Balance of Condi and Power

[Stajan.4581]

So over the years there has been a swing from side to side as to the best condi or power and power has come out on time mostly. Now it is found that in WvW that condi has gone crazy and is almost unstoppable. Well I have come up with the solution, this will do 3 things at once. 1 Balance power and condi 2 make gear that is not being used much more viable 3 spark up some build craft.

 

1 Balance Power and Condi: this is very easy to do and it comes at something most people will not like or maybe they will. first off lower the duration of condis make them at least half the time so if it takes 10 seconds to do 5000 damage make it 5 seconds to do 5000 damage Next the ticks, everyone loves seeing those ticks grow and grow and grow but each tick would do 5000 damage over 5 seconds well no, since in 5 seconds would do 5000 damage if you reach the threshold of 25 stacks at that time a max amount of damage would take place after 5 second, so You would see a number say 50K come up with these numbers of course this is PVE and you are looking at world bosses and stuff for these kind of numbers in pvp and wvw they would have to be different. So how do we combat this well that answer is already kinda in the game.

 

2 Combating the new condi mechanic well the answer is vitality the higher your vitality the less of a % of the damage you take from condi this is along the same lines as the toughness and power lines. But what about resistance and that stuff, well that is easy too, if you have burning on you and it is 2 ticks and in 2 seconds you would take 2000 damage and you have 2 ticks of resistance for 2 seconds you take 0 damage, if you have 1 tick you take half the damage divided buy your vitality%. This will make gear like trailblazers viable in PVE, yes you can run it but the way the damage is now it take way to long to kill things and forces you into a power type play. Trailblazers in WvW is very common for roamers but that is about all. The best thing about this is that you do not need to change any traits at all, just cut the duration of condis and lower the damage by the amount of vitality they have. World Bosses with there high vitality scores would take less damage from the condi burst so say it is 50K that would be the damage they might take only 30K because of their vitality score.

 

3 The 2 biggest gears being run right now is zerker and vipers this has been the case for what seems forever, and though I personally hate both sets I do understand the reason people run them. It however leaves a large void when players like myself want to get into other content like raid but do not run the gear or the builds that everyone is looking for. This will open the doors to better build craft and open the eyes of the players running raid and stuff to see that they is a different way to do things and that it does not need to be an elitist mind set to do raids.

 

So how about looking into my idea look at what it could do to the game where it makes a balance of power and condi.

 

Thanks for reading I look forward to reading some comments and hopefully hearing from a dev or two, until than keep safe.

[Dawdler.8521]

> @"Stajan.4581" said:

> Now it is found that in WvW that condi has gone crazy and is almost unstoppable.

Yes, it has become balanced against power now, hasnt it?

[Julius Seizure.4985]

Power uses 3 stats for maximum potential, and condition damage uses 2 stats for maximum potential. This is the root of the problem.

 

Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

 

Boom. All of a sudden you need Power/Precision/Ferocity or Condition/Precision/Expertise for maximum damage of each respective type. The bloat for condition damage come entirely from its ability to maximize at 2 stats, and often do insane damage with just 1 stats (Condition damage).

[Mizhas.8536]

> @"Julius Seizure.4985" said:

> Power uses 3 stats for maximum potential, and condition damage uses 2 stats for maximum potential. This is the root of the problem.

>

> Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

>

> Boom. All of a sudden you need Power/Precision/Ferocity or Condition/Precision/Expertise for maximum damage of each respective type. The bloat for condition damage come entirely from its ability to maximize at 2 stats, and often do insane damage with just 1 stats (Condition damage).

 

In fact, expertise is considered optional. It is just a good spot to spend spare stats nothing else.

 

So in reality we are comparing the need of 3 different stats against the need of 1. THAT is the key.

[Dawdler.8521]

> @"Julius Seizure.4985" said:

> Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

Thats called vitality and condi cleanse.

 

The latter part makes zerg essentially immune to condi attrition and removes any viability of condition damage at sizes above 3-5. Even a single heal firebrand or heal scrapper in such groups make condi very ineffective against them, while they in turn can just stack power and train people down.

 

"Crazy" and "unstoppable" my ass.

[Sansar.1302]

> @"Dawdler.8521" said:

> > @"Julius Seizure.4985" said:

> > Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

> Thats called vitality and condi cleanse.

>

> The latter part makes zerg essentially immune to condi attrition and removes any viability of condition damage at sizes above 3-5. Even a single heal firebrand or heal scrapper in such groups make condi very ineffective against them, while they in turn can just stack power and train people down.

>

> "Crazy" and "unstoppable" my kitten.

 

Yes it is in smal scale, some of these condi tank builds is only betable with a mirror ( same kinda build and class) Last meta where Power with some condi classes like mirage and condi thief still being good.

Zerg play cant say as I dont do that any more , but seams right what you say about it being less effective there.

[KrHome.1920]

- Rune of Antitoxin

- Sigil of Cleansing

- Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

- Burst damage

 

Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

[hobotnicax.7918]

> @"KrHome.1920" said:

> - Rune of Antitoxin

> - Sigil of Cleansing

> - Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

> - Burst damage

>

> Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

 

Condi is broken af right now, please don't try to defend this bs.

 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

> @"hobotnicax.7918" said:

> > @"KrHome.1920" said:

> > - Rune of Antitoxin

> > - Sigil of Cleansing

> > - Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

> > - Burst damage

> >

> > Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

>

> Condi is broken af right now, please don't try to defend this bs.

>

 

Take all of them and rip Condi comps to shreds...

 

The main problem of Condi is that only 1 stat is really needed to do good damage. If you focus on a single condition, then with traits, rune choices, and a sigil you can generally get 100% uptime on your damage condi without a single point spent on Expertise. Roll VTC stats and tank for days.

 

Rune of Antitoxin along with a couple of sources of condi clears will negate a great deal of condi damage, but dealing with the tank stats requires more DPS than is generally available since the last patch unless you are going full glass outside of the Antitoxin Runes.

[lodjur.1284]

> @"hobotnicax.7918" said:

> > @"KrHome.1920" said:

> > - Rune of Antitoxin

> > - Sigil of Cleansing

> > - Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

> > - Burst damage

> >

> > Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

>

> Condi is broken af right now, please don't try to defend this bs.

>

 

It's only overpowered against people who don't use the absurdly strong sigil of cleansing.

 

People need to start running arcdps. With a groupsize of 3 and normal amounts of clear, I take more than 50% dmg as condi in maybe 5% of the fights and that's a high estimate.

 

The very very vast majority of that is either getting stuck in Sword of Justice or getting hit by the stupidly overpowered true nature - Demon.

 

 

> @"Julius Seizure.4985" said:

> Power uses 3 stats for maximum potential, and condition damage uses 2 stats for maximum potential. This is the root of the problem.

 

Condi dmg builds need something crucial that power builds don't

 

Time

 

It's why dire/TB is needed for condi to be viable.

 

Now of course the really bursty condi builds need nerfs, as being tanky+bursty is obviously problematic.

 

The same can obviously be applied to the condi builds with high amounts of mobility/evasion (often the same as the bursty ones).

 

> Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

 

Sure then remove condi clears I guess? Because otherwise there's 2 big categories of counters to condi and only 1 to power.

 

> Boom. All of a sudden you need Power/Precision/Ferocity or Condition/Precision/Expertise for maximum damage of each respective type. The bloat for condition damage come entirely from its ability to maximize at 2 stats, and often do insane damage with just 1 stats (Condition damage).

 

There's a few outliers, SoJ for example but most condi builds hardly do "insane" dmg vs builds with normal amounts of clear

 

> @"Dawdler.8521" said:

> > @"Stajan.4581" said:

> > Now it is found that in WvW that condi has gone crazy and is almost unstoppable.

> Yes, it has become balanced against power now, hasnt it?

 

People want power supremacy (more than now) , not this silly "balance" you speak of.

[FrownyClown.8402]

At least with power I felt like we earned the kills. Also, condi comps are carried by burn damage.

[Farout.8207]

I've been messing around with a condi core thief lately and it's amazing how many people are running around WvW with zero cleanses. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

[biofrog.1568]

> @"Stajan.4581" said:

>

> 1 Balance Power and Condi: this is very easy to do..

 

You were so wrong by this point already, I stopped reading.

 

[aspirine.6852]

Perhaps burn is a bit strong, but the rest is ok. For big groups power is still king, and cleanses are still easily handling condi :/

[Turkeyspit.3965]

Overall I'd say both are rather balanced compared to each other.

 

Pre-patch roamers were split pretty evenly on power vs condition while zerg builds were exclusively power, and Scrappers were only required because of scourge boon corrupt.

 

Today it's all over the board. Most Revs are condi, even in zergs, but not necessarily because condi is super power, but because hammer rev is now just that bad by comparison. Soulbeasts are still power, and Power Scrapper is becoming more and more visible, while Reaper is seeing more play in zergs, while support Tempest is seeing more play while Staff Weaver is seeing less.

 

You have way more diversity in builds and professions today than you did 2 months ago, but people are just seeing the trees and ignoring the forest. Look at your squad panel next time you're in a zerg - you see more than 4-5 unique icons these days..much more..

 

[Spartacus.3192]

> @"KrHome.1920" said:

> - Rune of Antitoxin

> - Sigil of Cleansing

> - Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

> - Burst damage

>

> Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

 

if you take only 2 of those things it will make no difference to a good condi player. My condi rev sprays condis like its coming out of a firehose. Plus if youre playing power and taking antitoxin rune and cleaning sigils and cleansing skills, you will have to go full zerk and even then you will probably not have enough burst damage to take out a condi tank.

[Yasai.3549]

It's all about the frequency and speed that Conditions can be applied vs Power damage.

 

Power damage used to be absolutely oppressive because it deals explosive direct damage immediately, causing the Condi build to need to survive cooldowns in order to counter attack, and even then, the fight could go any way, but it favours Power heavily due to extremely powerful opening they can start the combat with.

 

Right now it has been tipped on the opposite end : Condi builds can easily survive any Power burst and while their Power based opponent is waiting on cooldowns, they have all the time in the world to apply Conditions and kite.

 

In theory, this is the perfect balance, but the balance is all gone when yu take into account that certain Professions, skills or traits have the ability to stack insane amounts of Conditions on their targets, at a very high frequency.

 

While it isn't a straight power burst, it is a burst of highly stacked conditions, totally overcoming Conditions one weakness : delayed damage over time.

 

Conditions in this game is the worst sort of balance for DoTs I have ever seen in any game.

"Burst over Time" should have never been a thing.

 

Imo what they should do is make Condition Damage affect scaling, and make Expertise affect speed at which the Condition ticks.

 

More expertise, the faster it ticks, the faster it expires.

Less expertise, the slower it ticks, the longer it takes to expire.

 

This won't solve burst condis but it would stop stacks of condis from accumulating to insane levels and dealing all the combined damage per tick, making them expire faster if the player has built expertise, and if they don't, it won't tick once per second, it would tick once per 2 seconds instead.

[Dawdler.8521]

> @"Yasai.3549" said:

> It's all about the frequency and speed that Conditions can be applied vs Power damage.

>

> Power damage used to be absolutely oppressive because it deals explosive direct damage immediately, causing the Condi build to need to survive cooldowns in order to counter attack, and even then, the fight could go any way, but it favours Power heavily due to extremely powerful opening they can start the combat with.

>

> Right now it has been tipped on the opposite end : Condi builds can easily survive any Power burst and while their Power based opponent is waiting on cooldowns, they have all the time in the world to apply Conditions and kite.

>

> In theory, this is the perfect balance, but the balance is all gone when yu take into account that certain Professions, skills or traits have the ability to stack insane amounts of Conditions on their targets, at a very high frequency.

>

> While it isn't a straight power burst, it is a burst of highly stacked conditions, totally overcoming Conditions one weakness : delayed damage over time.

>

> Conditions in this game is the worst sort of balance for DoTs I have ever seen in any game.

> "Burst over Time" should have never been a thing.

>

> Imo what they should do is make Condition Damage affect scaling, and make Expertise affect speed at which the Condition ticks.

>

> More expertise, the faster it ticks, the faster it expires.

> Less expertise, the slower it ticks, the longer it takes to expire.

>

> This won't solve burst condis but it would stop stacks of condis from accumulating to insane levels and dealing all the combined damage per tick, making them expire faster if the player has built expertise, and if they don't, it won't tick once per second, it would tick once per 2 seconds instead.

*What you're actually saying through all that:*

 

**Some classes can stack condi too fast.**

 

They could do that before the power nerf patch and people complained about them too because its the exact same builds that was just as strong then against glassy power builds. In fact most, if not all, of these condi builds *also* saw nerfs.

[Yasai.3549]

> @"Dawdler.8521" said:

 

> **Some classes can stack condi too fast.**

 

And too frequently.

 

Burn guards are able to spit out alot of Burning at a fast rate.

Condi Rangers are also able to do the same with Bleeding.

 

If they are allowed to reapply Conditions so frequently in addition to stacking them quickly, I don't see why Conditions should be allowed to stack to ludicrous levels to essentially enable "Bursts per second"

 

 

 

 

 

[Shroud.2307]

> @"lodjur.1284" said:

> > @"hobotnicax.7918" said:

> > > @"KrHome.1920" said:

> > > - Rune of Antitoxin

> > > - Sigil of Cleansing

> > > - Condition cleansing Skills and Traits

> > > - Burst damage

> > >

> > > Pick two to be able to deal with any condi build in the game.

> >

> > Condi is broken af right now, please don't try to defend this bs.

> >

>

> It's only overpowered against people who don't use the absurdly strong sigil of cleansing.

>

> People need to start running arcdps. With a groupsize of 3 and normal amounts of clear, I take more than 50% dmg as condi in maybe 5% of the fights and that's a high estimate.

>

> The very very vast majority of that is either getting stuck in Sword of Justice or getting hit by the stupidly overpowered true nature - Demon.

>

>

> > @"Julius Seizure.4985" said:

> > Power uses 3 stats for maximum potential, and condition damage uses 2 stats for maximum potential. This is the root of the problem.

>

> Condi dmg builds need something crucial that power builds don't

>

> Time

>

> It's why dire/TB is needed for condi to be viable.

>

> Now of course the really bursty condi builds need nerfs, as being tanky+bursty is obviously problematic.

>

> The same can obviously be applied to the condi builds with high amounts of mobility/evasion (often the same as the bursty ones).

>

> > Make it so condition damage is reduced by something (toughness, vitality, etc) and then have Precision add the current “ignores armor” reduction effect.

>

> Sure then remove condi clears I guess? Because otherwise there's 2 big categories of counters to condi and only 1 to power.

>

> > Boom. All of a sudden you need Power/Precision/Ferocity or Condition/Precision/Expertise for maximum damage of each respective type. The bloat for condition damage come entirely from its ability to maximize at 2 stats, and often do insane damage with just 1 stats (Condition damage).

>

> There's a few outliers, SoJ for example but most condi builds hardly do "insane" dmg vs builds with normal amounts of clear

>

> > @"Dawdler.8521" said:

> > > @"Stajan.4581" said:

> > > Now it is found that in WvW that condi has gone crazy and is almost unstoppable.

> > Yes, it has become balanced against power now, hasnt it?

>

> People want power supremacy (more than now) , not this silly "balance" you speak of.

 

Thank you for summarizing what I was debating on making an entire thread to write about.

[Shroud.2307]

> @"Yasai.3549" said:

> > @"Dawdler.8521" said:

>

> > **Some classes can stack condi too fast.**

>

> And too frequently.

>

> Burn guards are able to spit out alot of Burning at a fast rate.

> Condi Rangers are also able to do the same with Bleeding.

>

> If they are allowed to reapply Conditions so frequently in addition to stacking them quickly, I don't see why Conditions should be allowed to stack to ludicrous levels to essentially enable "Bursts per second"

>

>

>

>

>

 

Nerfing things across the board is never the answer with the exception of the February patch because it addressed _everything._ Adjustments should be made to the things causing the most problems be it skills, traits, runes or otherwise instead of further reducing the strength of innocent bystanders.

 

There isn't anything ( or are very, very few ) that applies 5+ stacks of any given Condition in a single hit. All Condition builds require constant application and a time to ramp up their damage where as Power skills are instant. Stay aggressive, dodge appropriately, don't panic cleanse. If you're getting hit with a lot of Conditions and it's a 1 v 1 either you're letting yourself get locked down by CC's or you're face tanking and hoping to out DPS their stacks.

 

In my own experience, I often take only a couple cleanses, sometimes only a sigil, and I do just fine in the vast majority of encounters be it large scale or small. In large scale I rarely take much Condition pressure at all unless I get locked in a CC bomb at which point Conditions aren't my only concern anyway. In 1 v 1's I actually can't think of a time in recent history where I was against a build that had too much Condition pressure to handle. Condi Rev's can be tricky sometimes and Condi Mes still has some pretty decent builds but that's pretty much it.

 

I'm 100% convinced this whole outcry about Condition builds is from people that don't know how to deal with them and want the answer to everything to be an oppressive amount of instant Power damage that nothing can tank through.

[DeceiverX.8361]

Problem is more the gear than the conditions themselves (except burning and torment are straight OP right now on a few builds).

Get rid of Dire/TB and it's largely fixed.

 

There's an unspoken advantage to condi vs power builds which is largely that control conditions are way more damning than they are when sourced from power builds.

Against condi you're forced to spend cleanses on the DoT's while you can manage the cleanses as you need to against power builds for essential control conditions like weakness, immob, and even blind when casting larger, high-impact channeled skills.

 

Killing S/T a power mesmer, for example, I can cleanse its blind and go for the kill when it enters stealth out of desperation because I know it's still in melee and my hit will track. Against a condi mesmer, I'm constantly trying to cleanse to not die, and don't have the resources to line up the killing blow so it can stealth safely. If given weakness by a condi build, I only get half the dodges, despite still needing to dodge the same skills to avoid the tick applications and CC.

 

Which of course, aside from blind, these effects are also extended by Expertise/condi duration effects, making it all the more problematic from a balance perspective.

 

Condi right now is mostly just a total PITA to deal with because of its pure defensive resources available in WvW (Dire/TB) and how the nature of condition builds is to gain power by extending a fight, which is now easier to do than at any other point in the history of the game. When they can't be killed quickly thanks to a myriad of issues, the strength is over-leveraged.

 

Sure we can all stack up on cleanses, but then as soon as we encounter a rounded-out power build we get slapped because their utilities, sigils, and traits just dominate Power vs Power. It's the same argument in reverse.

[babazhook.6805]

> @"DeceiverX.8361" said:

> Problem is more the gear than the conditions themselves (except burning and torment are straight OP right now on a few builds).

> Get rid of Dire/TB and it's largely fixed.

>

> There's an unspoken advantage to condi vs power builds which is largely that control conditions are way more damning than they are when sourced from power builds.

> Against condi you're forced to spend cleanses on the DoT's while you can manage the cleanses as you need to against power builds for essential control conditions like weakness, immob, and even blind when casting larger, high-impact channeled skills.

>

> Killing S/T a power mesmer, for example, I can cleanse its blind and go for the kill when it enters stealth out of desperation because I know it's still in melee and my hit will track. Against a condi mesmer, I'm constantly trying to cleanse to not die, and don't have the resources to line up the killing blow so it can stealth safely. If given weakness by a condi build, I only get half the dodges, despite still needing to dodge the same skills to avoid the tick applications and CC.

>

> Which of course, aside from blind, these effects are also extended by Expertise/condi duration effects, making it all the more problematic from a balance perspective.

>

> Condi right now is mostly just a total PITA to deal with because of its pure defensive resources available in WvW (Dire/TB) and how the nature of condition builds is to gain power by extending a fight, which is now easier to do than at any other point in the history of the game. When they can't be killed quickly thanks to a myriad of issues, the strength is over-leveraged.

>

> Sure we can all stack up on cleanses, but then as soon as we encounter a rounded-out power build we get slapped because their utilities, sigils, and traits just dominate Power vs Power. It's the same argument in reverse.

 

Here is the thing. Armor and toughness as those Bunker stats do less to protect a person against a power build then does all of those cleanses sigils and gear does to protect against a Condition build. It does not take away a whole lot of your power to take cleanses enough to shut down Condi builds especially in wvw. Cleansing sigl on swap as example. Where is that killing your damage out? On one thief power build I use trickster and the on evade cleanse food. It makes no significant dent to damage out and coupled with dodging condi bursts you can do fine.

 

Yes it harder to kill a person bunkered and I suggested that would be the case before the changes implemented. That is why you see more people in the CS tree and it those traits taken that will boost your damage more then a food that adds 70 power or gives a lightning strike on crit.

 

Now prior to these changes you were making the same argument against that same gear even when Power damage was so much greater. People in dire were getting one shot so i really can not reconcile the logic there. I have one thief that uses TB in a Condi build and he is still taken out by power attacks. One shots are not so common now but power builds can take him out. The fights take longer to be sure but a longer fight allows you to use more of your skills rather then who presses a button first .

 

The gear is not a problem.

[briggah.7910]

yawn. same complaints , different year

[sarangajit.5648]

power build with soldier's gear Vs condi build with dire gear. Which one is doing more damage and by how much?