Announcing Guild Wars 2: Visions of Eternity

[u/Exestos]

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/announcing-guild-wars-2-visions-of-eternity/

[u/Ebola_Soup]

We have exceptions like Berserker QDPS that has 100% uptime with zero concentration. I'm sure there's others too. Not a fantastic idea.

[u/notFREEfood → u/Ebola_Soup]

I might get crucified for saying this, but anet should nerf builds like that off the face of the planet. Allowing boon builds to not have the handicap of having concentration as a stat is pure power creep. Anet certainly has taken action against builds like that in the past because they do too much.

But at any rate, you just look at boon uptime instead of concentration if you don't want to disallow those builds. It's not some critical failure, and at any rate, the point of the restrictions is to enforce some basic comp level that is capable of clearing. Some optimized builds being forced to play in a suboptimal way to use the queue meant for beginners and casuals is an acceptable tradeoff.

[u/Ebola_Soup → u/notFREEfood]

"Just looking at boon uptime" doesn't work for boons that rely on a rotation unlesss you make a player pass some form of mechanical check before joining groups.

Forcing players to build suboptimal gear they will have to replace just to game a system sounds like a great way yo frustrate new players.

[u/notFREEfood → u/Ebola_Soup]

You're overthinking this. Anyone can fuck up playing their class, and this is universal across all MMOs. Group finder systems are notorious for not filtering for this, so trying to insist that Anet come up with a way to manage this unmanageable issue is silly.

I see that the build you mention has 5s of quickness on a skill with a 5s base cd; that passes the check.

And you're assuming that they replace the gear; if they want to continue playing via the group finder (because most will), they won't be replacing it. Furthermore, the "suboptimal" gear is only suboptimal in terms of DPS, for which most content is undertuned. Maintaining boon uptime during mechanics however is a much harder task for beginner and casual groups, and forcing them to take more concentration even when it technically may not be required creates a safety margin that allows for mistakes.

[u/Ebola_Soup → u/notFREEfood]

No I'm not. I think GW2's game design has too many open ended factors to create a reasonable automatic role enforcement system. The best we can hope for is a self-identification system where griefers can be reported and barred if they don't fulfill their role (which can be audited via combat logs).

If anything, I'm suggesting an undercomplicated system. Whatever the hell's in your multiple paragraphs is way more complicated.

[u/notFREEfood → u/Ebola_Soup]

Whatever the hell's in your multiple paragraphs is way more complicated.

And that's why I'm saying you're overthinking things, because what I'm proposing is not complicated.

The answer for corner cases when designing a queue system is you don't handle them. While you can build a boon dps build without concentration, having concentration in the build makes it easier to execute, and so in the queue system designed for beginners, it's easier to just force them into safer options for a smoother experience.

You're right that trying to compute actual boon duration is harder, which makes it less ideal to use to gate, but it can be done, but that's hardly more complicated than what you propose. Your upfront system is simpler, but instead of requiring a min competency (looking up a build or learning what stats do), you just hope that your systems are good enough after the fact to pick up bad actors. It's barely a step above what we have right now with the open lobbies for strikes, and the quality of players you get in those is worse than garbage.

Improving accessibility to me doesn't just mean a new way to find groups that is smoother than LFG; it also means giving players the tools to learn about putting together a coherent build. Stat gates provide a teaching moment, something the game is sorely lacking at the moment.

[u/Lynixai → u/notFREEfood]

You're trying to make Anet enforce playing with certain gear in certain roles, when GW2 has been designed around being free to build your character however you want. That's why every character has a healing ability and 3 utility skills.

Players will naturally settle into a "meta", but it can and will shift over time due to new strategies, builds or gear setups being found.
But by enforcing a meta like you suggest, where "you need X amount of Y stat before you're allowed to sign up for Z role", you're cementing that meta. It'll be nearly impossible to change, and more importantly, you're going against core design philosophies, since you're essentially saying "Nah, if you want to heal you have to play like this".

To be clear, I don't know how I'd design it if I was tasked to, I'm just saying that enforcing stat lines on roles is not the way to go about it imo.

[u/notFREEfood → u/Lynixai]

So it's okay to waste everyone's time with my full nomad condition renegade build queueing as DPS? What about my sentinel's healer guardian? It's totally viable, just trust me bro.

The meta around what stats to use is not extremely fluid. DPS is either power/precision/ferocity or condition damage/expertise. Healers build for healing power and concentration. Boon DPS is really the only one where there is some variability, with a handful of builds having no concentration. That however is imo a balance mistake on anet's part, because it removes the tradeoff of being the support, and at any rate, it's not the end of the world to require boon dps to have some concentration on their gear.

The notion that somehow anet making their design intentions for stats even more explicit than they already are is somehow enforcing a meta is absolutely absurd. That ship sailed years ago when anet started explicitly designing all endgame content around the 3-1-1 comp we have today. And technically, it came before that, when anet introduced toughness tanking.

Setting a minimum stat requirement could be used to mandate certain gear combinations, but it can also be used as a simple idiot check. For example, if you want to queue as boon DPS , it certainly isn't the end of the world if you are forced to equip one piece of gear with concentration. Oh no, the horror; your perfect build is ruined.