User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Overpowered Skills/General/Archive 1

Hex Mechanics

→ moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

I believe that the way hexes work in this game, give an advantage to the team that runs them. Lets take a look at the standard tripple hex build. 2 frontline, 2 mes, and 1 necro hexer. (also recently 2 necro and 1 mes have been seen). The way hexes are so easily applied and effortlessly shutdown mainstream damage and hinder the entire other team because of low recharge and spammability and stacks. The problem is not in interupts and removal, its the time and energy spent removing the hexes that allows the hex team to have so much pressure and score kills. Its a catch 22, if you dont spend time removing, you will experience a different kind of pressure than if you are spending time removing the hexes. I know people are going to respond to this by simply saying, split the hexes. OK, you have just split the hexes and they collapse back on you at base and you wipe. I am not trying to say that hexes are unbeatable, I am just unhappy with there current mechanics. Discuss —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.104.65.209 (talk • contribs) 14:15, 21 July 2007 (UTC).

The hex team running that build is usually very vunerable at its backline becase there is very little active defense in its midline. As for shutting them down there are lots of ways that they can be over powered without splitting. Powerblock the curse necro and his bar dissappears for 14 seconds, so he only has 6 seconds each 20 to be casting. The hex removal isnt too hard if you take it on the midline. a convert cast on the warrior allows him to push deep into their team to hit their backline with added armor, and since GW:EN has new hex removal its getting easier all the time. Running balanced you can shut down their 3 hexers quite efficiently with the PB Mes and the Ranger. --ChronicinabilitY 12:31, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah... no. Hex team would generally be very vulnerable, except the part where your warriors can't hit their targets thanks to Price/Reckless/Faintheartedness stacks, your ranger can't interrupt anything because of blurred vision/spirit shackles, and your monks run out of energy in ten seconds thanks to the AoE Panic. Splitting is the only reliable method to beat them, as their build is made to overwhelm more competent players running balanced.

Every time I start not caring about hexes, some totally retarded crap happens that infuriates me. For example, just yesterday, my guild went against some rank 1000+ guild running hexes on jade (which still works btw), and we got flat-out rolled. Did we get outplayed? Absolutely not. Every one of our players was more skilled than theirs; but the imba nature of their build allowed them to flatten us at stand. Their hall did the rest when we tried to split (nerf coral tbh). -Auron 13:08, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

The dominant hex build atm in Europe and Asia (2 sins, dervish, necro, mesmer) gives balanced teams incredible problems on every map (although ironically less on Jade than the others). One issue with it is that even if you have a Convert, it's going to be on your BS which you're going to have to send back to deal with their split. I know one guild that went from r900 to beating PnH in 3 weeks using the build, with no change in personnel. Of course they get very upset at any suggestion that the build rather than the players might be the determining factor, but... Errr 13:22, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I wish people would give suggestions on how to fix this - I think the balance between making hexes overpowered or making hexes useless is hard to obtain, especially without creating a "rock/paper/scissors" scenario in which if the other team is running hexes and you have "hex removal skill A buffed to be overpowered" you win, if you don't have it you lose. Erasculio 13:27, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Buff hex removal, none of this veil-takes-12-seconds-to-remove-one-hex-while-they-can-throw-on-a-hex-per-second BS. -Auron 13:34, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm kinda concerned about buffing all hex removal (to a point in which hexes would then become useless) or buffing only one or two hex removal skills (that would then be required to win against a hex based team). Wouldn't it be possible to nerf the duration of the long lasting hexes, so we have more things like Diversion (strong effect, but if you use it at the wrong time it's a waste) and less things like Reaper's Mark (long lasting hexes that don't really require you to know when to use it)? Erasculio 13:41, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly what's been suggested. Short-duration hexes that require skill and timing are good for gameplay, 30-second duration hexes are bad. Hex builds are seriously broken, especially the new split-friendly variety because splits used to be a balanced build's only hope against hexes.--Lodurr 21:32, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

The only argument against nerfing hexes I've seen is "we already have a fast-paced mechanic in the game, conditions! We don't need another!" which is total bull because having two fast-paced mechanics would require more skill to play effectively. If hex cast times were reduced to .5s-1s and the durations were reduced to like 10% of their current duration, hexes would actually require skill to play (and would still be effective... throw a 1/2s price on a war/derv/sin as they spike and its gg); but as it is, players without skill roll teams of more-skilled players regularly simply because the imbalance of builds.

"Balanced" can't counter everything at once. It's that simple. The logic "oh just bring a pblock and hexes lose" falls through because 1. not every build can fit a pblock, and 2. if we bring a pblock, we're probably sacrificing melee hate, and thus will get owned by the next melee heavy team that comes through. If Guild Wars is supposed to be based on skill, this worrying about countering builds simply because they are heavily imba shouldn't be a concern.

A balanced team has mild hex removal; two veils (maybe two denies, instead) standard. Maybe a HEV mes, maybe a convert ele (those are rare tbh). That's... 2-4 hexes removed every 12 seconds, and yet hexes can be applied about four times faster than that. Panic -> cover -> cover, Reapers/Spiteful -> price -> reckless -> cover... There simply isn't a way to counter that, aside from devoting your entire build to the task (which, as I've said, kills your team's ability to do anything else). -Auron 04:07, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok, let's get a couple things straight. Whoever said that hexes are a slow-paced mechanic, compared to conditions as a fast paced mechanic, is not playing Guild Wars. In Guild Wars, hexes are a fast *application* mechanic, with a slow *removal* mechanic. There are some slow conditions as well (Daze, Deep Wound) that need to be super powerful while they are up because of the fast removal mechanics, and are. A lot of idealized hexes are designed to be a slow mechanic, like Backfire, Spiteful Spirit, Migraine, etc. Problem is, there are a ton of hexes that *aren't* slow - Parasitic Bond and Conjure Phantasm being the chief offenders, along with anything AoE. The upshot of this is that there isn't any removal in the game that can deal with Conjure Phantasm. That in and of itself wouldn't be a problem, except that if you can't deal with Conjure Phantasm, you can't deal with the other nasty, sticky hexes that are available when used in conjunction with Conjure Phantasm - and boy, are there a lot of them. Mechanically, that is the source of all of the misery with hexes in Guild Wars. From the gameplay side of things, hexes are a gratuitous tempo build. Hexers provide both good damage and shutdown that can't be dealt with reasonably. But more importantly the hexer is on the offensive the entire time. If I'm a Necro hexer I'm spamming hexes, shutdown and degen, on a bunch of different targets. If my opponent comes and tries to shut me down, he usually isn't breaking even. I'm getting some hexes off despite his efforts, which deal damage or require removal. Even when removed, the hexes are still a good trade, because they did some damage before being removed, and also likely stalled someone for some amount of time while it was up. Repeat over the entire build, and you have a theme - lots of shutdown, lots of damage, and a whole lot of effort on your opponent's part to coordinate a *defense* against what you're doing. Problem being, it takes so much effort just to stop the hexes, that the team never really gets a chance to go on the offensive. The hex team just keeps doing what they're doing, you're having to fight to keep up, but because the hex team is never on the defensive they inevitably win when mistakes are made and the non-hex team breaks. Straight removal isn't a counter. *Punishment* is a counter. Look to condition removal, the effective stuff doesn't just remove conditions, it is removal accompanied by a heal that reverses the damage of many conditions. Hexes don't get the equivalent, they just get removed to stop the bleeding but whatever was done to that point sticks. There are a few skills that punish hexes like that - Hex Eater Vortex, through damage; Divert Hexes, through raw healing power; Expel Hexes, through raw energy and time efficiency. Problem being, the solutions to hexes are all elite. Just one won't cut it either, you need several punishing anti-hex elites to defend yourself against a hex build, creating the predicament we have now. How do you go about dealing with it? The most straightforward way is to stop pretending like hexes are hard to put on, and start to balance hex removal against Conjure Phantasm instead of Backfire. That's balance not just on energy and time, but on effect as well - removal needs to punish the hex. You need the tools available, in sufficient numbers, to not only stop the pressure but reverse the tempo and let you put pressure on the hex team as well. The other option is to remove devastating sticky hexes from the game. If hex removal is going to be weak, all of the sticky hexes need to be balanced as though they are hard to remove, not easy to remove as they are now. A combination of the two would be the best solution - changing the hexes that can be moved from sticky to temporary, and buffing removal to the point where it's actually a good trade with a hex. Hexes in Guild Wars are way out of balance. The only thing keeping them from being completely dominant is those aformentioned efficient hex removals, that let a team that wants to sufficiently spec against hexes to do so, at the cost of their ability to perform against most other builds. It's a huge problem with really hard RPS aspects to it that make the game less fun. I cannot urge you enough to take the hex problem seriously, and to stop using a chisel to approach a problem that needs a sledgehammer. -Ensign 11:59, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

As said above hexes are simply to overpowered. The majority of them can be applied more quickly and efficiently than a condition, and are much, much harder to remove or a punish any enemy for using. Apply Poison is the only thing that comes close to the convience of a typical hex usage condition wise...and it can removed for less energy, more often, and let enemeis heal the target with things like mend ailment. Sword.wind. 20:46, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I think that the only real problem with hexes is the amount of shutdown now availible. Both physical and caster shutdown are availible in the same professions. The degen wouldn't be so bad if the shutdown wasn't rediculous. I think that the hex based lines need to be changed to work better without just using tons of hexes. They need some short-term skills that do their effects quickly. The only long-lasting hexes should be pure degen hexes. Passive shutdown is just bad for the game. --TimeToGetIntense 23:03, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

My opinion on hexes is they are unbalanced, for a number of reasons, First being they are not fun to play against or to play, the powerful nature of Hexes makes it so a lot of teams play Hexes, and the options to dealing with hexes are so extreme. Hexes are meant and designed to stick, thats why removal is weaker, the problem comes with the combo of pressure, and shutdown that Hexes offer, basically their effect is too strong for their cost. I think this is due to a few factions, Glyph of Lesser energy, and Auspicious Incantation, both these skills give Hexes the energy power they needed to function, Reapers mark also adds to the mix. The second thing that I don't like about hexes is they encourage bad play, when your playing a hex team and you have your hex web out your positioning doesn't matter anymore, warriors can over extend, rangers can push up for monks, beacuse the physical damage of the enemy team can't punish you for positioning, the battle lines crumble. Now all this has been said 100 times and isn't really new, so the problem comes is finding the solution. 1.) Balancing removal vs Hexes is tricky, it's easy to make hex removal too good and poof Hexes go away, but I think we are far off from that so this should be less of a concern. 2.) Reduce the effect of Hexes, My main plain is to make hexes more active then passive, I've been reducing duration and trying to force more often use of these skills. While this is over generalizing basically if you halfed all costs and effects, the skill becomes more active. I'm still working on the exact details to fixing this problem, but I still feel it's the biggest problem with the current balance. ~Izzy @-'---- 18:43, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with point #1. You don't want to make hex removal too good and hurt balanced hexes like Diversion. Re: point #2, I'm not sure how long you've thought this way but hexes have been the bane of balanced GvG since before Jade Isle was updated, and I wonder why it's taken so long. If you have any regard for the diminishing field of long-term GvGers, you'd take care of it ASAP. And ask yourself, what do we have to look forward to with GWEN? More skill imbalances that take months to resolve? The Nightfall meta is almost over and it's still unbalanced like mad. Any of the things GvGers have to look forward to could have been done already. It's a bad deal. The promise of "e-sport"-quality PvP is currently not being kept.--Lodurr 21:08, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Hexes have been being tweaked for some time now, it's not like we are unaware of it, the difference is we've been trying to fix the problem rather then destroy hexes as we know it, it's easy to remove something from the meta it's hard to balance it so it's still viable and not overpowered. The problem isn't with one or two hexes it's a large web of problems with a lot of skills and taking drastic changes when there isn't enough time to test it isn't going to help. We make small changes to step towards a solution, I can agree often we are too slow and take too much time but I would debate the value of this over ping ponging back and forth, if you over power something then under power it over and over you spend a lot more time with an unbalanced game then you do when you make slow steps towards the solution. While I think Hexes are still strong, I surely don't feel we've been making the problem worse with each update. Also the way this skill system works every time we add new skills the time it takes to restore the game to a balanced state is longer, it's one of the issues with the game system I've been spending a lot of time trying to reduce the impact GW:EN will have on the meta, and as such you have to be careful about balancing something with new skills vs changing old ones, if you wait too long on new skills the game stays unbalanced if you change everything too quickly the new skills destroy the meta. In either case it's something that is being worked on but it's not a problem that is gonna be solved over night. ~Izzy @-'---- 21:34, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I think it's actually pretty simple. The imbalance is in the shutdown. Mostly the physical damage shutdown, but also the caster shutdown. How about you just nerf all the physical shutdown? Who cares if you completely remove hex teams from the meta? It would be better to make the hex attributes stronger for balanced teams. Corrupt Enchantment and Defile Defenses are good examples of skills that would be good in balanced. Once the hex lines actually have active skills that are useful for balanced teams, the passive degen hexes will be good to aid pressure, but they won't help to cover up rediculous shutdown skills. --TimeToGetIntense 01:36, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I care if I completely remove hex teams from the meta, destroying a large portion of GW skills because the balance is tricky isn't balancing something thats nuking what ever people are worried about at the time. You have to take slow logical steps until you fix a problem, the faster you go the more mistakes your going to make. Especially when your dealing with a system as delicate as GW balance, it's extremely easy to short term fix a problem it take a lot of effort time and energy to fix something correctly. ~Izzy @-'---- 07:33, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I see your point, but I don't think you understand that most people don't care if the Guild Wars of two years future is balanced and fantastic, if the interim two years are characterised by shocking balance. I've seen more people leave PVP over the current issues of balance, specifically hexes but more general balance as well since Nightfall release than any other time. If you destroy whatever is breaking the game and then slowly work it up, you do far less damage to your playerbase than you do by slowly edging down to balance. It's your game, but you're hurting it by refusing to put in interim measures. 121.221.169.234 12:06, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I understand your dilemna Izzy. But here are my thoughts on what you could do. How about change the effectiveness of all hexes so that instead of being incredibly devastating to a targets offense and instead of inflicting so much degen pressure they were toned down a little instead? Price of failure, spirit of failure, reckless haste at the attributes necros are specced at, make targets miss 50% of the time. If unremoved, they practically make a warrior useless, a soft target can comfortably tank a target hexed with these hexes without fear of dying. How about toning down the percentage to miss on these hexes so that in order to fully shutdown a warrior they need to be stacked at least 2 or 3 at a time, as it stands even 1 of these hexes can half the dmg output of a warrior. That way... only the heaviest of heavy hex spamming teams will be able to provide a total shutdown of an enemies offense, but thats fine because if you dedicate your build around hexes you should reap the rewards of doing so. Then a team with 2 hexers, which is the most popular form of hybrid hex pressure build atm, should only provide semi shutdown on an enemies offense. Hex removals against these lighter hex teams because less of a emergency since warriors and rangers can still inflict a bit of dmg with a bit of coordination and correct target choice. The pressure that hexes inflict through degen is trickier to deal with since without migraine and signet of humility an LoD monk should find it easier to counter the pressure with dwaynas kiss and LoD spam. Humility will not be so easy to activate if hexes werent able to make a ranger miss so comprehensively. A warrior will be able to exert some pressure on a migraine mesmer if he wasnt so comprehensively shutdown by a single hex thats covered by 2 minor hexes. I dont think making hexes more 'active' will solve the problem with hexes. It will surely make a necro curser a much more involving build to run, if its hexes had to be reapplied more frequently but its not the application-reappliction that is a problem imo, its the effect of the hexes when they are on targets thats the issue. Thinking in terms of removals is not necessary, we have plenty of tools to remove hexes, the problem is as Ensign states above, a team that is constantly hexing has the advantage over the team thats constantly removing hexes because one team is constantly on the offensive and the other is fighting a constant uphill defensive battle. One mistake on the side removing hexes and you face a team wipe, one mistake on the hexing team and its midline might actually be forced to watch its positioning and kite from melee characters and its monks might have to actually do some serious protting and healing but nothing so serious as a full team wipe. Think of it like this analogy. Hexes should be like sticky mud to a 100m sprinter who still reaches the 100m line but just takes a longer time to do so, however what they are at the moment is a concrete slab that stops him from even leaving the starting line. You should be able to power through hexes and score kills while putting a little strain on your monks but good coordination and communication will allow you to perform quick bursts of aggressive tactics without costing you the game. For a light-medium hex team your builds aim should be to provide a mix of defensive measure through conventional things like aegis chains, wards, blinds etc and the light shutdown provided by a shutdown hex thats been covered on a warrior. But its the mixture of defensive measures that you rely on the most and if 1 facet of those defenses fails you might lose. In a build like this you shouldnt be able to depend entirely on your hexes to keep you from taking dmg and pressure. In a heavy hex build you are fielding a large number of shutdown hexes with a good amount of cover hexes, and you should expect to be able to depend on this large number of hexes to comprehensively shutdown an enemies offense in a straight 8vs8 fight. However, because you rely so heavily on hexes for defense if the enemy is able to clean its offensive characters at opportune times you run the risk of exposing your mid and backlines to their offensive power with only the monks skills to protect themselves. This is quite a balanced situation i think. Another weakness to a dedicated heavy hex build is that it loses its effectiveness when split into 2 parts, but in interest of balance this is not such a bad thing. There should be ways of combating these teams without relying on straight removals. Splitting was never an easy strategy to pull off in GvG anyway so full respect for a team who successfully splits against a heavy hex team and wins. If you choose to run a heavy hex team you must recognise its weaknesses and strengths and admit defeat against a smarter opponent if they split against you. Sorry i should end my rant. 87.194.81.41 23:51, 26 July 2007 (UTC) Lorekeeper

I've always felt the biggest problem with hexes is the very broad range in how expensive they are to apply vs. the fixed cost to remove. The disparity forces the use of cover hexes and makes buffing removal problematic because it hits backfire, incendiary bonds, imagined burden et al far more then the cheap junk. If you do decide to balance removal around Phant as Ensign suggested, you then need to balance the rest of the hexes against easier removal. Cloud 14:50, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

I didn't read all of what you guys said but i'd like to respond and confirm some things you already mentionned, especially Izzy that pointed out Faction skills who got updated and are now a big advantage to hex teams. The 30s reaper's mark is also an example from the nightfall campaign, i don't know if it was a kind of continuity but it seems that before you thought hexes weren't powerfull enough ? or maybe ppl were arguing Necro and Mesmers were lacking of power. One good thing would be to nerf Auspicious Incantation (already pointed out btw) because, well if fits awfully well in Illusion Mesmer and Panic mesmer skill bars and seems to process in such a way that encourage the use of high-cost spells however the "range"it concerns isn't really controlled imo. I mean with this skill you can both have a great e-management (not exactly but i'll explain) and make use and even abuse of skills like panic and conjure nightmare (-8 energy degen for free mana). I'm talking about free mana because auspicious doesn't have an e-management effect it kinda have an energy-free effect, it doesn't help you to conserve energy (therefore forcing you to watch out and use your spells with more "thinking") but rather periodically refill your energy bar to force you to use such powerfull skills without fear.That's problematic because it's now part of the metagame and because, and maybe i misread what you said, but it seems you want to make hexes more active.Even if those spells have a low energy cost, they should obviously have a significant effect in order to be used and skills like auspicious would maybe "help" abuse of this since you don't care about energy (you would be able if we take all your skills in consideration, not one in particular, to maintain easily something like a -10 health degeneration upon an opponent whiwh imo is overpowered if it is easy, in this case easy because of energy).i think auspicious' effect is exactly the contrary of a balanced effect. In such conditions, the high-cost of skills like Panic is an awesome luck.High-cost is usually supposed to give a skill a really good effect (which Panic has) but it should put you into a kind of economic way of playing in terms of energy management first but also in terms of skill casting frequency and with only auspicious you can get over those two things. I know there's always counter to these, either interruption, even enchantment removal when you see ppl are casting auspicious, and Diversion, but still skillslike that need to be reworked. there are lots of different ways to correct this, either increase reload time of Auspicious/Panic/Conjure Nightmare (but with care because if this way of free-mana playing disappears we also don't want Panic to disappear, that is what's difficult). But i'd like to add that nerfing is a solution but not the only one, because it would concern only already existing skills and as somebody said, Nightfall's meta is now implanted and we don't want everything to be changed. First of all we need to make up our mind about how we want hexes to evolve and how we want them to affect the game.it seems that you already thought about it, you want hexes to be more active. I think it's a good thing, but as i said before it should be done along with a reworking of already existing skills in order to avoid abuses and future problems when the meta would be set. that's a difficult problem and ppl looks concerned about it, i think you're in the right way, at least in the good reflexion process. You have all my support in this way, i encourage ppl to participate and give their point of view. Concerning hex removal, i think the recently created skills are pretty good. Deny Hexes, Spotless Mind; Holy Veil is also the best thing you could have actually give to hex removal imo. One boost you could give to hex removal is a little health boost, i don't recall exactly but there's maybe a GWEN skill in Healing prayers that has this kind of effect, however this could be subject to controversy, since divine favor already gives an health boost (why not doubling or giving a +50% divine favor bonus for each hex removed when you use a hex removal ? i don't know, i don't think about the effect when i actually say it, maybe you could give your opinions). Anyway hex removal is good enough imo it won't need lots of changes, there's also hexbreaker aria that is nice, maybe you could buff it to something like "next time you use a skill"and if you find it to powerfull, increase it up to 10 adrenaline. 88.122.32.10 15:57, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

It would be neat if there were "lesser" hexes and "greater" hexes, with different removal skills for both. It would make covering much more difficult (could only cover a greater hex with another greater hex, presumably neither of which you'd want removed) but at the same time could boost lots of lesser-used hexes (bringing both greater and lesser hex removal would put quite a strain on a skill bar). --NieA7 09:29, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

That's a nice idea however i think we can't really do this. "lesser" means some hexes will have to be deleted ? We can't really do this... and if we buff some hexes to be "greater", if they are really great, i'm afraid they will cost 10 energy, and covering the way you said with "great" hexes might be tough in terms of e-management. Moreover it will only concern a small amount of hexes, so ppl will complain if their favourite hex isn't buffed but we can't really do anything about it :p However we should pay attention to this, because that means you won't be able to cast that much hexes, so there will be less hexes, therefore hex removal is likely to be easier and it meets the "active hexes" way of thinking. You found something interesting imo ^^ ~~ Azul 11:09, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, I try ;) Lesser/Greater wouldn't mean that some have to be deleted, the problem would be that they all would have to be classified, which would be a torturous and difficult process (Parasitic Bond as a lesser and Backfire as a greater sure, but what about the Conjure's, Price's, Reckless Haste etc etc? By definition there should be fewer Greater than Lesser). It was just a passing thought I had while reading the above discussion, in practice it'd probably take too much effort to implement. Could be good for a giggle though. --NieA7 13:05, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok i misunderstood what you were thinking about :p I'm afraid it's too late to change anything however, we could list hexes but wouldn't be able to do that much changes, just reworking their duration and effects, like what's beeing done in the subject below :p ~~ Azul 13:15, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Remove the cheap long lasting spammable hexes like parasitic bond, then just take a look. If single removals are actually viable, I think that would go a long way towards being able to deal with hexes. --221.237.23.190 15:28, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Specific suggestions for balancing hexes

→ moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

What about wide and deep hex removal skills added to the core skill set, with an energy return mechanic that favors removing many hexes at once? Such skills would not kill off the light use of hexes, because they wouldn't be energy efficient unless used against wide or deep hexing. Examples:

• Wide Smite Hex 25e, 2c, 8r Remove a hex from every ally. If a Hex is removed, foes in the area suffer 5...35 damage. For each hex removed in this way, gain 0..5 energy.
• Deep Smite Hex 15e, 1c, 8r Remove 1..8 hexes from target ally. For each hex removed, foes in the area suffer 5...35 damage. For each hex removed in this way, gain 0..3 energy.--Drekmonger 12:48, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Or just Deny Hexes, Smite Hex, Holy Veil -> 8 sec recharge, Sig of Devotion -> 1 sec cast (reduce the heal a bit if you like), Expel Hexes -> 5 sec recharge, Divert Hexes -> 3/4 sec cast, Convert Hexes -> target ally, not other ally. Personally I don't want to have to take another skill or two on my bar which will be no use at all except against hex teams. Convert/Purge already have that problem. Errr 13:02, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Single hex removals can probably stay how they are, so the 'good' hexes such as diversion/snares can still function, then buff mass/multitarget removals to counter the long lasting, passive 'bad' hexes.--Cakey 15:50, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Very good point - I retract my previous suggestion. How about just making Veil remove 2 hexes then, and Deny 1 + the number of recharging DF skills including itself? No need to make Smite Hex or HEV remove more because they already have very strong secondary effects. Errr 16:35, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

• Hex Stabber Signet: 1/4 c, 8r. Remove a hex from target ally. If a hex is removed, this signet is disabled for an additional 7..2 seconds.

I would like to see that... 69.109.171.112 18:07, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Specific Suggestions?

• Faintheartedness - 3…18d
• Meekness - 5…20d
• Price of Failure - 15e, 5…50d
• Reckless Haste - 10e, 1c, 10r, 4…10d
• Shadow of Fear - 5…20d
• Spoil Victor - 2c
• Calculated Risk - 10e, 1c, 10r, 4…10d
• Panic - 5…20d
• Spirit Shackles - 8…20d
• Spirit of Failure - 15e
• Blurred Vision - 10e, 1c, 12r, 4…10d
• Rust - 5…35d
• Remove Hex 1c

How's that work? -Ensign 01:18, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't that remove Expel Hexes from much use? 76.64.59.41 05:40, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

as we talked about earlier on MSN, blurred needs the duration reduction of 4..10, the Price low end does look better then the damage nerf. I'm a tad worried about Reckless going to 1c but I don't see how to avoid it if you want to make this more active. One nice thing I like about this approach vs the others we talked about is it puts a lot more pressure on your energy. All in all this is a strong list, and pretty close to what I'm looking at changing. While it's not 100% hex related, I've also got SoR 5->8r, Something with Aegis I honestly don't think the block scaling is going to stop people from using it from a mile away and I'm still debating the whole X attacks approach. I also want to do a small nerf to Weary strike. ~Izzy @-'---- 07:42, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

The only thing I'd add is a reduction to Price/Spirit of Failure's duration. 30 seconds is an eternity in a GvG, especially for a shutdown skill. Ensign's mentioned on another forum that a single PoF/SoF on you isn't a big deal, but actually, it is. The 25% miss rate ruins your ability to effectively melee spike, and it's too easily maintained on a target. Just a nerf to 20d would be effective.--Lodurr 10:29, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Here are a few other ideas to think about:

• Reckless Haste: 10e, .75c, 12r, 2...7d, 30...75% miss chance
• Calculated Risk: 15e, 2c, 8r, 5...12d
• Crippling Anguish: 15r
• Soothing Images: 10e, 2c, 5r, 3...15d
• Hexbreaker Aria: Spell -> Skill

The biggest single hex change is to Faintheartedness. The effect is stronger than Conjure Phantasm's but the duration has always been crazy, it wants a duration par with that skill or perhaps a touch longer. Also, I think that time is a much bigger issue than energy. Hexers can maintain shutdown on 3, 4 guys at once if nothing is pulled by cycling long hexes and covering them. Shorter duration hexes reduce that number to only a couple of guys as they tab around, restraining their effectiveness. -Ensign 10:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I really like your original suggestions for Blurred and Reckless (10e, 1c, lower recharge, lower duration). With enough battlefield awareness these skills can now serve as spike killers and are less "fire, cover and forget"-hexes. -Void 13:25, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree, those changes are great however 3/4s cast for Reckless Haste is too low, 1s is fine imo. Calculated Risk is a bit too tough on energy i prefer the previous change you submitted. What i deeply love is Hexbreaker Aria, this skill is just awesome, it's a shame ppl don't use it more often and changing it so as it triggers the next time you use a skill will now not only help casters. However i think theses hexes duration should range from 10s not less for something like 14 points in the correct attribute, with a 10cost. ~~ Azul 11:25, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Updated suggestions:

• Blurred Vision: 1c, 5...14d
• Reckless Haste: 10e, 20r, 5...14d
• Price of Failure: 20d
• Spirit of Failure: 20d
• Spirit Shackles: 8...20d
• Panic: 8...20d -Void 14:09, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Can We have Lieutenants insignia back without the nerf?? That would be awsome imo.

I really like the proposed changes. Hexes with something like 10/1/10 with 4..10d are much more interesting to play with and don't end up creating huge web of hexes. For PoF/SoF, i think i'd rather see the energy stay at 10 but reduce the duration/recharge too. I dunno, something like 15s recharge, 5..20d. Would cost about the same energy as 15E to maintain, but it wouldn't just last forever if it's not removed. I really prefer the 2nd suggestion for Reckless Haste, this would make the skill much more interesting as some kind of hex version of Blind. Buffs to Crippling Anguish and Soothing Images might bring those into play some more i guess, though Crippling is really powerful in a split so i dunno how much i want this buffed. Soothing Images is really not that harsh of a melee shutdown compared to the Curse line, so i don't really see a problem with buffing it, especially when now Melandrus consist of half the common frontline. But soothing can work on Paragons too. Will definitely do quite a bit of good to the game when this list comes to pass, and hopefully there will be at least 1 balance patch before GW:EN? That's still over 1 month away, and there's already been over 1 month since last balance... Patccmoi 14:33, 26 July 2007 (UTC)