Enemy Boons

[Alimar.8760]

In PvE, general exploration, and the new expansion coming out. I am very excited to play Spellbreaker. My favorite classes consist of Warrior and Guardian respectively. However I feel like i'm not going to enjoy playing Spellbreaker because their main focus is boon stripping. With someone who wasn't really into Warrior, I really want Spellbreaker to be loved. But it seems a lot of general PvE content the enemies do not apply boons to themselves. I've chatted with a bunch of friends and they agree, that the Spellbreaker is probably not really going to be useful at all in PvE, but is more focused on PvP/WvW.

 

It seems high level fractals bosses apply boons to themselves, but why not the rest? Honestly, I really think that enemies in general PvE should also be able to apply boons to themselves, and they should. Boon stripping and boon corruption is a mechanic that isn't going to leave, and is very important in the actual nuances of gameplay. Deciding to leave boons out of the equation in open world areas I feel hurts the players and encourages them to just "Smash it till it's dead."

 

What do you think? Was the Spellbreaker only made with WvW/PvP in mind? Is there something I missed with enemies applying boons?

 

TL:DR Enemies should be able to apply boons to themselves to encourage players to boon strip/corrupt.

[PookieDaWombat.6209]

I agreed with this the first time it was presented as an idea. In short, PvE enemies in high level content (level 80 maps) need to act in such a way that makes the core mechanics of the classes useful. If not, then why bother? All it says is that as far as PvE goes, the devs don't care what you run or how you run it as long as you dodge and do enough damage to kill something. It basically invalidates all the work the devs put into the new specs by just balancing them toward PvP/WvW content.

[Electro.4173]

The problem I see with making boon-heavy mobs in PvE is that not all classes have access to boon corruption / stripping. And even among those that do, some of them are restricted to just a couple of abilities on specific weapons or utilities for instance. So if you make boon-heavy enemies that are designed to encourage stripping / corruption, then when classes with extremely limited or no stripping have to fight them and have no way to deal with that mechanic "as intended" it can become too much. There's a fine line between enemies having boons that make stripping / corruption worthwhile while still making those encounters enjoyable to classes that don't have access to those things.

 

Especially when it comes to Spellbreaker. Anything that would ever require the amount of stripping Spellbreaker can put out would be hell for every other class in the game, even those that actually have decent stripping of their own, simply because of how crazy their own strips are.e

[Alimar.8760]

I never said boon heavy, but there should be at least some boons that enemies apply to themselves. Something that makes it feel worthwhile to actually learn how to boon strip/corrupt. And learn the mechanics. Similar to how break bars were introduced to help people understand the importance of CC.

[Ulion.5476]

The are 3 big enemy types branded, forge and the undead (ascended?). I am sure one of those forces will have boons on them. I just hope their are no karka like enemies with permanent retaliation.

[Alimar.8760]

Hopefully!

[Sorin Noroku.5342]

In GW1, the mobs would use the player skills and end up applying boons (then called enchantments) to themselves. It worked fantastic and kinda would wish they would do the same here. Even if each one did it themselves. Maybe if it was reserved for vets and up?

[JeKan.6304]

I want this to be a thing so very badly for the sake of scourge as well. A lot of scourge's utilities are focused on boon-corruption which will be great for pvp but not nearly as nice for pve content.

[tairneanach.8427]

> @"Sorin Noroku.5342" said:

> In GW1, the mobs would use the player skills and end up applying boons (then called enchantments) to themselves. It worked fantastic and kinda would wish they would do the same here. Even if each one did it themselves. Maybe if it was reserved for vets and up?

 

Well, the fodder having boons wouldn't make a difference, so they don't really factor into this discussion. Some mobs already have boons - skelks with regeneration, chak with retaliation, windriders with swiftness or quickness - but they're barely noitceable because they die so quickly even with them. To make boon stripping worthwhile in PvE, it'd _have_ to be veterans and upwards.