuming the same health, a condi class/burst (whatever) should be able to kill a high-armour target in the same timespan as a power class/burst (whatever) kills a low-armour class.
>
> This isn't even going into buffs/debuffs, immunities, rotations, gear etc (it's much easier to deck a char out in zerker gear than it is vipers).
>
> If a class needs to materially invest and strategise their skills to maximise their damage then it doesn't matter if that damage is from conditions or power. People are just stuck in the old-style of preferring power damage- it's somehow more acceptable to die to something physically hitting you than a stack of bleeds/burn/torment. Perhaps it's because i play necro and thief that i am used to not having any blocks or immunities (bar bandits' defense and DD max 7 dodges with signet and heal skill) that i don't have any sympathy for these ppl crying to nerf condi damage output.
Not really, no, because that just makes defense pointless. A condi damage spec should be able to kill a high armored target much faster than a direct damage spec should, but not as quickly as a direct damage spec kills a low armor target.
The problem people have is that condition damage is clearly over-tuned on numerous builds. But, actually, you raise a good point - one of the reasons conditions are frustrating is because they are often not telegraphed in any way, so people have no clue how to avoid them and often don't see themselves getting hit by it. This is another advantage they have in addition to bypassing armor, so it's even more evidence that condition damage needs to be reigned in significantly.
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> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > > > > > @saerni.2584 said:
> > > > > > > > > > > Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
> > > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > > > Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
> > > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > > Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
> > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > > ****How it actually should work:****
> > > > > > > > > > **low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
> > > > > > > > > > **medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
> > > > > > > > > > **high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
> > > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > > The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > I love how people cry everytime they have to "waste" skill slots for that "crap condi cleanse". I don't know if you ever noticed that, but you waste tons of skills already to midigate power dmg. Skills that grant protection, blocks, invulnerability, reflects, whatever. But you only complain about "condi cleanse crap" Why? Because in your opinion power dmg is the only "real" dmg worth protecting against?
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > This is a Role Playing Game. You have to choose one single specific role and then play this role. And since we're in an Massively Multiplayer Online Game you can invite other people into your party if you need another role.
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > There is no role/class/spec in this game that has tons of health and tons of thoughness, perma evade and blocks, that can spam resistance and cleanse and transfer conditions, that can dish out tons of power dmg, while stacking up multiple conditions, heal its allies and itself while keeping control of the enemies around.
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > If you specialize in having good defense against power dmg ( toughness, blocks, endurance reg, invulnerability, protection) you have to make sacrifices, same for conditions (resistance, cleanse, transfers, vitality). And btw. Most boons/skills that immensely help against power builds help at least a good bit against condition builds as well because conditions need to be applied first, whereas "condi crap"-defence is mostly only working against conditions.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > You appear to not even be comprehending what this discussion is about.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > I get it.
> > > > > > > You complain about condi dmg being too strong (And I told you how it is balanced)
> > > > > > > You complain about needing to waste skills to protect against conditions (And I told you that you need that for power dmg too)
> > > > > > > You complain about the core design intend behind condition and power dmg
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > And you claim the only solution would be to make the two dmg types distinct through armor type and how armor affects them. Which is in no way better than make the distinction through a ramp up time. Because you still have parts of the game where your dmg type is inferior to the other.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > You on the other hand have never even tried to come up with any argument against mine, you simply tell me it's all wrong and that I just don't get it.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > The argument was my original post. You're the one disagreeing with me with insufficient reasoning. Balancing with the expectation that condition damage should always outperform direct damage after a certain period of time is silly. If you look at damage benchmarks, you'll see that condition damage is almost universally superior in PvE. The reason why is because Anet have it in their heads that condition damage is "balanced" if it's weaker for the first few seconds and stronger after ramp up, but PvE univerally consists of longer fights. Moreover, this is in complete contradiction to how conditions were designed - which was as a tool to get around high passive defense.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > They were not designed like DoTs in other games. They were designed with relatively short durations (in most cases) that were stackable with the benefit of bypassing the target's armor, and it was usually intended to hybridize with direct damage rather than replacing it. Condi cleanse & immunity proliferated throughout the game more recently as a way to give players the ability to deal with the over-the-top damage they were receiving from conditions. But this is cludgy, because players have to build their kits around it, removing all sorts of customization options.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > It doesn't make any sense. If the sole important balancer is time in a fight, there will never be balance. Condition will always over-perform in PvE, or Direct damage will always over-perform in PvP. The only sensible solution is to narrow the damage gap between direct and condition damage, allow condition damage to "burst" to an extent with short durations, and balance the two damage types around armor rating, with low armor always favoring direct damage - even over time, and high armor always favoring condition damage. This _is a better solution_ than ramp-up time, because it's more varied within and between gameplay modes.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Arguing otherwise just makes no sense whatsoever.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > What? You do need to realize something. The majority of PvE content consists of trash mobs and bursting down your enemies. The majority of PvE is not raids, not high lvl fractals.
> > > > >
> > > > > So in most of the PvE content of this game power builds have an advantage. It's only high level niche content that has the problem that the meta builds for it consist out of condition builds, because those builds favour longer fights.
> > > > >
> > > > > What's the answer to that? Simply let raid bosses and bosses in higher fractals use condi cleanse every now and then. It's the easiest way of fixing that problem, it can also be balanced very easily.
> > > > >
> > > > > And to your solution. This would require Anet to rework every single NPC healthpool and armor type, every event, dungeon, raid, trash mob, story mission, every armor and weapon stat, every single skill in the game, most of the spec traits. And then we would still not know if it would really work or if it would be a balancing nightmare.
> > > > > We both know that this complete rework won't happen in the lifespan of this game.
> > > >
> > > > Except they don't. Condi does extremely well even against _trash mobs while leveling_, because even a few seconds is usually enough to give condi the advantage. If there's any solution warranted here whatsoever, which I'm not convinced there is, it's to have more high-armored mobs.
> > > >
> > > > Have you leveled with a condi spec vs a direct spec lately?
> > >
> > > Yes, I leveled with a condi spec, it was easier true. But I also recently leveled with a mount and one hitted everything so we shouldn't jump to conclusions.
> > >
> > > I ususally play condition Soulbeast and I use pets that can spam AoE conditions pretty well. I have no problems against several enemies in PoF. Game feels relatively smooth, except when several waves of enemies spawn close to after each other because I wiped the first waves so fast. Then I can get problems.
> > > I also played with a Holosmith after I got a bit tired of my ranger. And it was a complete new game feeling. It felt so smooth, I could just kill dozens of mobs with 3 skills within 3-4 seconds. I had tons of CC, stability, quickness, might, blocks and tons and tons of instant dmg.
> > >
> > > I was at the point that I really wanted to switch my main to Holosmith, so I took him to the DPS Golem. And yeah, it dealt only like 60-70% of the dmg. This doesn't mean that Soulbeast is better than Holosmith, it just means that my Soulbeast deals more dmg on that golem during 5 minutes. In the open world it's another story.
> >
> > Do you happen to know which golem it was and what its armor rating was? It's also worth noting that Holosmith is an outlier as power specs go. If the golem had very high toughness, though, it would appropriate for your Holo build to be outdone by your Soulbeast build. I know there are several and I think they have different armor ratings, though I could be wrong.
> >
> > I need to do a few more tests on there myself.
>
> I don't know that. I did tests on the 1million and the 4 million hp one.
>
> Also I usually test these things without any pre-buffs and I did the tests with my open world builds which would mean that my Soulbeast has more potential for dmg optimization.
>
> I didn't test the Holosmith because I wanted to go into raids with it, I just was curious
I'm fairly confident in the observations and conclusions from my original post. You can find examples of undertuned condition builds or well tuned direct builds, but, in general, condition damage builds are overtuned simply because Anet has not properly balanced around target armor and, as a result, immunity and cleanse have become too common. Again, direct damage builds _should_ outperform condition builds against low armor rating no matter how much ramp up time there is. Your example helps to illustrate how condition damage is really kind of out of control, and I can only assume it's because Anet is balancing it in a myopic fashion (kind of an MO of theirs).
I'm going to test my berseker shiro against my condition mallyx build on my Rev later, and I'll do it with neither Glint nor Kalla to keep things kind of baselined. I'll post the results.
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> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > > > @saerni.2584 said:
> > > > > > > > > Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > ****How it actually should work:****
> > > > > > > > **low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
> > > > > > > > **medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
> > > > > > > > **high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > I love how people cry everytime they have to "waste" skill slots for that "crap condi cleanse". I don't know if you ever noticed that, but you waste tons of skills already to midigate power dmg. Skills that grant protection, blocks, invulnerability, reflects, whatever. But you only complain about "condi cleanse crap" Why? Because in your opinion power dmg is the only "real" dmg worth protecting against?
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > This is a Role Playing Game. You have to choose one single specific role and then play this role. And since we're in an Massively Multiplayer Online Game you can invite other people into your party if you need another role.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > There is no role/class/spec in this game that has tons of health and tons of thoughness, perma evade and blocks, that can spam resistance and cleanse and transfer conditions, that can dish out tons of power dmg, while stacking up multiple conditions, heal its allies and itself while keeping control of the enemies around.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > If you specialize in having good defense against power dmg ( toughness, blocks, endurance reg, invulnerability, protection) you have to make sacrifices, same for conditions (resistance, cleanse, transfers, vitality). And btw. Most boons/skills that immensely help against power builds help at least a good bit against condition builds as well because conditions need to be applied first, whereas "condi crap"-defence is mostly only working against conditions.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > You appear to not even be comprehending what this discussion is about.
> > > > >
> > > > > I get it.
> > > > > You complain about condi dmg being too strong (And I told you how it is balanced)
> > > > > You complain about needing to waste skills to protect against conditions (And I told you that you need that for power dmg too)
> > > > > You complain about the core design intend behind condition and power dmg
> > > > >
> > > > > And you claim the only solution would be to make the two dmg types distinct through armor type and how armor affects them. Which is in no way better than make the distinction through a ramp up time. Because you still have parts of the game where your dmg type is inferior to the other.
> > > > >
> > > > > You on the other hand have never even tried to come up with any argument against mine, you simply tell me it's all wrong and that I just don't get it.
> > > >
> > > > The argument was my original post. You're the one disagreeing with me with insufficient reasoning. Balancing with the expectation that condition damage should always outperform direct damage after a certain period of time is silly. If you look at damage benchmarks, you'll see that condition damage is almost universally superior in PvE. The reason why is because Anet have it in their heads that condition damage is "balanced" if it's weaker for the first few seconds and stronger after ramp up, but PvE univerally consists of longer fights. Moreover, this is in complete contradiction to how conditions were designed - which was as a tool to get around high passive defense.
> > > >
> > > > They were not designed like DoTs in other games. They were designed with relatively short durations (in most cases) that were stackable with the benefit of bypassing the target's armor, and it was usually intended to hybridize with direct damage rather than replacing it. Condi cleanse & immunity proliferated throughout the game more recently as a way to give players the ability to deal with the over-the-top damage they were receiving from conditions. But this is cludgy, because players have to build their kits around it, removing all sorts of customization options.
> > > >
> > > > It doesn't make any sense. If the sole important balancer is time in a fight, there will never be balance. Condition will always over-perform in PvE, or Direct damage will always over-perform in PvP. The only sensible solution is to narrow the damage gap between direct and condition damage, allow condition damage to "burst" to an extent with short durations, and balance the two damage types around armor rating, with low armor always favoring direct damage - even over time, and high armor always favoring condition damage. This _is a better solution_ than ramp-up time, because it's more varied within and between gameplay modes.
> > > >
> > > > Arguing otherwise just makes no sense whatsoever.
> > >
> > >
> > > What? You do need to realize something. The majority of PvE content consists of trash mobs and bursting down your enemies. The majority of PvE is not raids, not high lvl fractals.
> > >
> > > So in most of the PvE content of this game power builds have an advantage. It's only high level niche content that has the problem that the meta builds for it consist out of condition builds, because those builds favour longer fights.
> > >
> > > What's the answer to that? Simply let raid bosses and bosses in higher fractals use condi cleanse every now and then. It's the easiest way of fixing that problem, it can also be balanced very easily.
> > >
> > > And to your solution. This would require Anet to rework every single NPC healthpool and armor type, every event, dungeon, raid, trash mob, story mission, every armor and weapon stat, every single skill in the game, most of the spec traits. And then we would still not know if it would really work or if it would be a balancing nightmare.
> > > We both know that this complete rework won't happen in the lifespan of this game.
> >
> > Except they don't. Condi does extremely well even against _trash mobs while leveling_, because even a few seconds is usually enough to give condi the advantage. If there's any solution warranted here whatsoever, which I'm not convinced there is, it's to have more high-armored mobs.
> >
> > Have you leveled with a condi spec vs a direct spec lately?
>
> Yes, I leveled with a condi spec, it was easier true. But I also recently leveled with a mount and one hitted everything so we shouldn't jump to conclusions.
>
> I ususally play condition Soulbeast and I use pets that can spam AoE conditions pretty well. I have no problems against several enemies in PoF. Game feels relatively smooth, except when several waves of enemies spawn close to after each other because I wiped the first waves so fast. Then I can get problems.
> I also played with a Holosmith after I got a bit tired of my ranger. And it was a complete new game feeling. It felt so smooth, I could just kill dozens of mobs with 3 skills within 3-4 seconds. I had tons of CC, stability, quickness, might, blocks and tons and tons of instant dmg.
>
> I was at the point that I really wanted to switch my main to Holosmith, so I took him to the DPS Golem. And yeah, it dealt only like 60-70% of the dmg. This doesn't mean that Soulbeast is better than Holosmith, it just means that my Soulbeast deals more dmg on that golem during 5 minutes. In the open world it's another story.
Do you happen to know which golem it was and what its armor rating was? It's also worth noting that Holosmith is an outlier as power specs go. If the golem had very high toughness, though, it would appropriate for your Holo build to be outdone by your Soulbeast build. I know there are several and I think they have different armor ratings, though I could be wrong.
I need to do a few more tests on there myself.
The average golem has a middling armor rating, so I would expect condi damage to deal around 10-15% more after DPS stabilizes for a few seconds.
-
> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > > > @saerni.2584 said:
> > > > > > > Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > ****How it actually should work:****
> > > > > > **low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
> > > > > > **medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
> > > > > > **high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
> > > > > >
> > > > > > The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > I love how people cry everytime they have to "waste" skill slots for that "crap condi cleanse". I don't know if you ever noticed that, but you waste tons of skills already to midigate power dmg. Skills that grant protection, blocks, invulnerability, reflects, whatever. But you only complain about "condi cleanse crap" Why? Because in your opinion power dmg is the only "real" dmg worth protecting against?
> > > > >
> > > > > This is a Role Playing Game. You have to choose one single specific role and then play this role. And since we're in an Massively Multiplayer Online Game you can invite other people into your party if you need another role.
> > > > >
> > > > > There is no role/class/spec in this game that has tons of health and tons of thoughness, perma evade and blocks, that can spam resistance and cleanse and transfer conditions, that can dish out tons of power dmg, while stacking up multiple conditions, heal its allies and itself while keeping control of the enemies around.
> > > > >
> > > > > If you specialize in having good defense against power dmg ( toughness, blocks, endurance reg, invulnerability, protection) you have to make sacrifices, same for conditions (resistance, cleanse, transfers, vitality). And btw. Most boons/skills that immensely help against power builds help at least a good bit against condition builds as well because conditions need to be applied first, whereas "condi crap"-defence is mostly only working against conditions.
> > > >
> > > > You appear to not even be comprehending what this discussion is about.
> > >
> > > I get it.
> > > You complain about condi dmg being too strong (And I told you how it is balanced)
> > > You complain about needing to waste skills to protect against conditions (And I told you that you need that for power dmg too)
> > > You complain about the core design intend behind condition and power dmg
> > >
> > > And you claim the only solution would be to make the two dmg types distinct through armor type and how armor affects them. Which is in no way better than make the distinction through a ramp up time. Because you still have parts of the game where your dmg type is inferior to the other.
> > >
> > > You on the other hand have never even tried to come up with any argument against mine, you simply tell me it's all wrong and that I just don't get it.
> >
> > The argument was my original post. You're the one disagreeing with me with insufficient reasoning. Balancing with the expectation that condition damage should always outperform direct damage after a certain period of time is silly. If you look at damage benchmarks, you'll see that condition damage is almost universally superior in PvE. The reason why is because Anet have it in their heads that condition damage is "balanced" if it's weaker for the first few seconds and stronger after ramp up, but PvE univerally consists of longer fights. Moreover, this is in complete contradiction to how conditions were designed - which was as a tool to get around high passive defense.
> >
> > They were not designed like DoTs in other games. They were designed with relatively short durations (in most cases) that were stackable with the benefit of bypassing the target's armor, and it was usually intended to hybridize with direct damage rather than replacing it. Condi cleanse & immunity proliferated throughout the game more recently as a way to give players the ability to deal with the over-the-top damage they were receiving from conditions. But this is cludgy, because players have to build their kits around it, removing all sorts of customization options.
> >
> > It doesn't make any sense. If the sole important balancer is time in a fight, there will never be balance. Condition will always over-perform in PvE, or Direct damage will always over-perform in PvP. The only sensible solution is to narrow the damage gap between direct and condition damage, allow condition damage to "burst" to an extent with short durations, and balance the two damage types around armor rating, with low armor always favoring direct damage - even over time, and high armor always favoring condition damage. This _is a better solution_ than ramp-up time, because it's more varied within and between gameplay modes.
> >
> > Arguing otherwise just makes no sense whatsoever.
>
>
> What? You do need to realize something. The majority of PvE content consists of trash mobs and bursting down your enemies. The majority of PvE is not raids, not high lvl fractals.
>
> So in most of the PvE content of this game power builds have an advantage. It's only high level niche content that has the problem that the meta builds for it consist out of condition builds, because those builds favour longer fights.
>
> What's the answer to that? Simply let raid bosses and bosses in higher fractals use condi cleanse every now and then. It's the easiest way of fixing that problem, it can also be balanced very easily.
>
> And to your solution. This would require Anet to rework every single NPC healthpool and armor type, every event, dungeon, raid, trash mob, story mission, every armor and weapon stat, every single skill in the game, most of the spec traits. And then we would still not know if it would really work or if it would be a balancing nightmare.
> We both know that this complete rework won't happen in the lifespan of this game.
Except they don't. Condi does extremely well even against _trash mobs while leveling_, because even a few seconds is usually enough to give condi the advantage. If there's any solution warranted here whatsoever, which I'm not convinced there is, it's to have more high-armored mobs.
Have you leveled with a condi spec vs a direct spec lately?
-
> @IndigoSundown.5419 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @IndigoSundown.5419 said:
> > > I question just how many condition builds the OP has played. Condi burst is not available to every condition build, only to some. Condi burst is indeed an issue, but an issue with specific builds does not call for an overall nerf of a damage type. Rather than an overall nerf, what needs to happen is adjustments to both the amount of stacks and the variety of conditions that certain builds can apply. Dealing with specific high-performing builds on certain professions is what's called for, not throwing the baby out with the bath water.
> >
> > It affects some skills more than others, but condition damage is generally over-tuned because they are using a bad balancing paradigm, and they need to change it. I'm not sure how I can make it more clear. Condition damage should not outdps direct damage in a fight with a low-armor target no matter how long the fight lasts. The fact that it routinely does is all the evidence we need to conclude that conditions are (generally speaking) overpowered.
> >
> > Here's a rundown of how it currently works (obviously, there's significant variation based on specific builds, this constitutes a very rough average across professions)
> > low armor - direct starts strong, but condi takes over after a few seconds and stabilizes with condi being about 10% stronger
> > medium armor - they start kind of even, but after a few seconds they stabilize with condi being about 25% stronger
> > high armor - condi dominates pretty much right away, stabilizing at 40+% of DPS
> >
> > Here's a rundown of how it should work
> > low armor - direct starts off really strong, and stabilizes around 10% higher than condi DPS.
> > medium armor - direct starts off pretty strong, but they stabilize with condi being about 10% higher
> > high armor - they start off fairly even, but condi quickly passes direct and stabilizes at around 30% higher
> >
> > And, again, we have too much immunity & cleansing popping up everywhere in the game as a result of over-tuned condition damage. This all needs to be peeled back and moderated better.
>
> Unless you can prove to ANet (which should also convince me) that the overall state of conditions damage is as you say, you will not see broad, sweeping changes. At the moment I'm not convinced. Anecdotes such as the above "rundowns" don't cut it, and neither does referring to the numbers obtained on target dummies with full raid buffs.
>
> I agree with you, though, that there is too much in the game. However, I believe there is too much everything, including things which both buff and counter direct damage.
Unfortunately, Arenanet isn't listening to me. It's too bad, because if I was put in charge of game balance i have no doubt I could make substantial improvements in about a hundred different areas that are getting either no attention or the wrong type of attention currently.
I don't disagree that the game is too dominated by buff-type effects in more areas than just cleansing and immunity. They've made the gameplay too complex (in a bad way) to be properly handled by the skill/trait system we have, frankly.
-
> @saerni.2584 said:
> A low cleanse low armor target should die quickly regardless if active mitigation is being used (evade and block especially).
>
> For a low armor low cleanse target I see no problem with condi outdoing power in the long term (although both would likely be effective after active mitigation is exhausted).
I don't know why you see no problem with it, since that basically means that conditions are _always_ more meta than direct damage and toughness is always more or less useless as an attribute. Cleanse should be way less of a thing than it is in general. This is actually how the original game was designed, and they borked it all up when they did all that condition reworking a couple of years back.
You cannot balance direct damage vs condition damage solely around fight duration when one game mode (the one they balance around) is dominated by short fight durations and the other (the one most players care about) is dominated by long fight duration. It's not rocket science, which is why it wasn't how the original game was designed. It's just that we now have a balance team that doesn't know what they're doing.
-
> @IndigoSundown.5419 said:
> I question just how many condition builds the OP has played. Condi burst is not available to every condition build, only to some. Condi burst is indeed an issue, but an issue with specific builds does not call for an overall nerf of a damage type. Rather than an overall nerf, what needs to happen is adjustments to both the amount of stacks and the variety of conditions that certain builds can apply. Dealing with specific high-performing builds on certain professions is what's called for, not throwing the baby out with the bath water.
It affects some skills more than others, but condition damage is generally over-tuned because they are using a bad balancing paradigm, and they need to change it. I'm not sure how I can make it more clear. Condition damage should not outdps direct damage in a fight with a low-armor target no matter how long the fight lasts. The fact that it routinely does is all the evidence we need to conclude that conditions are (generally speaking) overpowered.
Here's a rundown of how it currently works (obviously, there's significant variation based on specific builds, this constitutes a very rough average across professions)
low armor - direct starts strong, but condi takes over after a few seconds and stabilizes with condi being about 10% stronger
medium armor - they start kind of even, but after a few seconds they stabilize with condi being about 25% stronger
high armor - condi dominates pretty much right away, stabilizing at 40+% of DPS
Here's a rundown of how it should work
low armor - direct starts off really strong, and stabilizes around 10% higher than condi DPS.
medium armor - direct starts off pretty strong, but they stabilize with condi being about 10% higher
high armor - they start off fairly even, but condi quickly passes direct and stabilizes at around 30% higher
And, again, we have too much immunity & cleansing popping up everywhere in the game as a result of over-tuned condition damage. This all needs to be peeled back and moderated better.
-
> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > > > @saerni.2584 said:
> > > > > Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
> > > > >
> > > > > Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
> > > >
> > > > ****How it actually should work:****
> > > > **low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
> > > > **medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
> > > > **high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
> > > >
> > > > The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
> > >
> > >
> > > I love how people cry everytime they have to "waste" skill slots for that "crap condi cleanse". I don't know if you ever noticed that, but you waste tons of skills already to midigate power dmg. Skills that grant protection, blocks, invulnerability, reflects, whatever. But you only complain about "condi cleanse crap" Why? Because in your opinion power dmg is the only "real" dmg worth protecting against?
> > >
> > > This is a Role Playing Game. You have to choose one single specific role and then play this role. And since we're in an Massively Multiplayer Online Game you can invite other people into your party if you need another role.
> > >
> > > There is no role/class/spec in this game that has tons of health and tons of thoughness, perma evade and blocks, that can spam resistance and cleanse and transfer conditions, that can dish out tons of power dmg, while stacking up multiple conditions, heal its allies and itself while keeping control of the enemies around.
> > >
> > > If you specialize in having good defense against power dmg ( toughness, blocks, endurance reg, invulnerability, protection) you have to make sacrifices, same for conditions (resistance, cleanse, transfers, vitality). And btw. Most boons/skills that immensely help against power builds help at least a good bit against condition builds as well because conditions need to be applied first, whereas "condi crap"-defence is mostly only working against conditions.
> >
> > You appear to not even be comprehending what this discussion is about.
>
> I get it.
> You complain about condi dmg being too strong (And I told you how it is balanced)
> You complain about needing to waste skills to protect against conditions (And I told you that you need that for power dmg too)
> You complain about the core design intend behind condition and power dmg
>
> And you claim the only solution would be to make the two dmg types distinct through armor type and how armor affects them. Which is in no way better than make the distinction through a ramp up time. Because you still have parts of the game where your dmg type is inferior to the other.
>
> You on the other hand have never even tried to come up with any argument against mine, you simply tell me it's all wrong and that I just don't get it.
The argument was my original post. You're the one disagreeing with me with insufficient reasoning. Balancing with the expectation that condition damage should always outperform direct damage after a certain period of time is silly. If you look at damage benchmarks, you'll see that condition damage is almost universally superior in PvE. The reason why is because Anet have it in their heads that condition damage is "balanced" if it's weaker for the first few seconds and stronger after ramp up, but PvE univerally consists of longer fights. Moreover, this is in complete contradiction to how conditions were designed - which was as a tool to get around high passive defense.
They were not designed like DoTs in other games. They were designed with relatively short durations (in most cases) that were stackable with the benefit of bypassing the target's armor, and it was usually intended to hybridize with direct damage rather than replacing it. Condi cleanse & immunity proliferated throughout the game more recently as a way to give players the ability to deal with the over-the-top damage they were receiving from conditions. But this is cludgy, because players have to build their kits around it, removing all sorts of customization options.
It doesn't make any sense. If the sole important balancer is time in a fight, there will never be balance. Condition will always over-perform in PvE, or Direct damage will always over-perform in PvP. The only sensible solution is to narrow the damage gap between direct and condition damage, allow condition damage to "burst" to an extent with short durations, and balance the two damage types around armor rating, with low armor always favoring direct damage - even over time, and high armor always favoring condition damage. This _is a better solution_ than ramp-up time, because it's more varied within and between gameplay modes.
Arguing otherwise just makes no sense whatsoever.
-
> @saerni.2584 said:
> You misunderstand me Einlanzer.
>
> Of course armor should change those numbers. Just as more or less cleanse can change those numbers.
>
> I’m merely pointing out that in order to reduce the burst nature of conditions you need to eliminate the reason why burst is necessary: that is the abundance of cleanse.
>
> I don’t mean my numbers as serious suggestions. A condition user can expect to do more or less damage based on cleanses. Just as a power user can expect differences depending on armor. Ignoring that cleanse/armor adjusts the DPS a condition build should ramp up to higher DPS later. A power build should front load their damage.
>
> That said, a low cleanse target may die faster to a condition build (be burst down) than to a power build (assuming it has power damage mitigation). Or, a high cleanse target may take less damage even after a long period of time compared to a power build (assuming low armor).
>
> But, assuming equal armor and cleanse the short term game should power focused and the long term game condition focused.
Yes, I more or less agree. However, my argument is that cleanses should be less abundant, and that condition damage should be downtuned. This would create better balance between the two, where the average glass target would be more susceptible to direct damage even over the long term. It is my adamant opinion that the paradigm of "conditions should always do more if you assume x length of time" is folly. Maybe if you assume a mid-high range armor value, but not otherwise.
I also will restate my view here that "condi burst" is a red herring. Condi should be burstable to an extent, it just shouldn't result in the high short term damage it does. But, the problem is not the "burst" (as in the rapid fire succession of condition-landing), it's the tuning on the damage ticks. Immunity and cleansing mechanics are too prolific in the game, and too necessary to counter conditions.
-
> @Adenin.5973 said:
> > @Einlanzer.1627 said:
> > > @saerni.2584 said:
> > > Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
> > >
> > > Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
> >
> > ****How it actually should work:****
> > **low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
> > **medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
> > **high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
> >
> > The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
>
>
> I love how people cry everytime they have to "waste" skill slots for that "crap condi cleanse". I don't know if you ever noticed that, but you waste tons of skills already to midigate power dmg. Skills that grant protection, blocks, invulnerability, reflects, whatever. But you only complain about "condi cleanse crap" Why? Because in your opinion power dmg is the only "real" dmg worth protecting against?
>
> This is a Role Playing Game. You have to choose one single specific role and then play this role. And since we're in an Massively Multiplayer Online Game you can invite other people into your party if you need another role.
>
> There is no role/class/spec in this game that has tons of health and tons of thoughness, perma evade and blocks, that can spam resistance and cleanse and transfer conditions, that can dish out tons of power dmg, while stacking up multiple conditions, heal its allies and itself while keeping control of the enemies around.
>
> If you specialize in having good defense against power dmg ( toughness, blocks, endurance reg, invulnerability, protection) you have to make sacrifices, same for conditions (resistance, cleanse, transfers, vitality). And btw. Most boons/skills that immensely help against power builds help at least a good bit against condition builds as well because conditions need to be applied first, whereas "condi crap"-defence is mostly only working against conditions.
You appear to not even be comprehending what this discussion is about.
-
> @"Arricson Krei.9560" said:
> I think the dps of conditions needs to decrease, durations need a very substantial increase, and application frequency needs to go up. Condis began going in the wrong direction as soon as skills applied multiple stacks for only a few seconds... that's moving closer to burst dps instead of the sustained dps that condis were designed for. This means that necro scepter AA should be applying 15s bleeds and non-AA skills like Necro scepter 2 could still apply >1 stack for 20s or so. I also think power scaling on condi weapons should increase and condis should be delivered from many more skills, specifically from power-based weapons.
>
> Like Ubi.4136 said above, condi damage should not be threatening within the first 3 seconds of combat (despite 3 seconds is kind of an arbitrary number). Condis should ramp up overtime. If players decide to clear condis at an early stage, then they will suffer for it later on. If they wait until the condis are already stacked and space out their clears, then they _should_ be able to deal with condis effectively while slowly losing health overtime. Condi clears should be on short cooldown if they clear 1-2 condis and long cooldown if they clear >5 condis or so. Take Smite Conditions and Contemplation of Purity, for example. Although Smite Conditions would be a little too frequent if these ideas were to go through. Effects that clear condis every interval would have to be looked at too.
>
> Condi damage cannot "ramp" if it peaks within mere seconds and drastically falls off shortly after. It should be a slow and steady increase. One problem is that some of the hardest hitting condi skills activate instantly _and_ apply multiple conditions or apply multiple conditions in one packet (e.g. "burst" condi). Like with power-based skills, some of the hardest hitting skills are channeled (hundred blades) or situational (backstab). I think in order for condi damage to appropriately ramp, more skills with cast times need to apply long duration conditions that individually (i.e. at one stack) deals insignificant damage. Condis will ramp via skills that have casting times and therefore cannot "burst" because condition application is soft-time-gated behind casting times.
I think you're diagnosing the problem correctly, but I have a different view of the solution. I think it's fine if condi apexes at 6 seconds, because that means it's balanced in both PvP and PvE. Making it substantially longer will really gimp it in PvP. Going in the opposite direction will overpower it even more in PvE. Since the hardest fights will always be longer fights, balancing it in this way will always give the overall advantage to condition damage over direct damage.
That's why the primary balancing mechanic has to be armor, unless they are planning to make armor start mitigating condition damage, which I highly doubt. Condition damage should peak at 5-6 seconds into the fight, but it shouldn't automatically be outdamaging direct damage at that point - whether it does or not should largely depend on the target's armor value. At mid-range armor values, it should start slightly outdamaging direct damage at around the 6 second mark. At low armor values, it should never overtake direct damage. At high armor values, it should be significantly outdamaging direct damage by 3 seconds in.
To me, the fact that it doesn't already work this way (in most cases) is a very unambiguous demonstration of how condition damage is overtuned.
-
The combination of how many attribute combo options we have and their being fixed on (non-legendary) gear is become more and more problematic. It's overwhelming deciding what to collect vs forego, and it discourages experimentation.
I propose that every attribute prefix be grouped into different roles based on their major attribute(s) (options would also be somewhat limited based on gear level in the same way they are now). The idea of groupings is pretty flexible, so Anet can do it how they see fit, but here's an example:
Power - Berseker, Soldier, Zealot, Forsaken, Valkyrie, Captain
Precision - Captain, Rampager, Assassin
Toughness - Knight, Cavalier, Nomad, Settler
Power/Precision - Commander, Marauder
Power/Toughness - Vigilant, Crusader
Then, allow any piece of gear to freely change between the different attribute combos that are part of that group when outside of combat. Legendaries would retain the ability to switch between the groups in addition to the individual prefixes.
Future attribute combinations could be introduced through an unlocking system. Once you obtain a piece of gear with the new set of attributes, it is unlocked for any existing gear you have with that _role and slot_.
-
> @saerni.2584 said:
> Nerf abundant cleanse, increase condi durations, decrease application rates. Fights should be power favored (similar gear) under 25 seconds. At that point they should be even. At 35+ the condition damage should begin to overwhelm the power damage significantly.
>
> Nerf resistance to 33% reduction on incoming condition duration and 33% reduction in condition based damage. No immunity.
>
>
Disagree. First, those time stamps are completely arbitrary and will affect PvE and PvP very differently. Second, Power and condition damage will never be balanced as long as fight duration is the main metric used to balance them (it's apparently Anet's design paradigm, but it's wrong-headed). It can be secondary, but the primary should be the armor of the target, since the main purpose of condition damage is to bypass armor.
****How it actually should work:****
**low armor** - burst has advantage right out of the gate and never loses it, no matter how long the fight lasts
**medium armor** - burst has advantage at first, but it swings in favor of condi past a certain point (probably about 5-10 seconds)
**high armor** - condi has advantage from the getgo and never loses it (time is inconsequential, since it shouldn't be possible to take down a high-armor mob/player in under 5 seconds)
The problem with the above _right now_ is that condi cleanse, resistance, and immunity have become too prolific (and too mandatory) as a result of condition damage being overpowered for too long. All of this also makes toughness undervalued. Sources of these need to be scaled back so that condi damage can be re-tuned to the above paradigm, which would _also_ be an indirect and badly needed buff for Toughness and would bring a lot of build flexibility back into the game as people won't be so dependent on running anti-condi crap in their kits.
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> @takatsu.9416 said:
> Agree with those who think condi is imbalanced vs defense or power. This vipers stat builds is also making imbalanced because it's giving those condi pumping skills direct damage as well, giving a kind of burst of both damage type. We are so neck deep in this mess that I think we should really get a default buff to toughness and vitality at least in pvp and wvw.
>
> Lowering damage output will further cause imbalance because each class and elite specs currently are imbalanced. Take the weaver sword for example. There are class balances where some things are simply not doing enough damage on power or condi at its baseline. Reducing output will cause a potentially greater discrepancy, when it isn't enough to overcome anything already. Also reducing damage output if it affects pve will make us all unable to deal with the increasingly difficult pve content. I think the only way Anet has given itself is just buffing creep...
Yeah, I decided not to go into this in my original post, but part of the problem is that condi builds are more weighted toward Malice than burst builds are weighted toward Power. This effectively translates into condition builds having a lot more flexibility than burst builds do - they can optimize too well with Viper, or they can pick up utility or defense stats without sacrificing nearly as much damage, which is especially a problem since direct damage have to stay engaged and therefore arguably need better defense than condition builds.
The problem with buffing Toughness and Vitality is that will impact direct damage more than it impacts condition damage, and that's the opposite of what needs to happen. I think the only real solution is to just go through every class and nerf various sources of condition damage. There are some that are fine - someone mentioned Thief SB above, and that's hardly overpowered as a condition weapon - but more of them are OP than are not. However, I would not be opposed to a buff to base health and would actually make the case that it would benefit PvE as well.
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I accidentally posted this on the general profession board when I meant to post it here, but it's gotten a bit of good feedback so I wanted to go ahead and post it here so it would be more visible.
The legend swapping feature is thematically a bit weird and mechanically doesn't work as well as it should. This is mostly because each legend operates within a specific role, so swapping between them often doesn't make a lot of sense except as a way to restore energy, which just feels forced and awkward. Additionally, it leaves an absence of design space for more generic skill types that would fit the Revenant theme well and results in an overall lack of skill choice and customization options for Revenants, which is a problem that will only get worse.
What would a smarter design be? How about this - add 10-16 new skills that are not associated with any legend, and allow Revenants to drop one of their equipped legends and swap into a non-legend mode. When not channeling a legend, your "generic" skills can be customized on your skill bar in the same way other classes can. When you invoke your equipped legend, these customized skills are replaced by the fixed ones associated with that legend. This would allow you to build a customized loadout that synergizes with whatever legend you have equipped based on the role you want to play, and would make a lot of Revenant choices a lot more interesting.
Conceptually, at least, I think that would make a lot more sense than the current design, and, IMO, is how it should have been designed from the start. This is also how Rytlock works - he goes into and out of the Brill legend instead of swapping between two legends and staying in one or the other at all times.
Most importantly, it would give Revs much greater build depth, which is where they are most lacking. It would probably also justify the removal of weapon swapping - especially if they allowed for not invoking while still having two legend equipped.****
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Ah, gee.... let me think....
New WVW maps?
New Guild content?
New Races?
A more complete & polished Revenant?
New weapon types?
New dungeons?
You know, all the things they should have done and didn't the last two expansions. I mean, I know they don't have unlimited resources, and I love the content we did get in PoF, but sheesh - they do take too long to release too little. PoF didn't even really have more content than HoT, despite Mo's claim in the hype trailer.
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> @Kirin.7306 said:
> I like to play as a shortbow thief, please don't nerf me because some OP class can cover the world in AoE's.
The shortbow is a very weak weapon that needs buffs independently of any changes that are made to condis - you can't not make needed systemic changes because you're worried about how it may impact one weapon on one class - that's what ongoing balance patches are for.
"Condi Burst"
in Guild Wars 2 Discussion
Posted
> @Panda.1967 said:
> > @Adenin.5973 said:
> > > @Panda.1967 said:
> > > To be perfectly honest, i think a lot of the problem with condi truthfully stems from the existence of Vipers, Destroyers, Sinister, and Rampager stat sets... They allow condi builds to get high power damage alongside high condi damage. Other than Celestial, any statset that gives Power should never give Condi damage, and any statset that does Condi damage should never give Power. There isn't a single pure Condi DPS stat set that doesn't give Power, in fact they all give Power & Precision even...
> > >
> > > This means that every Condi build either A ) has high direct damage as well or B ) has high defensive or support stats. Usually high Power since it allows them to do heavy direct damage alongside high Condition damage. It creates an imbalance that favors Condi builds. Power builds just can't compete, even though Condi weapons generally have lower base direct damage.
> > >
> > > One of the ANet devs gave an example before to explain why Conditions are as strong as they are... but they didn't really paint an accurate picture of what we actually have. Their example:
> > > > Given the choice between an attack that does 1000 damage over 10 seconds and an attack that does 1000 damage instantly, you will always take the instant damage.
> > > However, in GW2 what we actually have looks more like this:
> > > > Given the choice between an attack that does 1000 damage instantly and an attack that does 500 instantly plus 1000 damage over 3 seconds, you will always take the later.
> > >
> > > If stat sets that gave both Condi damage and Power didn't exist then the choice to build Condi would result in minimal direct damage in exchange for high condition damage, allowing both to actually be balanced. Instead we have pure power and hybrid power/condi DPS stat sets... and the hybrid sets give just as much direct damage as the pure power sets.
> >
> > I've got some numbers about vipers gear vs berserkers gear (On a Ranger). I've used full ascended gear, no runes, no sigills, no traits, no food or other buffs.
> > I then looked at the tooltip dmg of Axe MH, since Anet claims that it's a hybrid weapon and I looked at one skill from Greatsword.
> >
> > With full Vipers gear we get:
> > Power: 2173, Crit-Chance: 34% ,Crit dmg: 150%
> > Condition dmg: 1173, Condition duration: 42%
> > Wintersbite dmg: 1013 + 7sec 1970 bleeding dmg
> > Maul dmg: 1559
> >
> > With full Berserkers gear we get:
> > Power: 2381, Crit-Chance: 50% ,Crit dmg: 214%
> > Condition dmg: 0, Condition duration: 0%
> > Wintersbite dmg: 1110 + 5sec 330 bleeding dmg
> > Maul dmg: 1710
> >
> > **Which means we get with vipers gear on the different skills, compared to berserkers gear following numbers:**
> > Wintersbite: 9% less direct dmg, 596% more bleeding dmg, total of 1543 dmg (207%) more than with berserkers
> > Maul: 9% less direct dmg, total of 151 dmg (9%) less than with berserkers
> >
> > Seeing that, I can't argue that vipers gear seems somewhat overpowered compared with berserkers gear.
> >
> > _Edit: What we of course don't see here is the effect of the increased crit chance and the increased critical damage, which should help berserkers quite a bit._
> >
> > Used tool:
> > http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/
>
> A quick comparison of average crit values using your numbers. (Damage x crit mult) / crit chance
> This gives an average crit value per hit, so...
>
> Viper
> Wintersbite: +517 damage
> Maul: +795 damage
>
> Berserker
> Wintersbite: +1188 damage
> Maul: +1830 damage
>
> This puts total numbers up at:
> Wintersbite: 1530 + 7sec 1970 bleeding dmg (Viper) vs 2298 + 5sec 330 bleeding dmg (Berserker)
> Maul: 2354 (Viper) vs 3540 (Berserker)
>
> Wintersbite +33% damage Viper's
> Maul +50% damage Berserker
>
> Overall, with crit factored in they even out, especially when you factor in armor. Dealing slightly less direct damage in exchange for nearly 6x condition damage, is ultimately the preferable option. Especially when you consider the fact that you can stack the condition damage, turning the slight damage bonus of a power build per hit into nothing. Not to mention a condi build can get extra condition stacks from traits and runes with crits.
>
> The formulas and damage of Condi is actually quite well balanced, it's only thrown off balance by the fact that hybrid stat sets allow for both to reach high levels. Honestly Rampager's is the only hybrid pure DPS set that is remotely balanced since both Power and Condi are it's minor stats, and it has no Ferocity. The Condi equivalent to Berserker should give Condi, Expertise, Precision. Lower initial damage, but easier to stack due to longer durations allowing it to eventually surpass power. If they remove the hybrid sets and replace them with proper condi sets, we'd actually see a more balanced playing field between the two.
Yes and no. The formulas and damage of condi are not well balanced at all, which his example plainly demonstrates. What you are describing is a product of the phenomenon that condition damage alone gives condition builds what it takes power, precision, and ferocity combined to give to direct damage builds. So, when you put power, precision, and expertise together with the major of condition damage, you end up with a massively over-tuned offense. Direct damage builds have no comparable option. That _is_ a problem with the underlying formulas and not just what stats happen to be available on gear.
Dire may produce damage numbers more in line with the berserker set, but then you have a lot of extra defense. If anything, direct damage builds should get free defensive stats since they require you to stay engaged with your target.
This example just exposes how horrendously broken condition damage actually is in the game.