What's your opinion on roles?

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"Rhyse.8179" said:

> > @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> > > @"Rhyse.8179" said:

> > > Roles (aka Holy Trinity) are weak game design and make for lazy gameplay. Unfortunately Anet replaced them with no control or support at all (until HOT, which finally added support, but there's still no control builds), so I don't think GW2 is any real improvement.

> >

> > Care to elaborate? How is it lazy? What is a "control" role exactly? How is a "support" role any different from buffers/debuffers, which in both GW2 and trinity games are just DPS+?

>

> A control role is the player that controls and directs the fight. In the Trinity, this is the Tank, occassionally helped by hard CC (aka polymorph). It's not the only way though. In EQ (remember back that far?) the core group was not 3, but 4: Tank, Healer, DPS, and Controller. The controller abilities included hard cc, soft cc like roots, aggro radius reductions, charming foes to fight for you, shifting or wiping aggro, massive debuffs, interrupts, and so on.

>

> Designing a game to only use a tank as it's control is ridiculously simple in comparison - it's one class manipulating a single number in the AI (aggro). Lazy to design and lazy to play. Sometimes that's good, don't get me wrong - nobody'y going to chill with a beer and shoot the kitten with their buds in a GW2 raid, they have to be on the ball. It's a different playstyle and has it's place in the scheme of things, but it's certainly not a challenge.

>

> GW2 removed ALL of that; they originally promised to replace it with a better system, but actually did the opposite. Not only is GW2 CC a mockery of the term, lasting only a second here and there, but "Defiance" was a buff on bosses that made them immune to all CC. Until HOT replaced it with a breakbar, which isn't so much control but rather just a timing test, there was nothing at all. Control of PVE encounters was literally not possible.

>

> Bottom line is that GW2 is an action game, not strategic game like old school MMO's are. The whole discussion about roles in GW2 is moot because it's undercut by the games basic design. This is why PVE encounters are either mechanics literacy tests or trivial, with very little in between. AI being what it is, mechanics is the only type of challenge the game can provide. If your group knows the mechanics, they win. If they don't they don't. Yay.

 

You'll get no argument here. GW2's system doesn't make for good raid/dungeon gameplay. It feels like roles are missing, although I'm not sure the "controller" role as you describe it adds anything to the trinity model. As all of those abilities still exist in those games but are simply spread across the other roles (CC, buffing, debuffing, threat management). GW2's model simply removed roles - or attempted to, until they realized that this didn't lead to compelling group play in instanced content.

 

They seem to have gone for a system that works quite well in open world zerg play, but not so well in more organized play. For example, "healing" here is simply spamming area effects into a pile of players, where in other games those abilities exist but are only a small part of the healer's arsenal. How else could it work, though? If the goal is to allow easy cooperation between players simply by being near each other, area effects are a convenient way of achieving that goal.

 

They also wanted the UI to be intentionally simple and unmodified. That is really not conducive to healing roles when you go beyond simply spamming area effects. Or tanking/protective roles, for that matter.

 

 

 

[Carighan.6758]

> @"Algreg.3629" said:

> Roles are done to death. I welcomed the GW2 original approach and still think the moment they caved in and introduced druid was anets fall from grace.

 

I agree, though I think the issue wasn't "caving in", rather I see the problem from the opposite side: The writing was on the wall that they'll struggle **hard** without coded roles, and they failed to make sweeping changes to their combat and class systems to make space for them ahead of time.

 

So now, we have a tangled mess with, as you said after the part I quoted, one of the **strictest** role systems in MMO gaming right now.

[Algreg.3629]

> @"Carighan.6758" said:

> > @"Algreg.3629" said:

> > Roles are done to death. I welcomed the GW2 original approach and still think the moment they caved in and introduced druid was anets fall from grace.

>

> I agree, though I think the issue wasn't "caving in", rather I see the problem from the opposite side: The writing was on the wall that they'll struggle **hard** without coded roles, and they failed to make sweeping changes to their combat and class systems to make space for them ahead of time.

>

> So now, we have a tangled mess with, as you said after the part I quoted, one of the **strictest** role systems in MMO gaming right now.

 

yes, probably there is a factor of that. I still think the whole combat problems come from a half-hearted take on wanting to create "action-oriented" combat while still relying on traditional attributes and abstract effects.

[man zonder schaduw.9721]

> @"Halandir.3609" said:

> > @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> > Hi Guild Wars players,

> >

> > I am struggling to keep playing guild wars at the moment.

> > And i think i know why that is. I love to play healer/tank/support.

>

> Dear OP. Assuming you spent 10 minutes looking at GW2 before you bought it, I have to ask: Whatever possessed you to play (and pay for) a game that was, clearly, designed with NOT having what you obviously crave, as a design goal?

> This kind of idiocy (people wanting GW2 to implement all the usual run of the mill genre-staples) carries a cost. Everytime Anet flips direction and doubt their original thoughts they turn away original fans.

>

> It's not like there is a lack of healer/tank/(dps or support) games out there - This one will just keep losing, trying to play catch-up on the other games homefield.

>

I'm a guild wars 1 day 1, guild wars 2 day 1 player i knew there wern't going to be hard roles, it's just now after nearly 6 years I discovered guild wars has only 1 role.

And that's DPS.

 

[starlinvf.1358]

> @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> That's true but they are pretty much used for raids and high lvl fractals.

> i would like to see roles to be needed in lower lvl fractals and even dungeons (they will need to come back first tho).

> so people can learn how to play and all, i think it's more fun. It feels like it's all about dps nowadays.

>

> I do like that you can play any character in PVE yes. but every class has got 3 specs now if a healer has a dmg spec for pve it would be fine too.

>

 

I think they should be "beneficial", not Mandatory for other content tiers. The problem right now is that supports and condi builds need a long fight to gain momentum, and with the Especs they need that combat to maintain resources and upkeep buffs. But the majority of the game's content is designed around trouncing trash mobs of various sized HP pools. Almost none of the dedicated support builds outside of Chrono can front load, and specing deep into support sacrifices the damage that would be useful in short fights.

 

This is the reason low tier difficulties lean toward damage and in-line support. Things die too fast to be worth doing a full rotation, and supports can't maintain cadence to keep their "support" rotations running. Plus theres an issue with forcing roles, as it creates a house of cards comp that isn't designed to handle the low TTKs our stat system is tuned for. Spank and Tank requires long fights, because its the only way to tax healers with access to large resource pools and front loaded and/or reliable burst healing . Enemies win attrition by default in this model, so the Tank, healers and debuffers all exist to mitigate that advantage.

 

With GW2s being balanced mostly around PVP, Active defenses and Player scales of damage, the Dev's biggest problem is trying to hamfist a typical million/billion HP pool slugfest of a boss fight, into a model designed around dismantling a foe's defenses for a momentary opening. Its a highly reactionary style of combat.... and Raid comps don't like unpredictability. What what they have right now with Raids is mechanically designed well, but relies too heavily on the concept of DPS checking to prop up the equally questionable "rage timer" as a form of artificial difficulty. But without that time pressure, players would go too conservative to avoid wipes. > @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> I believe it's a failed experiment. It carries more or less the same drawbacks of the trinity system (i.e. required roles for high end content) with none of the advantages. By which I mean that the roles we do have do not feel fully developed and everything else is just "DPS".

>

> Waiting for tanks and healers doesn't feel any different than waiting for druid and chrono. But playing tanks and healers feels distinctly different than playing DPS and creates gameplay dynamics that feel completely missing here in GW2.

>

> In my opinion, trinity is simply better.

 

It failed because Encounter designs are still stuck in the primitive mind set of DPS gating acting as "difficulty". All of the skills in the game are designed around PvP and the scales of stats Characters have access to. They're is a much heavier lean toward active defenses and damage avoidance, and having to combine concept such as burst damage, shut down, self sustain, and group dynamics. None of this exists in PvE....... Especially not raids, as what they run is more or less cheese builds. Raid encounters are almost akin to behavioral conditioning, built on a comp thats insanely fragile due to how tasking is loaded on players (by players).

 

None of the bosses fight in a way that replicates how these skills are intended to be used, and of the hand full of open world mobs that do mimic aspects of PvP styled builds, most players can't figure out how to fight them. Core Tyira has potato mobs that offer so little challenge, that when Mordrem appeared with AOE control skills, the majority of the player base (myself included) had no idea how to even approach them. The mobs and dungeons were tuned to break tank builds (which were being abused early on to slow clear difficult fights), but lacked an answer to overwhelming incoming Damage.

 

Despite most HOT mobs being kind of trivial with the power level of builds (and several difficulty nerfs), the most dangerous ones are still those that do simple things like Evade, have AOE skills, or access to solid control effects like Immob, stun, daze, blind, etc. Even in the content that came after, the most universally hated enemies are those with access to CC skills. They didn't even need a lot... they just needed to show up at least once a fight. In LS4 the Warden and Stormcaller are some of the most dangerous fights in the game, because of that combination of CC effects and actual threatening AOE damage. The Awakened Plague lab in Koruna? Non-threatening outside of the golem single targetting a glassy build, or the endless AOEs not catching the Necrotic distillate (because next to no one bothers to target them; and every few fights, I see at least a dozen people downed, because they were standing around it when it popped).

 

 

Trinity works, because its framework works on the presumption that the AI will target its strongest point (the tanks). But even in WoW, the fights where the AI will actively go after Healers gets called a BS design choice, despite the fact that in a PvP situation, eliminating the healer destroys the sustain of an entire group.... making it the perfect target. Its a House of Cards that collapses when any of its support pillars are compromised. More importantly, the strategies in PvP reflect that, and try to avoid single points of failure. You design a Raid where the mobs Ignore Chorno and target Druids (or anything generating a lot of boons or healing), and you can bet your ass players will complain about it loudly, while at the same time shuffling the entire team comp to try and cheese what ever AI rule is driving that behavior. Or even something more basic like frequently switching targets, with enough movement abilities to catch players half way across the arena.

 

If you create conditions that reflect the kind of combat the skills were designed and balanced around, and you'll see players run builds with a wider range of strategies.

[man zonder schaduw.9721]

In my opinion this game would be much more fun to play for all people except for dps fanboys if….

 

If classes had a much bigger variety in play style. as i said before nearly every armor set used now has zerker stats and zerker or damage runes.

they could've spended like 4 years of game devoloping less as the game is now for all the useless runes and armor stats and even weapon stats.

I like the fact ANet took a different path in creating GW2, but the path should have brought us joy to play the style you want, not go full zerk party.

I can go play hack&slash if dps is all i want to do.

So yes i saw some people talking about design flaws designing heroes, this is partly true i think.

 

There was, and still is so much potential in this game.

but please ditch the fact that zerker stats are the only path a player can walk.

let people play close combat support, healer, ranged support, tank(ish), hybrid, and ofcourse still dps(for all the fanboys out there).

this way people will start use other stats and runes and sigils.

I like this idea, and it will bring joy to all.

 

If you're bringing; you're talking about holy trinity. you're not reading.

I want this game to improve, and i think this sounds promising.

 

but yes as @AliamRationem.5172 said: the boss fights will still be buttonsmashers this way.

improving boss fightshould be in an other topic.

 

 

[Algreg.3629]

> @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> In my opinion this game would be much more fun to play for all people except for dps fanboys if….

>

> If classes had a much bigger variety in play style. as i said before nearly every armor set used now has zerker stats and zerker or damage runes.

> they could've spended like 4 years of game devoloping less as the game is now for all the useless runes and armor stats and even weapon stats.

> I like the fact ANet took a different path in creating GW2, but the path should have brought us joy to play the style you want, not go full zerk party.

> I can go play hack&slash if dps is all i want to do.

> So yes i saw some people talking about design flaws designing heroes, this is partly true i think.

>

> There was, and still is so much potential in this game.

> but please ditch the fact that zerker stats are the only path a player can walk.

> let people play close combat support, healer, ranged support, tank(ish), hybrid, and ofcourse still dps(for all the fanboys out there).

> this way people will start use other stats and runes and sigils.

> I like this idea, and it will bring joy to all.

>

> If you're bringing; you're talking about holy trinity. you're not reading.

> I want this game to improve, and i think this sounds promising.

>

> but yes as @AliamRationem.5172 said: the boss fights will still be buttonsmashers this way.

> improving boss fightshould be in an other topic.

>

>

 

any reason you have to turn this antagonistic now? Because it seemed like a reasonable discussion mostly.

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"starlinvf.1358" said:

> > @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> > That's true but they are pretty much used for raids and high lvl fractals.

> > i would like to see roles to be needed in lower lvl fractals and even dungeons (they will need to come back first tho).

> > so people can learn how to play and all, i think it's more fun. It feels like it's all about dps nowadays.

> >

> > I do like that you can play any character in PVE yes. but every class has got 3 specs now if a healer has a dmg spec for pve it would be fine too.

> >

>

> I think they should be "beneficial", not Mandatory for other content tiers. The problem right now is that supports and condi builds need a long fight to gain momentum, and with the Especs they need that combat to maintain resources and upkeep buffs. But the majority of the game's content is designed around trouncing trash mobs of various sized HP pools. Almost none of the dedicated support builds outside of Chrono can front load, and specing deep into support sacrifices the damage that would be useful in short fights.

>

> This is the reason low tier difficulties lean toward damage and in-line support. Things die too fast to be worth doing a full rotation, and supports can't maintain cadence to keep their "support" rotations running. Plus theres an issue with forcing roles, as it creates a house of cards comp that isn't designed to handle the low TTKs our stat system is tuned for. Spank and Tank requires long fights, because its the only way to tax healers with access to large resource pools and front loaded and/or reliable burst healing . Enemies win attrition by default in this model, so the Tank, healers and debuffers all exist to mitigate that advantage.

>

> With GW2s being balanced mostly around PVP, Active defenses and Player scales of damage, the Dev's biggest problem is trying to hamfist a typical million/billion HP pool slugfest of a boss fight, into a model designed around dismantling a foe's defenses for a momentary opening. Its a highly reactionary style of combat.... and Raid comps don't like unpredictability. What what they have right now with Raids is mechanically designed well, but relies too heavily on the concept of DPS checking to prop up the equally questionable "rage timer" as a form of artificial difficulty. But without that time pressure, players would go too conservative to avoid wipes. > @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> > I believe it's a failed experiment. It carries more or less the same drawbacks of the trinity system (i.e. required roles for high end content) with none of the advantages. By which I mean that the roles we do have do not feel fully developed and everything else is just "DPS".

> >

> > Waiting for tanks and healers doesn't feel any different than waiting for druid and chrono. But playing tanks and healers feels distinctly different than playing DPS and creates gameplay dynamics that feel completely missing here in GW2.

> >

> > In my opinion, trinity is simply better.

>

> It failed because Encounter designs are still stuck in the primitive mind set of DPS gating acting as "difficulty". All of the skills in the game are designed around PvP and the scales of stats Characters have access to. They're is a much heavier lean toward active defenses and damage avoidance, and having to combine concept such as burst damage, shut down, self sustain, and group dynamics. None of this exists in PvE....... Especially not raids, as what they run is more or less cheese builds. Raid encounters are almost akin to behavioral conditioning, built on a comp thats insanely fragile due to how tasking is loaded on players (by players).

>

> None of the bosses fight in a way that replicates how these skills are intended to be used, and of the hand full of open world mobs that do mimic aspects of PvP styled builds, most players can't figure out how to fight them. Core Tyira has potato mobs that offer so little challenge, that when Mordrem appeared with AOE control skills, the majority of the player base (myself included) had no idea how to even approach them. The mobs and dungeons were tuned to break tank builds (which were being abused early on to slow clear difficult fights), but lacked an answer to overwhelming incoming Damage.

>

> Despite most HOT mobs being kind of trivial with the power level of builds (and several difficulty nerfs), the most dangerous ones are still those that do simple things like Evade, have AOE skills, or access to solid control effects like Immob, stun, daze, blind, etc. Even in the content that came after, the most universally hated enemies are those with access to CC skills. They didn't even need a lot... they just needed to show up at least once a fight. In LS4 the Warden and Stormcaller are some of the most dangerous fights in the game, because of that combination of CC effects and actual threatening AOE damage. The Awakened Plague lab in Koruna? Non-threatening outside of the golem single targetting a glassy build, or the endless AOEs not catching the Necrotic distillate (because next to no one bothers to target them; and every few fights, I see at least a dozen people downed, because they were standing around it when it popped).

>

>

> Trinity works, because its framework works on the presumption that the AI will target its strongest point (the tanks). But even in WoW, the fights where the AI will actively go after Healers gets called a BS design choice, despite the fact that in a PvP situation, eliminating the healer destroys the sustain of an entire group.... making it the perfect target. Its a House of Cards that collapses when any of its support pillars are compromised. More importantly, the strategies in PvP reflect that, and try to avoid single points of failure. You design a Raid where the mobs Ignore Chorno and target Druids (or anything generating a lot of boons or healing), and you can bet your kitten players will complain about it loudly, while at the same time shuffling the entire team comp to try and cheese what ever AI rule is driving that behavior. Or even something more basic like frequently switching targets, with enough movement abilities to catch players half way across the arena.

>

> If you create conditions that reflect the kind of combat the skills were designed and balanced around, and you'll see players run builds with a wider range of strategies.

 

So, tell me how you would remedy this situation? For instance, you mention how it would be smarter for AI to focus healers. So now your healer essentially takes on the tank role and must be designed to tank by healing. Presumably, someone else would then take on a healing role, because the boss has to target someone, right? And we're back where we started.

 

To put it another way, imagine a PvP scenario where a giant HP sponge plays against 10 normal players. How do you make that work?

[man zonder schaduw.9721]

> @"Algreg.3629" said:

> > @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> > In my opinion this game would be much more fun to play for all people except for dps fanboys if….

> >

> > If classes had a much bigger variety in play style. as i said before nearly every armor set used now has zerker stats and zerker or damage runes.

> > they could've spended like 4 years of game devoloping less as the game is now for all the useless runes and armor stats and even weapon stats.

> > I like the fact ANet took a different path in creating GW2, but the path should have brought us joy to play the style you want, not go full zerk party.

> > I can go play hack&slash if dps is all i want to do.

> > So yes i saw some people talking about design flaws designing heroes, this is partly true i think.

> >

> > There was, and still is so much potential in this game.

> > but please ditch the fact that zerker stats are the only path a player can walk.

> > let people play close combat support, healer, ranged support, tank(ish), hybrid, and ofcourse still dps(for all the fanboys out there).

> > this way people will start use other stats and runes and sigils.

> > I like this idea, and it will bring joy to all.

> >

> > If you're bringing; you're talking about holy trinity. you're not reading.

> > I want this game to improve, and i think this sounds promising.

> >

> > but yes as @AliamRationem.5172 said: the boss fights will still be buttonsmashers this way.

> > improving boss fightshould be in an other topic.

> >

> >

>

> any reason you have to turn this antagonistic now? Because it seemed like a reasonable discussion mostly.

 

I mean no harm by saying fanboy, it's just that most(definitely not all) dont play anything else then dps.

Just wanted to make my point clear, sorry if i used the wrong words.

 

[ButcherofMalakir.4067]

I am maining chrono support. All fractals/raids/dungeons are easier and faster with chrono. If you dont need support for low tier cractals then go play higher

[Biff.5312]

I enjoy the role dynamic, but every game based on that system has the same problems - wait times to find a group, an overburden of responsibility on the tank to know the fights, rage-quitting healers that cause wipes, etc. I actually wish GW2 was more versatile in this respect, not less. People are still identifying optimal prof/build combos and requiring them for group play. The ideal is for anyone, with any build, to be able to join in and have fun.

[Tachenon.5270]

I loved the roles in City of Heroes. In no other game, including the original Guild Wars, has team-play clicked quite so well for me. I had characters for every role, of course, because that game was pure alt-heaven, but it's my tankers that I miss the most. A few years ago here in GW2, I was getting some blastery vibes while leveling one of my eles, but it went away in the higher levels and never came back. More recently, I've felt a little hint of that old tankery magic with my # 2 rev -- probably due to the PVT armor that came with the insta-80 thing -- which has made that character my current favorite. Not tankery in the sense of holding aggro, of course, but in being able to jump into the thick of a fight and stay there until it's over.

 

Anyway, ramble ramble, I tend to prefer games with well-defined roles, but I'm okay with games that don't have them.

[Nuka Cola.8520]

The reason you're struggling to keep playing is because there's nothing for you to play. Anet needs to focus on pve group content that isn't brainless open world zerging and you wouldn't be even thinking about "roles", the combat system would occupy you enough to forget about roles.

[battledrone.8315]

> @"kharmin.7683" said:

> > @"Tails.9372" said:

> > I think build diversity is a good thing and A-Net should stop trying to force certain playstyles onto people.

>

> I don't see ANet forcing play styles on anyone. It's the community that does so.

 

they changed mesmers, because mesmers were playing in a "unintended, passive" way

and that is just the obvious tip of the iceberg

[phs.6089]

pick guardian in right gear even core guardian is a tank/support for low level. Thing is you gonna need to damage, you can't stay in corner (like in other games) and play your mini-game with refilling HP bars

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"phs.6089" said:

> pick guardian in right gear even core guardian is a tank/support for low level. Thing is you gonna need to damage, you can't stay in corner (like in other games) and play your mini-game with refilling HP bars

 

Yeah, you can play the "everybody stack and DPS" mini-game instead...

[Einlanzer.1627]

> @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> > @"Einlanzer.1627" said:

> > I really like Arenanet's attempt at simulating a role system without a hard trinity, although the execution does need a bit more iteration (as others have stated, chrono and druid are too dominant mostly because of their over-the-top boon sharing, which is something that has persisted without balance updates for far too long.)

> >

> > In particular, Elementalist, Engineer, Guardian, and Revenant all have heavy support themes built into their profession but are pretty mediocre in that role compared to druid and chrono, which is something that needs to be re-balanced.

> >

> > I also think that the Power/Condi balance isn't as good as it should be. Fights should generally favor a mix of both when most fights heavily favor one or the other. Condi tends to be stronger than direct damage unless the fight is very, very short, which isn't a great meta to have. As I've said many times, armor rating should be the primary determinant of whether direct or condition damage is better.

> >

> > Lastly, I don't think you need to have a hard "tank role", and it's actually better if you don't, however, defensive stats are not tuned the right way especially in PvE. They need to rethink the implementation of and mechanics surrounding Vitality and Toughness.

>

> Here's the problem with this thinking. If you have no "hard" tank role, as you say, what do you have? Without meaningful threat manipulation you can't force enemies to attack your tank. This means that there has to be some way for non-tanks to survive boss damage. So now your pseudo-tank not only can't protect other players, but has no significant advantage over non-tanks defensively. In other words, your tank in this scenario is just a DPS role that can't deal damage effectively.

>

> You propose balancing stats like vitality/toughness, but without introducing meaningful threat manipulation that would ultimately facilitate a hard tanking role. How? First, it goes against the entire design paradigm of action combat. You're supposed to avoid damage, not tank it. And if you make these stats required for survival without adding in some means of a tanky character protecting non-tanky characters, then everyone ends up having to use these stats and we're back to square one.

>

> Which brings us back to the current system. The only roles we have are healers, support, and DPS. A trinity of sorts, but it lacks depth compared to a traditional trinity system because it's an intentional failure to commit to fully developed roles. Conceptually I don't see how this is an improvement over the trinity and, in practice, my opinion is that it definitely isn't.

 

FYI - I revised my post to better say what I was trying to say for the tank role.

[Embered.5089]

I'm in the process of deleting my guardian because it isn't the tank that I want. When I think of "tank," I think of very specific things that GW2 does not offer in the manner that I want them. But I don't think less of the game because of that. Instead, I'm replacing my guardian with a revenant and giving up my idea of a "perfect" tank.

 

Tinker around with builds and see what you like. Maybe you'll find a tanky or supporty build that you'll like on some obscure class or random trait line that you never thought to use.

Though I do agree that GW2 is much more dps-focused in casual PvE.

[Rauderi.8706]

> @"Rhyse.8179" said:

> Roles (aka Holy Trinity) are weak game design and make for lazy gameplay. Unfortunately Anet replaced them with no control or support at all (until HOT, which finally added support, but there's still no control builds), so I don't think GW2 is any real improvement.

 

This right here.

Until boss-level critters are designed in a way to take certain status effects (at certain times), there isn't much in the way of control that's permitted. What we get is a breakbar that occasionally stuns, or frequently get bosses with no bar at all, ever. It bypasses our control skills (and screws over the primary Thief damage evasion tool: blind) in favor of something "easy".

 

That same Defiance could be used differently. While blue, it eats up all the statuses as usual. When broken, instead of just the basic stun (or in addition to the basic stun), some statuses are permitted (blind, cripple, immob, etc), and after they trigger, the boss gains a short immunity to the afflicted status, and possibly increases the orange bar recovery rate. Change which statuses apply per boss and [boom] you've got yourself a more robust combat experience.

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"Rauderi.8706" said:

> > @"Rhyse.8179" said:

> > Roles (aka Holy Trinity) are weak game design and make for lazy gameplay. Unfortunately Anet replaced them with no control or support at all (until HOT, which finally added support, but there's still no control builds), so I don't think GW2 is any real improvement.

>

> This right here.

> Until boss-level critters are designed in a way to take certain status effects (at certain times), there isn't much in the way of control that's permitted. What we get is a breakbar that occasionally stuns, or frequently get bosses with no bar at all, ever. It bypasses our control skills (and screws over the primary Thief damage evasion tool: blind) in favor of something "easy".

>

> That same Defiance could be used differently. While blue, it eats up all the statuses as usual. When broken, instead of just the basic stun (or in addition to the basic stun), some statuses are permitted (blind, cripple, immob, etc), and after they trigger, the boss gains a short immunity to the afflicted status, and possibly increases the orange bar recovery rate. Change which statuses apply per boss and [boom] you've got yourself a more robust combat experience.

 

Not really. Let's take blind for example. If it becomes effective against bosses after you break their defiance bar, then the ideal scenario would be to time a blind prior to a big attack so that it bypasses the mechanic entirely by causing the attack to simply miss. That's not a lot different from cheesing your way through mechanics using group invuln application, which is why they did away with that. There's a reason why bosses are immune to CC in the first place. Breakbars are only there to provide some sort of purpose for these skills in boss encounters as they are otherwise useless by design.

[Rhyse.8179]

> @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

 

> Not really. Let's take blind for example. If it becomes effective against bosses after you break their defiance bar, then the ideal scenario would be to time a blind prior to a big attack so that it bypasses the mechanic entirely by causing the attack to simply miss.

 

So... it would require group coordination of CC's, a proper group composition (aka coordination prior to the encounter), good timing during the encounter, and would payoff with a high reward that feels great when you pull it off and changes the course of the encounter?

 

That's not cheese... that's GAMEPLAY

 

 

[Sinful.2165]

> @"man zonder schaduw.9721" said:

> > @"Kal Spiro.9745" said:

> > Considering GW2 was designed not to use those roles, I find it strange to say they've killed them. They're not actually supposed to exist to begin with.

>

> I personally dislike the fact they aren't existing that's why i wanted to start the discussion.

> I know people do like it, because most people play dps.

> But there's this small group of healer/support/tank players who are being pushed to dps.

 

I, too, dislike that the holy trinity doesn’t exist as a rule of thumb in GW2. But.. it is there for all the hardest content. For challenge modes and raids you definitely need specific roles filled: DPS, tank, healer and usually some utility.

 

I think Anet has tried to appeal to ULTRA casual people with super easy content that can be face rolled by any random build and then the (in this game anyway, there appears to be a lot of casuals) niche game modes of high end fractals and raids. It’s odd to see no holy trinity up until the point where it is absolutely required. There are no tutorials on how toughness affects aggro or even on basic stuff like how the break bar works as far as I know. It’s just incredibly simple content followed by a reality check at the end. Kind of odd for an MMO, I think.

 

Just consider 80% of the game play to be the easy mode tutorial and the final 20% to be your try hard holy trinity that you are missing. ;)

[Sinful.2165]

> Of course, it's also possible the experiment looks -- to me -- to have succeeded because I view traditional tanking as really stupid mob AI ignoring the attackers hurting it to focus on the one hurting them the least.

 

Ah, well in Guild Wars 2 the tank mechanic is merely who has the highest toughness. The system is not only the same as what you describe but also dumbed down by the fact that the ‘tank’ does not technically have to do much at all. They won’t ever fumble their tank mechanic losing aggro for a few crucial seconds and there’s no exciting moment of the boss bee lining for whoever has the highest aggro. It’s just... toughness.

 

DPS doesn’t have to watch their damage to manage aggro, no one has to be aware of their proximity to the boss, a healer will never pull aggro by going ham with all their cooldowns.

 

I do miss things like that. Raids in GW2 are okay, there are some cool mechanics to some of the bosses but overall I miss how involved and important the role of tank is in other games.

 

[joneirikb.7506]

> @"Sinful.2165" said:

> > Of course, it's also possible the experiment looks -- to me -- to have succeeded because I view traditional tanking as really stupid mob AI ignoring the attackers hurting it to focus on the one hurting them the least.

>

> Ah, well in Guild Wars 2 the tank mechanic is merely who has the highest toughness. The system is not only the same as what you describe but also dumbed down by the fact that the ‘tank’ does not technically have to do much at all. They won’t ever fumble their tank mechanic losing aggro for a few crucial seconds and there’s no exciting moment of the boss bee lining for whoever has the highest aggro. It’s just... toughness.

>

> DPS doesn’t have to watch their damage to manage aggro, no one has to be aware of their proximity to the boss, a healer will never pull aggro by going ham with all their cooldowns.

>

> I do miss things like that. Raids in GW2 are okay, there are some cool mechanics to some of the bosses but overall I miss how involved and important the role of tank is in other games.

>

 

Going to assume you talk about Raids here ? Outside of that, mobs just attack the first target they see, which makes tanking super easy, just walk in first, and ask your buddies to wait 3-5 seconds to attack. Except wolves.

 

I think a change to how enemies target could make for a more interesting game, if a mix of centaurs attacked different targets (determined by what they're good at etc, or trying to lock down potential dangerous players), even a few pre-determined enemy arc-types with predetermined "targets", could make combat in general more interesting, and encourage some more team work.

 

If a pack of 5 centaurs of random types, and the ones with physical ranged attacks all attacked casters to try to pincushion them, the casters tries to lock down medium armor players, while the melee tries to trample/knockdown the melee players, we would have to think a bit more about how we approach things. It still wouldn't have any "Aggro mechanics" but I don't think we need it (and honestly always felt that was a very contrived system), but it would let us adjust tactics/strategies/priorities on the spot depending on what combination of mobs we face.

 

A little bit closer to old GW1 Charr Warbands, my favorite enemy in the series yet.

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"Rhyse.8179" said:

> > @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

>

> > Not really. Let's take blind for example. If it becomes effective against bosses after you break their defiance bar, then the ideal scenario would be to time a blind prior to a big attack so that it bypasses the mechanic entirely by causing the attack to simply miss.

>

> So... it would require group coordination of CC's, a proper group composition (aka coordination prior to the encounter), good timing during the encounter, and would payoff with a high reward that feels great when you pull it off and changes the course of the encounter?

>

> That's not cheese... that's GAMEPLAY

>

>

 

Proper group composition? How so? Are there any classes that don't have access to blinds? I suppose if you redesigned CCs so that everyone didn't blind every other attack, then you might be doing more coordination than simply having everyone hold off on their blinds and designating one person to blind at the right moment? Again, this is little different than having someone able to invuln the group to bypass mechanics that were intended to be dealt with.

 

It could work, but that isn't how things are designed currently. It seems to me that the payoff for such a move would be small. And if we're just going to talk total redesigns, then sign me up for trinity because it sounds like a lot more interesting gameplay than this concept.