User talk:SylvXIII/Overpowered Skills

OP skills
Needs more Bsurge, MB, VoR, WS etc. Also, Palm Strike isn't balanced, people just don't bitch about it anymore cause sins are running more overpowered stuff. -- Tha Reckoning 22:42, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh and pretty much everything fire magic, assassin dervish necro or mesmer related. -- Tha Reckoning 22:42, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi Reckoning, many of the skills you listed were skills I had plans to introduce as overpowered. Among those, Bsurge and MB though I'm still not sure about VoR. Bsurge mainly because of the aoe effect and spammability of the skill, MB for the ridiculously strong e-management and VoR for the insanely annoying AoE effect. Palm strike although being ridiculously strong even post-nerf was not on my list especially since I haven't seen it in practice for ages on sins now that seeping wound is all over the place. What are your reasons for thinking those skills are overpowered? Sincerely, SylvXIII 23:16, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * VoR = remove everyone from the game, Bsurge = remove melee from the game, PS = skip to dual attack + damage + snare, MB = infinite energy, so pretty much the same reasons as you. -- Tha Reckoning 23:40, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Faintheartedness. -- Tha Reckoning 01:17, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
 * KD spamming adrenaline wars... They are funly overpowered, No? Oh wait, they are countered just as easy as Wounding Strike with blinding. Wait a moment... nope its true, noo! Wounding Strike can really be countered with blinding! Just hope you got a PS sin on your team, or a SW one. --Darkness Prevails 02:14, 2 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Now now, because you cannot deal with hammer warriors (if that is what you're implying) is far from meaning they are overpowered. Yes it's possible for a hammer war to Backbreaker + hammer bash + grapple + iron palm + bull's strike someone which is, in pure honesty, pretty gay but not overpowered: they have the worst damage in comparison to axe and sword. Hammer warriors are only useful when they kd things. Typical anti-melee (hexes, blind) and anti-knockdown (Aura of Stability, Balanced Stance, Dolyak Signet) and anti-spikes (Disciplined Stance, Shield Bash, Smoke Powder Defense, Guardian, Distorsion and so on) are all effective counters to counter hammer warriors. @Darkness, I'm not quite sure whether you are mocking my skill choice of overpowered skills or what you're pointing out. As for faintheartedness, it's one of those skills like Resilient Weapon and Cure Hex that are great. While its function is to shutdown anything physical-based, it does its job very effectively and could seriously take a duration nerf and a little longer recharge. Out of all things, a shockaxe PR warrior (now nerfed), a magebane poison rupt ranger, a curse necromancer carrying faint and a woh monk were the classes played in "balanced group" in Team Arenas, which shows how strong a curse necromancer is the same way PR warriors were and magebane rangers are. While I agree faint shuts down interrupt rangers, any frontliner and so on, interrupts (pure rupts or kds) shut down any spell casters (magebane and dshot particularly). While your teams will probably not have the tools to dispose of a good curse necromancer in RA, it doesn't mean it is overpowered. Faint is the basic anti-melee skill for a curse necro the same way guardian is the basic anti-melee prot. It's overpowered? No, it's great and unless you give me reasons other than "it fucks up melee", I will never believe it is. Sincerely, SylvXIII 01:41, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It's not the fact that faint jacks up physical damage. It's the fact that it doesn't require any skill for you to do so. You can cast it on a hammer war or an inter and that char is nearly useless for the rest of the match. It's gonna be under parasitic bond anyway, so no worries about a monk removing it. It's far too good a skill for what you have to pay for it. You have to be good as a warrior or a ranger to shut down casters, but with one throwaway slot a caster can shut down a warrior or a ranger. Imagine playing a hammer war and going BLARGGG 1234324512341235. Nothing happens, but that's exactly what curses necros can do to win games. -- Tha Reckoning 08:20, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your answer Reckoning, I did put a lot more thoughts into it than what I wrote. It's the same issue with Bsurge ele, what you have to do to counter it as a melee character is ten times harder that what the melee shutdown character has to do to fuck you up. Along with a great Duration/recharge ratio, it's spammability is pretty epic. How many times I managed to turn the outcome of many Random Arena games by playing a Foul Feast Curse necromancer against 3 melee and a monk, I know not but it sure is a lot. While faint is easier to shutdown than bsurge for instance, I guess that's coped up by the non-elite property. Your statement "You have to be good as a warrior or a ranger to shut down casters" is something I mostly agree with. It's pretty normal for casters to have a slight advantage over physical damage dealers as they have far less survivability overall. Yet, we both know that in Guild Wars, it's much more than a small advantage. Sincerely, SylvXIII 18:12, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think that Diversion is overpowered, simply because it's an active hex, i.e. it requires you to be conscious of the flow of the match to gain full reward from it. Sure, you can spam it on recharge on whatever you like, and you'll disable stuff, but the difference between buttonmashing and a well timed diversion is the win or loss of a match. It's for that reason that it's only strong in the hands of those who know how and when to use it, the definition of balance. -- Tha Reckoning 06:07, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Diversion, Dshot, Dchop, Shield Bash, Sig of hum: All skills that can disable other skills. Mesmers have this unique property along with shield bash to be able to disable skills without necessarily rupting them. 6 seconds shutdown to begin with is pretty good, chain-able with other shutdowns such as shame/backfire/vor, etc. When you look at the properties (10 energy, 3 seconds cast time, 12 recharge), it seems fairly balanced but what I believe is overpowered is simply the ridiculously long skill disabling duration. 50 seconds? Dshot on WoH typically wins game but sometimes you get can get your way through it. Diverting woh is overkill. It's like dshotting woh, dshotting it again once it recharges and then doing a normal rupt on it when it recharges again. Of course that's just an example. You can divert skills on purpose to avoid disabling crucial skills, hope for a hex removal or you can sit the 6 seconds duration: there are many ways to counter the skill. Many skills in the game rewards players making good use of them (notably interrupts, bull's strike, holy veil, knockdowns, etc) but does it mean they're all balanced? Is a random Sig of Hum better than a timed one? Yes of course, but when spammed on recharge randomly it will eventually get to you like random rupting noob rangers on long games. Diversion is a six seconds ban from Guild Wars, like VoR although you can unban yourself prematurely by banning one of your skills for about a minute. Even in the hands of noobs, whatever skill you use through it will be disabled for 50 seconds or will be waited out for 6 seconds. I'm pretty cool with Vor (Aoe effect aside), Backfire, Shame as the punishment for casting through these skills is in the realm of you being able to deal with it but you cannot deal with diverted skills on your bar. You're not a bad monk because a bad random ranger eventually rupted you out of 438943 tries. However, you will look pretty terrible when one of your main heal goes bye-bye for more than 50 seconds and when this kind of shit happens in a close game you might as well type /resign and say sorry to your team. It's not only strong in the hands of good players. Skills disabling skill(s) are very powerful in the hands of anyone.

A good team will know when diversion is coming, so usually terribad teams can't surprise one on you, because you have someone that called it, or you can hear the skill activating. The difference between a bad diversion and a good diversion (imo) is that a bad diversion will be on you when they hope you're going to use a key skill. A good diversion will be on you when they MAKE you use a key skill. The difference is that even though you're aware of the diversion incoming in both situations, the good team will force you to sacrifice through it, while the bad team is hoping you'll screw up. I still don't think it's overpowered, because you have to have a lot of coordination and timing to land diversion on what you actually want to divert. -- Tha Reckoning 07:18, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I see your point that a random diversion can knock out one of your skills for ~1 min, but the fact is that a good player will see that coming and act accordingly. If made to use WoH or something like that through it, then I count that as a well timed diversion. -- Tha Reckoning 07:19, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

sounds a lot like. During diversion, you are most vulnerable. Let's say you're going to time diversion to disable an infuse, before a spike. In our little theory, the world is perfect and your timing is bang on. The payoff is essentially getting to push through spikes without fear of infusing, whenever you like, because you can exhaust the prot's energy in less than a minute, and he's not going to be able to catch very many spikes using spirit bond. The risk is having the other team somehow stop you from disabling infuse. If you fail, you lost ten energy, and don't have the ability to push spikes through whenever you like. Let's say your timing is off, and you disable idk, cure hex or something. You've by no means done anything anywhere near as good as disabling infuse. Do you see why diversion is balanced? It has risk, rewards good play, and punishes bad play. Worst case scenario (against a good team) is that your infuse sits out six seconds, and your prot holds the spike until the fuse can get to it. Skills that can be used by good teams to beat bad teams aren't overpowered, it's the other way around. If a terribad team was winning matches solely because of diversion spam, I'd be a little more worried, but as it is, it requires a hell of a lot of good timing to be effective. -- Tha Reckoning 03:33, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course, I agree with your statement that a good player will see it coming, most likely a good backliner. Nevertheless, fact remains that a minute is a lot and you better not waste a useful skill through it unless it's a game-winning move otherwise you'll be hating yourself for the following minute. It's like a really strong virus. Prevent it all you want but when it gets to you, there's no pill to cure you and it fucks up one of your abilities like using your right leg for a week. Ok this comparison is not so good, but I'm just exaggerating about the duration. We have Signet of Hum which is 15, dshot 20, magebane 10, thieveries that are 33 (spells only, 19 seconds for the elite one), Shield Bash 15, etc. There isn't a skill that's even close to how powerful diversion is in terms of fucking up someone. Many can argue it's one of the backbone skills on the Mesmers. I agree, it's just the best Mesmer skill to fuck up people. Non-elite on top of that. You've pointed out many good reasons to why you think Diversion is balanced and I'm all good with what you said. I will keep thinking the effect is overly strong. I typically don't bring any useless skills on my bars and I know from experience that when you get something diverted when you don't expect it (as a Warrior I don't expect Mesmers to diversion me but eh sometimes people might surprise you, also the typical dshot diverted cause your ranger was too late on his rupt, typically because of a FC), the shutdown it can generates is immense for it can be timed by a pro or randomed and maintain full effectiveness. Sincerely, SylvXIII 02:49, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It is a strong skill, but it pays for that dearly in casting time and the spotlight that's thrown on you when you hear that sound. I look at it as more of a skill that you should be coordinating with your team before you use. Strong, yes, overpowered, no. -- Tha Reckoning 07:22, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Well no offense Reckoning, but everything you said about how to use the skill and how to counter it were things I already knew. In fact many Mesmer hexes have a specific sound and your sound effects ought to be high when facing a Mesmer in serious PvP as well as camera view. You can look at the skill as something that can only be used very successfully in decent teamplay and it's true that it is but that's not all there is to it. The skill is amazingly versatile and can shutdown anything: if it could only shut down spells it'd be more balanced although I still have a grudge with the duration (and would only trigger on spells). While it's pretty cool to coordinate a spike and throw a diversion on the backline to bait a main heal, Diversion has way more uses than that. Just because you've never witnessed this skill's potential empirically doesn't mean it's not overpowered. Vor can shut down anything in the game. 10 seconds. Elite. Aoe. People QQ everywhere about it cause every wiki Mesmer runs it and they get owned. No need to be a genius to time diversions properly, but being smart is something not a lot of players in this game are. Being able to shut down anything with a skill is not something that I consider balanced with all things considered. Overpowered, Yes. Sincerely, SylvXIII 20:56, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It can't be randomed to full effect (unless you get really lucky). By "full effect" I mean "disabling what you want to be disabled". Imo you're thinking of the 1 min as the full effect, which I disagree with. I think that the full effect of diversion is disabling exactly what you want to with it, which makes it more useful for an experienced team than an inexperienced one. It does a lot, but is very risky to use. Isn't that the definition of balance? -- Tha Reckoning 01:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * No sir, that is not the definition of balanced. I won't even try to define what is "balanced" but I can tell you this: whenever you attempt to do something very strong, this is also the moment where you are the most vulnerable (I'm not really referring to frenzy, though it's a pretty good example). Is Vor balanced because it's risky to use? Is Palm strike balanced because it's risky to use? By "risky to use" I assume you mean, "long cast time" or predictability. Whatever OP skill exist in this game can be dshotted/diverted right off the bat especially if the pattern is predictable and/or the casting time is long, doesn't mean they're balanced. As to "full effect" I simply mean that something gets diverted. I don't know players who typically bring useless skills on their bar to divert. When it's balanced vs balanced, I suppose you'll be using all the skills on your bar. Anything that gets disabled will considerably shut you down. Pick any bar you want and Rez Sig aside, notice how considerable the effect of not having one of those skills would affect your gameplay. I don't know man, but I think we're running in circles. Sincerely, SylvXIII 03:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "It does a lot, but is very risky to use. Isn't that the definition of balance?"
 * Well you certainly did not read the rest of my post after the little quotation you did. It's not like I agreed with you. I mean, seriously? Make a skill that wins the game if casted successfully. Put a very long cast time. "It's strong but it's very risky so it's balanced" Wtf? Correct me if I'm wrong but all skills in this game reward good play, even when they're overpowered so you've pointed nothing new. Risk? Everything has a risk, even OP skills since you have to use them. I do however agree, it punishes bad play. I'd like to be nice and keep arguing for 10 more posts but really I can't be arsed. This one's staying on my page, feel free to repeat yourself. Sincerely, SylvXIII 05:30, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I'll spell it out for you, since you don't seem to get it. You may not think you agree with me, but you're saying something similar. Your vulnerable point and my risky point are the same thing. Notice that these words are synonymous. You're right, every skill in the game does reward good play. It's the ones that punish bad play that are balanced. Eviscerate is a common example. If you get evis blocked, you are punished because you can't spike for a while. If you get wounding strike blocked, you are not punished. Balanced vs overpowered. If you use diversion at the right time, you can change the flow of a match. If you use it at the wrong time, the flow doesn't change, i.e. if you divert something like cure hex vs diverting infuse, as I mentioned earlier. I'm not sure how to make it any clearer. I don't care if you take it off your page or not, but realize that diversion is not overpowered. -- Tha Reckoning 07:46, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh yeah, one more thing. Please don't fill my talk page with HOW TO GUILD WARS 101 for future reference. This could have been an interesting discussion, but it's one-sided so I can't be bothered. Peace, SylvXIII 08:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Be more open to the possibility that you're actually wrong, then. The sooner you get over yourself, the better. Hint: discussions are one sided when it couldn't be more obvious that one party is correct. -- Tha Reckoning 17:35, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * This is a conflict and I'm not going to back down until I make your last words mirror back to you. Full explanation to come. SylvXIII 20:04, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

This isn't really a conflict at all, this is me explaining to you why diversion is not overpowered. Being stubborn doesn't make you right, and a full explanation has already happened. If you think diversion is so grossly overpowered, maybe you can link me to all the feedback pages there are of people begging for changes? Or its huge talk page of people ranting? There have been people on this wiki with a very in depth understanding of game balance for longer than you or I have been here, and they don't seem to think diversion is overpowered either. This discussion is over. -- Tha Reckoning 20:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes this is a conflict. This is you not caring about what I say and me tired of talking to the void. Now let me do my explanation will you. SylvXIII 20:19, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Let's sum it up. Your Reasons for thinking it's overpowered: My response to all of those above points: I agree. My Points: From your responses, I suppose you haven't even considered point 1. You however agreed to point 2.
 * Difficulty to use (decent teamwork needed to divert specific skills, field awareness, following the flow...)
 * Existing Counters (Veil, Sound, Animation, Hex removal, ....)
 * Long Casting Time (Risky, easy to interrupt)
 * 6 second shutdown on any class in the game that uses skills (aka everything)
 * Very Long disabling duration (additional 53seconds@14 Dom Magic)

Next, you try to ponder my Point 2 by your points 1-2-3 which I already agreed to. Since I already agree with what you said, trying to ponder one of the reasons I think it's imbalanced by something I agree with does not go anywhere but you insist on doing this. I eventually say something like "Dude I know everything you said so far so you're not telling me anything NEW or even convincing". You keep saying the same things and add words such as "balanced" that you try to define and "risk" which is pretty much in every skill of the game. Because you're spouting the same things on every post in different words, I eventually tell you "We're running in circles". Seeing as you don't bring anything new even if I still consider Diversion overpowered after reading your next post, I tell you that I'm tired of hearing you say the same things all the time and that we might as well end it here. Next, you say a provocative statement "I'll spell it out for you, since you don't seem to get it". Look, this isn't about your conviction that Diversion is balanced, it's about mine that it is imbalanced so you're being pretty aggressive at this point. You even say "I don't care if you take it off your page or not, but realize that diversion is not overpowered" which is most likely a lie because the reason Diversion is on my page is because I believe it is overpowered and you're still trying to convince me with nothing new. If you actually did not care, discussion would have been over a while ago. So you're just being an ass by adding fuel to the fire (using nice words is cool, but raw stuff is sometimes more explicit). Then comes this "Be more open to the possibility that you're actually wrong, then. The sooner you get over yourself, the better. Hint: discussions are one sided when it couldn't be more obvious that one party is correct". So because I agree and have been agreeing with your 3 points and I still consider it's overpowered, I'm close-minded? Good Joke. You say another provocative statement which self-proclaims that you are righteous for the....idk... 5th time without making any sense? This is how I see this whole mess. In the end, I declare that this is a conflict and I tell you I'm going to make an full explanation (this one) that I hope you're going to read. You don't give me the time to do it and yet another provocative self-righteous statement "This is not a conflict, this is me explaining to you why diversion is not overpowered". The best part is this "Being stubborn doesn't make you right" as this applies to both of us. Then you go with the typical "everyone says it's not overpowered so it's not overpowered" as a last resort to proclaim your righteousness. And BAM! a statement I agree with "This discussion is over". About time you FINALLY noticed. Now get the hell out. (Yes this is a provocative statement, starting to enjoy this). Sincerely, SylvXIII 21:11, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * tl;dr... Arguing online does not make you look cool. Also, if you are the only one who thinks a skill is overpowered, people will not take you seriously.  Koda  [[Image:User_Koda_Kumi_UT.jpeg‎|19px]]  Kumi  21:29, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi Koda. If you have a personal message to me or to Reckoning, then feel free to write it on our respective user page. This is the Talk page of an article about Overpowered skills. Sincerely, SylvXIII 23:31, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

The only thing that Reckoning proved in the above discussion is that Diversion isn't broken, he didn't prove anything about it being overpowered or not. Then it really gets down to the numbers. 50 disable is a lot and a lot more than the typical Ranger shutdown Distracting Shot provides. But Distracting Shot is reactive as opposed to Diversion's pro-activeness, meaning it's obviously somewhat harder to pull off. While this doesn't mean Distracting Shot or Diversion takes less skill than the other, I still think some compensation is in place. 30 additional seconds, however, is far too much. I think if the shutdown duration was reduced to, say, 5-35 scaling it would definitely be balanced number-wise.

I'm not really a big fan of the "underpowered/overpowered" viewpoint of balance because that implies every skill function can be balanced with number changes while in reality, this isn't the case. My issue with most of the skills on your list (with the exception of Diversion) is not only that they are too strong (which they are), but that they always lead to inferior gameplay. The problem lies, I believe, in the fact that these skills don't take much thought or skill to play. Rampage as One/Primal Rage? Frenzy/Rush combo requires better positioning and awareness. Wail of Doom? Zero positioning as opposed to Blackout's touch range requirement. Xinrae's Weapon? Works against all packets of damage unlike Reversal of Fortune, which only works against high ones, meaning you have to anticipate on the incoming damage far less than you have to do with RoF.

I'm currently trying to catch balance with axioma's and deduction. While my efforts are still in its infancy and the conclusions are rather basic, I have noticed it provides a solid base to defining how balance and ultimately the game works. You're obviously a far more experienced player than I am so I would greatly appreciate it if you would take a look at my balance page. Morphy 08:03, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi Morphy, I agree on your point about Reckoning on Diversion, it's not a broken skill as it requires some in-game skills to use and by broken I assume you mean "very overpowered" like the pre-nerfed VoR, Palm Strike and Seeping Wound. The long disabling duration is something that should not exist at all the way I see it and while I agree Diversion would be less strong and more reasonable with a quick fix in number, it could have a small buff elsewhere (casting time for instance) as it's a priority number one rupt. You're right, a quick fix of numbers can sometimes do it, but in some cases it's the whole functionality of the skill that is broken. How many times have Anet "mega-nerfed" some skills with a number fix because they didn't realize the skill itself was a problem (Ether Renewal for instance)? They still did some smart moves like making Orders unstackable with a quick functionality change. They killed some skills, they fixed some, they changed many and up to this day there are still matters to balance.


 * I really like your point about "inferior" gameplay" and is something I agree with. The fact that brain-dead players can buttonmash and win games without actively thinking when facing skilled players in a Balanced vs Balanced setup (well some sort of Balance...) is quite an issue and something noticed from my page. Palm Strike, Seeping Wound, Mind Blast: pick a target, press your buttons and win. Nevertheless, smart players will play better than random spamming as usual. When they put "easy to use" skills (or to an extent skill bars) that are strong in the game, it goes on PvX and immediately becomes a meta. Long time ago, we used to call those FotM builds (Flavor of the Month) as the major part of the community was still discovering and experimenting new builds (which is something I rarely see nowadays). Sure I am experienced PvP-wise but I did miss a good 2-2.5 years during which the community evolved while I was PvEing and busy with college. I'll certainly look up your balance page and will leave you a message over there. Thanks for the insightful comment. Sincerely, SylvXIII 05:16, 29 April 2010 (UTC)