Guild Wars 2

[Lantyssa]

("healing spring" aoe heal for instance... 45 second cooldown, 2 second cast time and heals a grand total of.... 1% hp over 5 seconds in an AOE... rofl)

By itself, Healing Spring isn't that impressive.  Now couple that with a Ranger throwing axes which bounce, or a Thief using Rapid Fire... now each of those shots is also healing people.

Using fields is a huge part of the game.  Now I do wish they lasted longer, as my twitch skills are not that great, but it does work if you time things well.

[Numtini]

In terms of healing, my impression was the game replaced the holy trinity with the DPS zerg.

[kildorn]

Anything that heals other people will pretty much suck from what I saw. The elementalist heals were all about one normal mob hit worth of healing on a 10-15s cooldown. Regen is worth applying if you have it.

Combo fields need a tutorial, or some better feedback on their effects. I know I light combo fielded myself a bunch, but I can't tell you what it did beyond popping up Combo! messages.

[Outlawedprod]

Mesmer looks nice
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0nKx_Ukpec

[Kageru]

They're a right pain in PvP from what I saw.

Healing is wide spread, lots of classes have some (plus the self-heal everyone gets) but it's all fairly constrained. Either small values, long cool-downs or small areas. I expect being able to add a healing power to the group will still have value but it won't have anyone doing all the work and you can't rely on it allowing one person to soak all the damage. And you've made a DPS trade off to get that power.

It is going to be very interesting to see how that plays out at higher levels in dungeons. I think it is going to look more zergy but I hope that's not all it is.

[Kitsune]

I didn't get the time I wanted to experiment with combo fields, and since I didn't get past 11th level with any character, I really couldn't try out anything too creative with traits, either.  My hope is that a greater depth exists in clever use of combos and traits than just 'keep mashing the 1 key and occasionally hit some other key too'.  I'd very much like for an organized group using combos and other synergies to be able to wipe out a group that isn't doing those things.  Whether that actually turns out to be the case or not, I dunno.

My summoner in FFXI was forever trying to organize parties sufficiently to pull off combos.  Sometimes I was successful and we'd tear things up.  Other times the party just couldn't get the timing down and we'd just be okay.  But when it worked, it was always great.

[Spiff]

Problem is though, going into melee range seems to mean: instant aggro.
On boss mobs that was a problem without constant healing, so unless they expect you to literally dodge/block almost every attack, you'd better switch to ranged and only pull out a sword for a hit and run.

For PvP though, I like it.
I always felt dedicated PvP healing sucked in equal parts for the people forced to do it as the people on the other side.

[Shatter]

Problem is though, going into melee range seems to mean: instant aggro.
On boss mobs that was a problem without constant healing, so unless they expect you to literally dodge/block almost every attack, you'd better switch to ranged and only pull out a sword for a hit and run.

For PvP though, I like it.
I always felt dedicated PvP healing sucked in equal parts for the people forced to do it as the people on the other side.

I made it to level 19 and did a number of boss / elite type encounters almost all of which AE cleaved or AE fingerf*cked everyone within arms reach.  Melee dropped liked flies and ranged finished the battle on every fight.  Keep that in mind for launch :P

[kildorn]

Every melee attack cleaves, from what I saw. So melee will get mauled if the mob turns and faces anyone. From what I saw the dedicated melee lines that worked well had blocks or Protection/Regeneration scattered around the sets. Part of the reason Mesmer melee is so strong is that it's main damage skill is also about 2-3 seconds of invulnerability.

[Shatter]

Every melee attack cleaves, from what I saw. So melee will get mauled if the mob turns and faces anyone. From what I saw the dedicated melee lines that worked well had blocks or Protection/Regeneration scattered around the sets. Part of the reason Mesmer melee is so strong is that it's main damage skill is also about 2-3 seconds of invulnerability.

Wasnt just cleaves,  I saw at least 1 that did some jump and AE fire ring around it and demo'd the melee.  Ranged laughed and continues to fight.  I suspect we will see a lot of that and TBH, I dont have the drive anymore to have to pay that close of attention to a mob so I can dodge its sh*t every 5 seconds while ranged players get to eat buffalo wings and drink beer then get the same credit :P

[Nebu]

For PvP though, I like it.
I always felt dedicated PvP healing sucked in equal parts for the people forced to do it as the people on the other side.

I enjoy playing a dedicated healer in pvp.  I will miss having the option to play that role in GW2.

[Spiff]

Fair enough, luckily my taste in gaming isn't edict.
Plenty of MMO's out there already cater to that though (as I'm sure you know, I get the impression you've tried all of em  ) so I'm happy to try out the alternative here.

[Nebu]

My assessment is that pvp will devolve into whoever has the best assist train.  Since there is no dedicated healer, the group that focuses down targets the best will always win (assuming they have sound target selection). 

Seems like this will create a pvp mini game that isn't particularly deep when it comes to strategy.

[Nonentity]

I was playing an Engineer in PvP over the weekend and I could do pretty well as far as a 'healer' role. I could most definitely keep myself up, and found myself commonly holding a point against two or more people for an extended period of time.

You take the Healing Kit as your heal skill (which lets you spawn little quake-style health and condition removal pickups, as well as gives you a self-heal on your profession button), grab an Elixir Gun for another skill (condition removal via your poison spray, bouncing snare + haste shot, and a regen area, and throws a point blank aoe regen on a profession button), and fill the other slots with whatever. I used the elixir that removes all conditions on you and breaks stuns, good for those fucking thiefs that go a condition build and stack a 9 stack of bleeds on you.

Also great for the Engineer that I used on my build was the Mine Kit. You can lay down 5 mines, and through traits, you can give them increased explosion radius, and give them Knockback when they explode. It is kind of silly - with that, I could literally just run in a circle planting mines, and the melee that would try to stick to me could not stay on me. You can then pop over to the Heal Kit and spawn health kits and use your heal skills, and I was able to hold a point for a ridiculous amount of time. If you get totally swarmed, you throw Supply Drop on the elite skill, and pick up the trait to make it so your supply drop gains an additional rifle turret + more supplies, and you're INCREDIBLY self-sufficient.

[Spiff]

My assessment is that pvp will devolve into whoever has the best assist train.  Since there is no dedicated healer, the group that focuses down targets the best will always win (assuming they have sound target selection). 

Seems like this will create a pvp mini game that isn't particularly deep when it comes to strategy.

It's possible, although I have to say my guardian to an extent made up for her lacklustre healing with defensive moves (most of which helped my team as well).
I had a myriad of ways to block or mitigate damage on other people, especially ranged dps.

It doesn't make up for healing in drawn out battles (such as the larger PvE events), but in the more bursty encounters I had in PvP it certainly made a difference, enough for me to feel more useful than had I just focus-dps'ed the same target anyway.

[Draegan]

After playing the beta weekend, I have to say, GW2 as it stands now is feeling more like a plain vanilla cupcake then the double strawberry cream-filled layer cake of Guild Wars 1.

From the character traits to the skills, it's just lacking spice.

For instance, in GW1, there were many kinds of defensive and offensive abilities that could completely destroy enemy teams if said enemy team brought no defenses. Things like boon stacking.. persistant damage reduction stacking.. diesease spread.. etc.. etc.. were all interesting and possible because the skills themselves had flavor.

However, in GW 2 most skills are a variation of ... do xx damage in an AOE... add xx boon for xx duration .. apply xx condition for xx duration... and most of the conditions are just so plain.. many of them could just be replaced by a generic Damage over time and they would be functionally the same.

Due to this, during World vs world with more then 10 or so players, it has really felt like simply numbers win almost every time. There are really no unique combinations, "shut down" combinations if you will, so numbers almost always win. Not to mention that because most skills can apply to an infinite number of players (if they are AOE), they are really really weak unless used in a massive blob of people. ("healing spring" aoe heal for instance... 45 second cooldown, 2 second cast time and heals a grand total of.... 1% hp over 5 seconds in an AOE... rofl)

This is really fucking boring.

I almost laughed when I saw some of the guardian "protection bubble" skills in use... these are as close to some of the interesting abilities of guild wars 1 I could find in the game... and the 120 second cooldown "sanctuary" bubble that the guardian has is like... 1 meter large. It's basically a personal bubble for 5 seconds.

It seems to me that the Arena Net team are afraid of introducing interesting abilities for the sake of "balancing" things.. but balance only makes things boring to be quite honest. Guild wars 1 had tons of unbalanced stuff flying around, with the meta game changing constantly.. and that's why it was so damned fun.

tl;dr - obsession over balance and skills that can apply to an infinite # of players makes GW2 boring.

I don't think you've seen or looked at any of the utility skills.  There are boon stacking, boon replicating, walls, bubbles, deisease spreading etc.

[kildorn]

The only things missing from the GW1 skillset are "if target has N condition, does Y" type things like auto crits when burning and whatnot. And mesmer/ranger lockdowns, which are entirely gone (interrupts) because the gameplay design changed a lot as far as how many long slow casts there are.

Otherwise boon/condition spreading/cleansing/reversal is still the GW metagame (necros have a well that will completely fuck a condition spreading mesmer, for example). If anything, there's a shitload more going on as far as GW1 skills to GW2 skills entirely because we lost interrupts, but gained the combo field system and directly placed AEs/walls.

[Fabricated]

...Did someone just say twitch?

[Kitsune]

When I fought big things as a melee guardian, I learned early on that the order of the day is called hit and run.  Standing in front of the big monster like a WoW tank was a quick way to faceplant.  So instead I'd run up, fire off the best attack I had off of cooldown at the moment, roll away, circle around for a moment and whack on its back with a mace, then move back in, fire another attack, repeat.  Never stand still and kite the bastard for everything you've got.

This was admittedly a low level guardian, so hopefully the traits and utility powers that I lacked would let me stand up and absorb punishment better, but I never got to find out.

[Numtini]

When I fought big things as a melee guardian, I learned early on that the order of the day is called hit and run.  Standing in front of the big monster like a WoW tank was a quick way to faceplant.  So instead I'd run up, fire off the best attack I had off of cooldown at the moment, roll away, circle around for a moment and whack on its back with a mace, then move back in, fire another attack, repeat.  Never stand still and kite the bastard for everything you've got.

This was admittedly a low level guardian, so hopefully the traits and utility powers that I lacked would let me stand up and absorb punishment better, but I never got to find out.

I think that's what they want you to do, but melee didn't look to me to be nearly high enough to make that comparable to spamming attacks from distance and I'm skeptical they could balance it.

[Kageru]

Someone is going to be in melee with the mob and a guardian is fairly durable with the number of defensive abilities they have. They're not the only ones though and a lot of it is going to depend on having other melee around so you can back out when you get low and all your abilities are on cooldown. Likewise getting support from the ranged in terms of some healing.

It's basically part of their fight against the trinity. Most classes can tank for at least a while and all classes have ranged options.

[Numtini]

I played a guardian and a ranger and I felt just as squishy as a guardian in melee. In both cases, it was minor damage until the mob decides you're the target and then an instant or near instant death.

[Kageru]

A guardian actually is relatively squishy, they're a low health profession and armor doesn't seem to make a huge difference. If they have any tanking ability it's in the skill choices you make. The mace and shield skills have some decent mitigation and regeneration abilities, as do your class skills and selectable skills. I tanked an event boss from start to finish but it pretty much depended on keeping my skills up and burning cool-downs. Of course you also hope other players are assisting me or debuffing the mob (blindness, weakness, chilled) in addition to DPS.

But I probably could have done the same on my necro adapted for life-tapping (they actually have huge health pools and a secondary pool due to transforming). You could probably kite the boss around without a tank if you had enough mobility debuffs. That's sort of the point I think.

[Murgos]

They've said all along there is no trinity.  That means no tanks, no dedicated healers and no dedicated dps.  Everyone does everything (or nothing) depending on your knowledge of the class and appropriate skill usage/selection(/equipment?).

[kildorn]

I've seen some "tanky" guardian setups, but they require utility skills and traiting that lowbies would not have. There are no taunts, so they're simply tanky in that they can take a beating, not force a mob to beat on them.

Basically it's a regen tank though, not a mitigation tank. You still evade big hits and such, but you're rolling around with 33% damage reduction and heavy health regen through boons and spec thingies.

[Kageru]

You don't really need taunt because the aggro mechanics are intentionally simple. It looks a lot like the default is the mob will pick a proximity target and happily wail on them till they move out of range then it picks someone else. That allows you to tank (first to engage, stay in melee) but also rotate tanks when you are out of cooldowns and resources. Though I imagine they have other aggro patterns, including ones that switch targets so ranged are also threatened.

It's not so much there's no trinity, you can spec for durability, dps or support, just it's much more "soft", flexible (as you can weapon switch) and distributed so you are not dependent on the trinity, not as focused on the role and there's more alternatives in how you handle the encounter. Which is pretty good because if there was truly no ability to role focus the game would be an undifferentiated zerg (as well demonstrated by CO on release).

That said the real test will be once people work out the details. At the moment a lot of the numbers for powers aren't available and people are working things out. I would be shocked if people do not identify "optimal" party configurations unless Anet's design and balance is amazing. Of course once identified they can break it.

[kildorn]

From looking at instance fight videos, the aggro isn't proximity based beyond the first part of an engagement. It quickly turns into "I will pick some dude to wail on as I wish", though a tanky person can stand between you and a ranged mob and soak his attacks for you.

Given GW1, optimal party builds for structured pvp will come and go constantly. Seriously, people go mental about skill builds.

[Mavor]

My assessment is that pvp will devolve into whoever has the best assist train.  Since there is no dedicated healer, the group that focuses down targets the best will always win (assuming they have sound target selection).  

Seems like this will create a pvp mini game that isn't particularly deep when it comes to strategy.

I have to agree with you Nebu. The only thing keeping assist trains and number-beat-all strategy out of GW 1 was the deep defense/healing meta. If you had good healers with their shit together, you could go 2:1 odds if you had a great organized team against lesser-skilled players.

The way it is now though, you can't really do much to get yourself back into the fight when your heal is on cooldown, and your team can't really help you either... so instead of having a constantly regenerating "party health bar" so to speak, you end up with a bunch of individual ones that can be blown through one by one.

I think what is going to happen is that assist trains, guerrilla warfare (get in quick, kill 2-3 players and retreat back... wait for rezzers and nuke them down.. etc), and invulnerability will be the pillars that the pvp meta game stands on.

The invulnerability in this game was really surprising to me... for instance, with one trait and a utility skill you can have 10 seconds of invulnerability from damage every ~ 50 seconds on a warrior... that is on par or better then the invulnerability that paladins in wow get for example (haven't played wow in a looong time so not sure if that's still correct).. this is considering the fact that warriors output craptons of damage.

Mesmers are similar, with 3 seconds of invuln on a 6 sec cooldown skill.

[Kageru]

The GW2 wiki says agro is primarily proximity based which matches my experience in that I could keep an even mob focused on me for the whole fight even though I certainly wasn't doing the most damage. I didn't see too much ping-ponging but it's pretty hard to observe that carefully when you are focused on trying not to die. The wiki links to a hour long video and a print interview which mentions aggro.

In regards to AI and aggro… simple creatures will use an AI system to determine who attack, and one of the most important criteria will be who is the closest target to them, but there are also criteria like who’s doing damage, how much damage they’ve done… and other things like that.

The interview also promises lots of other behaviors like focusing on range, focusing on armor type, picking a target and chasing it... but I have no idea if they implemented all that or how widely it is applied. I would expect instance fights to be the place where this is used since you expect the group to be able to respond in an organized fashion which isn't true for an event.

If they have random aggro then they've wasted a lot of time allowing people to specialize their characters.

(on PvP)

I'm crap at PvP but isn't it always going to come down to focused damage? With mobility, invulns and blind determining who can apply it first and best? And the warrior invuln looks to be 5 seconds every 90 seconds with the talent causing it to auto-trigger at 25% health. I also don't see any reason that condition can't be purged, converted to a negative (necromancy is fun) or stolen.

For group PvP I assumed it would be a firing line of death but then I realized there's quite a few anti-missile skills which absorb projectiles to help close. It will be interesting to see how that plays out.

[kildorn]

I'm basing my aggro observations off some yogs and TB videos with the devs chattering. It's entirely possible it's only in instances where it will decide to not wail on the closest target.

The pvp meta will be about assist trains like every other PVP game on the planet (the only way to avoid this is to either have people be able to out heal 5 dudes worth of damage while sucking at multi target healing, or make stacking damage reductions per person on a target. Otherwise DUH you should focus fire), and the meta will be about mitigating their impact while your train goes after them. Snares, hastes, invulns and other defensive skills matter. Given the anti projectile skills and anti melee skills, I'm fully expecting the meta to revolve around how to peel an assist train, and ways to get around the ground effects.

[Phred]

The pvp meta will be about assist trains like every other PVP game on the planet (the only way to avoid this is to either have people be able to out heal 5 dudes worth of damage while sucking at multi target healing, or make stacking damage reductions per person on a target.

Doesn't the fact that people can stand in the way of most incoming damage offer a strategic option to counter assist trains? Also, is there any plans for a Target of Target icon?

[kildorn]

The pvp meta will be about assist trains like every other PVP game on the planet (the only way to avoid this is to either have people be able to out heal 5 dudes worth of damage while sucking at multi target healing, or make stacking damage reductions per person on a target.

Doesn't the fact that people can stand in the way of most incoming damage offer a strategic option to counter assist trains? Also, is there any plans for a Target of Target icon?

The boon/debuff fields are actually where my mind goes. DO NOT CROSS walls make assist trains difficult, as do decently long duration projectile blocking walls. It seems like once people get used to it, it's going to be hard to sit on a target for more than a few seconds.

[Lantyssa]

Also, is there any plans for a Target of Target icon?

Ctrl-T to mark targets, T to target the marked target.  Different keys, but the same as GW1.

[Threash]

Anyone still playing GW that has any idea how much i should try to get for a 7th birthday present and a couple of 6ths?

[Simond]

...Did someone just say twitch?

Someone had to make this post, and I would like to thank Fabricated for stepping forward.