No matter what I try, the game has been ruined.

[Razor.6392]

Wanna know how to design the most balanced game in existence? Just put out 8 classes with punches, kicks while only changing their visual effects.

 

A nerf across the board of this caliber might make the game easier to organize and balance, but if to do that you have to take away most things that were **satisfying to use to the players** then you're doing it wrong!

 

I remember vividly a excerpt of a Riot Games balance patch where they had to nerf Kha'zix - don't get me wrong, riot balance sucks just as much but it's worth mentioning - It read that they could have just hit his leaping ability hard, but then the hero would not be fun to play as anymore, so instead they chose a different way to tone him down. This is exactly what's wrong in this massive 'balance' patch. The balance team just whack-a-mole'd "unfun" concepts across the board with very little regard for class uniqueness, feel or fantasy. Nobody likes a completely homogenized game. Fighting games are great because you can have multiple archetypes there, even those that can fly and do everything, but those in return have shortcomings of their own. That's how every game should be balanced, and that's a notion that has been missing in this game since day 1, with all of the overpowering specs that had zero downsides when it came to mobility, burst, brawling, condi clear, sustain, etc. A restart was needed but now everyone heals the same, everyone bursts the same, no cc does damage, no class has that outlier one ability that inflicts tons of damage. Everything feels so uniform and lifeless, uninteresting and dull.

 

Collateral damage in nerfing has also been present since day 1 for the balance team. I've lost count of how many times they have murdered INNOCENT, nonmeta, fun builds just because they wanted to tone down the meta stuff. Plenty of suggestions have always been made so that many builds can coexist, or the problematic traits / skills / builds see a reduction without affecting other playstyles, but these have always been ignored. Fresh Air in this patch is once again a victim as multiple of the skills that made this build playable have been destroyed or nerfed to irrelevance, with no compensation buffs or even the most remote of acknowledgements from the dev team. I shouldn't be saying this but I will since I don't care anymore: The balance team is so clueless and stupid that they completely forgot to touch the dual weaver skills for scepter in the damage pass. Yes, plasma burst is still doing 8k damage but guess what, it's pointless since the spec is clunky as hell and hits as a wet noodle anyways. I don't expect this to ever be addressed, just like they never even acknowledged the bugs on scepter weaver abilties 3 years later, but if something, by some sort of miracle, were to happen, it'd probably be these nerfs.

 

So yes, in pvp nothing that involves a scepter works. Focus was destroyed and offhand dagger received ninja nerfs that they didn't even care to mention in the patch. Arcane abilities do 1k damage, elemental surge was nerfed (a trait only used by FA eles), glacial drift, the water / air dual scepter skill that has a projectile speed so slow it can be outran, the same skill that will randomly say "obstructed" as soon as you cast it for no reason since 2017, yes, that one ability got 1 stack of stability FOR WHO KNOWS WHAT REASON. This is how they compensate buffs. Complete afterthoughts with zero brainpower behind them, and I cannot stand it anymore.

 

I got over 5k hours on ele, playing since 2012 on and off and this is by far the worst time to play. Even when ele was weak, FA ele kept its niche: bursty mofo with not much else going for it but man was it fun, now it can't even do that. Just delete scepter at this point lmao.

 

This game is not worth playing right now. Hopefully when anet decides to do a balance patch they start rightfully buffing and turning these gimped icons with various visual effects into actual classes.

[FrownyClown.8402]

D/d core is performing quite well actually. But yeah, arcanes do as much as an auto attack in air. The only viable burst is Phoenix so you're pretty much required to run zerker with fire air arcane to be relevent

[Ryou.2398]

> @"Razor.6392" said:

> Wanna know how to design the most balanced game in existence? Just put out 8 classes with punches, kicks while only changing their visual effects.

>

> A nerf across the board of this caliber might make the game easier to organize and balance, but if to do that you have to take away most things that were **satisfying to use to the players** then you're doing it wrong!

>

> I remember vividly a excerpt of a Riot Games balance patch where they had to nerf Kha'zix - don't get me wrong, riot balance sucks just as much but it's worth mentioning - It read that they could have just hit his leaping ability hard, but then the hero would not be fun to play as anymore, so instead they chose a different way to tone him down. This is exactly what's wrong in this massive 'balance' patch. The balance team just whack-a-mole'd "unfun" concepts across the board with very little regard for class uniqueness, feel or fantasy. Nobody likes a completely homogenized game. Fighting games are great because you can have multiple archetypes there, even those that can fly and do everything, but those in return have shortcomings of their own. That's how every game should be balanced, and that's a notion that has been missing in this game since day 1, with all of the overpowering specs that had zero downsides when it came to mobility, burst, brawling, condi clear, sustain, etc. A restart was needed but now everyone heals the same, everyone bursts the same, no cc does damage, no class has that outlier one ability that inflicts tons of damage. Everything feels so uniform and lifeless, uninteresting and dull.

>

> Collateral damage in nerfing has also been present since day 1 for the balance team. I've lost count of how many times they have murdered INNOCENT, nonmeta, fun builds just because they wanted to tone down the meta stuff. Plenty of suggestions have always been made so that many builds can coexist, or the problematic traits / skills / builds see a reduction without affecting other playstyles, but these have always been ignored. Fresh Air in this patch is once again a victim as multiple of the skills that made this build playable have been destroyed or nerfed to irrelevance, with no compensation buffs or even the most remote of acknowledgements from the dev team. I shouldn't be saying this but I will since I don't care anymore: The balance team is so clueless and stupid that they completely forgot to touch the dual weaver skills for scepter in the damage pass. Yes, plasma burst is still doing 8k damage but guess what, it's pointless since the spec is clunky as hell and hits as a wet noodle anyways. I don't expect this to ever be addressed, just like they never even acknowledged the bugs on scepter weaver abilties 3 years later, but if something, by some sort of miracle, were to happen, it'd probably be these nerfs.

>

> So yes, in pvp nothing that involves a scepter works. Focus was destroyed and offhand dagger received ninja nerfs that they didn't even care to mention in the patch. Arcane abilities do 1k damage, elemental surge was nerfed (a trait only used by FA eles), glacial drift, the water / air dual scepter skill that has a projectile speed so slow it can be outran, the same skill that will randomly say "obstructed" as soon as you cast it for no reason since 2017, yes, that one ability got 1 stack of stability FOR WHO KNOWS WHAT REASON. This is how they compensate buffs. Complete afterthoughts with zero brainpower behind them, and I cannot stand it anymore.

>

> I got over 5k hours on ele, playing since 2012 on and off and this is by far the worst time to play. Even when ele was weak, FA ele kept its niche: bursty mofo with not much else going for it but man was it fun, now it can't even do that. Just delete scepter at this point lmao.

>

> This game is not worth playing right now. Hopefully when anet decides to do a balance patch they start rightfully buffing and turning these kitten icons with various visual effects into actual classes.

 

Yep taking away the fun aspects and not even giving it something equal or better is a big issue, my experience in mmos over the years quickly go downhill after a few years over things like this.

[Patty.3268]

If something gets nerfed because it overperforms/is overpowered, there's no need to compensate for these nerfs. If they would get compensated, the class or build will still overperform, just differently. E.g. if damage gets nerfed and you get a buff in survivability in return, you haven't really brought down that class/build. Especially when due to the buff in survivability, you can just replace a few defensive skills and traits with offensive ones and are back to square one. So if the devs would start compensating all the nerfs of the recent patch, it's purpose of bringing down the power level would be out of the window.

 

 

[vesica tempestas.1563]

> @"Patty.3268" said:

> If something gets nerfed because it overperforms/is overpowered, there's no need to compensate for these nerfs. If they would get compensated, the class or build will still overperform, just differently. E.g. if damage gets nerfed and you get a buff in survivability in return, you haven't really brought down that class/build. Especially when due to the buff in survivability, you can just replace a few defensive skills and traits with offensive ones and are back to square one. So if the devs would start compensating all the nerfs of the recent patch, it's purpose of bringing down the power level would be out of the window.

>

>

 

Unless it's overnerfed as part of generalised rather than targeted nerfs, for example reducing healing across the board, but failing to compensate for the weighting ele had on healing because of low armor. At the moment in wvw and pvp staff, sceptre and warhorn are dead., clearly the nerfs need compensation in these cases.

 

 

[Aigleborgne.2981]

The worst is not the patch, which was necessary. It is the complete lack of communication post-patch from balance team.

Maybe they are already making adjustments but without telling us, we can also suppose we will have to wait for 3 months...

[Yasai.3549]

> @"Aigleborgne.2981" said:

> The worst is not the patch, which was necessary. It is the complete lack of communication post-patch from balance team.

> Maybe they are already making adjustments but without telling us, we can also suppose we will have to wait for 3 months...

 

Worst thing is, they deny us the chance to test changes or show us the changes in action time and time again.

They are more content with tinkering in their secret lab instead of being upfront either streaming the changes and how they work, or better, letting us test in a PBE.

 

Alot of games with balance changes to competitive usually have a PBE to allow for player feedback and gather more information, it's clear Anet doesn't give a hoot about competitive, rather focusing on PvE first, then giving competitive side a massive upheaval every 6 months to keep it "fresh"

[Jski.6180]

By far ele dmg was overnerfed where other classes dmg was undernerfed as ele dmg was balance before the update.

[MyPuppy.8970]

"the ability to inflict massive damage in a single attack" has been removed long ago.

"What they lack in physical toughness" has been nerfed even more though...

[Eddbopkins.2630]

Fa ele never had a burst to be scared of. You rarely see one in a match. Once in every 10 games maybe at least. It was not strong to begin with and the lvl of obstructions that happen on every map on nearly every skill is disapointing.

Now after this balance, it's has become unplayable for me. I have over 5k hours in this game and 90% of it is on fa ele. After this patch it has been deleted. Thf, gaurds necros, all light classes, all have blocks, invis, evades, or a 2nd life pool totaling over 35k to be able to survive a burst and maintain a fight. Fa ele has barebones nothing!

What does fa ele have to compete with.....I don't see anything.

[Vrath.1754]

> @"Yasai.3549" said:

> > @"Aigleborgne.2981" said:

> > The worst is not the patch, which was necessary. It is the complete lack of communication post-patch from balance team.

> > Maybe they are already making adjustments but without telling us, we can also suppose we will have to wait for 3 months...

>

> Worst thing is, they deny us the chance to test changes or show us the changes in action time and time again.

> They are more content with tinkering in their secret lab instead of being upfront either streaming the changes and how they work, or better, letting us test in a PBE.

>

> Alot of games with balance changes to competitive usually have a PBE to allow for player feedback and gather more information, it's clear Anet doesn't give a hoot about competitive, rather focusing on PvE first, then giving competitive side a massive upheaval every 6 months to keep it "fresh"

 

You've said this a couple times unfortunately I dont believe it would change anything in regards to balance changes. It hopefully would for bugs.

 

Sure they can put up a PTR that will be flooded with suggestions and complaints that they have to mine through the bias towards ones own classes, the narrow focus of players not looking at the enter games modes scope ect. I mean just look at the forums there are a lot of suggestions right now how many are actually unbiased and consider other classes and the interaction of the game mode?

 

To balance in that manner is a huge time sink and when MMOs do this very rarely do they alter things drastically based on player feedback in regards to balance.

 

Im struggling come up with an MMO which actually makes balance changes based on player PTR feedback. Outside of WoW mainly the raid testing.

 

Swtor has a ptr but they don't really balance around player feedback in most cases.

 

What would it really change? In an ideal world they'd have the resources to wade through the BS but very few MMOs have those resources.

 

One good thing about PTRs is some obvious bugs can be fixed ahead of time like the Rangers bugged rugged growth assuming they have the resource and prioritize it.

 

Thinking about it, it couldnt hurt to provide a test realm maybe some good would come out of at least easy bugs could be identified and hopefully fixed.

 

Tldr: Idk there is no perfect solution a ptr wouldnt change much if anything in regards to balance changes, there be very few suggestions that werent balance biased. Maybe I'm jaded from working in development and seeing all the stupid from consultants to support to end users. There is a reason Dell support starts with the question 'is it plugged in'

 

[vesica tempestas.1563]

If you have regular patch updates (1-2 weeks) and ability to emergency fix then you can test in live, which is much more cost efficient with a huge tester base. There's a well known saying in software dev, fail fast, fail often which actually means, change fast without fear. Cadance is king, Ptr delays change and eats resources.

[LolLookAtMyAP.8394]

FA ele is just atrocious design. In fact I want to say it's the worst-designed build in the game. From instacast air 2 and air attunings, hard to predict attacks, and fast moving projectiles it's little surprise why this got the nerf hammer. To add, FA ele is almost exclusively single target which can be abysmal in teamfights.

 

Proposal, make air 2 and air attuning not result in an instacast lightning strike, but rather spawn an initial "red lightning" which then spawns a legitimate lightning strike. It is now an AoE skill. The air attune trait is similar but it's target-based and not ground-targeted (for obvious reasons). Double damage done by lightning strikes, and they daze as well.

 

Slow down all projectiles except earth 3 but increase the damage significantly. (Earth/water auto, earth 2, arcane blast)

 

Arcane Wave is no longer an instacast AoE. It now graphically pulses three times before exploding into a massive AoE. Damage is increased, effects stay the same.

 

 

[solemn.9608]

I've always thought you were a disagreeable bastard but I actually agree with you for once.

Nice post.

[Virdo.1540]

Maybe they finally add something that lets this game be like other mmorpgs like wow.

Something that let us expand our stats to infinity.

 

More players - more income for anet - every class can be op,which would be balanced.

[Junkpile.7439]

Tested scepter/dagger ele and it's just horrible. Well player was horrible too. Kind of impossible play burst spec that do low damage, can't take any damage and doesn't really have any tools to survive.

[Stallic.2397]

> @"Junkpile.7439" said:

> Tested scepter/dagger ele and it's just horrible. Well player was horrible too. Kind of impossible play burst spec that do low damage, can't take any damage and doesn't really have any tools to survive.

 

After all the changes Anet has made. Dagger Off-hand really needs some help. Water 5 doesn't scale well with healing power and has a low heal in pvp. Water 4 has a 30 sec cooldown! Unnecessarily long for aura generation, especially since dagger is a close range weapon. There's a whole thread about updraft so I won't even get started on that. Ride the lightning has gotten so many nerfs. At least give it's evade back. With lack of stab, Earth 4 is hard to execute, then you have Earth 5 which is even harder! Channeling it successfully requires stab or lightning flash.

 

Dagger off hand is honestly a glassy weapon with no reward. As for scepter, I get FA was oppressive with all it's instant casts, but if Anet wants that gone, then they need to give alternatives. I currently haven't found one or seen one. The closest I"ve seen is a kite-orientated build that avoided damage quite well but had little to no damage in return. Really defeats the purpose.

[Waisenpai.6028]

Keep up the feed back and remember to post on the wvw balance change forum to let them know the made a tad wee mistake with those darn coefficient numbers to all classes the base power, healing and 300 seconds cd on stun breaks maybe a tad over kill. If they don't want us to use it tell them to give us new traitline or skill. Ele was base on jack of all trades and if the nerf us on all trades than we nothing? We can play self condi clearer with no damage? Anet has redefined ele as the wvw kick me sign or zerg bait. Tasty loot, you either died right away or you can bunker and die after. Tempest no damage trash suport tank ( death by well place condi) or fire/earth condi weaver you can kind use 2 conditions and limit to poor and mitigate conditions. Both are poor builds have no pressure on enemies your skill level or 1-2 tiers below. Unless they are pve karma trains, back lines or soft core players, you will be hooped.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

I just don't want to play traiblazer, but it seems it's the only effective set in wvw. Abandon my d/d marauder/celestial for traiblazer fire makes me sick. It's like playing the old cancer mirage. (Still cancer in WvW by the way with +40% endurance regen food, +50% on weapon swap, perma vigor ... )

Otherwise in PvP, tempest shines again a bit. I don't 100% agree this is meta; there are too much counters (and popular ones, a necro or spb can just cancel your build and dance on your body) but it works better than others spec/builds.

[steki.1478]

> @"Zhaid Zhem.6508" said:

> I just don't want to play traiblazer, but it seems it's the only effective set in wvw. Abandon my d/d marauder/celestial for traiblazer fire makes me sick. It's like playing the old cancer mirage. (Still cancer in WvW by the way with +40% endurance regen food, +50% on weapon swap, perma vigor ... )

> Otherwise in PvP, tempest shines again a bit. I don't 100% agree this is meta; there are too much counters (and popular ones, a necro or spb can just cancel your build and dance on your body) but it works better than others spec/builds.

 

D/f LR weaver is literally god tier in both pvp and wvw roaming. Is it really that hard to adapt to changes or at least check a couple of videos/streams? Tempest doesnt even come close to what weaver can do.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

What's your build for WvW ? I tried it a long time ago, it worked. I tried it a week ago, I got smashed by a core necro ; a SB with 40sec of stab and a tons of condi bunkers like heralds, ... fire weavers ...

Tempest Defense got nerfed a year ago. Electric Discharge deals Zero dmg, I still press Obsidian flesh like an kitten. And overall it lacks condi mitigation : one immobilize and you can't dodge in water, you only have earth#4.

 

Yes it works, but it's scissor in the hand game, when half the roamers and pvp players are now Rock.

[steki.1478]

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGgAg2lZgFhZiF912LA-zVRYVRTRRM06lRmJQvFgazR1MA-w this is the general "template" of the build that I'm using.

 

- Weaver traits can vary from 1-3-3 to 1-2-1, based on preference, matchups, experience. 1-3-1 or 1-3-3 is usually what I use.

- Utility skills options: flash, air signet (currently the best stun break), primordial stance, stone resonance (both work great when you trait stances), conjured shield (cc, defense, mobility).

- Sigils: you can play around with sigil of battle, absorption and impact (or even doom vs heavy sustain bunkers).

- Runes : leadership, durability or any offensive rune of choice (I like runes with power+precision because they allow me to have >90% crit chance with fury + weakness on enemy).

- Gear stats: I found marauder to be the best choice since the build has quite decent base sustain through regens and barriers, but 200-300 healing power helps a lot too. I've noticed that a lot of my damage comes from burning as well so having a few celestial (or marshal) pieces can help. For pvp there's marauder, cele and avatar amulets.

 

 

Electric discharge doesnt need damage, it applies 8 vuln instead of 1, which increases your damage elsewhere. I'm kinda glad that tempest defense got nerfed because we'd have very low fury otherwise (and extra shocking aura would be way too strong in this build). There's way too many ele traits in the same column that are competing for the same thing, whether it's same type of damage in air or healing in water.

 

As for condi cleanses, you dont have many in this build, but you can keep enemy under pressure a lot with CC so it's hard for them to burst you down, especially if you take defensive weaver traits and stances.

[Axl.8924]

Is tempest just really unviable as support? did a few matches of 2v2 and it went horribly.

 

As soon as i go in everyone is chasing me, and i feel like i am not healing much at all.

[avey.4201]

> @"Jski.6180" said:

> By far ele dmg was overnerfed where other classes dmg was undernerfed as ele dmg was balance before the update.

 

Dragon hunter has this issue too, since many skills are capable of a CC in some form(even if you cant land the cc on any player as they move)DH lost damage from damage skills and cc skills, even nerfed damage gained from being tethered(besides the 5 minute cooldown, top kek anet), when you need tether pull to use the only viable trap left meaning you un-tethered.

DH and ele atm only have condi bunker builds, power is broken bad enough fighting 1v2 you have to kill them with downed penalty as people are unaffected by zerk cleave.

[Razor.6392]

> @"LolLookAtMyAP.8394" said:

> FA ele is just atrocious design. In fact I want to say it's the worst-designed build in the game. From instacast air 2 and air attunings, hard to predict attacks, and fast moving projectiles it's little surprise why this got the nerf hammer. To add, FA ele is almost exclusively single target which can be abysmal in teamfights.

>

> Proposal, make air 2 and air attuning not result in an instacast lightning strike, but rather spawn an initial "red lightning" which then spawns a legitimate lightning strike. It is now an AoE skill. The air attune trait is similar but it's target-based and not ground-targeted (for obvious reasons). Double damage done by lightning strikes, and they daze as well.

>

> Slow down all projectiles except earth 3 but increase the damage significantly. (Earth/water auto, earth 2, arcane blast)

>

> Arcane Wave is no longer an instacast AoE. It now graphically pulses three times before exploding into a massive AoE. Damage is increased, effects stay the same.

>

>

 

Proposal, stop posting and keep quiet.

 

If the build was so amazing everyone would have used it. Kinda makes you think no? It's almost like predicting dodges is a thing