http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/warlock/demonology/dps-rotation-and-cooldowns it would seem if i still played WoW this would be my rotation looking at it scares me unless you got good memory and reflexes you can easily ruin your dps....and im pretty sure it used to be slightly bigger before they made the game easier and dumbed down...
Edit: i would honestly have never left WoW if they hadnt kept dumbing it down and its gonna be easy enough for a 10 yr old to set up a spec when MoP comes
Demo lock is the most complex class to raid with in wow. But still that rotation is basically 2 spells to cast once, 3 cds, and one spammer (that changes depending on boss health) and one proc. Still a lot by dps standards, but even less than a priest healer in the same game uses.
Yes, you "only" get 10 skills on your bar (though you also get 1-4 class specific abilities) but they are NOT just spam and forget or rotation-based DPS etc. etc.
Each and every single skill has a purpose and a greater strategy and synergy with other skills and talents.
Even the "auto-attacks" (1) have 3 phases and depending on the weapon have different effects like Heals, Illusion generation, bleeds, etc. etc.
It may be very simple on the surface - 10 skills.. but the layers of complexity between skills and builds and traits and gear and all the synergies and relationships and combos and strategies...
you seem to be forgetting tho that rotations are based around dps abilities, and when ur not dodging or CC'ing what are you doing :P you can very well still find a suitable rotation even if its between 2-3 skills during a burst phase where ur clear to dps
Edit: also being tho "No-root" system everyone seems to enjoy you can avoid attacks WHILE using a rotation its just in general a way of keeping track of your dps abilities
But there are no DPS "rotations" in the same sense as there are in games like WoW, Rift, etc.... there are combinations to increase your damage to a target, like applying a Vulnerability before a burst damage skill/special, or a root/snare before a damage spike,
impossible to meassure dps in GW2 because combat is not *stay still hit damage skills* you are always moving around and kiting or avoiding, so you will never have a stable dps EVER. the combat is more about effectively surviving. the build with the highest 'damage' does not ensure survival at all, it could be that the higher damage builds have less in what is required to effectively control the flow of the encounter.
for example, the Mesmer to me felt like it had little damage compared to the Warrior, but it seemed to be fairly more survivable because the abilities allowed to better avoid damage.
http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/warlock/demonology/dps-rotation-and-cooldowns it would seem if i still played WoW this would be my rotation looking at it scares me unless you got good memory and reflexes you can easily ruin your dps....and im pretty sure it used to be slightly bigger before they made the game easier and dumbed down...
Edit: i would honestly have never left WoW if they hadnt kept dumbing it down and its gonna be easy enough for a 10 yr old to set up a spec when MoP comes
See the difference is that in GW2 they want you to think about when to use each skill and do so at an appropriate time. Not just follow some rotation. After learning that Warlock rotation and doing it a few times it literally becomes just a routine. You don't have to put any thought into why you're using the skills after you've established the best DPS rotation. You just mash the buttons in some preset order or sequence. That's not meaningful combat.
And in the Guardian example above I use 9 abilities regularly to beat a mobile solo. I didn't count any of my f 8 cds that I'd choose to pop depending on the situation. So really demo lock will seem like a breeze in comparison.
Yes, you "only" get 10 skills on your bar (though you also get 1-4 class specific abilities) but they are NOT just spam and forget or rotation-based DPS etc. etc.
Each and every single skill has a purpose and a greater strategy and synergy with other skills and talents.
Even the "auto-attacks" (1) have 3 phases and depending on the weapon have different effects like Heals, Illusion generation, bleeds, etc. etc.
It may be very simple on the surface - 10 skills.. but the layers of complexity between skills and builds and traits and gear and all the synergies and relationships and combos and strategies...
you seem to be forgetting tho that rotations are based around dps abilities, and when ur not dodging or CC'ing what are you doing :P you can very well still find a suitable rotation even if its between 2-3 skills during a burst phase where ur clear to dps
Edit: also being tho "No-root" system everyone seems to enjoy you can avoid attacks WHILE using a rotation its just in general a way of keeping track of your dps abilities
But there are no DPS "rotations" in the same sense as there are in games like WoW, Rift, etc.... there are combinations to increase your damage to a target, like applying a Vulnerability before a burst damage skill/special, or a root/snare before a damage spike,
impossible to meassure dps in GW2 because combat is not *stay still hit damage skills* you are always moving around and kiting or avoiding, so you will never have a stable dps EVER. the combat is more about effectively surviving. the build with the highest 'damage' does not ensure survival at all, it could be that the higher damage builds have less in what is required to effectively control the flow of the encounter.
for example, the Mesmer to me felt like it had little damage compared to the Warrior, but it seemed to be fairly more survivable because the abilities allowed to better avoid damage.
Impossible is an exaggeration it would simply take a really really skilled player to be able to avoid damage while staying in range to dish out consistent dps
Edit: basically someone good enough to survive at the same time as dishing out heavy damage dps will be there in any game and will always vary depending on how consistently you can stay on mobs you cant deny its existence but at the same time you are right you have to focus more on survival so the true "Highest dps" possibly attained would come after finding the point in which you can burst like mad while just barely surviving
BadSpock, you're correct but also not. I retraced my steps and those particular mobs. And that's what I used more or less every time. But I did that rotation because, like you said the situation called for it. It will vary from fight to fight. I just wanted to highlight the complexity of seemingly few skills.
Yes, you "only" get 10 skills on your bar (though you also get 1-4 class specific abilities) but they are NOT just spam and forget or rotation-based DPS etc. etc.
Each and every single skill has a purpose and a greater strategy and synergy with other skills and talents.
Even the "auto-attacks" (1) have 3 phases and depending on the weapon have different effects like Heals, Illusion generation, bleeds, etc. etc.
It may be very simple on the surface - 10 skills.. but the layers of complexity between skills and builds and traits and gear and all the synergies and relationships and combos and strategies...
you seem to be forgetting tho that rotations are based around dps abilities, and when ur not dodging or CC'ing what are you doing :P you can very well still find a suitable rotation even if its between 2-3 skills during a burst phase where ur clear to dps
Edit: also being tho "No-root" system everyone seems to enjoy you can avoid attacks WHILE using a rotation its just in general a way of keeping track of your dps abilities
But there are no DPS "rotations" in the same sense as there are in games like WoW, Rift, etc.... there are combinations to increase your damage to a target, like applying a Vulnerability before a burst damage skill/special, or a root/snare before a damage spike,
impossible to meassure dps in GW2 because combat is not *stay still hit damage skills* you are always moving around and kiting or avoiding, so you will never have a stable dps EVER. the combat is more about effectively surviving. the build with the highest 'damage' does not ensure survival at all, it could be that the higher damage builds have less in what is required to effectively control the flow of the encounter.
for example, the Mesmer to me felt like it had little damage compared to the Warrior, but it seemed to be fairly more survivable because the abilities allowed to better avoid damage.
Impossible is an exaggeration it would simply take a really really skilled player to be able to avoid damage while staying in range to dish out consistent dps
Edit: basically someone good enough to survive at the same time as dishing out heavy damage dps will be there in any game and will always vary depending on how consistently you can stay on mobs you cant deny its existence but at the same time you are right you have to focus more on survival so the true "Highest dps" possibly attained would come after finding the point in which you can burst like mad while just barely surviving
you cant do damage while dodging, but while kitting you can. problem is that there is no way to have a stable DPS +- 5% in any encounter because you cant predict how it will play. also damage skills are also situational and you cant just burn them on the fly. trust me, i like meassuring my dps in every game, i did find that meele does far more DPS though it is still dependant on the encounter, so where a meele does abysmal dps a range could OWN and vice versa. there is no 1 trick pony dps build (at least for the classes i played) and meassuring dps would have to take into account the type of encounter, which is not exactly possible to do.
Originally posted by Svarcanum BadSpock, you're correct but also not. I retraced my steps and those particular mobs. And that's what I used more or less every time. But I did that rotation because, like you said the situation called for it. It will vary from fight to fight. I just wanted to highlight the complexity of seemingly few skills.
Very understandable and true.
I too would get into a "habbit" on a particular mob because of their AI / behavior I was able to predict and accurately counter their actions with a "pattern" of my own.
But is that a rotation? Questionable.
You are right though, extremely complex interactions for using 9 "buttons."
On my Warrior, some fights would be like this...
Sword+Shield - 2 to range close, 1 to apply bleed, auto switches to 1, dodge back to avoid attack, 4 to charge w/ shield and stun, F1 for burst, 5 for shield block next attack, 3 for hamstring, dodge next attack, 2 again to range close, finish with 1, maybe 2nd/3rd 1.
But sometimes after I dodged out of range the first time I'd weapon swap, 3 to damage with Whirlwind (Great Sword), quick turn and 4 to bleed/ranged attack, charge with 5 - then burst F1 or use 2 for burst - but I'd for sure take some damage this way because I wasn't avoiding every attack.
lets put it this way. do you like FPS? I do. Loved Bad Company 2 and im loving B3. You can play it thousands of times, even the same scenarios, and have fun. I just miss one thing you know. I wish it had more skills. I would like a:
- CC ability, maybe some curse where i could prevent the enemy trigger finger to paralyse, so he wont be able to fire....unless he could change shooting stance...oh dear;
- Debuff ability. Now i could use some of those, in particular for snipers. They can fire at some long long range. I want a debuff on them where i could shorten their firing range for 50%...ofc the skill needs to have 2km range.
- Weapon skills. Now i dont know why they dont have multiple atack choices for my M16. Sure there is the grenade launcher, but that is so basic. Here are some ideas to add to my rifle: a throwing net (to pin down the guys), flamethrower (to fire up things), lazer beam (to cut steel and armored stuff), rocket launcher (to blow up things), Sidewinder portable launcher (to shoot me some birds), fireball and snowball launcher (to fight them evil wizards), stealth detector, animal detector, human detector with gps and a arrow to point where the guy is, portable warp (so i can insta close distance), portable wormhole generator (so if im losing i can kill everyone in the map and start a new map).
This is ofc only for my main gun. I want also for my sidearm...
Explosive darts (with a multi throw option so i can hit 10 guys at same time), hummm how many keys do i have 1..2..4..5 nah still very basic...dont want to play a game with only basic stuff so people can acuse me of having fun...ok...sidearm....a glue firing ball (so i can lower targets run speed by 50%), soundwave projector (so i can silence people and also vehicle engine),...
- Also i think an ability tree is required. Maybe with 4,5 maybe 6 different branches where one could maximize and specialize in a given utility. Like, there could be a branch where i could put some points where it could maximize dmg on my rocket launcher by 1/2/3%, and increase my critical sniper dmg, but only when buff of the stealth bomber is on, by 2/4/6% of my total dexterity with my can openener when using 2h TNT sticks....
- Also, a huge robot boss or battleship should spawn for the winning team where new upgrades can drop, and there shoud be 3 types of them (blue, green, gold) so you can say whos the boss in that group.
The issue here, Odin, is that complexity does not equal fun. In the same way that basic does not equal fun also. All that matters is in what way a given system is implemented. Arenanet approach to combat system is aimed at making combat quick and fluid, and i dont see how that can be a bad thing. I also like tons of skills and spells, but ive been having those for 8 years now, and i want to change pace. So, for me, it is a welcome change to the genre,
You could had said that maybe you liked Gw1 system better, or that you have fun when your toon is full of stuff to press, whatever, instead you chose to completely ignore the fact that:
- Some people just like it fluid and uncomplicated.
And, for me, Gw2 combat system may not be perfect, but its great great fun, and makes combat not stationary.
Just the fact that you can dodge makes it much more better, I stopped playing MMOs where all you could do was stand still and smash skills and you were good to go, glad they gave positioning a lot of importance.
Remember... all I'm offering is the truth. Nothing more.
Originally posted by Svarcanum BadSpock, you're correct but also not. I retraced my steps and those particular mobs. And that's what I used more or less every time. But I did that rotation because, like you said the situation called for it. It will vary from fight to fight. I just wanted to highlight the complexity of seemingly few skills.
I just don't trust that you know what you're talking about enough to take your "9 button rotation" as credible.
There are a few reasons for this, but really, the way the game actually plays, there are multiple weapons and multiple utility skills to choose from for every class. You are describing a situation as if there was one way to accomplish a goal. Every player will have a different set of weapon/class skills available to them. To act like there was a 9 button rotation for whatever your setup was is just shite in my opinion.
Really, GW2 appears to be about, at least in PvE, reacting to your surroundings. You are supposed to blind the big ass champion right as he telegraphs his "elite." You are supposed to dodge when you see him telegraph his frontal cone. You are supposed to position yourself in a way in order to be able to ignore his frontal attacks. You are supposed to cripple that champion when a group memeber begins to take too much damage and can't get away. When it comes down to it, all bosses are affected by almost all conditions. This is incredibly different than most other MMORPGs and incredibly important to understand.
If you are retarded enough to attempt to lay out a rotation during a fight where you are supposed to be a part of a group, you are hurting the group by not doing the correct things during combat. Attempting to "rotation DPS" in this game is literally the most retarded thing you can do in order to succeed. Stop thinking about his health bar and start thinking about how you can help your group win.
I have less skills, with more tactical uses. This means Im always thinking about how to sqeeze out effectivness from my skills.
For Example:
The heals. The thief's first heal is Hide in shadow. You stealth and regen. So obviously I can use it as a heal. Secondly the stealth element can drop aggro in a fight even if my health is fine, so its also defensive. Thirdly, stealth offers me new skills to use. I like to use that to stun mobs with a sword equippedor as a rapid fire shot with the pistol, for example, so its also offensive.
In most games, a heal is just a heal, possibley with some support oriented buff, but in GW2 I have several very important tactical uses of just that one skill. I am constantly weighing the value of the different elements to find the right move for the situation.
Originally posted by Svarcanum BadSpock, you're correct but also not. I retraced my steps and those particular mobs. And that's what I used more or less every time. But I did that rotation because, like you said the situation called for it. It will vary from fight to fight. I just wanted to highlight the complexity of seemingly few skills.
I just don't trust that you know what you're talking about enough to take your "9 button rotation" as credible.
There are a few reasons for this, but really, the way the game actually plays, there are multiple weapons and multiple utility skills to choose from for every class. You are describing a situation as if there was one way to accoplish a goal. Every player will have a different set of weapon/class skills available to them. To act like there was a 9 button rotation for whatever your setup was is just shite in my opinion.
Really, GW2 appears to be about, at least in PvE, reacting to your surroundings. You are supposed to blind the big ass champion right as he telegraphs his "elite." You are supposed to dodge when you see him telegraph his frontal cone. You are supposed to position yourself in a way in order to be able to ignore his frontal attacks. You are supposed to cripple that champion when a group memeber begins to take too much damage and can't get away. When it comes down to it, all bosses are affected by almost all conditions. This is incredibly different than most other MMORPGs and incredibly important to understand.
If you are retarded enough to attempt to lay out a rotation during a fight where you are supposed to be a part of a group, you are hurting the group by not doing the correct things during combat. Attempting to "rotation DPS" in this game is literally the most retarded thing you can do in order to succeed. Stop thinking about his health bar and start thinking about how you can help your group win.
Rotations aside, i thought the point of winning was to bring health bars to 0, and if they can avoid attacks while doing a "rotation" ie debuffs, dps, and cc's during big attacks isnt it actually helping the group as long as he stays alive?
I feel like the game is less about "rotations" and more about figuring out combos.
Like on my Guardian, using the Greatsword, 5, 2, 5, 3 is a great AoE combo to tag everything, lay down your symbol, pull them all on top of you (and they get knocked down) and then AoE blast them down. i guess it is sort of a "rotation" but I only really use it situationally to kill many things at once, or do heavy AoE damage. Not to mention, all the mobs you pull in are inside a combo field, and all your attacks will combo off it as well.
I feel most things in GW2 invovle setting up a high damage attack. Like on Warrior, using a Bulls Charge/Bola's, then Frenzy into 100 blades seems to do a lot of damage. Following that, you can do a 3, 4, 5 to basically charge through opponents, throw your sword at one from range, and then charge back into combat on your main target. On Mesmer using Sword/Pistol, I found myself using 5,4, 2, F1 and then Mantra of Pain for pretty huge spike damage on groups of mobs/people. I mean, I don't know if these are the best combos, but it are a few examples of things I found and used the short time in the beta. There will be much more of this discovery as I play the game more and especially after I start playing one class more (as I played all of them to 10+ during the past 2 betas).
I guess I don't really consider these rotations, because what you need to do is constantly changing. But learning these combinations and using them effectively can make fights easier and go your way more often. Also, I find certain mobs are better suited for different tactics. Faster hitting, lower damage mobs seem to be better to take out from a distance. Slower hitting things, I can usually get right up in their face and avoid the large attacks and take them out with ease. It just all depends.
Originally posted by Svarcanum BadSpock, you're correct but also not. I retraced my steps and those particular mobs. And that's what I used more or less every time. But I did that rotation because, like you said the situation called for it. It will vary from fight to fight. I just wanted to highlight the complexity of seemingly few skills.
I just don't trust that you know what you're talking about enough to take your "9 button rotation" as credible.
There are a few reasons for this, but really, the way the game actually plays, there are multiple weapons and multiple utility skills to choose from for every class. You are describing a situation as if there was one way to accoplish a goal. Every player will have a different set of weapon/class skills available to them. To act like there was a 9 button rotation for whatever your setup was is just shite in my opinion.
Really, GW2 appears to be about, at least in PvE, reacting to your surroundings. You are supposed to blind the big ass champion right as he telegraphs his "elite." You are supposed to dodge when you see him telegraph his frontal cone. You are supposed to position yourself in a way in order to be able to ignore his frontal attacks. You are supposed to cripple that champion when a group memeber begins to take too much damage and can't get away. When it comes down to it, all bosses are affected by almost all conditions. This is incredibly different than most other MMORPGs and incredibly important to understand.
If you are retarded enough to attempt to lay out a rotation during a fight where you are supposed to be a part of a group, you are hurting the group by not doing the correct things during combat. Attempting to "rotation DPS" in this game is literally the most retarded thing you can do in order to succeed. Stop thinking about his health bar and start thinking about how you can help your group win.
Rotations aside, i thought the point of winning was to bring health bars to 0, and if they can avoid attacks while doing a "rotation" ie debuffs, dps, and cc's during big attacks isnt it actually helping the group as long as he stays alive?
That's not a rotation. You were specifically talking about a rotation. Now you are obviously backing off. Hard.
I tried playing some RIFT after the last GW2 BWE and oh my lord I almost fell asleep.
Tried some "Instant Adventures" - no group cause no one is lower level so I was solo, grinding mobs and moving from one mob grind to the next, combat so slow and boring, animations so static and stale, no way to avoid damage - and with no self heals forced downtime between mobs to drink/rest or use consumables.
In most mmo's i've played, i'd rarely use more than 10-12 skill's. So GW2's system really doesn't bother me with limited ammount of skill's, plus i love how very few skill's root you in place like most game's. Plus how skill's interact with each other is cool. All in all GW2 has imo the funnest combat of any mmo i've played to date.
I'm used to having 4 action bars in MMO's, but two of those are usually for consumables, just because it's more convienent to hit them from the button than open my inventory. So really it boils down to just 2 bars worth (24 skills). Just like Odinthedark1, I have the cata mouse (love that thing) which let's me program 12 buttons to use for skills. That's sufficient to cover 99% of the buttons I need to hit during combat. Sure there are skills I don't have enough mouse buttons for but those have very limited use.
To put things in perspective, for GW2 12 mouse buttons isn't enough. I have the 5 weapon skills, the 5 other skills, 4 function keys, a dodge key, and a weapon swap key. I use the double-tap directional keys for dodge, so that leaves 3 actions that I don't have enough mouse buttons for.
So the only real difference I see between GW2 and a "standard" MMO is I don't have 2 action bars full of consumables.
Also, I think it's misleading to look at the GW2 action bar and think "wow only 10 skills". There's also 5 skills from your secondary weapon and 4 function keys. So really it's 19 skills. For a kit-based Engineer and Elementalists it's even more than that. So I fail to see how GW2 is more limited in skill selection than any other MMO.
It's not. But if you have troll, you've got to come up with something. So pretending there are only five skills and then rant about how simple the game is, is a great way to start troll/flame-bait topic.
My 'main' will be a Sylvari elementalist. She will have 20 weapon skills, 1 heal, 3 utilies (from a large pool), 1 elite (when I get there...) and a racial. More so than any other MMO, I use all of those weapon skills. In LOTRO, I played all 9 classes to at least level 45 and I used a far fewer skills on the most complex of them than I do on my 'simple' elementalist. My Rune Keeper, when combat spec'd, would be the closest to the elementalist, and by the time I hit the 5th skill in my rotation (of 6 lightning attacks), unless it was a boss, it was dead and I couldn't ever use the 6th attack which depended on a 'rage pool' (called attunement). So, fight after fight: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...
To vary it I'd do a fire rotation: Alt 1, Alt 2, Alt 3, Alt 4, Alt 5.... Ice was pretty crappy and was really only good to slow/debuff and you couldn't do that in a party because you had to do either DPS or HEAL because Rune Keepers are terrible at crowd-control compared to Hunters and Lore Masters. Anyway, between all the skills, pots, minor crap I didn't use... Sure, I filled 59 of the 72 slots in the 6 hotbars I had stacked. Yet in the core gameplay, I pretty much just used the same five attacks each time. Just like when I was the 'healer' and used the same six heals all the time.
I also think there are two things in the issue that get ignored by the critics/trolls. First is the failure to understand beyond all the shiny of all those skills, is that many of the 'different' skills you have in skill proliferation MMOs are the same skill, just redone slightly. For example these are three advanced (rage pool) attacks used by my Champion: Brutal Strikes: 650 to 1000 damage (4.2 second cd, costs 3 rage). Feral Strikes 600 to 950 (4.2 second cd, costs 3 rage). Remorseless Strikes 650 to 950 (1.8 second cool down, costs 4 rage). Yay, LOTRO has 3 buttons. They're all, effectively, the same attack on 3 different cool-downs.
Second, is most of those skills are counters necessary because the combat is rooted in place. Every melee fighter has a kick so he can interrupt a boss because otherwise he's gets one-shotted. Every squishy class has a root/slow because he can't move when he's casting. This kind of stuff isn't necessary in GW2 because the combat system relies on the dodge ability combined with your inherent mobility and awareness to provide the combat advantage of stuns, roots, knockbacks, etc. In short ANet removed the reason/necessity for the proliferation of hose abilities by allowing you to do it naturally through movement, awareness and the dodge key.
Further, since we've gone away from the holy trinity. All those aggro-holding skills aren't necessary. Now your combat is fluid. Now you're responsible to ensure you avoid attacks instead of some poor tank getting the crap beat out of him while he's being saved by a dedicated healer. We also lost all those healing skills because we lost the tanks. You job is to AVOID damage proactively and not be HEALED FROM DAMAGE because you can't figure out how to move and work the system.
So, sure, there are fewer skills. They've been elimated for good reason, leaving you with the same kind of core rotation you use in games with scores of skills.
But honestly looking at the changes and why... That doesn't make for good trolling/whining.
I am not a great fan of GW2 combat but the rest of the game is so cool that I will bear with it.
Here is my major complaint. In GW2 combat you are basically forced to move around if you want to survive. This is fine in open areas (though you had better watch for aggro!) but does not work in closed areas.
There was a level 10 story quest on the Norn necromancer that I could not beat even at level 15 (downleveling does not help). The combat occurs in a cave. No matter how much you move around you are hit and hit hard and, if you leave the cave the boss resets his life. I never completed the quest.
A similar event on my human mesmer (same level) took me 7 tries and I think that I cheated to beat it. Once again you are forced to fight a boss in a confined space (a single room). I found that if you went up the stairs there was a nook you could hide in to force only one mob at a time. Had I stayed in the main room I would have died.
It doesn't matter what class I play - in a confined area - I die. From what I hear of players who hit level 20 the mobs start doing snares. I have a feeling that is where my time with GW2 will end. You can take a bit a dying as fun but when you die most of the time it is frustrating.
I know both of those fights and beat them both first time and did it at level (elementalist, guardian for human, thief for Norn). So I'm going to pull you up short right now and say: sorry, but downleveling does help. Gear up and skill up first, then downlevel. You'll have all your skills and weapons at 15. It's only your abilities and HP that downlevel.
I suspect you were just running around with trash-mob gear and incomplete items (jewelry, etc). Because those fights, despite the cramped quarters, is not difficult if you're geared-up properly to level. And with 15-gear, you should have cruised through them.
From someone who cant even type "yes" way to gut the paragraph to make people see it the way you want them (or even yourself) to see it.
I"ll take his typos over your failure to understand the game every day. His typos can be fixed with most any decent spell/grammar checker. But pulling the wrong ideas out of someone, who deliberately doesn't wish to understand, head... That's impossible.
some people complain about few skills in GW2 but i want to know ,people who are happy with 40-60 skills , do you use them all in a fight that last less than 1 min ? ( pve fight)
even in pvp i doubt all your 40-60 skills/spells are useful
you might actually lose that bet, first off the numbers are way exaggerated...secondly it would depend on the Class, Player, and the build but it is very possible....i remember how crazy my destruction / demonology warlock used to be lol...you have to use all skills or your dps would be crap. Even in tera or rift when i played them.
Edit: As it goes, if you're not using them all you're doing it wrong!
So, basically, you had a macro or were just sitting there punching buttons, like some fast-food cashier, while staring at the hotbars on the screen. Personally I think macros/addons are for people who can't play or are to fix problems with skill-bloat systems that were so over-designed that they're functionally useless. I have no respect for anyone who uses an add-on or a macro or a game that requires it. There's not any skill there beyond a Google search for the right combat macro and build. You just copy a build and download a macro off the interent and BAM! you're a 'power player' or you've fixed the defective game design. And, in either case, the skill of the add-on/macro user is trivial because it's your computer doing the job, not the person behind the keyboard.
You want to know real combat skill? Eve Online. It's easy F1, F2, F3... But it's not. You have so many environmental issues to deal with plus outfitting your ship.. Are you damped? How are you going to deal with transversals? Signature radius? ECM? When do you turn on your ASB? OR do you even have one? Do you dual-tank or armor tank or shield tank or signature tank? How are you going to deal with NOS and NEUT? Is your tank a local rep or logistics or passive? Are you Tech 1, Tech 2 or Tech 3? Can you fit the build to your powergrid? What kind of drones do you use? When do you deploy them? Should you deploy a full wave or stagger it? EC drones, damage drones, rep drones? Light, medium, heavy or (if you can) sentry? How are you going to get the enemy drones off you? Then we have cap management... Overheating... Relative advantage/disadvantages of your opponent? Are you going to neut a Minmater ship? Are you going to use tracking disrupters on a Raven? Shield tank against Amarr? If you go up against a Rokh, is he more likely to use blasters or missiles? Is he more likely to shield tank or armor tank?
It's a staggering amount of choices, conditions, environments and what not. Yet just eight (at most) function keys, plus a mouse, being used...
Yet we have SWTOR (WoW Junior) with all that skill bloat. It must be a much, much harder game... Nope, here's my old Sentinal rotation:
First Rotation: Focus building
Force Leap Zealous Strike Precision Slash Blade Rush Blade Storm
Second Rotation: DPS Rotation
Master Strike (to start the cooldown) Precision Slash Zealous Strike Blade Storm Zen Blade Rush
Four hotbars almost completely filled with skills, barely enough room for a stack of pots and a stack of boosters. Seven skills actually used. I used to nod-off during combat sometimes from the shear tedium of it...
remembering that most wow pvp players use the macros to combine several skills into 1, we see that they really dont need tons of skills, im proud that some gamimg company tryed to solve the mechanics that wow brainwashed into most of his players.
and of course when the skill are few, and you still need to kill inteligents and deadly bosses, then you need to upgrade your brain and figure out a solution, thats what actually i belive is an skilled player
I actually like the weapon system skill "thing" it makes sense, its nothing groundbreaking, it's just an improvement of the "You cannot perform that action at the moment" spam you get when you try and use a skil that requires a specific weapon. It adds a bit of context to the game, I hate class restrictions on weapons and I havent really tried every class there is but at least for the ranger I am happy I am not stuck with a dagger or 1 handed weapon because I am a ranger I cannot carry a two handed sword so it is quite nice.
It is a bit farfetched to think that people wont theorycraft as soon as it is released and find optimal rotations/key presses that provide the best returns, it is still a numbers game whether you see the numbers plotted in an ingame graph or not, people will find the optimal way of performing any task and the optimal combination of weapon/skills.
Comments
http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/warlock/demonology/dps-rotation-and-cooldowns it would seem if i still played WoW this would be my rotation looking at it scares me unless you got good memory and reflexes you can easily ruin your dps....and im pretty sure it used to be slightly bigger before they made the game easier and dumbed down...
Edit: i would honestly have never left WoW if they hadnt kept dumbing it down and its gonna be easy enough for a 10 yr old to set up a spec when MoP comes
impossible to meassure dps in GW2 because combat is not *stay still hit damage skills* you are always moving around and kiting or avoiding, so you will never have a stable dps EVER. the combat is more about effectively surviving. the build with the highest 'damage' does not ensure survival at all, it could be that the higher damage builds have less in what is required to effectively control the flow of the encounter.
for example, the Mesmer to me felt like it had little damage compared to the Warrior, but it seemed to be fairly more survivable because the abilities allowed to better avoid damage.
That is not a rotation that is using abilities when neccessary and there is no way you did the exact same thing every time over and over.
A rotation is something like Rift/WoW where you are literally going 1-2-2-2-2-1-2-2-2-2-3-2-2-2-2-1-2-2-2-2-3-2-2-2-2
See the difference is that in GW2 they want you to think about when to use each skill and do so at an appropriate time. Not just follow some rotation. After learning that Warlock rotation and doing it a few times it literally becomes just a routine. You don't have to put any thought into why you're using the skills after you've established the best DPS rotation. You just mash the buttons in some preset order or sequence. That's not meaningful combat.
8 cds that I'd choose to pop depending on the situation. So really demo lock will seem like a breeze in comparison.
Impossible is an exaggeration it would simply take a really really skilled player to be able to avoid damage while staying in range to dish out consistent dps
Edit: basically someone good enough to survive at the same time as dishing out heavy damage dps will be there in any game and will always vary depending on how consistently you can stay on mobs you cant deny its existence but at the same time you are right you have to focus more on survival so the true "Highest dps" possibly attained would come after finding the point in which you can burst like mad while just barely surviving
you cant do damage while dodging, but while kitting you can. problem is that there is no way to have a stable DPS +- 5% in any encounter because you cant predict how it will play. also damage skills are also situational and you cant just burn them on the fly. trust me, i like meassuring my dps in every game, i did find that meele does far more DPS though it is still dependant on the encounter, so where a meele does abysmal dps a range could OWN and vice versa. there is no 1 trick pony dps build (at least for the classes i played) and meassuring dps would have to take into account the type of encounter, which is not exactly possible to do.
Very understandable and true.
I too would get into a "habbit" on a particular mob because of their AI / behavior I was able to predict and accurately counter their actions with a "pattern" of my own.
But is that a rotation? Questionable.
You are right though, extremely complex interactions for using 9 "buttons."
On my Warrior, some fights would be like this...
Sword+Shield - 2 to range close, 1 to apply bleed, auto switches to 1, dodge back to avoid attack, 4 to charge w/ shield and stun, F1 for burst, 5 for shield block next attack, 3 for hamstring, dodge next attack, 2 again to range close, finish with 1, maybe 2nd/3rd 1.
But sometimes after I dodged out of range the first time I'd weapon swap, 3 to damage with Whirlwind (Great Sword), quick turn and 4 to bleed/ranged attack, charge with 5 - then burst F1 or use 2 for burst - but I'd for sure take some damage this way because I wasn't avoiding every attack.
To the OP:
lets put it this way. do you like FPS? I do. Loved Bad Company 2 and im loving B3. You can play it thousands of times, even the same scenarios, and have fun. I just miss one thing you know. I wish it had more skills. I would like a:
- CC ability, maybe some curse where i could prevent the enemy trigger finger to paralyse, so he wont be able to fire....unless he could change shooting stance...oh dear;
- Debuff ability. Now i could use some of those, in particular for snipers. They can fire at some long long range. I want a debuff on them where i could shorten their firing range for 50%...ofc the skill needs to have 2km range.
- Weapon skills. Now i dont know why they dont have multiple atack choices for my M16. Sure there is the grenade launcher, but that is so basic. Here are some ideas to add to my rifle: a throwing net (to pin down the guys), flamethrower (to fire up things), lazer beam (to cut steel and armored stuff), rocket launcher (to blow up things), Sidewinder portable launcher (to shoot me some birds), fireball and snowball launcher (to fight them evil wizards), stealth detector, animal detector, human detector with gps and a arrow to point where the guy is, portable warp (so i can insta close distance), portable wormhole generator (so if im losing i can kill everyone in the map and start a new map).
This is ofc only for my main gun. I want also for my sidearm...
Explosive darts (with a multi throw option so i can hit 10 guys at same time), hummm how many keys do i have 1..2..4..5 nah still very basic...dont want to play a game with only basic stuff so people can acuse me of having fun...ok...sidearm....a glue firing ball (so i can lower targets run speed by 50%), soundwave projector (so i can silence people and also vehicle engine),...
- Also i think an ability tree is required. Maybe with 4,5 maybe 6 different branches where one could maximize and specialize in a given utility. Like, there could be a branch where i could put some points where it could maximize dmg on my rocket launcher by 1/2/3%, and increase my critical sniper dmg, but only when buff of the stealth bomber is on, by 2/4/6% of my total dexterity with my can openener when using 2h TNT sticks....
- Also, a huge robot boss or battleship should spawn for the winning team where new upgrades can drop, and there shoud be 3 types of them (blue, green, gold) so you can say whos the boss in that group.
The issue here, Odin, is that complexity does not equal fun. In the same way that basic does not equal fun also. All that matters is in what way a given system is implemented. Arenanet approach to combat system is aimed at making combat quick and fluid, and i dont see how that can be a bad thing. I also like tons of skills and spells, but ive been having those for 8 years now, and i want to change pace. So, for me, it is a welcome change to the genre,
You could had said that maybe you liked Gw1 system better, or that you have fun when your toon is full of stuff to press, whatever, instead you chose to completely ignore the fact that:
- Some people just like it fluid and uncomplicated.
And, for me, Gw2 combat system may not be perfect, but its great great fun, and makes combat not stationary.
Just the fact that you can dodge makes it much more better, I stopped playing MMOs where all you could do was stand still and smash skills and you were good to go, glad they gave positioning a lot of importance.
Remember... all I'm offering is the truth. Nothing more.
I just don't trust that you know what you're talking about enough to take your "9 button rotation" as credible.
There are a few reasons for this, but really, the way the game actually plays, there are multiple weapons and multiple utility skills to choose from for every class. You are describing a situation as if there was one way to accomplish a goal. Every player will have a different set of weapon/class skills available to them. To act like there was a 9 button rotation for whatever your setup was is just shite in my opinion.
Really, GW2 appears to be about, at least in PvE, reacting to your surroundings. You are supposed to blind the big ass champion right as he telegraphs his "elite." You are supposed to dodge when you see him telegraph his frontal cone. You are supposed to position yourself in a way in order to be able to ignore his frontal attacks. You are supposed to cripple that champion when a group memeber begins to take too much damage and can't get away. When it comes down to it, all bosses are affected by almost all conditions. This is incredibly different than most other MMORPGs and incredibly important to understand.
If you are retarded enough to attempt to lay out a rotation during a fight where you are supposed to be a part of a group, you are hurting the group by not doing the correct things during combat. Attempting to "rotation DPS" in this game is literally the most retarded thing you can do in order to succeed. Stop thinking about his health bar and start thinking about how you can help your group win.
For me the answer is simple:
I have less skills, with more tactical uses. This means Im always thinking about how to sqeeze out effectivness from my skills.
For Example:
The heals. The thief's first heal is Hide in shadow. You stealth and regen. So obviously I can use it as a heal. Secondly the stealth element can drop aggro in a fight even if my health is fine, so its also defensive. Thirdly, stealth offers me new skills to use. I like to use that to stun mobs with a sword equippedor as a rapid fire shot with the pistol, for example, so its also offensive.
In most games, a heal is just a heal, possibley with some support oriented buff, but in GW2 I have several very important tactical uses of just that one skill. I am constantly weighing the value of the different elements to find the right move for the situation.
Rotations aside, i thought the point of winning was to bring health bars to 0, and if they can avoid attacks while doing a "rotation" ie debuffs, dps, and cc's during big attacks isnt it actually helping the group as long as he stays alive?
I feel like the game is less about "rotations" and more about figuring out combos.
Like on my Guardian, using the Greatsword, 5, 2, 5, 3 is a great AoE combo to tag everything, lay down your symbol, pull them all on top of you (and they get knocked down) and then AoE blast them down. i guess it is sort of a "rotation" but I only really use it situationally to kill many things at once, or do heavy AoE damage. Not to mention, all the mobs you pull in are inside a combo field, and all your attacks will combo off it as well.
I feel most things in GW2 invovle setting up a high damage attack. Like on Warrior, using a Bulls Charge/Bola's, then Frenzy into 100 blades seems to do a lot of damage. Following that, you can do a 3, 4, 5 to basically charge through opponents, throw your sword at one from range, and then charge back into combat on your main target. On Mesmer using Sword/Pistol, I found myself using 5,4, 2, F1 and then Mantra of Pain for pretty huge spike damage on groups of mobs/people. I mean, I don't know if these are the best combos, but it are a few examples of things I found and used the short time in the beta. There will be much more of this discovery as I play the game more and especially after I start playing one class more (as I played all of them to 10+ during the past 2 betas).
I guess I don't really consider these rotations, because what you need to do is constantly changing. But learning these combinations and using them effectively can make fights easier and go your way more often. Also, I find certain mobs are better suited for different tactics. Faster hitting, lower damage mobs seem to be better to take out from a distance. Slower hitting things, I can usually get right up in their face and avoid the large attacks and take them out with ease. It just all depends.
That's not a rotation. You were specifically talking about a rotation. Now you are obviously backing off. Hard.
I tried playing some RIFT after the last GW2 BWE and oh my lord I almost fell asleep.
Tried some "Instant Adventures" - no group cause no one is lower level so I was solo, grinding mobs and moving from one mob grind to the next, combat so slow and boring, animations so static and stale, no way to avoid damage - and with no self heals forced downtime between mobs to drink/rest or use consumables.
Old way is so, so dead to me.
In most mmo's i've played, i'd rarely use more than 10-12 skill's. So GW2's system really doesn't bother me with limited ammount of skill's, plus i love how very few skill's root you in place like most game's. Plus how skill's interact with each other is cool. All in all GW2 has imo the funnest combat of any mmo i've played to date.
It's not. But if you have troll, you've got to come up with something. So pretending there are only five skills and then rant about how simple the game is, is a great way to start troll/flame-bait topic.
My 'main' will be a Sylvari elementalist. She will have 20 weapon skills, 1 heal, 3 utilies (from a large pool), 1 elite (when I get there...) and a racial. More so than any other MMO, I use all of those weapon skills. In LOTRO, I played all 9 classes to at least level 45 and I used a far fewer skills on the most complex of them than I do on my 'simple' elementalist. My Rune Keeper, when combat spec'd, would be the closest to the elementalist, and by the time I hit the 5th skill in my rotation (of 6 lightning attacks), unless it was a boss, it was dead and I couldn't ever use the 6th attack which depended on a 'rage pool' (called attunement). So, fight after fight: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...
To vary it I'd do a fire rotation: Alt 1, Alt 2, Alt 3, Alt 4, Alt 5.... Ice was pretty crappy and was really only good to slow/debuff and you couldn't do that in a party because you had to do either DPS or HEAL because Rune Keepers are terrible at crowd-control compared to Hunters and Lore Masters. Anyway, between all the skills, pots, minor crap I didn't use... Sure, I filled 59 of the 72 slots in the 6 hotbars I had stacked. Yet in the core gameplay, I pretty much just used the same five attacks each time. Just like when I was the 'healer' and used the same six heals all the time.
I also think there are two things in the issue that get ignored by the critics/trolls. First is the failure to understand beyond all the shiny of all those skills, is that many of the 'different' skills you have in skill proliferation MMOs are the same skill, just redone slightly. For example these are three advanced (rage pool) attacks used by my Champion: Brutal Strikes: 650 to 1000 damage (4.2 second cd, costs 3 rage). Feral Strikes 600 to 950 (4.2 second cd, costs 3 rage). Remorseless Strikes 650 to 950 (1.8 second cool down, costs 4 rage). Yay, LOTRO has 3 buttons. They're all, effectively, the same attack on 3 different cool-downs.
Second, is most of those skills are counters necessary because the combat is rooted in place. Every melee fighter has a kick so he can interrupt a boss because otherwise he's gets one-shotted. Every squishy class has a root/slow because he can't move when he's casting. This kind of stuff isn't necessary in GW2 because the combat system relies on the dodge ability combined with your inherent mobility and awareness to provide the combat advantage of stuns, roots, knockbacks, etc. In short ANet removed the reason/necessity for the proliferation of hose abilities by allowing you to do it naturally through movement, awareness and the dodge key.
Further, since we've gone away from the holy trinity. All those aggro-holding skills aren't necessary. Now your combat is fluid. Now you're responsible to ensure you avoid attacks instead of some poor tank getting the crap beat out of him while he's being saved by a dedicated healer. We also lost all those healing skills because we lost the tanks. You job is to AVOID damage proactively and not be HEALED FROM DAMAGE because you can't figure out how to move and work the system.
So, sure, there are fewer skills. They've been elimated for good reason, leaving you with the same kind of core rotation you use in games with scores of skills.
But honestly looking at the changes and why... That doesn't make for good trolling/whining.
I know both of those fights and beat them both first time and did it at level (elementalist, guardian for human, thief for Norn). So I'm going to pull you up short right now and say: sorry, but downleveling does help. Gear up and skill up first, then downlevel. You'll have all your skills and weapons at 15. It's only your abilities and HP that downlevel.
I suspect you were just running around with trash-mob gear and incomplete items (jewelry, etc). Because those fights, despite the cramped quarters, is not difficult if you're geared-up properly to level. And with 15-gear, you should have cruised through them.
I"ll take his typos over your failure to understand the game every day. His typos can be fixed with most any decent spell/grammar checker. But pulling the wrong ideas out of someone, who deliberately doesn't wish to understand, head... That's impossible.
So, basically, you had a macro or were just sitting there punching buttons, like some fast-food cashier, while staring at the hotbars on the screen. Personally I think macros/addons are for people who can't play or are to fix problems with skill-bloat systems that were so over-designed that they're functionally useless. I have no respect for anyone who uses an add-on or a macro or a game that requires it. There's not any skill there beyond a Google search for the right combat macro and build. You just copy a build and download a macro off the interent and BAM! you're a 'power player' or you've fixed the defective game design. And, in either case, the skill of the add-on/macro user is trivial because it's your computer doing the job, not the person behind the keyboard.
You want to know real combat skill? Eve Online. It's easy F1, F2, F3... But it's not. You have so many environmental issues to deal with plus outfitting your ship.. Are you damped? How are you going to deal with transversals? Signature radius? ECM? When do you turn on your ASB? OR do you even have one? Do you dual-tank or armor tank or shield tank or signature tank? How are you going to deal with NOS and NEUT? Is your tank a local rep or logistics or passive? Are you Tech 1, Tech 2 or Tech 3? Can you fit the build to your powergrid? What kind of drones do you use? When do you deploy them? Should you deploy a full wave or stagger it? EC drones, damage drones, rep drones? Light, medium, heavy or (if you can) sentry? How are you going to get the enemy drones off you? Then we have cap management... Overheating... Relative advantage/disadvantages of your opponent? Are you going to neut a Minmater ship? Are you going to use tracking disrupters on a Raven? Shield tank against Amarr? If you go up against a Rokh, is he more likely to use blasters or missiles? Is he more likely to shield tank or armor tank?
It's a staggering amount of choices, conditions, environments and what not. Yet just eight (at most) function keys, plus a mouse, being used...
Yet we have SWTOR (WoW Junior) with all that skill bloat. It must be a much, much harder game... Nope, here's my old Sentinal rotation:
First Rotation: Focus building
Force Leap
Zealous Strike
Precision Slash
Blade Rush
Blade Storm
Second Rotation: DPS Rotation
Master Strike (to start the cooldown)
Precision Slash
Zealous Strike
Blade Storm
Zen
Blade Rush
Four hotbars almost completely filled with skills, barely enough room for a stack of pots and a stack of boosters. Seven skills actually used. I used to nod-off during combat sometimes from the shear tedium of it...
But hey, lots of 'skill buttons' to push...
remembering that most wow pvp players use the macros to combine several skills into 1, we see that they really dont need tons of skills, im proud that some gamimg company tryed to solve the mechanics that wow brainwashed into most of his players.
and of course when the skill are few, and you still need to kill inteligents and deadly bosses, then you need to upgrade your brain and figure out a solution, thats what actually i belive is an skilled player
I actually like the weapon system skill "thing" it makes sense, its nothing groundbreaking, it's just an improvement of the "You cannot perform that action at the moment" spam you get when you try and use a skil that requires a specific weapon. It adds a bit of context to the game, I hate class restrictions on weapons and I havent really tried every class there is but at least for the ranger I am happy I am not stuck with a dagger or 1 handed weapon because I am a ranger I cannot carry a two handed sword so it is quite nice.
It is a bit farfetched to think that people wont theorycraft as soon as it is released and find optimal rotations/key presses that provide the best returns, it is still a numbers game whether you see the numbers plotted in an ingame graph or not, people will find the optimal way of performing any task and the optimal combination of weapon/skills.