Why Build diversity feels so bad

[Gwaihir.1745]

Yeah guard weps outside of fb are so bad now they aren't even worth mentioning in this post.

[Kuma.1503]

> @"felix.2386" said:

> i like how u skipped warrior because everysingle thing about warrior other then greatsword,shield,dagger are completely garbage

> basically 4/5 weapons are garbage

> other word, warrior has more trash weapon then all other classes' weapon combined including good weapons.

 

I skipped warrior because I have single digit hours played on it :^)

[Swagger.1459]

@"JusticeRetroHunter.7684"

 

Weapons are a very interesting topic for me. Now I don’t fully agree with the assessments of the OP, but I’m definitely interested to know more about how exactly you would apply science to fix underperforming weapon skills so we can improve build diversity in pvp modes! What specifics can you share?

 

Edit- Let’s go down the line here... Can you please identify the lesser used and underperforming weapons and give some recommendations as to what should be improved so they are more widely used in the various profession builds? Because obviously the more viable weapons a profession has access to the more build diversity increases.

 

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Weapon

[felix.2386]

why diversity is so bad? because thief that deletes anything trying to be a ganker, and holo excist and deletes everyone else

[Anomaly.7612]

> @"Dantheman.3589" said:

> Your thief section is way off my friend. A short analysis of what they’ve done to thief weapons recently is summarized as neutering front loaded damage but keeping good back loaded damage on everything but stealth attack skills. This is maybe the number one reason why dp sees play because all it needs for front loaded damage is the stealth attack meanwhile s/d needs auto damage and larcenous etc to be good but only larcenous is decent and even then it’s only decent while autos are kitten poor.

>

> Looking at your post you described staff as bad, but what if I told you staff is one of the least nerfed? Would you be shocked, or would u realize it’s just not seem becuz they put a bad taste on it- basically the stealth attack is useless and the staff2 combo is fairly weak as well as mug, so the deadly arts staff suffers, but vault is insanely good rn. Basically acro was neutered so vault spam is out the door and that’s the only reason staff is bad.

>

> Looking at the main purpose of your post though- initiative changes are what’s killing the weapon sets themselves- the main victims are actually S/p with it’s huge initiative cost for the only actually useful thing in the kit. Most would say this isn’t viable, but are only partially correct becuz s/p damage and stun are 1 thing that can unstale this boring meta- so it’s actually really good just unstable becuz of cost, but reduce it back to normal and it’ll be a meta contender for sure. Rifle has been completely neutered as well but this was an over time change literally meant to neuter it- which I hate, it is only still viable in the hands of a good deadeye who spams rifle 2, which sucks but can unstale the meta at least in ranked

>

> There’s my full thief weapon analysis- hope it helps

 

Except backstab hits for an average of like 4.5-4.8K while running zerker/divinity AND has a cooldown AND positional requirements and is easily mitigated by a block or evade. One block or evade or blind or just running back and forth to prohibit them from getting behind you and no more backstab. The range on it is so bad too. Literally have to be up the person's ass to make contact It's so much easier to pull off 4.5-5K in front loaded damage on so many other classes that it's just a joke to bring backstab up imo.

[Anomaly.7612]

> @"felix.2386" said:

> why diversity is so bad? because thief that deletes anything trying to be a ganker, and holo excist and deletes everyone else

 

Dude what is your personal beef with thief? All you do is talk shit on thief yet don't back to what exactly they're doing that's so much more OP than other classes. Do you main a mesmer or something yet use the thief icon as your avatar to seem like a thief main? Explain your logic.

[Psycoprophet.8107]

> @"Kuma.1503" said:

> > @"felix.2386" said:

> > i like how u skipped warrior because everysingle thing about warrior other then greatsword,shield,dagger are completely garbage

> > basically 4/5 weapons are garbage

> > other word, warrior has more trash weapon then all other classes' weapon combined including good weapons.

>

> I skipped warrior because I have single digit hours played on it :^)

 

No one came blame u for that haha

[felix.2386]

> @"Anomaly.7612" said:

> > @"felix.2386" said:

> > why diversity is so bad? because thief that deletes anything trying to be a ganker, and holo excist and deletes everyone else

>

> Dude what is your personal beef with thief? All you do is talk kitten on thief yet don't back to what exactly they're doing that's so much more OP than other classes. Do you main a mesmer or something yet use the thief icon as your avatar to seem like a thief main? Explain your logic.

 

? my personally beef? yes i got beef after playing it myself in plat 2 and carried games, while the other build is holo, the rest of the builds are so limited and i dropped rating by playing them.

 

i actually care about general balance, sorry. if u actually see my post history, you would see i can talked about full counter OP right before healbreaker became a thing. because that's how i feel about full counter for it being completely busted.

 

i literally feel unfair for the other classes/builds how busted these two can be

and that it saddens me when 80% of the "top" pvpers are playing these 2 classes in ranked if you actually pay attention. because only these two classes are relevant in ranked. oh and the 20% plays rev

[voltaicbore.8012]

I think the problem is too fundamental to fully address, although I'm a huge fan of ideas like what @"Jekkt.6045" mentioned in terms of baked-in tradeoffs.

 

I'd like to suggest that what we really want is every class to be more viable, which is different than "build diversity" in my opinion.

 

The best example of the difference between "wider viability" vs "build diversity" I can think of is BDO. In that game, you don't have to choose which parts of your kit to take with you into battle - _every single_ passive (the equivalent of GW2's traits) and _every single_ active (the equivalent of weapon skills and heal/utility/elite skills) is available to you at all times in every single fight. All you need to do is get the skill points to train those skills, and it's both possible and fairly commonplace to farm up enough skill points to fully train up everything in your class.

 

In this regard, BDO has absolutely zero build diversity. Ironically, this seems to make it easier for more classes to be viable in small scale pvp. Since the devs know anything they put into a class will be available to every single player running that class, all they need to do is make sure that each class' skill tree gets access to its own flavor of combat essentials (like stability, blocks, protection, cc, and a few big nuke moves). To differentiate classes, the devs do throw in a few tradeoffs; some classes have excellent aoe and stability and high HP, but move slowly, can't close gaps all that well, and are totally unable to touch targets at midrange and beyond. Some classic assassin specs have incredibly high single target burst damage, but depend on landing that burst from stealth, and can be severely punished for messing up due to very low HP and weak active defenses. So while there are differences (and many times these differences need to be tuned to buff garbage classes and nerf OP classes), as a general rule every single class has some way to achieve important combat goals. The BDO devs can (and have!) even gone so far as individually adjusting how much damage each class does against every other class, when re-tuning the tradeoffs isn't enough to balance small scale combat.

 

So the sense of variety in BDO comes not from having a wide range of builds at your disposal, but from the fact that your class (when learned properly) stands a fighting chance in most small-scale pvp situations, and you can use any of your moves in a variety of different ways depending on the situation. So while I do not have any real build options when playing a class, I can be reasonably assured that whatever class I play can participate effectively in most of the game. In other words, no build diversity, but pretty wide class viability.

 

GW2 is much harder to balance, in this regard. Since every class has skills and traits locked to various weapons and specializations, the devs do not have any assurance that every tweak or addition they make to a trait or skill will be reflected in players' builds. Instead they have to distribute enough desirable qualities across enough of the specializations, if they want to make sure each specialization can have some sort of role in pvp. However, achieving true equality of usefulness across every specialization would be kind of stupid, since there's only 12 things they can put into each specialization; if you always make sure to put roughly the same mount of offense, defense, utility, and cc/stability into each one, that's not a lot of space for differentiation. Each specialization would end up looking like just differently named versions of the same thing. They'd have to come up with a unique way to represent those combat essentials (so for instance one trait line might have resistance utilities on shorter cd, while another would give you access to a longer-cd pulsing resistance), and there's only so many ways to do that.

 

What ends up happening is the stale metas we have now. Players figure out, through theory as well as trial and error, which single combination of traits and skills allows each class to fulfill a useful role while also being well-rounded enough to deal with the widest variety of threats. So we essentially end up with one build for each class much like BDO does, but while BDO's single-build system gives your class **everything** at once, your single-build in GW2 only brings a **fraction** of all the cool things available to your class. That fraction-ing is a long-term problem, because some classes have trait lines that are packed with useful things for pvp, while other classes have a more scattered distribution and therefore struggle to patch together 3 traitlines and 15-ish abilities to cover their bases _and_ specialize enough at a particular role. Furthermore, once you've settled on a build and loadout, there's really not too many ways to play it. The apex of combat variety in GW2 is maybe baiting out cleanses and dodges with cover condi and weapon swap skill cancels, or finding stupid kiting spots or no port spots that are less about your class and more about having practiced enough to land non-obvious jumps.

 

So while adding greater complexity as @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" suggests is indeed the goal, I really don't see it happening due to GW2's fundamental design in forcing player choice. Unless they completely homogenize those choices (making them stupid and meaningless), it appears nearly impossible to me to make sure every trait line across every class has an equivalent share of essential pvp tools. I think the best we can hope for is what we've been getting all along, which is short-term changes to address short-term issues.

 

[Dantheman.3589]

> @"Anomaly.7612" said:

> > @"Dantheman.3589" said:

> > Your thief section is way off my friend. A short analysis of what they’ve done to thief weapons recently is summarized as neutering front loaded damage but keeping good back loaded damage on everything but stealth attack skills. This is maybe the number one reason why dp sees play because all it needs for front loaded damage is the stealth attack meanwhile s/d needs auto damage and larcenous etc to be good but only larcenous is decent and even then it’s only decent while autos are kitten poor.

> >

> > Looking at your post you described staff as bad, but what if I told you staff is one of the least nerfed? Would you be shocked, or would u realize it’s just not seem becuz they put a bad taste on it- basically the stealth attack is useless and the staff2 combo is fairly weak as well as mug, so the deadly arts staff suffers, but vault is insanely good rn. Basically acro was neutered so vault spam is out the door and that’s the only reason staff is bad.

> >

> > Looking at the main purpose of your post though- initiative changes are what’s killing the weapon sets themselves- the main victims are actually S/p with it’s huge initiative cost for the only actually useful thing in the kit. Most would say this isn’t viable, but are only partially correct becuz s/p damage and stun are 1 thing that can unstale this boring meta- so it’s actually really good just unstable becuz of cost, but reduce it back to normal and it’ll be a meta contender for sure. Rifle has been completely neutered as well but this was an over time change literally meant to neuter it- which I hate, it is only still viable in the hands of a good deadeye who spams rifle 2, which sucks but can unstale the meta at least in ranked

> >

> > There’s my full thief weapon analysis- hope it helps

>

> Except backstab hits for an average of like 4.5-4.8K while running zerker/divinity AND has a cooldown AND positional requirements and is easily mitigated by a block or evade. One block or evade or blind or just running back and forth to prohibit them from getting behind you and no more backstab. The range on it is so bad too. Literally have to be up the person's kitten to make contact It's so much easier to pull off 4.5-5K in front loaded damage on so many other classes that it's just a joke to bring backstab up imo.

 

I mean like true it’s not one shotting anyone, but it’s like a full larcenous combo and the only thing hitting harder is vault on thief- also on the meta dp build ppl just get by spamming backstab and heart seeker + shadow shot. My analysis is still completely correct.

I’m not gonna argue about how strong it is, as if actually argue that thief is insanely weak rn on average since it’s been gutted really hard in areas but it’s 100% true that weapons are being back loaded w/ a decent stealth skill as we can clearly see from dp and pd thief builds and other not as strong ones.

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

> @"Swagger.1459" said:

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684"

>

> Weapons are a very interesting topic for me. Now I don’t fully agree with the assessments of the OP, but I’m definitely interested to know more about how exactly you would apply science to fix underperforming weapon skills so we can improve build diversity in pvp modes! What specifics can you share?

>

> Edit- Let’s go down the line here... Can you please identify the lesser used and underperforming weapons and give some recommendations as to what should be improved so they are more widely used in the various profession builds? Because obviously the more viable weapons a profession has access to the more build diversity increases.

>

> https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Weapon

 

You need to understand something first. You want specifics without even knowing how the fundamental part of it is supposed to work. Did you even read any of my comments?

 

There are mechanics in the game that restrict diversity by simply being designed in such a way that restricts diversity. Before jumping the gun and applying Band-Aid fixes, you should really try and find the bullet in the bullet wound first.

 

Now some good examples have already been provided by others here that actually read the comments and understood what was being said. If you go back and read the comments and try to understand and follow the logic, which I'm really trying to explain as simply as possibly can, I list out these mechanics that restrict that diversity. I then proceed to explain other mechanics that should exist on skills, like synergies, and other things I didn't mention like usefulness and uniqueness. Another one of these things I mentioned being tradeoff's, which I elaborate on in great detail on why the current trade-offs in the game aren't actual functioning trade-offs.

 

I then provided examples of how such tradeoff's would work to self balance skills to prevent divergent, runaway behavior, and one of the commenters even gave a good example of skills that would work in this way.

 

So what you want now are even more examples because you are trying to find a hole in the logic that you clearly did not bother to read nor understand, which you even admitted to.

 

So please if you want this to be constructive, do me and everyone else here the courtesy to at least read and then understand the oppositions point before trying to attack it.

 

Anyway, since you want specifics here's some ideas.

 

Elementalist

1) Trait : Powerful Aura

Aura's you grant to yourself are shared with a nearby allies. When an Aura ends, inflict 5 vulnerability to nearby enemies.

If you are inflicted with 25 vulnerability when an aura ends, that aura is refreshed.

 

Staff Abilities (Water)

Staff 5 - Turn Vulnerability into Regeneration for allies and cleanse conditions. Enemies that are inside this field have vulnerability converted into healing for allies.

Staff 4 - Summon a field of Ice, chilling enemies. Allies with an aura are healed while inside this field.

Staff 3 - Place a geyser that resurrects fallen allies. Easily interrupted if you do not have a frost aura.

Staff 2 - Splash the ground to heal your allies, and detonating allies auras around you (blast finisher)

Staff 1 - Heal nearby allies for x healing, and inflict X stack of Vulnerability onto yourself for each ally you heal. At 25 stacks, Vulnerability is converted into a Frost Aura.

 

Now I came up with these very quickly and on the fly. I'm sure if one were to spend more time, u could come up with all sorts of ideas for the rest of the weaponset, and other traits that you could make synergy's for. I artificially gave it the theme with vulnerability since Anet had that idea in mind when it came to water traitline...so ya there you go just an example of how adding synergies, and implementing equilibrium mechanics (actual tradeoffs) can make an entire weapon useful and dynamic in build crafting without making it imbalanced.

 

The idea here is that

a) You want equilibrium mechanics...tradeoffs that prevent run-away divergent behavior.

b) Uniqueness and usefulness determines how interesting the actual mechanics of skills are and if they are good at achieving a goal, or number of goals in different ways.

c) Synergy...how many traits and abilities can synergize with not only other things but with itself....the more synergy you can create and uncover, the more interesting and complex the weapon becomes and in turn it becomes more useful.

d) Looking at just one weapon in the vacuum isn't enough to prove a point btw, since diversity is a global macroscopic thing that involves many things interacting with one another. If one were to create sleuths of useful weapons and abilities, then the number of builds that can be created that are useful increases, and due to the anthropic reasoning, outlier builds will statistically exist less often.

 

 

 

 

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

> @"voltaicbore.8012" said:

> I think the problem is too fundamental to fully address, although I'm a huge fan of ideas like what @"Jekkt.6045" mentioned in terms of baked-in tradeoffs.

>

> I'd like to suggest that what we really want is every class to be more viable, which is different than "build diversity" in my opinion.

>

> The best example of the difference between "wider viability" vs "build diversity" I can think of is BDO. In that game, you don't have to choose which parts of your kit to take with you into battle - _every single_ passive (the equivalent of GW2's traits) and every single active (the equivalent of weapon skills and heal/utility/elite skills) is available to you at all times in every single fight. All you need to do is get the skill points to train those skills, and it's both possible and fairly commonplace to farm up enough skill points to fully train up everything in your class.

>

> In this regard, BDO has absolutely zero build diversity. Ironically, this seems to make it easier for more classes to be viable in small scale pvp. Since the devs know anything they put into a class will be available to every single player running that class, all they need to do is make sure that each class' skill tree gets access to its own flavor of combat essentials (like stability, blocks, protection, cc, and a few big nuke moves). To differentiate classes, the devs do throw in a few tradeoffs; some classes have excellent aoe and stability and high HP, but move slowly, can't close gaps all that well, and are totally unable to touch targets at midrange and beyond. Some classic assassin specs have incredibly high single target burst damage, but depend on landing that burst from stealth, and can be severely punished for messing up due to very low HP and weak active defenses. So while there are differences (and many times these differences need to be tuned to buff garbage classes and nerf OP classes), as a general rule every single class has some way to achieve important combat goals. The BDO devs can (and have!) even gone so far as individually adjusting how much damage each class does against every other class, when re-tuning the tradeoffs isn't enough to balance small scale combat.

>

> So the sense of variety in BDO comes not from having a wide range of builds at your disposal, but from the fact that your class (when learned properly) stands a fighting chance in most small-scale pvp situations, and you can use any of your moves in a variety of different ways depending on the situation. So while I do not have any real build options when playing a class, I can be reasonably assured that whatever class I play can participate effectively in most of the game. In other words, no build diversity, but pretty wide class viability.

>

> GW2 is much harder to balance, in this regard. Since every class has skills and traits locked to various weapons and specializations, the devs do not have any assurance that every tweak or addition they make to a trait or skill will be reflected in players' builds. Instead they have to distribute enough desirable qualities across enough of the specializations, if they want to make sure each specialization can have some sort of role in pvp. However, achieving true equality of usefulness across every specialization would be kind of stupid, since there's only 12 things they can put into each specialization; if you always make sure to put roughly the same mount of offense, defense, utility, and cc/stability into each one, that's not a lot of space for differentiation. Each specialization would end up looking like just differently named versions of the same thing. They'd have to come up with a unique way to represent those combat essentials (so for instance one trait line might have resistance utilities on shorter cd, while another would give you access to a longer-cd pulsing resistance), and there's only so many ways to do that.

>

> What ends up happening is the stale metas we have now. Players figure out, through theory as well as trial and error, which single combination of traits and skills allows each class to fulfill a useful role while also being well-rounded enough to deal with the widest variety of threats. So we essentially end up with one build for each class much like BDO does, but while BDO's single-build system gives your class everything at once, your single-build in GW2 only brings a fraction of all the cool things available to your class. That fraction-ing is a long-term problem, because some classes have trait lines that are packed with useful things for pvp, while other classes have a more scattered distribution and therefore struggle to patch together 3 traitlines and 15-ish abilities to cover their bases _and_ specialize enough at a particular role. Furthermore, once you've settled on a build and loadout, there's really not too many ways to play it. The apex of combat variety in GW2 is maybe baiting out cleanses and dodges with cover condi and weapon swap skill cancels, or finding stupid kiting spots or no port spots that are less about your class and more about having practiced enough to land non-obvious jumps.

>

> So while adding greater complexity as @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" suggests is indeed the goal, I really don't see it happening due to GW2's fundamental design in forcing player choice. Unless thy completely homogenize those choices (making them stupid and meaningless), it appears nearly impossible to me to make sure every trait line across every class has an equivalent share of essential pvp tools. I think the best we can hope for is what we've been getting all along, which is short-term changes to address short-term issues.

>

 

Thank the six, someone that completely understands the concepts without me saying it a billion times.

 

Yes, everything you said is exactly the issue with gw2. The truth is that gw2 can never be balanced because if it could, the game would have to be completely homogeneous and at that point it would no longer be gw2. Player choice would have to cease to exist, and class differences would have to have no meaningful differentiation to achieve balance, aka stickwars 2.

 

Now I think however that it is possible for Anet to avoid this fate, because we can look at highly diverse systems in the real world and figure out how those are able to work and then apply that to guild wars 2. There is a balance to be found in high differentiation and heterogeneity, and that balance is the kind of balance we see in nature and in natural complex systems like biology. In many ways, gw2 and especially gw1, mimic biological systems, through how builds go through this artificial selection process...where good builds survive, and the bad ones go extinct, as players adapt to their surroundings and try to achieve goals.

 

So what i spent a lot of time on is how this process happens, and really its just as simple as making the interaction of abilities more complex in order to make more viable meta builds. The reason this is the case, is because of how, having more builds that are viable in general, will statistically smother outlier builds due to sheer numbers, produced from the increase in complexity. (this is the anthropic reasoning i spoke about earlier)

 

To explain, its like thinking about the number of meta builds we have. If there exists 1 op build among 10,000 builds that people play (the meta) and 1% of those builds can counter that op build, than that means there exists at least 100 builds that can counter that op build.

 

Now If there exists 1 op build among 5 builds that people play (the meta), if 1% of those builds hard counter the op build, then how many builds can counter that 1 op build? 0.

 

This is the magic behind just having a large number of things, which enables a system to smother outlier builds by having many counter builds exist in opposition to it...and so the system moves in flux between all 10,000 of these builds, rather than just 5...so the idea is to make the game more complex so that more builds can be there to compete with one another and silence outliers. Ten thousand is probably way too many to have, but the idea is roughly the same where hundreds of meta builds at least is going to show drastically better balance than just 3 meta builds.

[Kuma.1503]

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said:

> > @"Swagger.1459" said:

> > @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684"

> >

> > Weapons are a very interesting topic for me. Now I don’t fully agree with the assessments of the OP, but I’m definitely interested to know more about how exactly you would apply science to fix underperforming weapon skills so we can improve build diversity in pvp modes! What specifics can you share?

> >

> > Edit- Let’s go down the line here... Can you please identify the lesser used and underperforming weapons and give some recommendations as to what should be improved so they are more widely used in the various profession builds? Because obviously the more viable weapons a profession has access to the more build diversity increases.

> >

> > https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Weapon

>

> You need to understand something first. You want specifics without even knowing how the fundamental part of it is supposed to work. Did you even read any of my comments?

>

> There are mechanics in the game that restrict diversity by simply being designed in such a way that restricts diversity. Before jumping the gun and applying Band-Aid fixes, you should really try and find the bullet in the bullet wound first.

>

> Now some good examples have already been provided by others here that actually read the comments and understood what was being said. If you go back and read the comments and try to understand and follow the logic, which I'm really trying to explain as simply as possibly can, I list out these mechanics that restrict that diversity. I then proceed to explain other mechanics that should exist on skills, like synergies, and other things I didn't mention like usefulness and uniqueness. Another one of these things I mentioned being tradeoff's, which I elaborate on in great detail on why the current trade-offs in the game aren't actual functioning trade-offs.

>

> I then provided examples of how such tradeoff's would work to self balance skills to prevent divergent, runaway behavior, and one of the commenters even gave a good example of skills that would work in this way.

>

> So what you want now are even more examples because you are trying to find a hole in the logic that you clearly did not bother to read nor understand, which you even admitted to.

>

> So please if you want this to be constructive, do me and everyone else here the courtesy to at least read and then understand the oppositions point before trying to attack it.

>

> Anyway, since you want specifics here's some ideas.

>

> Elementalist

> 1) Trait : Powerful Aura

> Aura's you grant to yourself are shared with a nearby allies. When an Aura ends, inflict 5 vulnerability to nearby enemies.

> If you are inflicted with 25 vulnerability when an aura ends, that aura is refreshed.

>

> Staff Abilities (Water)

> Staff 5 - Turn Vulnerability into Regeneration for allies and cleanse conditions. Enemies that are inside this field have vulnerability converted into healing for allies.

> Staff 4 - Summon a field of Ice, chilling enemies. Allies with an aura are healed while inside this field.

> Staff 3 - Place a geyser that resurrects fallen allies. Easily interrupted if you do not have a frost aura.

> Staff 2 - Splash the ground to heal your allies, and detonating allies auras around you (blast finisher)

> Staff 1 - Heal nearby allies for x healing, and inflict X stack of Vulnerability onto yourself for each ally you heal. At 25 stacks, Vulnerability is converted into a Frost Aura.

>

> Now I came up with these very quickly and on the fly. I'm sure if one were to spend more time, u could come up with all sorts of ideas for the rest of the weaponset, and other traits that you could make synergy's for. I artificially gave it the theme with vulnerability since Anet had that idea in mind when it came to water traitline...so ya there you go just an example of how adding synergies, and implementing equilibrium mechanics (actual tradeoffs) can make an entire weapon useful and dynamic in build crafting without making it imbalanced.

>

> The idea here is that

> a) You want equilibrium mechanics...tradeoffs that prevent run-away divergent behavior.

> b) Uniqueness and usefulness determines how interesting the actual mechanics of skills are and if they are good at achieving a goal, or number of goals in different ways.

> c) Synergy...how many traits and abilities can synergize with not only other things but with itself....the more synergy you can create and uncover, the more interesting and complex the weapon becomes and in turn it becomes more useful.

> d) Looking at just one weapon in the vacuum isn't enough to prove a point btw, since diversity is a global macroscopic thing that involves many things interacting with one another. If one were to create sleuths of useful weapons and abilities, then the number of builds that can be created that are useful increases, and due to the anthropic reasoning, outlier builds will statistically exist less often.

>

>

>

>

I like this idea for staff. I'm a bit of a nerd for RP, and this got me thinking of how this might work thematically.

 

While attuned to water, eles chill their foes, and heal their allies. But even as the water splashes onto you to heal your wounds, it chills your armor, making it more brittle. As they splash more water onto you, your armor eventually gets so cold that it emits a frosty aura. Cool stuff! (pun 100% intended)

 

Adding on some ideas of my own. Perhaps Earth could play around with CC.

 

Staff 2 - Unstable Ground - Create area of unstable ground that inflicts cripple on foes. Anyone who stands on the unstable ground loses 1 stack of stab per pulse becomes more susceptible to crowd control (this includes allies) increasing it's duration by 25%. After a delay, the ground collapses dealing damage and bleeding foes.

 

Staff 3 - Mudslide - Unleash a torrent of mud, crippling and slowing foes and coating your allies in mud. If enemies are already crippled, they are instead immobilized.

Allies hit are coated in mud, causing their next 3 attacks to inflict cripple and slow, but they also move 5% slower per stack of mud they have remaining.

 

Staff 5 - Impale - After a delay, earthen spikes erupt from the ground, dealing damage, and crippling and bleeding foes. Spikes continue to erupt a total of 3 times with a delay in-between, each time inflicting greater damage and a longer cripple. Final eruption knocks up foes. Every eruption is a blast finisher.

 

[Vancho.8750]

> @"felix.2386" said:

> i like how u skipped warrior because everysingle thing about warrior other then greatsword,shield,dagger are completely garbage

> basically 4/5 weapons are garbage

> other word, warrior has more trash weapon then all other classes' weapon combined including good weapons.

Even GS being the best for PVP has 2 terrible skills (3 if you count the basic attack) out of 6, the only reason it is taken cause warrior lacks mobility outside GS, and warrior is hardstuck on it, the closest mobility that warrior can get is sword but that thing has 4 bad abilities if you count off hand and i'm not sure if even Final thrust is good, i find it quite funny actually that warrior gap closers are so bad that they are used as movement and not actually to hit people cause they rarely do.

 

[Swagger.1459]

@"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" I don't think we need fully explore other topics outside of weapon skills. Besides, it’s easy enough for you to apply your understanding and keep presenting us with your revamped weapon skills that improve weapon viability and build diversity!

 

Very awesome below btw! This game really needs stuff like this, so can you do more?

 

“ Elementalist

1) Trait : Powerful Aura

Aura's you grant to yourself are shared with a nearby allies. When an Aura ends, inflict 5 vulnerability to nearby enemies.

If you are inflicted with 25 vulnerability when an aura ends, that aura is refreshed.

 

Staff Abilities (Water)

Staff 5 - Turn Vulnerability into Regeneration for allies and cleanse conditions. Enemies that are inside this field have vulnerability converted into healing for allies.

Staff 4 - Summon a field of Ice, chilling enemies. Allies with an aura are healed while inside this field.

Staff 3 - Place a geyser that resurrects fallen allies. Easily interrupted if you do not have a frost aura.

Staff 2 - Splash the ground to heal your allies, and detonating allies auras around you (blast finisher)

Staff 1 - Heal nearby allies for x healing, and inflict X stack of Vulnerability onto yourself for each ally you heal. At 25 stacks, Vulnerability is converted into a Frost Aura.

 

Now I came up with these very quickly and on the fly. I'm sure if one were to spend more time, u could come up with all sorts of ideas for the rest of the weaponset”

 

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

> @"Swagger.1459" said:

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" I don't think we need fully explore other topics outside of weapon skills. Besides, it’s easy enough for you to apply your understanding and keep presenting us with your revamped weapon skills that improve weapon viability and build diversity!

>

> Very awesome below btw! This game really needs stuff like this, so can you do more?

 

The example is merely the result of following the logic to it's valid conclusions which comes from an understanding of complexity theory.

I could come up with ideas in a vacuum like a cat chasing a laser beam, but none of that is really applicable when I'm not the one who designs the game, nor do i think ideas in a vacuum is constructive if the underlying reason for the change isn't fully understood either.

 

The point is that, once the underlying concepts are understood you can extrapolate and then apply it to your problems...in this case the problems are more than just weapons...it's traits, it's runes, it's sigils it's the structure in which these elements are built upon...only then can someone who is paid to do the job can change the system where it actually needs to be changed in order to make an impact on the problems of the game.

 

Frankly my position doesn't even extend that far...im just here to provide insight into how problems the community presents can be looked at from a completely different perspective. Most people believe that balance is about making things equal (homogenous)...when what complexity theory can show us, is that you can also have balance by things just being more and more different from one another (heterogenous). It's a completely different way to think about the problem, and in my view is what starts people to ask different questions and approach the complaints in the game from a different way... or at least think about the implications of just asking to "nerf this, or just buff that."

 

If i were to be frank, the idea of "balance" itself is a misnomer...a perpetuated false truth that somehow settled on the idea that balance is akin to balance on a scale between two objects. It's intuitive to think that would be the case because we think of the word balance we think about a scale, or trying to fix our balance when we walk...but this is a primitive misunderstanding of the word. What people believe is balance, is actually just one side of a spectrum in diversity...which is a spectrum that lies between homogeneity and heterogeneity...which itself has it's origins in thermodynamics (equilibriums and mixtures etc...) it's these things that were originally taken from physics, misunderstood and now used as common knowledge that needs to be dispelled in order to be asking the right questions or complaining about the real problems.

 

So when people mention "viability" and "diversity" and "balance" these things themselves were never defined properly in the first place. What does it really mean for something to be viable? what does it mean really mean for something to be balanced? This is why I'm here on the forum...to dispel false truths so that we can ask better questions.

[ollbirtan.2915]

Hammer guard says hello. But tbh, problem isn't with weapons. Some weapons are just better than others - shrug- . But you can thank all those '_OHMAGAWD NERF XXXX_' threads for current lack of diversity. You get what you ask.

[Swagger.1459]

@"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" I don't understand. I thought we were here talking about weapons and diversity through weapons? What is the "balance" and "false truths" stuff about? Just asking for weapon improvement ideas on lesser used weapons in pvp modes and how to improve them... You provided only one example, but we need the angle on more...

[Obtena.7952]

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said:

> At a certain point, if every skill is useful and has a vast number of possible synergies and less limitations, it becomes more difficult to find optimal builds strategy, and you get more diversity. That is how this is done.

 

From a practical perspective, I see two ways to this 'useful skills'

 

1. Making more strategies for winning, therefore allowing the pool of skills to take on 'usefulness' to those strategies.

2. Making more skills the same as the currently useful ones ...

 

if the goal is diversity, #2 is arguably not very 'increasing' on diversity anyways. Basically, I don't see a way out for Anet in this game for more diversity except for #1 ... it's just TOO simple a game. it's like the Rubik's cube man ... there is only 1 solution and there are only a few ways to optimally solve it compared to the number of combinations for turning the cube.

 

 

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

> @"Obtena.7952" said:

> From a practical perspective, I see two ways to this 'useful skills'

>

> 1. Making more strategies for winning, therefore allowing the pool of skills to take on 'usefulness' to those strategies.

> 2. Making more skills the same as the currently useful ones ...

>

> if the goal is diversity, #2 is arguably not very 'increasing' on diversity anyways. Basically, I don't see a way out for Anet in this game for more diversity except for #1 ... it's just TOO simple a game. it's like the Rubik's cube man ... there is only 1 solution and there are only a few ways to optimally solve it compared to the number of combinations for turning the cube.

>

 

Right exactly. If one were to imagine a homogenous game, all elements in that game would be equal, and there would exist no optimal path to win the game. By contrast, in a heterogeneous game where all elements are not inherently equal, there will always be an optimal path and the way to find this path is by comparing each and every element and combination of elements...this is an essential property of heterogeneous systems that allow it to evolve over time. This is also why in computer science they call it complex computation...how many operations would it take for a computer to find the optimal path in a system to solve a problem (winning the game).

 

The number of operations is essentially the time it takes for the computer to figure that out. The less complex the system, the shorter time it takes, and the more complex the system, the longer the time it will take. The key here to dealing with a game that is heterogeneous like guild wars 2, which have inherently non-equal elements and always will always have an optimal path, is to increase the time it would take for that path to be found. This is where the rest of complexity theory comes into play, which is how one would increase that time, and that is done by making the system more complex.

 

The key thing to note about Complexity is that you don't need to add more elements to a system or a game in order to make it more complex, but rather is to enrich interactions between elements. Interactions themselves are pretty nuanced because you can get non-linear interactions with simple mechanisms.[ The Game of Life](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life) is one such example of a game that uses very small number of elements, with a small number of interactions, that lead to very complex behavior because the interactions are very rich.

 

So the term usefulness is derived from the above...making interactions between skills qualitatively richer aka meaningful, increases complexity, which would increase the time it takes to find the optimal path to winning the game.

[Burnfall.9573]

> @"felix.2386" said:

> > @"Anomaly.7612" said:

> > > @"felix.2386" said:

> > > why diversity is so bad? because thief that deletes anything trying to be a ganker, and holo excist and deletes everyone else

> >

> > Dude what is your personal beef with thief? All you do is talk kitten on thief yet don't back to what exactly they're doing that's so much more OP than other classes. Do you main a mesmer or something yet use the thief icon as your avatar to seem like a thief main? Explain your logic.

>

> ? my personally beef? yes i got beef after playing it myself in plat 2 and carried games, while the other build is holo, the rest of the builds are so limited and i dropped rating by playing them.

>

> i actually care about general balance, sorry. if u actually see my post history, you would see i can talked about full counter OP right before healbreaker became a thing. because that's how i feel about full counter for it being completely busted.

>

> i literally feel unfair for the other classes/builds how busted these two can be

> and that it saddens me when 80% of the "top" pvpers are playing these 2 classes in ranked if you actually pay attention. because only these two classes are relevant in ranked. oh and the 20% plays rev

 

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Nerf-Wish-list

/joking aside

 

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/5424/nerf-wish-list

 

 

since Guild Wars 2 beta and throughout the years, there has been countless threads with suggestions by Honest-Truth-telling Thief Profession players concerning the state of their Profession being non-competitive and un-fair to the ongoing, endless community concerns with their negative-unhealthy experience in dealing with Thief Profession

 

“We will be known forever by the tracks we leave.”

 

Thank You! for being Honest

 

 

[wevh.2903]

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said:

> > @"Jekkt.6045" said:

> > It's often times not even that skills are useless but rather you can't take them because you need X skill/weapon just so you can stay alive. Weapons that used to be good are now essentially useless because they don't deliver the required numbers. For example, utility wise dagger offhand on ele is a great weapon. it has cc, mobility, healing, name it and you have it. but you can't take it because sustain damage is so ridiculously high you need an invul so you can have "room to breathe". Look at tempest right now, focus offhand, mist form and lightning flash are pretty much required just so you can stay alive.

>

> Here's the thing about this and i want you to follow the logic here so you can draw a different conclusion. I understand that the above is a valid observation, but in order to understand why the above observation happens, you have to be asking the right questions.

>

> The way you have to look at the game as a whole is as if it were a complex system...in which some parts have some interaction with other parts...like looking at a spider web. One thread in this spider web is a build that can be made that matches what you said in this quote. In this web there are other builds that will seek to either cooperate or compete with this build, and this is where player choice is introduced.

>

> If you were a super computer to determine which thread in this web is the most optimal decision, it would take you some period of time to figure that out. If you can calculate that the thread you have is not optimal, you will not use the build, or find some other configuration that is more optimal. These paths for finding optimality is what reduces the number of meaningful choices you have available to you.

>

> So the question here shouldn't be about what makes something good or bad to use...the question is about how to make this web more complex, so that finding out whether the build you are using has optimal choices becomes irrelevant rather than relevant.

>

> >

> > How can you fix that? Not in a way that is feasible for arenanet.

> > You either need to boost ele's core defense so you can take different utility skills, or buff all other weapons/skills to the same level. It's basically a horrible idea...

> > ...So how can anet actually fix this without having to buff or rework most of the weapons?

>

> Now here's the other thing. This goes deeper into how understanding complexity theory can tell us how to approach these kinds of problems. I've discussed this in detail before, but essentially Buffs and nerfs do not work because in it's fundamentality it's a flawed procedure that doesn't make any real differences. I've explain why in this comment here https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/comment/1344346#Comment_1344346 .

>

> Once we understand that numerical balance changes are meaningless when considering the entirety of this "web" of balance, we can then move on to understanding that the only way to address these problems of diversity, and in turn it's balance (because turns out they are both basically the same thing) is by looking at mechanics and whether these mechanics create complexity. Alone Lava Font is a skill that features almost no complexity because it has very little interaction with any other skill or traits in the game...and the reason is not because of it's damage, or it's range, or it's speed... It's because of it's actual functions, and the function lacks synergy.

>

> So again this leads back to whether people are asking the right questions. By looking at the problem as "need to boost ele's core defense so you can take different utility skills" This will lead to other areas of the web, and just changing the optimal path from one path to another...and this doesn't solve the problem of diversity or balance, it just moves it around, which amounts to having no meaning based on what i linked above.

>

> > Nowadays too many skills are too bloated in what they do. Often times skills are just straight up utility+damage+healing which is horrible design. In that regard, removing damage from cc skills was kind of a good decision, just that no damage at all was a bit too much.

>

> Now yes over bloating is a bad design...this can also be explained, but I'm gonna try to keep it short and sweet. Essentially what the game lacks is actual tradeoffs. Now i want to explain that trade offs have a scientifically applicable definition, and that what Anet has implemented as "tradeoffs" are not real tradeoffs.

>

> In my previous comment i mentioned that Target Caps are part of the problem, that reduces the complexity of interactions in the game. This should have got you thinking a bit because it seems counter intuitive at first...how can it be possible that removing target caps give us more diversity and better balance? What happens if we had skills like "Backstab" that could hit 100 enemies...wouldn't that be overpowered?

>

> The answer lye in what's called "Equilibrium mechanics" aka real tradeoffs. We see these tradeoffs in science all the time, and it's essentially just functions that stop divergent behavior from becoming more divergent. The Stock Market is a perfect example of a system that functions off of unbounded mechanics (where stock price could potentially diverge in either direction infinitely...without bound), that on their own create equilibriums when the behavior of the system becomes more divergent (Supply and Demand...Overbought and Oversold triggering reversals in stock prices). These equilibrium mechanics also existed in some ways in guild wars 1, and were abandoned in before launch of guild wars 2... Where skills and abilities that do something should come with a cost, and this cost isn't a linear "tradeoff" like -300 vitality...These costs should be functions that stop divergent behavior.

>

> So we could look at the example of Backstab without a target cap... This skill in it's current form only works in 1v1 fights, as the target cap is a maximum of 1. Increase the target cap to 5, and it now becomes useful in teamfights (5v5 bracket) and in all brackets below that...from 2v2,3v3,4v4 etc...So now imagine this ability without a target cap against 100 people. Landing a Backstab becomes VERY valuable if it were to hit 100 people. So this behavior is called divergent behavior, where in this case, something becomes exponentially more useful the higher number of people you are fighting against. An equilibrium mechanic...or a true tradeoff, would be a mechanic that presents a cost, such that the higher number of targets there are when using this ability, the more of the cost you will incur. My favorite example to use is that, every time you land a backstab on a player, you apply 1 poison to yourself. In a 1v1 situation, applying 1 poison is low impact, and interesting tradeoff...but now if that backstab was used against an 80man zerg, well now, you have to face the consequence that if you used a backstab, you could get 80 stacks of poison with a single use. This is a REAL tradeoff that prevents divergent mechanics from taking off...which to your point, is how one should approach balancing of bloated skills.

>

> There's a lot more to point out in this subject area, but that's just one aspect about the quote I'm responding to in your post.

>

>

>

 

"Backstab only works in 1v1 fights" . Not true , thief value is rotate fast and outnumber fights quickly getting a kill, thief doesnt have winning 1v1 matchups . Thief value in a team fight is take down a target that has no hp/cds , by making thief "good in team fight" you would unbalance the game .

 

 

[lare.5129]

> @"Kuma.1503" said:

>Why Build diversity feels so bad are good.

why not? As for me all weapons should ne absolutely equal in any game type for any biuld.

 

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

> @"wevh.2903" said:

> "Backstab only works in 1v1 fights" . Not true , thief value is rotate fast and outnumber fights quickly getting a kill, thief doesnt have winning 1v1 matchups . Thief value in a team fight is take down a target that has no hp/cds , by making thief "good in team fight" you would unbalance the game .

>

 

Trust me, i know what you are referring to and the whole sindrener mantra yada yada I've played thief for 4 years in competitive plat level.

 

This example isn't about thief or class dynamics in ranked or anything like that...its an example about single target skills, like backstab... you can replace backstab here with any single target skill of your liking, from any class. the idea is that because backstab (or other single target skills) don't hit more than one target, it is not receiving the same value as a skill that can hit 2 targets or 3 targets etc. likewise, skills that target 5 targets don't receive the same value as skills that apply to 10 targets, and likewise every bracket for in which the target cap for one skill is higher than another skill means it's gaining more value when there are more players around.

 

This is why you don't see a backstab thief in wvw zerg...it will just never happen not in a million, billion years. Because the value you receive from a single target skill in comparison to the value you would receive from something that targets 5 or more targets will always receive less value when fighting more than a single target, while a skill that targets 5 targets or more, will always receive the same value for brackets at 5 targets or below

 

Anet manages this kind of target cap dilemma by just adjusting damage...so they will make 5 target abilities do less damage then a single target ability like backstab. Problem with that is, that if 5 target skills do not-a-lot of damage, then they also do 5x times less damage in 1v1 situation's, and you get this sort of inverse problem of the above, where skills that target 5 targets gain less value when targeting less than 5 people. The approach to this is problematic for many reasons, but you can see it most obviously in specs like deadeye..."Let's make single target skills do tons of damage so it will be useful in teamfights" and ya this kinda worked... deadeyes are useful in teamfights...because that value that would have been lost by the difference in target cap is replaced instead by damage...except it's now completely overpowered in 1v1 situations and oneshots everyone in a 1v1. This is a large part of the powercreep problem people were well aware of at POF. where the wrestling between how much damage aoe's should do and how much single target damage skills should do when the problem has always been the number of targets abilities could select.

 

 

[wevh.2903]

> @"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said:

> > @"wevh.2903" said:

> > "Backstab only works in 1v1 fights" . Not true , thief value is rotate fast and outnumber fights quickly getting a kill, thief doesnt have winning 1v1 matchups . Thief value in a team fight is take down a target that has no hp/cds , by making thief "good in team fight" you would unbalance the game .

> >

>

> Trust me, i know what you are referring to and the whole sindrener mantra yada yada I've played thief for 4 years in competitive plat level.

>

> This example isn't about thief or class dynamics in ranked or anything like that...its an example about single target skills, like backstab... you can replace backstab here with any single target skill of your liking, from any class. the idea is that because backstab (or other single target skills) don't hit more than one target, it is not receiving the same value as a skill that can hit 2 targets or 3 targets etc. likewise, skills that target 5 targets don't receive the same value as skills that apply to 10 targets, and likewise every bracket for in which the target cap for one skill is higher than another skill means it's gaining more value when there are more players around.

>

> This is why you don't see a backstab thief in wvw zerg...it will just never happen not in a million, billion years. Because the value you receive from a single target skill in comparison to the value you would receive from something that targets 5 or more targets will always receive less value when fighting more than a single target, while a skill that targets 5 targets or more, will always receive the same value for brackets at 5 targets or below

>

> Anet manages this kind of target cap dilemma by just adjusting damage...so they will make 5 target abilities do less damage then a single target ability like backstab. Problem with that is, that if 5 target skills do not-a-lot of damage, then they also do 5x times less damage in 1v1 situation's, and you get this sort of inverse problem of the above, where skills that target 5 targets gain less value when targeting less than 5 people. The approach to this is problematic for many reasons, but you can see it most obviously in specs like deadeye..."Let's make single target skills do tons of damage so it will be useful in teamfights" and ya this kinda worked... deadeyes are useful in teamfights...because that value that would have been lost by the difference in target cap is replaced instead by damage...except it's now completely overpowered in 1v1 situations and oneshots everyone in a 1v1. This is a large part of the powercreep problem people were well aware of at POF. where the wrestling between how much damage aoe's should do and how much single target damage skills should do when the problem has always been the number of targets abilities could select.

>

>

 

Is not about "thief mantra" . Forget about "thief" , every class has "tags" that are the axiom of competitive pvp based on nodes. These tags sort out every class by specific properties inherent on conquest.

 

High movility , sustain , team support , utility , aoe , high spike damage , sustained damage , kite potential , chase potential , etc

 

 

These properties dictate "roles" . These roles are SUBJETIVE and are made by which properties a class highlight over the rest.

 

Roles are sidenoder (1v1er , tank decapper ) , team fighter , support , healer, roamer . Roles are non static so a class can fullfil different roles.

 

 

"Team fight" classes usually have high self sustain and aoe spam as main properties . Classes that doenst main those stats usually cant compete on a equal fight . For example necros are "main" team fight classes cuz this class has high sustain and high aoe damage . Thieves cant compete vs necros on a equal fight , thats why at 2v2 and 3v3 seassons necro is always a better choice than thief.

 

"Thief" highlight on high movility , team utility ,kite potential , chase potential and spike damage . So with those properties you can classify thief as a "roamer" .

 

"Roamer" is a conquest concept based on getting a kill and quickly rotate destabilizing the map .

 

Balance orbitates around those properties , you CANT give backstab 5 target cuz u cant buff "aoe" on a class wich massively highligh on other properties .

 

 

This is what balance is about , necro is slow af and has low disengage potential in exchange for his other properties .

 

 

For example power rev isnt faster and has less team utility than thief , but this class is much better at team fights and has highly spike damage . Condi rev in comparision with power rev has highly sustain and sustained damage wich mades it better for team fights and can sidenode cuz its tanky af but at the same time it is way slower than power rev and has no spike damage . Condi rev cant chase kills while prev can. Crev will be always better on 3v3 and 2v2 seassons than power rev , but power rev can compete with crev is conquest by highlighlying on other properties where crev cant.

 

This is why runes like speed are bad for balance , necro is supposed to be slow with low chase/ kite potential but this rune literally breaks this .

 

 

 

 

As i said these roles are SUBJETIVE and are mostly hybrid , for example necros can take some 1v1 (mostly as core nec) but you dont rly want your necro as a sidenoder cuz it has bad disengage potential and theorically it will dye easy on a plus while other classes will be able to disengage when getting plused . If a necro goes far and takes a 1v1 , a eneny respawn can quickly kill the necro and make map a 4v5 scenario.

 

This is why some classes are broken af , nades holo literally fulfills every role on game , it has big movility , self sustain team utility , chase potential , kite potential , can take 1v1 .

 

"Thief" can be a hybrid on roles too , taking staff u gain aoe and self sustain but u lose team utility and spike damage , staff thief can take 1v1 but it is not worth cuz it doenst fullfil its role better than other classes . There is a guy called S Juson playing staff with without dash and shortbow , he plays thief as a dueler instead of a roamer . He gets big hate cuz as i said this thief build doenst fullfil its role better than other classes so when he faces a better sidenoder this build will be completely useless.