Guild Wars

[Pindar]

What do those in the know, know about this game and its children?

[TevashSzat]

Well, I played the game substantially when it came out up to right after the Sorrows Furnance free update was released. The game is pretty nice and has a big community due to its no monthly fees, but the game will become boring unless you become a hardcore gamer. Once you finish the main missions, the game becomes more or less pointless due to the lack of any major diversity in dropped items except for hunting down all of the skills. The only thing to do after you finished everything in PvE is to go PvP. The thing is the only thing worthwhile to do in PvP is guild battles or Tombs both of which is impossible to do properly unless you are in a half decent guild or has pretty high ranking probably 3 or higher. Even if you are in a guild, you must be in a top ranked guild, preferably top 500 to be in lots of PvP, but since these battles have high stakes, the guilds usually only let its best players join. In my guild which was ranked 210 at its highest, the best players would often train togeather for hours on end in tombs so they could get ready for a guild battle. The only times I actually did serious PvP with my guild is if we needed an extra monk, the healer, in which I would help out.

[Xiahou]

^ Pretty much what he said. I played GuildWars quite a bit when it first came out. I even played in two of the pre-release beta weekends. There's a lot of fun to be had playing the storyline, but in hindsight, it's not very deep. Once you complete the main story, there is some replayability in terms of exploration, skill gathering, and playing with other classes. Also, you can buy any of the expansion and play thru them as well. Ultimately, the game does seem to cater to the PvP community- the first expansion made that clear to me.

GuildWars basically served as the gateway drug into MMOs for me. I moved from GW onto WoW for several months and finally broke free of that only to get started on Vanguard. I tried to go back to GW several times, and while it can still be fun, it lacks the depth that I've come to like in the other games I've played.

[econ21]

Point:

I bought Guild Wars with my son for the PvE part, but it did not really grab us (me especially). There's not much variation in the monsters you fight (at least initially), no strong plot or even interesting sidequests, no memorable NPC characters or speech worth anything, there's precious little loot n stuff, and the character development system was restrictive and strangely non-addictive (normally with RPGs you really want to go up levels, not here). The whole thing struck me as basically pointless.

I've never played any mmorpgs, so maybe this is the norm. But coming from the single player CRPG genre, Guild Wars reminded me of the worst kind of hack n slash - e.g. Dungeon Siege.

I can imagine the PvP is fun, but that's just not my cup of tea.

Counter-point:

Dungeon Siege

Ouch! Hey, stop cursing - GW is not quite _that_ bad.

Think of Guild Wars as a kind of hybrid between an RPG and an FPS. The gameplay focus in GW is to pick the right skills out of hundreds and use them to best effect in a tactical engagement - not to exploit an advantage in character levels or equipment. Granted, the PvE side is easy at first, but I've actually seen people that think the areas around Ascalon are too hard. Lowest denominator and all that...

The game has received deserved criticism for its pace. To keep things interesting, it's good advice to proceed briskly in GW and not do every possible sidequest. Only the main plot missions (shield thingies on world map) and sidequests that reward skills are of importance in the long run.

That said, PvP is where the main meat is. GW is one of the most demanding team games in the history of gaming - a bit like real-time Magic the Gathering where each player on the team controls a "hand" of 8 skills. High-level PvP requires constant communication (teams use voice comms), eye on positioning, adapting to opponent's tactics, skill to execute tactics correctly and wits to take advantage of opponent's mistakes. It's not hack'n'slash! Waaah!

Since that exchange, I once tried to go back to GW, but after 30 minutes I wanted to tear my brain out I was so incredibly bored. My son took pity on me and released me from the torment of having to keep playing it. It's the worst CRPG and indeed game I've bought for a quite a while.

If you want a good CRPG, my current recommendation is Jade Empire[1]. Great story, great characters, decent combat - it's the anti-Guild Wars in some ways, although I expect Crandeoleon will soon step in and say there are some marked similarities in combat etc.




[1]That's unless you somehow missed Vampire Bloodlines, the best CRPG since BG2.

[Navaros]

I played Guild Wars extensively for a long time.

Once you learn how to play and master all the missions there's not all that much to do in the PVE side of things.

The PVE presentation is not all that good, ie: the voice acting and cutscenes are almost univerally horrible across all 3 games. Most of the game is presented via NPCs standing in one spot whilst text blurbs float over their heads instead of voice acting, like in King's Quest 1 or something. The NPCs don't look that good. I literally have games from 1999 that have NPCs that look better than most of the Guild Wars' NPCs.

PVP is pretty deep but unless you intend to become a seriously hardcore player who devotes huge amounts of time to it, you will have little to no success. Making teams in PVP is a huge headache, often taking 1 - 3 hours of real time to assemble a competent team before you can even start playing. Then once the team loses 20 - 40 mins later, it disbands. And even if you become hardcore and win a lot, there are very little rewards for winning in PVP, which ulimately is why I lost interest in it. Also are very few PVP maps, and they just get copy and pasted into each new game (ie: no PVP content is created for new games, other than new classes and skills). And don't even think about trying PVP without hardcore third party voicechat programs like Ventrilo or Teamspeak running, because you will lose in the first round every single time if you do.

To add insult to injury, the devs are constantly nerfing the crap out of any good skills available in the game to appease bad PVP players' and their incessant complaining about skills they do not have the talent to beat. This means that if you like playing a certain class or using certain skills, chances are you will be extremely aggravated when the devs nerf it to smithereens against your will - which will inevitably happen.

After having played Oblivion a lot and recently loaded Guild Wars up again for a bit, I can say my eyes definitely have a very painful adjustment trying to readjust again to Guild Wars' vastly inferior graphics. I've seen games released in 2003 that have better graphics than Guild Wars, and in 2007 they are getting more and more noticeable to me. Although I've seen a lot of people ranting about how Guild Wars has "beautiful graphics", so perhaps my graphical standards are higher than yours may be. The graphics are the same in all 3 games.

When Guild Wars first came out I woulda gave it a 75%, but because of it's age and stagnating graphics, presentation, and gameplay (all 3 games are basically the same thing), at present time I'd give it 65%. On second thought, due to the devs' constant nerfing of everything that bad PVP players ask to be nerfed (which screws over PVE players too), I'm knocking the score down to 50%.

[Crandaeolon]

Fine, I'll bite. GW does have a few strong points.

Been playing GW (and its later chapters) since release, mostly PvP (Player vs Player) though I've finished each PvE (Player vs Environment) campaign at least once and completed all endgame PvE areas succesfully. My guild has been playing top-level PvP for well over a year now.

--- "Review" section ---

Guild Wars has a unique approach to team-based combat, and this is what the game really excels at. The skill system makes character "development" and team selection highly varied. Battles can get very hectic, and player statuses (health, afflictions etc) change wildly during combats. GW is one of the few games that has managed to make purely support classes interesting (and demanding) to play; indeed, skilled Monks are among the most respected players in GW.

Other strengths of the game are good art direction (though like Navaros said, from a technological standpoint the graphics are getting old) and a relatively large game world. A major problem with some recent CRPGs like KotORs, NWN2, Jade Empire et al is that they have no exploration to speak of - you'll eventually visit all of the areas the game has to offer just by following the story. GW doesn't suffer from this and feels expansive in comparison.

Character development differs dramatically from traditional RPGs. You'll collect XP, levels and attribute points, but the level cap is very low and attribute points can be reconfigured at will whenever visiting a town. Secondary class can also be changed at will, so only the primary class of the character is set permanently upon character creation. Perfect equipment is quite easy to attain, leveling the playing field.

Collecting skills is the primary means of character development. At any given time, you can have only 8 skills (out of hundreds) at your disposal. Skills can be changed freely in towns, but not during exploration or missions. The whole game revolves around this system, so it will make or break the character development and combat aspects for you. The system limits your power and encourages you to pick a specific role to complement other members of your team. Most of the time you'll need a team to succeed; soloing is quite limited in GW.

Monster AI (and, thanks to the skill system, diversity to a lesser extent) is far superior when compared to, well, pretty much anything else. (I still don't understand how they screwed this up in NWN2.) You can also clearly see what skills the targeted critter is using; a feature that would be most welcome in other recent RPG offerings.

The game is well balanced, with occasional rebalancing to shake things up, and there's a nice sense of danger in most fights. Endgame areas are challenging, and min-maxing doesn't result in stupidly overpowered characters like in Oblivion, KotoRs, NWN2, Gothic... well you get the idea.

GW interface is window-based (no digging through millions of menus) and fully customisable - all elements can be repositioned, hidden and resized. I honestly can't remember another game interface that could best GW.

The game runs flawlessly in windowed mode and is very solid and bug-free. Server downtime is practically non-existent, though European players have occasionally suffered from lag. Hardware requirements are low.

Even though GW is an online game, it can be played with computer-controlled henchmen and heroes. I wouldn't recommend GW to pure singleplayers though, unless they like action RPGs. Like others have said, GW has a rather poor story and cutscenes. GW is at its best for a group of buddies, preferably on voice chat, who enjoy action and exploration and don't take their entertainment too seriously - many of the cutscenes are so horrible that they actually have comedy value.

--- PvP-exclusive bits ---

I'd like to offer a few counterpoints to Navaros's gripes about PvP group forming, rewards and balance updates.

In team-based games, forming groups efficiently for high-level play is all about the social networks you've managed to build. (This probably holds true for all games, even Total War.) If people in the network are inefficient (or random), wait times will increase and/or performance will decrease. For example, my guild has an efficient system for arranging games; wait times before games are practically zero if enough players are present. Building a social network can be time-consuming of course, but for the hardcore it's the only option. You'll need playing skill, communication skills, organisation and social ability to succeed in high-end PvP play.

I think there are enough PvP modes and maps for both the casual and the hardcore. More is not necessarily better; other competitive games have already proven this. No one played Bombing Run or Double Domination in UT2004, which is why the next UT installment actually has less gametypes than the previous one. Same holds true for maps. Sure, it'd be nice to have new well made maps, but quality trumps quantity here as well. Ever played de_dust with real fanatics?

PvP rewards are a non-issue in my opinion. I'm not playing PvP for in-game rewards; I'm playing it because it's fun. The current rewards for PvP play (faction points, titles, rank, cape trims, recognition via observer mode etc.) are more than adequate.

Rebalancing is a heated issue in PvP circles. However, I believe the community is realising the impossibility of balancing 1000+ skills perfectly with the first try. What the game _really_ needs is more frequent rebalancing with less drastic adjustments, helped by player feedback.

--- Closing words ---

Guild Wars best suits action-oriented, social players. Interest in PvP is good, you'll get more value for your money, but the vast majority of GW community are mostly PvE players. A casual playthrough of each chapter should last anywhere between 40 and 100 hours. For a hardcore PvP player who wants a controlled, level playing field, GW is the only choice at the moment.

For most singleplayer RPG fans, Oblivion (even with its flaws) is probably the premier CRPG. It has a nice balance of story, action, character development and exploration, all wrapped in a good-looking package.

[TevashSzat]

I just remember their nerf of smiting farmers with the creatures running away from balthazar's aura and symbol of wrath. That just broke the game for me as I ran out of any way to make decent amounts of money except for trapping farming which just takes forever

[Lehesu]

Guild Wars really is a unique beast in terms of how it fits in the MMORPG mould. I think comparing Jade Empire to it is rather unfair, just as it would be unfair to compare Diablo II to, say, Morrowind. I have all three Guild Wars and have certainly derived enough pleasure to justify the costs. The skill system is very elegant, imho, and you have subtle variations of builds even in the same class. There is certainly more thought involved in how you set up your character and approach tactical situations than the average RPG.

That being said, the game is still essentially a more refined hack and slash, but one in which loot plays a rather insignificant part in. This has a tendency to make combat tedious when you are just trying to work through the campaign. However, the higher level missions can be really rewarding if you have active, intelligent guildmates. Being able to advance through high level missions like UW or FoW with a competent party can be rewarding.

Really, GW will only appeal to you if you can appreciate the tactical side of the combat; the storylines are rather weak, the loot isn't all that important, and the level cap is low. I still play the game, and have been doing a lot of AB recently, because I enjoy the actual mechanics of the combat itself.

[TevashSzat]

I essentially agree with Lehesu. The only people able to stay in Guild Wars for long periods of time are those who are in active and good guilds or hardcore PvPers, but the release of new expansions is making the game last longer for those who are more relaxed and casual

[John86]

Play it. Now.

My ingame name is Hiji the Mute for anyone who plays.

Currently, sorta, kinda Looking for top 100 GvG guild, If anyone is recruiting.

[Productivity]

Don't bother. The PVE goes nowhere, you finish the game, then you either repetitive farm, or you repeat the game from a different profession. It's linear and it gets boring very quickly.

The PVP side is where this game had a lot of potential. A year ago, I would have strongly recommended it, but now I can't. The game has gotten so out of balance that now it very quickly becomes build wars. That is, often, before you even have ocntact with your opposition, you have lost the game. They have a build, you don't have counters, you lose. Ok, it's not quite so simple as that but it's close. The PVP side of the community is the smaller of the two (PVE + PVP) and it shows in the ammount of attention it gets. It doesn't get the balance and the reworks it needs urgently and you play it, lose to whatever is overpowered today, or you run whatever is overpowered today and feel like you're playing a retarded sort of game.

This is if you get anywhere near the competitive scene - you're going to be be coming in quite cold, knowing hardly anybody, whereas all of the really competitive groups are put together from people who know each other. Pick Up Groups rarely go anywhere in Heroes Ascent (the *casual* high end PVP area), no matter how well ranked they are.

The Guild ladder is dominated in the top 100 by the same 200 people that have been there forever, with incursions by people who are running whatever is imbalanced for the last month to farm their way quickly up. They never stay there and most of the more established top players view them with a good deal of contempt.

It's a bit sad really because this game had far more potential from a PVP viewpoint than most, yet it's been wasted for lack of effort. If you enjoy linear PVE that doesn't change and farming, then that might do it for you. If you're interested in PVP, don't bother, the community is about to collapse (I'd argue that it's a shell at the moment that gives a outward view of being alive, but is rotten inside) and there are very good reasons behind that.




WTS: Rank 7, Champ 3, KOaBD account.

[UltraWar]

I remember when I first played the game around 2 years ago... it was great. One year ago, I sold off my account and have now bought myself a new account. It is great! After just 2 days, I'm now a level 10 and ready to take on the world. If anyone is interested in questing with me, I'm usually in District 1 of the European Districts.

[John86]

Productivity is right in the GvG area, If your not a top player, your going no where. But the game is not limited to GvG: HA and TA are still good fun for beginners.

By the way, What guild were you in Productivity?

[TevashSzat]

Getting to the Hall of Heroes or just winning the first round is a challenge for any PUG without decently ranked players and good coordination through vent/ts. Even organizing a good PUG group takes ages since everyone seems to be incredibly impacient and starts leaving the group if there was a loss or it is taking too long to fill up missing slots

[Crandaeolon]

Good job Productivity, that post brought a nice TGH vibe to the thread!

You've got some good points (most of which are being discussed at TGH and other GW forums), but i think you're exaggerating the problems. For a casual player, PvE still offers tens of hours of content per chapter - equal or superior to any other action RPG. Let's face it, no sensible person really expects to play any RPG, action or not, for hundreds or thousands of hours without it becoming repetitive. Right?

Count your hours. Based on your titles I'd say that you have at the very least several hundred hours of active playtime. I wouldn't be surprised at all if you had a thousand or two. Game's getting a bit repetitive you say?

The community is complaining, yes, but which community isn't? Balance problems exist in pretty much every game, and GW is actually quite well balanced when compared to the competition. I've played at top 20 level for 15 months now, and my guild has played balanced pressure or splits the entire time. I don't play HA anymore, but my rank 9 was achieved almost solely by monking in pressure teams. All consistent top guilds can play a wide variety of builds.

I think most of the PvP community agrees that GW needs more frequent rebalancing with less dramatic adjustments. As far as I know, the devs see this need too. Squashing ritspike in mid-tournament was at least a start, we'll see how it goes.

Another common complaint is the relative lack of meaningful tournament play, something that the automated tournament system was supposed to address. Anet didn't manage to deliver the system as soon as they'd hoped, but it's a pretty sure bet that they'll implement it once the stopgap Celestial Tournament is over. (They need the system to compete with Fury and to test it for GW2.)

The Guild ladder is dominated in the top 100 by the same 200 people that have been there forever, with incursions by people who are running whatever is imbalanced for the last month to farm their way quickly up. They never stay there and most of the more established top players view them with a good deal of contempt.

Breaking into hardcore GW is still very much possible. I'd say the biggest hurdle for a completely new player is actually the expense of buying all the chapters, not ingame reasons. Talented players with social skills and some initiative will eventually manage to build (or get into) a successful social network, just like before. It really differs little from breaking into top-level team-based FPS games.

There's a reason why gimmick players are viewed with contempt and why they inevitably drop from the top. They don't play to learn - they take the short-sighted approach of "playing to win" in the ladder. Ladder (or player) rank means squat; gimmick players inevitably lose in tournaments against more generally skilled teams. Playing to learn = playing to win in the long term.

Your numbers and the prediction about the community collapsing seem to be a bit off. Sure, some vets claim that they are leaving but with thousands of hours in the clock, the main reason is quite likely burnout. _Anything_ gets stale eventually. And, many of them are coming back anyways - there's no real alternative yet. Even a minor rebalance is an excuse to come back when the market doesn't offer anything else.

If you want to look at hard numbers, check out the ladder. Even guilds in the 900-1000 range appear quite active. About 1000 or more gvg games are played each day; wait times in the 100-200 range (where our alliance's pickup guild is) are about a minute or two in Euro primetime. The Celestial Tournament had 211 competing guilds last I checked, despite all the issues with timezones and fallback times. I'd say the game is still alive and kicking.

[Quintus Of Pompeii]

Hello All!

I have never played GW but i am wanting to buy it, i have heard good things and bad things about this game. A few kind of N00b questions but.
Is it better or worse than WoW?
Is it simmilar to the free MMO SilkRoad Online?

I occasionaly play on SRO, and thought that most of my contacts on Xfire own this game, (especially NF) so any advice on buying or avoding this game would be much obliged.

-Q

[Navaros]

Breaking into hardcore GW is still very much possible. I'd say the biggest hurdle for a completely new player is actually the expense of buying all the chapters, not ingame reasons. Talented players with social skills and some initiative will eventually manage to build (or get into) a successful social network, just like before. It really differs little from breaking into top-level team-based FPS games.

There's a reason why gimmick players are viewed with contempt and why they inevitably drop from the top. They don't play to learn - they take the short-sighted approach of "playing to win" in the ladder. Ladder (or player) rank means squat; gimmick players inevitably lose in tournaments against more generally skilled teams. Playing to learn = playing to win in the long term.

Your numbers and the prediction about the community collapsing seem to be a bit off. Sure, some vets claim that they are leaving but with thousands of hours in the clock, the main reason is quite likely burnout. _Anything_ gets stale eventually. And, many of them are coming back anyways - there's no real alternative yet. Even a minor rebalance is an excuse to come back when the market doesn't offer anything else.

I find these comments about how "easy" it is to break into hardcore (ie: the only teams that will have any success whatsoever) Guild Wars PVP to be painting an extremely overly-rosey and unrealistic picture. Most half-decent teams/Guilds would not touch a new player. Not that I blame them for that; I wouldn't either. That would be greatly handicapping their team for no benefit to them. Look on any GW forums, one of the main reasons why almost everyone hates PVP (relatively speaking in terms of numbers of PVE players which I know you Crand admit vastly-outnumber PVP players) and an incessant complaint that keeps coming on forums ad infinitum is that it's impossible for new players to get on a good team. A new player expecting success in Guild Wars PVP is gonna be up the creek without a paddle, and only way he'll get that is by going through several massive migraine headaches first of trying to claw himself some titles with one horrible PUG at a time.

I also disagree with the reason given for why gimmick builds are viewed with contempt. Gimmick builds are viewed with contempt simply because the most vocal PVP players do not have enough skill to beat them, even though those builds are usually not the least bit overpowered. So the same said players whine on GW forums incessantly until the devs nerf the crap out of everything they ask to be nerfed.

GW's devs' goal is not really "balance" (although they say it is). Really their goal is more accurately stated to be something like: "Nerf any common and effective build that a vocal minority of PVP players do not have the talent to beat, simply because they are asking us to nerf it because they can't beat it." Of course for the sake of "saving face" the PVP players use the exscuse of "you can't win with a real build", even though ironically, it is those saying that that are the ones who can't win.

Most PVP players will always use common & effective builds to win, aka "gimmick builds" - especially since it's the only way to get a game started in under 3 hours - and likewise the PVP players' "Incessant Whine on Forums til Devs Nerf for Us Brigade™" will always be out in force demanding constant nerfs. And they will get them. Never really because of "imbalance", though.

This is why Guild Wars' constant "nerf everything that is common and effective" way of operating will never stop, and "balance" will never be achieved.

All that the never-ending nerfs really accomplish is to tick off the vast majority of PVE players who can't use their favorite class or build any more, and tick off the vast majority of PVP players who were having fun using the "gimmick builds".

I am of the opinion that as time goes on, more people are going to come to realize what I have stated here and eventually as more start realizing that it's not worth the headaches of bothering with, Guild Wars' PVP will be populated almost exclusively by a small number of super hardcore players.

Is it better or worse than WoW?
Is it simmilar to the free MMO SilkRoad Online?

It cannot compete with WoW at all. The reason why Guild Wars has no monthly fee is because it's 100% instanced (which sucks). A 100% instanced game cannot justify a monthly fee, which is why they don't charge one. That is why WoW has ~7 million subscribers, and Guild Wars only sold 3 million copies combined for 3 separate titles (hence Guild Wars only has ~1 - 1.5 million actual players).

Although D&D Online tries to bilk consumers by being a 100% instanced game with a monthly fee, but most consumers are too smart to fall for it.

You get what you pay for. You won't get WoW-quality content or quantity of things to do with Guild Wars, but as one-time fee online games go I suppose Guild Wars is one of the best "alternative" to WoW currently available (even though WoW is way better in every way).

I have never played SRO but I have observed players of SRO complaining on GW forums that GW doesn't have as many good features as SRO, like ability to make your character progress and get better stuff (which Guild Wars barely has any of). Other common complaints about Guild Wars are lack of mounts, lack of an Auction House, and lack of Houses. Not sure if SRO has those.

If you post what are the specific things you like about SRO, then I can tell you if GW has them too or not.

[Crandaeolon]

Is it better or worse than WoW?

Depends on what you like. If you like traditional MMORPGs, WoW is by far superior. GW is an action RPG that can be played online, not a MMORPG, so whether or not you like the action itself will make or break the game for you.

[TevashSzat]

WoW is for the more hardcore traditional MMORPG player while Guild Wars I guess would be more attractive to the hardcore PvPers due to the relatively useless PvP in WoW.

[Crandaeolon]

Aww, I really couldn't afford the time to get into a debate. Maybe just this once...

Most half-decent teams/Guilds would not touch a new player.

I agree, though occasionally top teams seek out pro- or semipro gamers of other games (such as Counterstrike) for training, or recruit friends that they know to be good gamers, and previous GW experience is not required in such cases. (They have proven their potential in other games first.)

A new player expecting success in Guild Wars PVP

That's the "problem" right there. High-level PvP is demanding and competitive. New players should NOT expect instant success in high-level PvP. People should also realise that in team-based games you'll need more than just button-mashing ability to succeed - good communication skills, some creativity, a thick enough skin to take criticism, initiative... and being a nice guy help quite a bit.

Basically, people are complaining that a competitive game has *gasp* competition. That is not the game's fault, quite the opposite imo. Just try to get into top 5% (roughly equivalent to GW top 100) in Counter-Strike or maybe Starcraft to see how "easy" it is... I'd wager that GW is a cakewalk when compared to those.

I also disagree with the reason given for why gimmick builds are viewed with contempt. Gimmick builds are viewed with contempt simply because the most vocal PVP players do not have enough skill to beat them, even though those builds are usually not the least bit overpowered.

Sounds like I explained myself poorly. Gimmick builds (as I understand the definition at least) are one-dimensional builds that employ a certain "trick" that the whole build relies on. This makes them easily counterable in a tournament setting by tactics, map or build choices. Sure, gimmicks can climb the ladder quickly, but the ladder is largely irrelevant anyways - now even more so than before, since ladder rank is not directly connected to participation in tournaments. And, using the currently most effective skills is not the same as playing gimmicks in my opinion.

Gimmicks may net some relatively easy victories in the short term and a good ladder ranking for a time, but in the long run, gimmicks cripple guilds. They won't learn the necessary skills to succeed in long-term play. Nerfs are not the real reason for these guilds disappearing; they have already ensured their own demise by not understanding what kind of approach is most effective in the long run.

This is why Guild Wars' constant "nerf everything that is common and effective" way of operating will never stop, and "balance" will never be achieved.

True, absolute balance will never be achieved: there is no such thing. It's humanly impossible to balance 1000+ skills over 10 classes and half a dozen PvP modes plus PvE as well. Since there will never be true balance, the game needs to gradually shift its metagame to keep things from becoming stale. Theory can help (for example, an offensive metagame is generally more fun to play than a defensive one), but only trial and error can ultimately determine the best gameplay. And this is why more frequent but less heavy-handed rebalancing is needed; gradual adjustments give people more time to get used to changes and the direction the metagame is taking, not to mention the lessened likelihood of balancing errors. I believe this would benefit PvE'ers too.

BTW, WoW has about 8,5 million (!) subscribers now.

Edit: My engrish sux.

[ShadeHonestus]

Crandaeolon

Now there is a name I remember...if my memory serves.

[Crandaeolon]

Hi Honey!

Yep, I was in the Shades. Good old times.

[ShadeHonestus]

Yeah good times and good to see you again.

[Pindar]

Thank you for all the replies.

[TevashSzat]

Gimmik builds are usually just used to get to Hall of Heroes since Guild Battles add in another dimension to the game with npcs and the such, but they really do ruin the game since most PUGs would only run the gimmik build of that time. If you don't have the right skills or character and is not a hardcore gamer with like rank 4 or 5, it would be near impossible to find a decent PUG. I remember all of gimmiks at the game's start. It was first just spiking with lightning eles, then e/mo smiters with ether renewal + zealots fire + draw conditions, rangers spikers with either quickshot + quickening zephry + tigers fury or punishing shot, then towards the end of my playing of guild wars, FRICKING IWAY TEAMS that would get owned easily by any decent team with a brain.

[Navaros]

FRICKING IWAY TEAMS that would get owned easily by any decent team with a brain.

That's exactly the point I was making earlier. Despite the fact that IWAY teams would get owned easily by any decent team with a brain, IWAY has been directly nerfed at least 5 - 10 times to appease those who complained about it. But after each nerfing, most people still loved it because it's the only build that a PUG without hardcore third party voicechat could run. So they kept using it despite the nerfings. Then the complainers kept complaining and the devs nerfed 8vs8 to 6vs6 (which is like cutting off one's nose to spite one's face) just to get rid of it.

The "stale" exsuse to justify unnecessary nerfings comes up a lot. Any game that needs to drastically change & warp the rules from one week to the next in order to not be "stale", is not a worthwhile game to begin with.

[TevashSzat]

What really pissed me off by it was that it had no really good basis. All it really gave you was insane health regen and armor for like 10 secs when you had lots of dead teammates which by that time the game is basically over for your team anyways. If they had a reliable way to kill of their pets it might have been a mediocre build, but still they would have had trouble against any other build.

IMO, gimmicky builds are nerfed because they simply makes the game less fun. The people that originally came up with the build probably had lots of successful so everyone started copying the build, but they can't pull the build off and before you know it, all you see is the gimmiky build just destroying the game for anyone who can't be a part of that build.

Was just playing for 15 min last weekend and noticed that quickshot was nerfed too....sigh. They turned an elite skill that was already only usable under very special circumstances and skill shots into one that has no benefits under any circumstances

[Productivity]

Gimmik builds are usually just used to get to Hall of Heroes since Guild Battles add in another dimension to the game with npcs and the such

I see your comment and respond with (insert imba build here) on Isle of Jade, Rift Spike, Ranger Spike, Necro Spike, all of which have been run very successfully in GVG.

Don't kid yourself, gimmicks while more common in HA than GVG are still extremely prevalent, especially in tournament settings where you know which map you're going to be on and can abuse it.

And re. IWAY, it's initial form was ridiculously powerful. Tiger's Fury, IWAY stacking IAS, double orders, other things that I can't remember. After the nerf to orders to not stack then it became a perfectly balanced build, it actually added a lot more to the HA community than people will give credit for. It kept people playing, it kept games flowing. In a sense it was the blood of HA. Beleive me, I have sat in the HoH for 20 minutes seeing "No opposing party". Facing an IWAY and having a game is far better than that. I don't think IWAY ever got actually specifically nerfed beyond that, there were just incidental nerfs that kept hitting it.

Good IWAY was actually really fun to play against. There's a lot of brainless IWAY hate out there, it doesn't bother me too much as I never played IWAY, but it just seems a bit stupid to me.

* Of my ~2300 fame, precisely 0 of it has come from IWAY, in fact I'd say 95%+ came while on a monk.

[Crandaeolon]

Over-usedness is sometimes a good reason for nerfing. Relative balance also differs between game modes and skill level of players. Take IWAY, for example. It wasn't imbalanced at high levels of player skill; the imbalance was lower. Crap IWAY teams could pretty much always defeat other crap teams, which forced the other crap teams to switch to IWAY or lose. Nav's comment proves my point:

[IWAY is] the only build that a PUG without hardcore third party voicechat could run.

Indeed, it was pretty much the only build that a PUG could run. They couldn't win good teams, but they could roll mediocre or bad teams. This resulted in Tombs filled with IWAY teams. It's the very definition of degenerate, or stale, gameplay when 9 out of 10 teams you encounter use the same build.

I didn't mind good IWAYs, the best of them were actually good players and the games were hectic and furious. It's the vast hordes of dung IWAYs that were the problem.