User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Underpowered Skills/PvE and Monster/Archive

PvE Skills

Ether Nightmare

Just not that great. The scaling's lousy, being tied to the biggest grind title in the game and the Energy loss is meaningless in PvE. Illusion Magic in PvE is pretty much a waste outside of Frustration or Clumsiness/Wandering Eye since the degen spells are rather inefficient, considering they are single-target one-time effects. Phantom Pain's about the only good one out there and that's because it provides a caster Deep Wound, but I'd argue that it has been superceded by Finish Him, which incidentally also replaces Shrinking Armor as a source of Cracked Armor.

Ensign made a note on the latest update page that improving this skill would make Cry of Pain more relevant. I'd agree on the fact that most Mesmer hexes that stick have no business doing anything else other than triggering Cry of Pain - Empathying a caster is just retardedly inefficient, and the time investment in setting up something like Shrinking Armor -> Cry of Pain is kludgy, since you'd be pinned to a certain timeframe to get the damage, and hitting an important skill for the interrupt. Not to mention the cost of the setup + Cry of Pain, which approaches Elementalist-like levels without the attunements. The hexes that do stick aren't relevant in PvE either, namely Spirit of Failure (15e + 10e for some 80 AoE damage? I'll take Deep Freeze))or Spirit Shackles.

So making Ether Nightmare here, even as a singular skill, should help. I'd switch the degen to 10, and duration to 4...7...8 seconds as with the Energy loss. Or just rework the whole thing to not suck. The skill's priced right for what should be a strong effect, but the effect is neither relevant nor even strong. ~Seef II <☎|۞> 21:11, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

10 energy degeneration to every foe in earshot and still not be that fantastic. Why they would add an e-drain to a PvE only skill is beyond me.--Deathwing 21:13, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

what are you guys talking about? causes a bit of energy drain loss (big whoops, but it's only there to make it feel mesmery) and hexes everything in a huge area, which in itself is quite useful (shatter and drain delusions spring to mind). and Deathwing, this skill gives health degen, not energy degen. And it's not as if you have to inteerupt a foe to get the damage from cry of pain anyway (seems like that was implied in the first post). --Ckal Ktak 22:05, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

No shit, the point was any e-drain e-denial or e-degen is totally pointless on a PvE skill. --Deathwing 22:17, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

That's not entirely true. The obscene amounts of e-denial you can get from Spirit Shackles, Sympathetic Visage or Ancestor's Visage is useful if the fight lasts long enough. -- Gordon Ecker 01:50, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I'd say that e-denial in PvE is mostly limited to some attrition-based farming builds (e.g., the old 55/SS, Jayne Forestlight, Shiroken farming). No reason to run e-denial in regular builds because you can blow stuff up. And if you're looking to Ether Nightmare for a farming build, you are looking at the wrong skill. It's terrible even for that purpose. I know that you don't need to hit the interrupt to get the damage on Cry of Pain. But you do need to hex the target beforehand, and there aren't any efficient (read: fast, cheap, complementary to the rest of your bar) Mesmer hexes that you can stick on beforehand. Ether Nightmare has some shred of potential because it hexes an area, which is nice if you need to switch targets to pop the interrupt off or if the mobs move around. Sure, you could always use it as some stupid nuke and ignore the interrupt, but I'd then question why you aren't running another Elementalist instead, whose PvE damage and utility potential pretty much exceeds the Mesmer's by a good factor. ~Seef II <☎|۞> 18:36, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

And exactly there you are oh so wrong. Unless of course you run around ganking stuff in starting areas, where the lack of armor ignoring damage is actually a bonus, mesmers outnuke elementalists in pve anytime. Cry is an in the area 1/4 sec castingtime Nuke that hits in high lvl pve for easily 3 times as much as SF does. The fact that it also interrupts is just a nice gimmick. Do DoA in hard mode with mesmers as damage dealers and do one with eles as damage dealers and you know what i am talking about. And if you are looking for cry trigger hexes and if you as a mesmer really do not use any hexes then try Arcane Conundrum for an AoE trigger hex that is actually quite usefull or use Mind Wrack if you just want a cheap spammable spell. Using the later one on my Ele all the time, though it is nice to have a mesmer around with conundrum and/or ether nightmare.

As for Ether Nightmare, i don't see where your problem is. It already does up to 160 damage and is a nice trigger hex for Cry. Complaining about that the energy drain is useless is kinda odd. Cry and Ether Nightmare are both nukes. The interrupt and energy drain are just there to justify them beeing mesmer stuff. They both supersede any other direct damage abillity of any other class. And i think that already qualifies them for not beeing underpowered.

By the way, i myself would love having the castingtime of this spell reduced to 1 sec, because my ele does not have fast cast and would love this as trigger hex for cry. But i guess that is exactly the reason why it has such a high castingtime. Beetlejuice 17:48, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I think we'll have to agree to disagree. If I'm taking a Mesmer in PvE, I'm probably taking him for some reason other than damage. If I want damage I bring physicals. Ether Nightmare's main thing is some edenial and a small amount of degen for the time and energy investment. I can't stomach it. It's passable caster damage, but caster damage is comparatively inefficient in this game compared to physicals. And I'm not stuffing chaff like Mind Wrack on a Mesmer bar - it's gimping the class more than it already is in PvE, turning it into a one-trick pony. I want to at least try to play Guild Wars these days. :\ ~Seef II <ℹ|۞>

Oh i completely agree with you that dmg of physicals is horribly overpowered. So for PvP and general pve i have to agree with you there. But in high lvl PvE it always comes down to tank&spank. And there AoE dmg is king. So it comes down to Elementalists or Mesmers. And against lvl 28-30 enemies cry is much better than anything an ele could bring. And to come back to topic while i agree with you that ether nightmare might seem a little underpowered compared to cry, its still pretty much overpowered compared to any other pve skill.

I am always with you if you say ether nightmare and cry suck because they don't fit into the mesmer class description. And i am always with you if you say mesmer have a hard time in pve because shutdown in pve is not really needed. In fact i would have made those two spells into some nice aoe shutdown spells and increased the number of healers/made them knock down immune to push mesmers into pve again. But ANet chose against that, i guess because it would have been a bit more work to finetune.

But as nukes, you can't honestly say those two spells are underpowered. They completely trash anything in the AoE dmg department. And that's not just some theoretic mindgame, that's an empiric fact. I have done lots of DoA hardmode and Energy Surge/Arcane Echo/Cry of Pain with Ether Nightmare as trigger on a 3 mesmer dmg backline is much faster than any skills you can put in a 3 ele backline. Beetlejuice 12:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

This skill isn't underpowered in the slightest. I mean with some co-ordination, you could have all of the damage component of the team (casters, even the dervs and maybe a warrior) Carry Cry of pain, and all use it the instant they see the enemy health bars go purple as a result of this skill. Total wipeout if you ask me. Of course, this needs human party memebers. --Ckal Ktak 19:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Or you could just use Parasitic Bond --Deathwing 20:25, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Or you could read cry of pain; "Mesmer Hex". --Ckal Ktak 23:01, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Or Conjure Phantasm.--Deathwing 03:46, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Lightbringer Signet

This skill is probably very, very underused due to the "within range" being adjacent. I think that "within range" should be changed to "in the area" so that casters could feasibly use this elite skill without having to run up next to a baddie. But, then since A.Net really seems to want to avoid pre-battle Adrenaline gain I would suggest the following:
If you are adjacent to a demonic servant of Abaddon, you gain 1 strike of adrenaline, plus 1 adrenaline for each rank of Lightbringer you have attained. If you are in the area of a demonic servant of Abaddon, you gain 3 energy for each rank of Lightbringer you have attained. --Ravious 16:00, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

that would mean an ele who tries to use this for e-manage is useless if any wth-their-names-are torment warrior decide to attack them. i'd say only change range and maybe add an a-boost if you're in touch range. - Just_m3 16:05, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think you know what "in the area" means. My proposed change would give adrenaline only if you are adjacent, but energy if an enemy is in the area of you. In the area means from adjacent to in the area and everything in between. See Range if you still don't understand, and I hope this helps. :) -Ravious 15:32, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

→ moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

Has Adjacent range, making it unusable to casters for the most part. long recharge, Elite status. Adrenal only applies to warriors and paragons. Overall, I think it just plain sucks. Everyone I know thinks the same. I have never seen anyone ever use or suggest to use Lightbringer signet, for anything. I think this should change. 76.174.13.77 03:28, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

My suggestion: Target demonic servant of abbadon loses 100 health, and if this signet kills target foe, it instantly recharges and you ghain 2 energy for each lightbringer rank you have. Cast: 1sec, reload 30 sec. great for everyone, an elite I might put on my bar.

Hmm... that's an interesting suggestion. Reminds me of Abaddon's Favor, but with a lightbringer twist.. I don't know what izzy'll do, but I think it should hit more than one foe, or having a secondary effect. Like changing Flare for Fireball, or Volley for Barrage. I personally think Lightbringer signet should be much like a more powerful Lightbringer's Gaze.76.174.13.77 11:46, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Elemental Lord

As I understand it, this skill was lowered from +2 to +1 because of Glyph of Elemental Power, and buffing it back up to +2 is not an option. What about adding some secondary effect, such as "For 30...54...60 seconds, your elemental attributes are boosted by 1, and your Elementalist spells recharge 25% faster.". -- Gordon Ecker 03:40, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

cool idea, but then its like glyph of swiftness and goep =P —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090. 04:56, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

this skill died, nobody would waste 2 slots for +3. revert to +2 with Awaken the Blood in mind

Right now the skill really is not worth the slot it takes. I can see that you want to have a cap on max attribute and with Glyph of Elemental Power and this one that goal could get a bit out of reach. But i wonder why not make this one an element independant attunement. You always talk about promoting dual element builds. Well, one of the main reasons they do not work is that you need your attunement because ele spells are balanced with attunement up, so having an attunement is not a bonus but a requirement. Making this one work like Fire Attunement just for every element would solve at least that problem and make this skill usefull again. Beetlejuice 13:33, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

You mean make it Elemental Attunement? - HeWhoIsPale 13:40, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Pretty much, just using the stats of Fire Attunement. The one Problem with Elemental Attunement is that it won't help your dual element builds because like any other e-management skill for the elementalist it is on energy storage, the attribute line you want to take the points away from for your other element because of the steep scaling of elementalist nukes (and with any others i just included Second Wind and Mind Blast because although they are not technically on e-storage they still need lots of max energy to work so taking away to much points on e-storage is a bad idea here too). The other one is that Elementalist damage is balanced around Elite Nukes, particularly Searing Flames (or Savannah Heat for those only playing normal mode or not realizing that this is the reason monsters in hard mode start to run around like chicken). Taking any other Elite than a Nuke seriously reduces your dps as Elementalist because of the large number of horribly underpowered non elite nukes (only PvE option here would be Rodgort's Invocation but even that one looses by quite some amount compared to SF unless you go against burning immune enemies). And if you want to spike you are better of with Echo, Glyph of Renewal or playing a Mesmer in the first place (nice work on buffing Cry of Pain btw, the most powerfull PvE skill just got even better :o). Beetlejuice 15:00, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Now I might just be confused but aren't PvE skills supposed to be stronger than normal skills? So what if it made Glyph of Elemental Power look like crap. It's supposed to! Why else would they have made the skill? Right now Glyph of Elemental Power blows this garbage right out of the water. Done25 00:21, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I think they're supposed to fill in niches. "Never Rampage Alone!" makes beast masters useful, Critical Agility gives Assassins an armor and attack speed buff, Eternal Aura makes forms sustainable and "Theres Nothing to Fear!" gives Paragons strong healing and the strong defence they used to have before the "Incoming!" and armour stacking nerfs and Cry of Pain gives Mesmers a fairly straightforward nuke. I think Necromancers and Elementalists didn't get great skills because they don't need any more help. The major problem with that theory is that Ritualists got a tiny buff and Monks got a huge buff. - Gordon Ecker 01:36, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Intensity

This is a waste of a slot, expect on 2 builds i can think of, sin's promise nuking and sliver armor farming. i really don't understand why this was nerfed, a 18/30 seconds of a boost was very balanced, especially because the mobs in pve are lvl 28 and this makes you skills do the damage they really show. its basically unusable now for general builds, 1/4 time of having a slight damage boost is a waste of a lot, when you can put another straight damage attack (fireball, liquid flame, ect.) and deal 100 damage. i think lowering the recharge ratio to 10/30 or 15/45 and maybe making energy cost 10 to balance it out would make this a more popular skill for pve eles. i've been waiting months for these and they've been nerfed 2 days after release... —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090 (contribs). 23:59, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I think this skill is fine as it is. Elementalists are already powerful enough in PvE to demand a very powerful PvE skill (between high damage spell and strong health degeneration for enemies with high armor, even in the end areas they are used more often than not), and this skill actually promotes thinking - you can't keep it on all the time, but rather you have to think when you are really going to need the extra damage and use it then. Erasculio 13:59, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

It is fine, but I don't think it is yet in its "sweet spot." Maybe change it to a zero-cast skill like Ritual Lord, and keep everything else the same. --Ravious 16:13, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

That would be nice, indeed. Would make the skill better without being overpowered. Erasculio 16:29, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

you only have 8 skill slots. —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090 (contribs). 21:52, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

What about making it improve casting time so you can unload more spells while it's active? -- Gordon Ecker 03:42, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Glyph of Renewal with 10 second recharge ? =D, pop renewal, this skill, spell spell, renewal start again.

What about making it a "basic" instant-cast skill like Ritual Lord? Echo would only let you cast it twice per cycle at the cost of your elite slot, and echo chaining would only let you cast it three times at the cost of 55 Energy, your elite slot and 3/8 of your skillbar. -- Gordon Ecker 21:13, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

just an idea, something like 'Glyph. For 15 seconds, your Energy Storage attribute is reduced by ten. Your Elementalist spells deal 13...25% extra damage'. 10e/1c/15rc. —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090. 03:29, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

(reset) I've played ele for 2 years now, and I can say this skill is crap as-is. People think that eles do massive damage instantly like a warrior or dervish can. Most ele skills take a while to cast and some time to recharge. Usually by the time you finish casting, your target is already below 40-50% health if not already dead. Instant cast would greatly help this skill, but I can say I will never use it how it is. (even when farming) --Lou-Saydus 20:04, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Intensity & ele lord is failure: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10225894

This skill really needs to be looked at. Right now bringing this will lower your damage output in almost any case because the lost skillslot and the lost 2 sec castingtime outweight the damage increase in such short time by far. With the lack of 1 sec castingtime max dmg spells and with factoring in aftercast you will have a very hard time to squeeze those 4 max dmg spells in you would need to justify not having cast another damage spell instead. And that works only every 45 sec, while just bringing another damage spell will work much more often in boosting your damage. On top of that with beeing a spell this messes up a lot of the more effective attack sequenzes of elementalists, lowering its usefullness even more. Casting it before Arcane Echo for example will cut off another 3 sec of its effective duration. Casting it after will mess up or at least delay your attack then. My suggestion would be make it a shout (for a straight buff) or a stance (if you want to force elementalists to choose between this and mantra of resolve for example). That way a 10 sec duration would be ok because you really can use all of the 10 seconds and you don't have to waste castingtime worth more than the dmg you get by the buff. Though i still would redurce recast to 30 or 35 seconds to ensure that it is available once every fight. Beetlejuice 18:13, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

This skill first deserves to be the weakest of the Sunspear skills, because PvE eles have such an easy time of it anyway. but there's nothing stopping you casting your DoTAoE and then casting this, (yes it does work like that). If you really want to maximise this skill, try mindbender, then you'll realise how much you can squeeze into those 12 seconds (Assuming a 20% ench mod, which I'd assume you'd have with this). --Ckal Ktak 22:28, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

You'd be better off using Ebon Battle Standard of Honor anywhere you'd consider using this. Not only does it add comparable damage for you, it does the same for your teammates. --24.179.151.252 22:49, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

So your argument is this has to suck because you hate eles? Well, message recieved. And i know how this one works so i know how much it sucks. And the only reason "eles have it so easy right now" is just because still ppl haven't yet realised that mesmers do 2-3 times the dmg of Eles now in high lvl pve (in which by the way DoTAoE is non existant for everyone with half a brain, so your argument about how it works with DoTs was pretty much moot anyway). Beetlejuice 01:02, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

What's true doesn't matter, what's perviced to be true by the many is, people all still think eles are better than mesmers in PvE, therefore you have to compensate for that and give the mesmers an easy time for seeing sense. --Ckal Ktak 12:01, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Signet of Corruption

Slow, long cooldown and pathetic damage and regain. For most necromancy, Signet of Lost Souls is a far better option, and doesn't requie a title grind either. Let's say Increase the range of this skill and at least double the damage. Bring down the damage on necrosis if you want a little balance, that bad boy was powerful enough as it was before it got buffed to 90 damage. --Ckal Ktak 13:42, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I like the direction this skill went - grinding increases the damage slightly, but its main effect (the energy gain) does not require more grind than just getting the skill. In order to avoid making its power too dependent of said grind, I think the damage should be kept as it is, although I would increase the range to "In the area" so the energy gain is bigger. At the same time, given how the Necromancers don't have any "In the area" hex (at least not that I remember : P), using this skill would require some planning, instead of being just a matter of spamming it as soon as it recharges. Ironically, I think this would have been a great Mesmer PvE skill - it would have a good synergy with the skills related to signets the Mesmers have. Erasculio 13:59, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

But, I think the energy gain is too prohibitive to be worth being on a skill bar. The skill is not meant to damage as much as be an energy gain, for sure, but even with careful execution, one would be lucky to get 10 energy or so (requires 5 hexed/conditioned foes in that range). I think buffing it to "in the area" would be very helpful especially if you are a more hex based party. --Ravious 16:19, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree, buffing it to "in the area" would be great. Erasculio 16:30, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Maybe giving a scaling energy gain for each condition/hex on the affected characters? That way, you can gain some good energy even if there's only one target. Makes the energy gain cap a little more important as well. Of course, that would make this a popular skill for condition-stacking 'Sins, but it's PvE... that's not a big deal. -- Jioruji Derako.> 17:29, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Add more dmg, reduce energy gain, give a scaling energy gain for each condition and hex on the affected characters. 87.189.197.171 22:56, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Seed of Life

→ moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Underpowered Skills/Monk

Seed of Life in it's current state is horribly under powered and completely useless to anyone not running the little Mo/E gimmick to make it last longer, and that's the majority of players. Prior to it's last nerf the skill was only somewhat decent if you knew just when to throw it and who to throw it on... because of it's incredibly short duration... so not everyone was using it for that reason, but now the skill is completely useless to anyone who doesn't run some gimmick build to extend it, and most people aren't going to be bothered with that just for a single skill. This needs to be buffed or just removed from the game. ~ J.Kougar 04:34, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Second the fact that its underpowered, 1..4..5 with 25 recharge is just too much. If you're worried about life bond gimmick maybe make it only trigger on actual damage (not zeroes)? 76.102.172.202 05:53, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you J.Kougar for your awesomely optomistic and useful commentary on a PvE skill. It is quite reassuring when the member of the community says these things over a PvE skill they made overpowered, and then scaled back.</sarcasm>-File:Drago-sig.gif Drago 05:55, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Didn't I already shoot down all your arguments for the nerf on the skill's actual discussion page, and leave you with no response that didn't make you look even more like you didn't know what you were talking about? Do I really have to do that all again? ~ J.Kougar 06:44, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

You didn't shoot down his arguments so much as kept saying "mentally handicapped Chihuahua with a cocaine addiction". That being said, the nerfing of this skill saddens my bonder monk. Oh well, moving on. BTW, I did run this skill and it was way powerful. - HeWhoIsPale 12:52, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't mean for it to sound like I was taking all the credit. Many people chimed in to shoot down his arguments on the skill's discussion page, not just me. But aside from a few folks, most everyone agrees that the nerf was too much.  :) ~ J.Kougar 18:24, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

The newest changes to this skill don't help, as it doesn't solve the problem. I didn't see anyone complain about the cost or activation time. The skill is still useless because it doesn't last long enough for crap unless you use some gimmick build, and most people aren't going to use some stupid gimmick just to make the skill viable for use. This was just a pathetic attempt to fix what they broke. Why are they trying so hard to get people to use gimmicks just to play with half the skills? ~ J.Kougar 02:19, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. What about lowing the recharge and giving it a self-disable? Giving it a fixed healing amount and making the self-disable scale with Divine Favor would make it usable by secondary Monks while remaining better for primary Monks, and the self-disable would solve the Glyph of Renewal issue. -- Gordon Ecker 03:08, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

...or better yet, change Glyph of Renewal to give an additional 15-10 second recharge when not used on an Elementalist skill (scaled via Energy Storage). That would solve the problem and since the skill is so rarely used in builds anyway, shouldn't be too hard on those using it for other builds. Might even prevent other future gimmick builds from coming up with it, since it was buffed not too long ago. ~ J.Kougar 04:55, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

I far prefer setting up seed of life like spirit bond - have it end after a fixed number of damage packets are recieved and revert the rest of the skill to the prior behavior. In it's current state there's no reason for me to use it any more. --Tankity Tank 23:50, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

This skill was also incredibly overpowered, even more than "There's Nothing to Fear!", given how Monks don't need any help PvE wise. I this this skill could use a small reduction in recharge (20 seconds instead of 25), but otherwise it's fine now - like Intensity, it became something to be used only when required, as opposed to something that could almost be spammed. Nerging Glyph of Renewal because of such a niche skill is a horrible, horrible idea. Erasculio 01:34, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Nerfing Glyph of Renewal because of a pve skill is a horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible idea. --Tankity Tank 04:35, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Nerfing a PvE skill that was supposed to be more powerful than normal skill because of one gimmick build is a horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible idea (and it was only even slightly powerful if you had the max title, which most don't, and if you used the gimmick, which most don't). ~ J.Kougar 17:15, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It was incredibly overpowered, and it had to be nerfed regardless of Signet of Renewal. The idea that PvE skills are "supposed to be more powerful than normal skill" is a player's creation - the nerf to this skill, to Intensity and to "There's Nothing to Fear!" should have dispelled that notion already. Erasculio 20:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Seed of Life was not over-powered, how can you even fathom it was when it required you to have the title maxed out to get any decent duration (which the majority of players don't have) and the only way to extend it further was a gimmick build that most people didn't know about and weren't using? With the original long recharge and energy cost, you had to make sure you threw it on the person getting hit the most just when they started taking the damage or got mobbed, to be any good. If you were a second or two off when that person started to get pummeled, the spell lost the majority of it's usefulness. It was a nice supplemental heal, but nothing more and nothing that great... definitely not something you could use excessively or to use as a key skill on your bar. Now it's useless without the gimmick, so the skill has been effectively been destroyed, not nerfed. Even if it was over-powered, which is wasn't without the gimmick, it's not even viable as a skill now. You can take Healing Seed and get better results.

As for the PvE skills never having been intended to be more powerful than normal skills... that's a given. Why would it reward PvE players to get PvE Only skills that were designed to be weaker and crappier versions of exciting skills? That would be like them making a new PvE Only Monk skill right now, called 'Oracle of Healing' that is a 5-1-2 and heals for 30 health with a 12 in Healing Prayers and has half casting range... ya know, basically inferior to "Orison of Healing" in every way, and then expecting people to use it just because it's a special PvE Only skill. The skill balancers might be that dumb, but I doubt many of the players are.  ;) Besides, if they wern't supposed to be more powerfull, then why make them PvE Only instead of just normal skills? They were to help with PvE where you fight more creatures than in PvP, and creatures with more levels and attributes than anyone you'll ever find in PvP... and I was pretty sure they said they'd release them with Hard Mode (which they failed to do) to help compensate for the ridiculous way they just over-powered all the monsters to up the difficulty, since giving them more creative skill sets or second professions was too much effort to put out. ~ J.Kougar 21:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Throwing seed of life on a bonder still is an awesome "go to" move when you're in trouble, before the nerf you could keep it up almost 24/7. That meant that your party could aggro whatever it wanted, the more damage packets you took the more healing you got. The only thing that shut down that tactic was enchant strip, so you'd run orders to cover.... It was fun but it was really, truly broken. --Tankity Tank 22:01, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

You could keep it up 24/7 without the use of a gimmick? How so? Because if the average player who doesn't have a maxed out title and doesn't read the 'Daily Gimmick' to see what builds they should be running before they play, could not keep it up like that, then the skill wasn't at all over-powered and didn't reserve a nerf that only hurt the few folks using a gimmick to get more from it. ~ J.Kougar 22:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Two monks, one of them a bonder. Bonder uses his seed as active prot, other guy hits the bonder with it when things get bad. --Tankity Tank 22:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

(EC)In other words, the skill required players to actually think instead of spamming it. That's a given for any skill, but even as it was, it was still too powerful - with Sunspear rank 7 (something hard to not get by the end of the game just through normal play, unless you have chosen to ignore all the shrines on your way to Abbadon) and a +20% enchantment mod, it could be kept on all half the time, and that was already too powerful as it was, becoming only a bit worse (a bit) with two monks (the most common set up in PvE); Glyph of Renewal wasn't even needed most of the time for 100% coverage. Now, like Intensity, this skill is a powerful but limited resort, meant to require skill when using it, as opposed to just spamming it on recharge. In other words, the skill requires more player's skill, while still being very powerful.

And the reason why PvE skills are PvE only is a very simple one: they would hurt PvP. Now, it may be hard to figure this out (the "dumb" skill balancers understand it, at least ; ), but there is something between overpowered skills and "weaker and crappier versions of exciting skills" - something good yet balanced, just like Seed of Life is now. That skill, just like "There's Nothing to Fear!", would make PvP become too defensive, something bad for that game mode. Likewise, Itensity and Necrosis would be abused in spiking, something that is not used in PvE (therefore it's not a problem there) but that would impair PvP. And so on. The PvE only skills would all hurt PvP.

The idea that the PvE skills would be "overpowered" in order to "compensate" for the enemies in Hard Mode is contradictory - if you are going to make skills so powerful that Hard Mode becomes easy, it would be the same thing as just playing in Normal Mode without said skills. This idea, together with all the others that ignore the idea of balance in PvE, not only is ilogical but also has no room in GW - and fortunatelly that's something a few players don't understand, but that Arena Net does. Erasculio 22:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Running a bonder and seeding him as often as possible didn't take any thought, covering with orders only made that approach more resilient to removal. Seeding the bonder when you get in trouble is a little better, but it's still extremely effective, ie: just about everything is still retardedly easy with this approach. I need to rescind what I said earlier, this is still an extremely effective skill. --Tankity Tank 22:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I must have missed something then, because I thought the skill had a 20 second recharge on it and with a 7 in sunspear lasted about 8 seconds. So even with an enchanting mod, how the heck were you going to spam it across half your team and maintain it on them all the time?

So you're trying to tell me that a skill being too powerful in PvE, even if it's a PvE Only skill, hurts PvP and requires a nerf? The only way that manes any sense is if the PvP only players complaining about it are just jealous because it's a skill that's more powerful than they can get, and since they can't have it they don't want anyone else to either. Real mature.

How is Seed of Life balanced now, and not just useless? The average player is only going to be able to make it last for 4 or 5 seconds at best, and given how tricky it can be to cast at the right time and no more than it'll do to protect/heal the target (as well as the ridiculous recharge time) why would any one with any sense (or at least the option to use skills from all the campaigns) waste a slot on their skill bar for this skill now, when almost everything else is more powerful and useful than it is?

Besides, how am I supposed to trust that ArenaNet knows that's best or what they are doing when they work so hard to piss off the majority of the players, provide an inferior product, and then dismiss the player's concerns because they think their Devs know best... and to heck with the customers (they don't even realist that keeping customers happy is how thy make their money, just look at some of the current fiascos). ~ J.Kougar 22:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

"I must have missed something then" - you did, like this: "it could be kept on all half the time" and this: "becoming only a bit worse (a bit) with two monks (the most common set up in PvE)". I also wonder where did your comment ("So you're trying to tell me that a skill being too powerful in PvE, even if it's a PvE Only skill, hurts PvP and requires a nerf?") come from - could you point to me where I have said that, please? What I did say was that "This idea, together with all the others that ignore the idea of balance in PvE, not only is ilogical but also has no room in GW", which is true. I would also like to know why you think you have to use "it across half your team and maintain it on them all the time", given how Seed of Life is a party wide healing skill that heals a lot if only one party member is under attack. In fact, I doubt there are party-wide healing skills better than it currently is - and Tankity Tank said, it is a very good skill.

And regarding "when they work so hard to piss off the majority of the players" - you are not the majority of players. You do not know what the majority of players think, do, or want. You are not able to speak for them, and I do not want you to try to speak for me (especially if you come with that "inferior product" speech), I'm capable of doing that myself, thank you. If the skill being nerfed bothers you, sorry, but the well being and balance of the game are more important than one player being worried about one overpowered skill being balanced into being a powerful, but not extremely so, skill. Erasculio 22:57, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

(Reset indent)

You said "it could be kept on all half the time" so how are you going to keep it on "all" the team half the time?

I may not know specifically, but I can read the comments made on the changes here and see all the folks complaining about the issues, which I think gives me a pretty good idea that the majority of people are pissed-off about the way they are doing things recently. I doubt when people post things like "I feel like I just wated $35.00" when talking about GW:EN, I don't think it's too crazy to assume they aren't happy.

A skill being nerfed is one thing, but almost all the PvE skills being nerfed and countless other skills, constantly, because they don't test anything before they impliment it to find out how the nerf they are doing will affect the players, and then having to go back and make change after change to try and compensate... does bother me. Just like it bothers all the rest of the people complaining about it. Surely you aren't going to tell me I'm the oly one on this wiki who has complained about the nerfs and other current issues? ~ J.Kougar 23:10, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Again, why do you want to keep a party healing skill on "all" the team? One person being attacked under Seed of Life gives you a better party-wide healing than many, if not most, party wide healings. With a minimum of preparation (like, using a tank? Something that is actually a good idea in most of PvE?), you will have only one person taking the great majority of damage anyway.

And I'm not going to say you are the only one complaining about the nerfs - I'm pointing something even more obvious, that those complains are actually discussions, with arguments and counter-arguments defending or attacking the nerfs. Claiming that you know what the majority wants is a bad argument - you don't, that's a simple fact. Other arguments aren't as bad ("almost all the PvE skills being nerfed" is, though - if you make a list with how many PvE only skills exist, only a minority has been nerfed), hence the discussions we see here and on other pages. But the general idea - nerfs are done for the betterment of the game, just as buffs (that are somehow forgotten often when someone complains about nerfs) are, is mentioned time and time again, despite being ignored time and time again. Erasculio 23:19, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't know why you would, you are the one who keeps saying "it could be kept on all half the time" on all who, half of the time then? Perhaps a lot of my confusion is your poorly typed messages and/or your trouble conveying your thoughts via text? ~ J.Kougar 05:27, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If you don't have any argument left other than to attack my ability of writting on what is a secondary language to me, I have a strong feeling you don't really have anything to add to this discussion. I don't see any good argument from you about why this skill would be weak now, or why this nerf was bad for the game. Erasculio 13:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I didn't realize that it was your second language and I am still just trying to understand what thoughts you are trying to convey. To argue further when I can't get clarification does seem a little pointless though, sorry. ~ J.Kougar 14:00, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

How To Win: (1) Lifebond everyone. (2) Wait for big aggro, seed bonder. (3) Kill stuff while order of the vamp/order of pain hero covers lifebonds continuously to prevent bond strip/stop damage flowing to the bonder, alternately use a couple of */Mo heros with Aegis, same effect. (4) Watch ridiculously huge swath of blue numbers hit everyone's screens. (5) Press some buttons, or just let the heros/hench/minions kill everything. Win, move to next group.

Ignoring the best synergy this skill has and trying to balance it around some other sub-par use is bad. In all seriousness go try this with two human monks before you discount the effectiveness of the skill, hell, I'll give you full bars for the entire team if you're confused about how to set it up effectively. This skill is still a winner, it's just not as brain dead as it was before. --Tankity Tank 23:51, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

And you expect everyone to be able to get two human monks, with specific skills, and a Necro with specific skills, each time you join a PUG in PvE? Have you ever played in PvE, or at least played the first few campaigns since the newer ones came out? You're lucky to get one human monk, much less two with every skill you need. Yea, in an ideal situation that skill might be good... but given 90% of the time the situation in PvE is anything but ideal, it just means the skill is useless to most players and thus, was nerfed to hard. ~ J.Kougar 05:27, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

This skill is one of many tools in the toolbox, not understanding how to use it doesn't make it bad. I think your real issue here is that you don't have competent people to use the skill with, not that there's anything wrong with the skill. --Tankity Tank 08:49, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It's that mentality that will kill the game in the end, because there are more casual players than hardcore players and the hardcore players won't be able to support the game when all the casual players are driven away. ~ J.Kougar 14:00, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Stop using dire predictions and digression to avoid the discussion at hand. This skill is demonstrably strong, enough said. --Tankity Tank 18:58, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd actually have to agree that this was over-nerfed. This skill was overpowered using a specific gimmick build before, and so they nerfed it to complete uselessness on anything at all now (Maybe still get it to work for a gimmick). What they should have done was nerfed the gimmick instead of the skill. Make it like essence bond where the party is healed whenever your target takes physical or elemental damage (which is most times they're actually getting hit except for dark/holy damage and Life Bond). Then the skill would still be something for regular monks to throw on without the gimmick. 76.102.172.202 19:26, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Just like to add that, after looking into it for a little bit, the gimmick would still be plausible using Glyph of Renewal, Blessed Aura, and +20% enchanting mod. With proper timing of your glyph you could keep it up for the vast majority of the time (a few seconds down time where you would actually have to heal! OMG!); and of course this is compared to the complete uselessness of this skill on any non-gimmick bars.

I figure there's better ways to counter gimmicks: Make it not trigger on 0 damage (No bond) and disable for recharge time to prevent Glyph of Renewal. This could have effectively killed the gimmicks WITHOUT destroying the actual skill. I think a revert to the old stats with these changes would make it much better. 75.71.34.9 16:46, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Just wondering how having it trigger on basically everything except life bond isn't a good way to counter the gimmick? If it only doesn't trigger on zero damage, then bonders would probably just use lvl 0 protection prayers to still heal on any significant hits. I still support "Whenever target ally takes physical or elemental damage..." 76.102.172.202 23:00, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

"There's Nothing to Fear!"

→ moved from User_talk:Isaiah_Cartwright/Overpowered_Skills/PvE_and_Monster#Overpowered_Sunspear_Skills

The problem I see with this change is instead of truly truly balancing it you've instead made it as a Global Protection up all the way when ran by two Paragons. In essence you've made this skill like Incoming was when it first came out. Okay if a single paragon uses it (still not amazing as a PvE now in my opinion) but able two run in its 'Overpowered' state with multiple paragons.--The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:67.165.84.250 .

That encourages people to actually use paragons in PvE, maybe I'll use my paragon now instead of just muling crap with her. --Tankity Tank 04:08, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Doubtful, I mean most will see it as yet another huge hit to the Paragons where it is a change to how single Paragons use the skill. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:67.165.84.250 .

Excuse me, I play a paragon. I have never received a PUG party invite for any HM mission, nor have I been in any party that ever had more than me as the paragon. The only guys I can play with as my paragon, is with my guild. Soooo, you go find a party with two paragons or more and then complain. Almost all of the paragon shouts are now a disgrace. Sadly, Anet had a great idea with the paragon, but they made it way too powerful when it came out. Then they nerfed it to hell and then some. If any class needs complaining about large scale damage, let's please nerf more all the SF/GG/MS/etc 8 man parties of elementals. Incidently, HM is a breeze with an elementalist anyway. What TNTF has done for the paragon was make it possible to actually want to play HM or vanquish. It made it manageable. If shouts really are that powerful, why do we see so few warriors using WY or even Save Yourselves? Besides, there is enough stuff in HM to shutdown the paragon anyway, and more so now that Mesmers can interrupt us. May be the other classes hate the paragon too much...I know! They're jealous of our wings ;)

May be ANet wants us to use our spears now instead of shouting. May be we can all be P/E with conjure weapon spells. Might help us do more dmg than the monk does with his staff ;p

Soldier's Fury

Blazing Finale

"There's Nothing to Fear!"

"Watch Yourself!"

"Shields Up!"

"Save Yourselves!"

Signet of Synergy

Signet of Return

--Shaia 12:27, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

The nerf was fine, it didn't make the skill significantly weaker, and it was overpowered anyway. Ensign's arguments above have good points explaining why the nerf was needed, in the end. Erasculio 13:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

The nerf wasn't fine. Seems so to all and sundry that don't play paragons. If the problem was in players running 2ndry paragon, then nerf it for them, not for the paragon itself. Make it more dependant on the paragon primary, make it ONLY for paragons, make it dependant on faction level as well. Or on the amount of PVE titles one has, as this is a PVE-only skill. Make it last 0 seconds if you have no Leadership attribute points. Not that hard to balance it instead of nerfing it, is it? -- Shaia 22:25, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I play a Paragon. And the skill was overpowered for Paragons. The balance required by overpowered skills is a nerf. Erasculio 22:55, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

As much as I dislike the nerf, I have to agree that it was overpowered, but Paragons in PvE are underpowered overall, and one overpowered skill isn't enough to cancel that out. I'm not saying it shouldn't have been nerfed, I just think that some of the other Paragon skills need some buffs or tweaks, such as the anti-paraway finale tweaks I suggested at User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Misc Skill Tweaks#Finale tweaks. -- Gordon Ecker 23:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

PvE paragons are not underpowered. They are easily the 2nd or 3rd best PvE class (possibly the best overall.) People just need ot learn how to use them. -Warskull 03:51, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

The pve skills are tuned to encourage more class diversity in gameplay. The reason the Paragon, Mesmer and Assassin skills are so strong is that these classes have only niche roles in pve play. That said, I think nerfing TNTF the way it was nerfed didn't address the problem of cross-class spam in quite the right way. I'd rather see the damage reduction and healing tied to leadership and the duration tied to the pve title track, ie:

Shout. For 1..12 seconds, all party members within earshot take 5% less damage and are healed for 20 Health when this Shout ends. For every two ranks in Leadership damage reduction is increased by 4% and Healing is increased by 6 Health.

As the skill stands now it doesn't make me want to run out and group a bunch of pve paragons when I could just run an orders necro and a bunch of barrage/gfte heroes, or a bunch of metshower eles and an obs flesh dervish. A paragon would need to be able to replace a monk in pve for me to justify taking one in any but a rare niche context, they could do that with the original TNTF. --Tankity Tank 23:15, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Alternately you could tie duration and healing to leadership, and tie damage reduction to the title track. That IMO would be optimal. --Tankity Tank 23:20, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, that would allow it to remain usable by secondary Paragons while restricting the full benefits to primary Paragons. -- Gordon Ecker 23:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

However, you are assuming the problem with this skill was cross-profession abuse; I think the problem was that it was too powerful on Paragons. So your suggestions would not solve that problem. Erasculio 01:31, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware the most broken part of the skill was that the end-condition was met more often by using non paragons. It's like a better-than-aegis chain with a bunch of free heal parties thrown in. When it's used on a paragon primary you get more global damage reduction per use but the end condition triggers only occasionally. IDK, I'm not saying this is the best way to go but it seems better than the current setup to me. --Tankity Tank 04:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

After creating a support paragon for this skill alone, i can say that it was very overpowered. Even the current version with double recharge is still very powerful and will still probably see usage. But the reason it gets so many complaints imo is because this skills outshines every single paragon skill including elites. So it just hit harder in that paragons have little to fall back on (fewer skills, a lot of nerfs). If you gave this nerfed version to any other class they'd love it and go on happily with their lives. point: buff other skills to make them useable. and for anyone who says you can easily get around this nerf easily by getting two paragons... when's the last time you were in a PVE party with 2 paragons. heck even playing one, it's only happened 2 or 3 times for me.

Most PvE pickups do nothing but tanknspank (or, I should say, *try* and tanknspank and end up failing miserably, but that's neither here nor there). Paragons don't have a place in that archtype, never did, only ever will if you grossly overpower them because what they do isn't at all relevant to that build's trick. If you aren't playing tanknspank, Paragons are one of the best professions in PvE, even with their shallow skillset - they were unquestionably the best with pre-nerf TNTF. The nerf to the skill is a bit awkward, for sure, but it's still an amazing skill on a very good profession. -Ensign 20:17, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

FWIW I think chopping the duration down from 4+1/2level to 4+1/3level will make it a stronger skill overall for a Paragon. -Ensign 03:01, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

→ moved from User_talk:Isaiah_Cartwright/Misc_Skill_Tweaks#.22There.27s_Nothing_to_Fear.21.22

On August 30th, this PvE skill received a significant nerf to its recharge timer. Previously set to 10s, the recharge was doubled to 20s. To date, no reasoning or explanation was given. A simple, "It was too powerful," would have been enough. Please follow through with the requests from the Paragon community to provide the reasoning behind this change.

In addition, please consider that this is seen as an overnerfed skill now, and would be more appropriately set to a recast of 15s. An alternatively to this is the extend the duration to be equal to the Leadership skill (instead of its current 4s + Lead./2). The current format allows non-primary Paragons to achieve something that was unique to the Paragon primaries. --Veraci 20:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I think its the healing as well that get it abused by no para primaries as well, worth taking into consideration. Ajax Baby Eater 23:35, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't the skill being nerfed imply that it was seen as too powerful? -67.161.44.231 23:48, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that's why we aren't suggesting that it should be restored to its' pre-nerf power. -- Gordon Ecker 01:36, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

This skill is still by far the strongest skill that a Paragon can use. --Deathwing 21:28, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

It still is, even after the nerf. 145.94.74.23 07:48, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

As a Motivation Paragon, I am glad that it got nerfed. It basically overshadowed the entire Motivation line in a single skill. Any Paragon could be godly just by using Leadership and Spear Mastery. As far as I am concerned, it is still way to powerful, but I suppose PvE can use it. It is easier than boosting Motivation to a usable level...Nicky Silverstar 13:38, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I think they should alter the duration and/or recharge so that the skill can be kept up continuously by a single Paragon with a reasonable amount of Leadership (around 8-10) and rebalance the skill around the assumption of 100% uptime to make single Paragons and Command and Motivation builds more appealing. -- Gordon Ecker 03:40, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

GW:EN PvE Skills

Anet has set a precedent for balancing PvE skills with recent tweaks to Seed of Life and "There is Nothing to Fear!". I think these balances were fair and justified, but that's not what this post is about. The best thing about this precedent is that there is a good chance for PvE skills to get buffed. Which ones, and how is largely a matter of opinion and perspective, but I'll share what's on my mind.My opinion is fluid, so if you think I'm wrong here, I'd gladly reconsider a specific skill if you have a good argument for it.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Summon Ice Imp

This one Summon is different from all the rest because of its skill selection. Enervating Charge, Stoning, and Immolate have recharges of 8, 5, and 3 seconds respectively. The Ice Imp's Ice Spikes has a recharge of 15 seconds, meaning at even at max Asura Rank, it can only use the spell 3 times. To bring it up to spec with all the other summons, I'd give it both Ice Spikes and Shard Storm. Ice Javelin's half range would put the summon in danger, and Icy Prism doesn't have the utility of the other water slows.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

isn't this the only summon with an aoe effect spell?

They can also inflict damage with their regular attacks. -- Gordon Ecker 01:32, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Ice Spikes has been buffed, so this summon has been as well. Besides, it is great utility on a AoE Elementalist...I actually think this is the most powerful one of the 4 summons spells. 145.94.74.23 07:47, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm happy with the Ice Spikes Buff. This Summon dies often enough to have a new pool of energy to use as well, so it's pretty potent.--Skye Marin 04:02, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

"Don't Trip!"

Pretty weak, in comparison to Ward of Stability and Brace Yourself, and it is hard to use on anything but a Paragon. It's meant for use against Giant Stomp, but isn't effective against more than one. Reduce cost to 5, Decrease recharge to 10.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Needs longer duration or reduce energy cost. 87.189.197.171 23:02, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Breath of the Great Dwarf

Much higher recharge than Heal Party/LoD, and heals for less, and the fire-removing part is mostly useless in most scenarios, especially with the high recharge. It could a good middle-ground for Heal Party and/or LoD. The benefit is saving your Elite Slot on your monk, and not needing to spec into Healing for other classes. Increase healing to 40..80, decrease recharge to 10 seconds.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Ear Bite

Too similar to Sever Artery, and not any better than Jagged Strike. It can't be blocked, but the touch skill doesn't cause additional damage from a weapon hit either. Add 20..60 damage.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Why so much? Nicky Silverstar 11:58, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Because Low Blow costs 6 adrenaline and strikes for 30...70 dmg + conditional cracked armor. 87.189.237.93 11:58, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Light of Deldrimor

Adjacent damage is difficult to pull off, and this Holy damage does not ignore armor. This skill is needed in some dungeons to find things, so a buff to beyond an Inferno / Flame Burst model of would be appreciated. Increase damage to 40..120, reduce recharge to 15, increase area of effect to "Area".--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

What do you think about just making it to ignore armor instead of increasing the damage? Would be helpful against high armored enemies, would add consistency with other skills that deal holy damage, and would increase the damage done by this skill indirectly. Erasculio 21:03, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The ironic thing is that, Lightbringer's Gaze also does Holy damage, but also doesn't ignore armor. Simply making it ignore armor wouldn't be much of a buff either. If didn't need it for the dungeons, it would be easier to use Balthazar's Rage or even Eternal Aura for more, better AoE damage, which gives commentary on how poor the skill is from a damage perspective. The damage is not the skill's main function, but it would be really nice if it was more than just a liability to complete a handful of dungeons.--Skye Marin 21:18, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The AoE on this is In The Area. -Ensign 23:35, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Are you sure? the skill page says adjacent. —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090. 00:34, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It's in the area, the page has been updated. -- Gordon Ecker 02:49, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

There are a few dungeons with undead, where this skill is awesome as is. No need for a buff. --Xeeron 09:10, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Ignoring armor is extremely powerful in Hard Mode, where everything has more than 60 armor. I think this skill is fine, especially since it gives you free goodies. 145.94.74.23 07:45, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Free goodies in a dungeon. Nowhere else!

Snow Storm

Unlike other Fire Nukes, (Breath of Fire is the closest related skill), this skill doesn't have the benefit of Attunements. 40 cold damage really isn't much considering the high armor level of some foes. Lower cost to 10, increase AoE to Nearby.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

This needs to be good at low spec without being imba at high spec. I like the recharge, but 15e and 'adjacent' really sucks. I'd rework it into 10/2/12, Spell. Cause a Snow Storm at target foe's location. For 5 seconds, that foe and nearby foes suffer 32...48...52 cold damage per second. For what it's worth, the damage should be worth it over other DoT's given the lack of attune or other utility. PvE only so the recharge can stand to take a hit. It'd be a great spell on a mesmer if the damage were raised and the cost lowered - and mesmers could still use some help in Proph/Fact/NF PvE. No more having to bring fire nukes to do damage, fire off a Snowstorm and do other mesmerly things. ~Seef II <☎|→> 21:11, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps interrupting attacks or spells, one or the other, a sturdy effect at any attribute level, and making the damage scalar icing on the cake? MA Anathe 16:20, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

This isn't a bad skill if you have some extreme energy management and/or fighting against 60 armor foes. Only thing that saves it is its low recharge, never mind the fact that using this on anything then tier 10 is a waste of time. Biz 12:52, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't have extreme energy management. Reduce energy cost to 10. 17 October 2007

Please don't. The one thing that Elementalists can do better than professions is a lot of AoE damage. Let them keep that advantage. Besides, it may be weak on Fire-elementalists, but it is a welcome addition to Air, Earth and Water Elementalists, whose skills are all weaker when it comes to raw damage. It is a nice boost for them. 145.94.74.23 07:43, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

15 energy is too much because elemental attunement skills will not give any energy back. With water attunement you get 6 energy every time you cast a 15 energy spell like Ice Spikes. In other words Snow Storm drains your energy pool like a 21 energy skill. 87.189.197.171 23:06, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Deft Strike

This skill needs some additional utility as a simple ranged conditional bleeding is not entirely useful. Adding the clause "causes cracked armor if foe is moving" to the middle of the skill would be handy.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

It does have a lot of hidden utility, It's the only attack skill which works with spellcasting weapons, so you can suddenly trigger all of those effects that require "attack skills" to use, mostly Paragon anthems. It's a pity we see so few paragons in PvE anyway. --Ckal Ktak 13:24, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Weakness Trap

High recharge makes it unattractive as a trap, especially knowing that weakness is a cheap to apply condition. Expertise doesn't effect it, so the full cost should be worthwhile. Reduce recharge to 10.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

What about making Expertise affect all traps? -- Gordon Ecker 02:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. 87.189.197.171 22:58, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

"You Are All Weaklings!"

This one stands out to me as, ironically, the weakest PvE skill. It's like Enfeebling Blood, but with a shorter duration and longer recharge. Reduce cost to 5, reduce recharge to 8.--Skye Marin 20:54, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok I've held my tongue on most of these even though I disagree with them, but this one blows me away. Enfeebling Blood is on the short list of skills in the running for 'best skill in PvE'. I cannot fathom what you could possibly be thinking that would lead you to conclude that this is the weakest PvE skill. The ridiculous power of Enfeebling Blood is the only reason why this skill isn't a must run on every character. -Ensign 23:34, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Let's compare this skill directly to Enfeebling Blood. It's better because it's instant cast and there is no health sac. It's worse because it has less than half the duration, more than double the recharge time, and it's adjacent instead of nearby. I think the cons outweigh the pros here.--Skye Marin 02:47, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

So it's not going to replace the best Necro skill in PvE. This is a problem because... -Ensign 02:51, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Because PvE skills were implemented for a handful of reasons. Imagine if Sunspear Rebirth Signet didn't have the extra energy gain. If PvE skills are introduced that don't have a clear advantage over comparable existing skills, then there really is no reason for those PvE skills to exist. It's a big "So What?" to PvE skills. It becomes a wasted effort to build the icon/animation art and program the skill. It's lost potential.--Skye Marin 04:03, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

YAAW has one significant advantage over Enfeebling Blood. It's completely independant of attributes and professions. -- Gordon Ecker 04:23, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

The problem isn't because "This doesn't replace Enfeebling Blood", the problem is, with Enfeebling Blood, this skill is totally useless to even bring. Since EB is a runner for "best skill in PvE", you should always have a necromancer with it, meaning that this skill will never have a purpose. --Deathwing 19:47, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

This skill + Oppressive Gaze is still not worth using imo.

You Are All Weaklings needs nearby range like Enfeebling Blood. 80.133.78.186 4 November 2007

I don't think that it needs to be better than Enfeebling Blood, but even if it was within earshot and lasted a minute, Necromancers would still have more than enough good skills to remain competitive with other professions. -- Gordon Ecker 00:39, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't need to be better, it needs to be different. --Deathwing 00:47, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Winds

is pretty bad & not worth a skill slot or what do you think ? 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the block rate should scale with rank (30% or more at max rank) and the cost should be increased. -- Gordon Ecker 01:05, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

It also should only work on foes...at the moment it works on Allies (and you) as well. 99.245.143.39 22:51, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Very weak effect - 15% is nothing. Affects ALL creatures, not just foes. Long recharge for such a weak effect. Title track ranking has no bearing on effectiveness. 27 October 2007

This is the worst skill in the game. 87.189.197.171 22:59, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Why not reward interrupt mesmer/ranger more in PvE: Create a level 1...10 Spirit. All foes within its range have a 10...30% chance to miss with ranged attacks. Winds deals 14...43 damage to all foes that are interrupted and within range of the Spirit. This Spirit dies after 30...90 seconds. 87.189.238.254 14:27, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Black Powder Mine

I'm deldrimor rank 8 (82 000 reputation points) and this skill only does 26 dmg. Every non pve trap is better with only 7 points in wilderness survival.

What about adding Cracked Armor or knock down? -- Gordon Ecker 00:23, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Cracked armor is a good idea or change it this way "When Black Powder Mine is triggered, every second (for 3 seconds total), all nearby foes are struck for 10...30 damage .." 7 October 2007

It's a dust trap in terms of blindness with a 20 second recharge for 10 energy that anyone can carry. Dust Trap has amazing damaging power due to ignoring armor, but still - Black Powder Mine is pretty balanced. The issue with Black Powder Mine is more of a general thing with the PvE skills. Because they're general skills, the 3 slots are pretty competitive. The 'best' 3 will be taken every time, though the 'best' 3 aren't always going to be the same for every build.

Black Powder Mine is a decent general skill that you can drop on to any back or midliner for good effect. PvE doesn't encourage solid general skills, in general though. There are few situations where you want to do other than kill faster, or up the team's survival rate just long enough to be able to kill quickly. Why would I want to carry Black Powder Mine in PvE?

At some point, they're going to have look at the design of PvE skills and decide whether they want to go ahead and make them basically additional elites, or at least middling between regular skills and elite skills, or if they want them to be solid regular skills that are almost never used at all, particularly because of their watered down effects due to being usable by all professions. MA Anathe 15:43, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

The problem with the idea of this skill being fine because anyone can carry it is that no one will. This skill is just plain bad. Traps are already fairly particular in use and almost impossible to use in pve (other than trapper groups luring enemies into them in which case why use a 30 dmg trap...) and then the fact that this is really no better than dust trap (weaker version of it) just makes this useless. They should make it something cool, like foes hit by it suffer from bleeding, blind, dazed, weakness, cripple, cracked armor and burning for x seconds. That would be unique at least, a skill that causes 7 conditions. 64.164.223.159 06:36, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Traps are not entirely bad in PvE. Most of the time, there is a good chance that enemy warriors will come over to smash in the caster's face. So even with one trap, there is a good chance that it will hit something. However, this skill is pretty damn bad. --Deathwing 01:06, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

It's 10 seconds of nearby AoE blindness covered by bleeding for 10 energy with a 20 second recharge usable on any profession. I realize that the big draw of dust trap in PvE is the armor ignoring damage, rather than the blindness, but for the purpose of blinding, Black Powder Trap has no immediate parallel. It's good at what it does, and I feel it was designed appropriately for what it does.

Even so, I agree with the points that as a PvE skill, it's not good. It doesn't up your kill rate, it eats a valuable PvE skill slot, it eats up a skill slot period on crowded skill bars, and traps in PvE in general tend to be problematic.

Thinking it over, I like the idea of cracked armor a lot. The enemies you want to hit with Black Powder Mine to blind, you're most likely to benefit from the armor reduction on. Monsters in general are more likely to pass the 60 AL mark, making the skill usable (not to be confused with useful) on all opponents, and an explosive mine inflicting cracked armor is flavorfully appropriate. It also has synergy with Piercing Trap, for Rangers. Either swap it in place of bleeding, or add it in and make it a threesome. Throw in an expertise reduction on trap skills, and it might actually see some love? MA Anathe 18:09, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

As long as expertise doesn't affect traps i am actually glad that all the pve traps are so much worse. Other way Rangers would not even manage to get into trapping groups anymore because ppl would want classes with 4 pips regen. Beetlejuice 17:14, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Nonsense. Right now PvE traps are more attractive on classes with 4 pips regen because those traps are not affected by expertise. Rangers would easier get into trapping groups if PvE traps would be affected by expertise. And no, a buff to the PvE traps would not make it harder for Rangers to get into trapping groups. 87.189.233.157 10:56, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Technobabble Alkar's Alchemical Acid Ebon Vanguard Sniper Support

Technobabble < Defile Enchantments

Alkar's Alchemical Acid < Defile Enchantments

Ebon Vanguard Sniper Support < Defile Enchantments

The new pve "damage" spells are simply underpowered compared to necro skills(maybe even to any aoe spell with adjacent range), Defile Enchantments wins with nearby range, shorter recharge & more armor ignoring dmg, but even Oppressive Gaze is better and that one was nerfed. I'm aware of the fact that pve skills can be used by any profession and that alkars crap is more useful against destoyers and 5 seconds daze on technobabble is the awesomeness(its not) but the real question is why do you keep these skills so low on damage ? These are simply useless for my ele & necro 99% of the time. I mean why would I use Ebon Vanguard Sniper Support against the charr when I have better aoe spells which work better against any mobs and why are these skills pve only, they would not even inbalance pvp. 16 October 2007

AoE damage+unconditional AoE dazed,Armor ignoring damage and cracked armor against destroyers,can be used by any profession and doesn't require any attribute points. Sure, they may be useless for your ele and necro sometimes, but they aren't bad skills, and defile enchantments is nothing like and has nothing to do with any of these skills. Lord Belar 19:00, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

I think Technobabble could use a slight duration buff (2...6 → 3...8) for better synergy with Extend Conditions. -- Gordon Ecker 01:56, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

All those skills need to be upgraded to nearby range.

"Target foe and all adjacent foes are struck for 30...40 damage." Anyone noticed that technobabble does not even deal armor ignoring dmg ? 18 October 2007 (UTC)

The whole point of technobabble is the dazed, not the damage. --Xeeron 11:04, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I know however Technobabble is supposed to do armor ignoring dmg but it doesn't. Untyped dmg -> armor ignoring dmg. Looks like many gw:en skills never left beta stage, Light of Deldrimor did not ignore armor either until it was fixed (hm maybe a bad example). 19 October 2007

Technobabble is INSANELY powerful, Unconditional AoE Daze is underpowred? The damage is only there so it's easy to see what you've actually hit, by no means the purpose of this skill. Alkar's Alchemical acid is Unconditional Cracked armour on Destroyers, any warrior with Body blow will tell you how amazing that is, as well as any nuker. The only real weak on is Vanguard sniper support, but that is armour ignoring, when it shouldn't be (piercing damage). --Ckal Ktak 13:38, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Ebon Sniper Support does not ignore armor, Alkar's Alchemical Acid is a stupid slow projectile spell and only useful against destroyers, daze is not godly in pve, Technobabble is far away from being powerful, the first two spells need bigger aoe radius. 20 October 2007

Name me another non-elite skill that can cause unconditional daze and I'll take back everything I said. Oh wait, you can't, there isn't any. Being able to suppress groups of high level casters is something you have to do a lot in hard mode, paricularly elementalists or monks, where the former will quickly dispatch you and the latter will out-heal you. Being able to daze them all (or at least some) at once can be the difference between victory and defeat in a given battle, the short daze duration is long enough to upset their attack and defense. The fact that you originally thought of this skill as a damage skill is firstly laughable and secondly shows that you really don't know what you're doing with it. And sign your comments please. --Ckal Ktak 08:09, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Stop comparing pve skills with normal skills to fit your arguments, I mean name me a non pve skill that can cause 80 dmg, cracked armor & deep wound at the same time or a non elite skill which is better than "There's Nothing to Fear!". Only because there is no unconditional daze outside of pve doesn't make technobabble a good skill. Spear Swipe can cause unconditional daze but it has melee range. I said I'm aware of the fact that daze on technobabble is the awesomeness, but the terrible dmg, high recharge and too short daze duration is the reason why I think its underpowered, especially in hard mode where monster cast twice as fast, don't you remember ? 20 October 2007

Having seen the effect of dazed on hard mode creatures, I can assure you they don't normally cast twice as fast, since a dazed HM creature casts slower than normal for a NM creature. And anyway, where do you get off telling me to stop comparing PvE skills to common skills? You started this conversation by saying all of these skills were worse than defile enchantments! Make your mind up. Technobabble is not weak. No, it really isn't. Stop asking for broken skills to be even more game breaking, there won't be any challenge left at this rate. --Ckal Ktak 12:00, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Brokens skills to be more game breaking ? Thx now I understand how you think about pve. 22 October 2007

Yes, I have this strange idea that PvE should still be challenging. --Ckal Ktak 18:52, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Saying Technobabble is insanely powerfull is an even more insane exaggeration. While i agree that dazed is a powerful condition and spreading it aoe is even more powerful, the problem is technobabble has a horrible aoe radius, very short dazed duration and costs a lot of energy. PvE casters don't clump very well, so the only situations where you will be able to get more than one monster dazed would be tank&spank groups, and there you have no one attacking so dazed won't ever get triggered. The fact that it won't work on a boss is the last nail to its coffin, because there you would want it most. So what you are left with in reality is a more or less single target 6 sec dazed every 19 sec for 15 energy that does not work on bosses. Really not that impressive. Beetlejuice 14:19, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

But the fact remains, you can't exactly compare it to defile enchantments now can you? It's like comparing blinding surge to invoke lightning. --Ckal Ktak 22:37, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Eotn PvE spells are indeed inferior to other spells and yes Alkar's Alchemical Acid and Ebon Vanguard Sniper Support are good examples. 87.189.221.46 14:25, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Sniper support yes, bt I never do go and fight Destroyers without my acid. --Ckal Ktak 17:24, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Raven Blessing

Unlike the other blessings, the block chance causes you to lose much more energy (meaning it lasts a shorter time). I think a flat % damage reduction or -damage (ala Shielding hands) would be a better feature. (Raven swoop is on 4 cooldown and its essentially Flameburst/Frozen Burst that is armor ignoring so it will never meet the popularity of Ursan even after this buff.) Perhaps adding a modest Flare-level of damage to the Raven talons wouldn't be bad either. --Life Infusion «T» 14:52, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Or they could replace "You gain Energy whenever you take or deal damage." with "You gain Energy whenever you take or deal damage or successfully block an attack.". -- Gordon Ecker 00:13, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

The m ain problem with this skill is raven talons not doing damage. --Ckal Ktak 13:09, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

PvE-only caster skills from EotN in general

suck. the melee/para/ranger ones are great, but the caster effects are basically suck. why is there nothing useful for casters? —The preceding awesome-sauce comment was added by Skakid9090. 22:27, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

That's interesting. I consider the GW:EN shouts to be pretty bad for Paragons ("Don't Trip!" is a niche skill, the self-buff shouts only give 1 Energy from Leadership, making them almost as good for other combat professions, and the debuff shouts are 10 Energy, which means that they're only good on someone with caster Energy regeneration unless someone brings Energizing Chorus), and Pain Inverter, Great Dwarf Weapon, Snow Storm, "Finish Him!" and Ebon Battle Standard of Wisdom look like they'll be great on casters. Could you point out some specific skills? -- Gordon Ecker 22:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the problem some skills have is the requirement to be within melee or a shot range of the target, but many GW:EN skills work very well on casters. Even Ursan Blessing, for example - the attack skill may be used from a range (for some reason, the one we get in the "mission" can't, but the one from the elite skill can), and it's easier to keep up on an Elemntalist with Energy Storage or on a Necromancer with Soul Reaping than with a Warrior or a Paragon. I think many other skills in GW:EN are like that - they do not provide a direct benefit if the character is a caster (like Mindbender does), but they require energy and are thus easier to use on casters. Erasculio 23:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Casters have Mindbender, that's reason enough to enjoy the fun of PvE casting. Does obliterate the need for mesmers though. --Ckal Ktak 09:33, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Just take a look at the dmg, every new pve dmg spell is underpowered, (Alkar's Alchemical Acid, Technobabble & Ebon Vanguard Sniper Support) casting them faster doesn't do anything. Skills like Necrosis & Defile Enchantments are much better.

Please sign your comments rather than just writing in the date, and actually have a look at the intended purpose of most of the Pve Skills, they aren't purely there for damage. --Ckal Ktak 13:42, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Asuran PvE skills (e.g., Radiation Field)

→ moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

Hey! I was browsing through the PvE skill list and was a bit disappointed with the Asuran skills, at least when you compare them to what is available to other title tracks. At midlevel title, the summons will be level 14-15, meaning against level 25 enemies they will take greatly increased damage. 60 second recharge doesn't help either. I suggest making the progression for summon levels 15...25 to warrant the "only one summon active at time" status and reducing recharge to 45 seconds. Skills like Radiation Field and Technobabble have high energy cost and recharge compared to their effect. 5 seconds of -6 degen means 60 health loss for enemies in ward range at max Asuran rank :/. Smooth Criminal sounds like a fun skill. I suggest making it "you can use the stolen spell at same attribute rank as enemy you stole it from". Cheers mate! --Toge 04:28, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Radiation Field at highest tier on fleshy enemies does 220 damage where 160 is disease alone, how ever its still only viable to be used on a tank or some suicidal caster who holds enemies around him long enough for secondary effects to kick in, making it "at target foes location" or 1 sec casting would do a lot. Still not as good as signet of infection on a sword war. Biz 07:08, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Well of Suffering is pretty good comparison to Radiation Field. Both have very similar effect, except Radiation Field costs +5 energy, has +1 second cast, +2 second recharge and Disease means -2 smaller degeneration compared to hex degen (and can backfire if enemies are human). Radiation Field is a Ward instead of Well, which can be both good and bad thing, but equal in power they are not. It makes me wonder why Radiation Field is a PvE-only skill in the first place. --Toge 11:46, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Radiation Field being a ward means it's more powerful than a well. You cannot choose exactly where to place a well, you need a corpse, and so on. It's logical that a ward is less powerful than a well, given how situational the later is. Erasculio 13:00, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think this is a right place for you to start a lecture how skills work. --Toge 14:48, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

A lecture like "Both have very similar effect, except Radiation Field costs +5 energy, has +1 second cast, +2 second recharge and Disease means -2 smaller degeneration compared to hex degen (and can backfire if enemies are human). Radiation Field is a Ward instead of Well"? Funny, I have the feeling I'm allowed to state my opinion regarding skills in a section about skills, even if you don't want to hear it. Erasculio 14:53, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

orly, more blabla plz, back to topic, yes most of the asura skills are weak and even worse with low asura rank. Degen doesn't do crap dmg in pve btw. but I will not explain why. 9 September 2007 (UTC)

hi 2 u anon, troll moar pl0x --Tankity Tank 21:55, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

All of the Asuran skills are trash at a low title spec. Pain Inverter is ok at a high spec as a boss killer, as is Asuran Scan; Mindbender becomes really attractive at high spec for a caster. Some of the Polymock summons look pretty strong but I wouldn't even look at them until you're rank 8. Sure there's a good amount of trash in there as well (Radiation Field, Smooth Criminal, Air of Superiority), but most of the skills are at least decent; they just have scaling issues that make them useless without near-max titles. -Ensign 20:27, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Compare Radiation Field to Rotting Flesh. I'd say it's a Radiation Field is better skill. Remember that one major advantage PvE skills have all other skills is that you don't need any attribute point investment, only title investment.--Skye Marin 21:01, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Radiation Field is an order of magnitude worse than Rotting Flesh. The inability to open with it or aim the skill effectively kills it. I guess you could put this on a cornerblocking Warrior or something but that seems pretty awful, doesn't it? Don't get me wrong, I'm a pretty big fan of disease, but I really don't see how you'd ever use this. How were you thinking of making use of it? -Ensign 23:26, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

You're spreading a condition to an area, instead of a single target. Both instances have the additional effect of spreading to nearby foes of the same species. The durations are comparable. A 5 second delay (with bonus degeneration) for 'area' disease is not a bad trade, and becomes a matter of preference and situation.--Skye Marin 11:39, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll ask again: on what character and under what circumstances do you think that Radiation Field warrants a slot on your bar? -Ensign 21:54, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Basically anytime I'd use Rotting Flesh on a caster, this can replace it. Being in the area of a melee foe, who is near another melee foe, who is near a caster foe means disease will spread there, and having it in 'area' and ignoring species barriers makes it more likely to infect all foes you're encountering anyways. Consider also that plenty of caster-class creatures in PvE do melee-attack damage too. Remember, the duration overlaps the recharge, and the recharge is the only numerical downside comparing Radiation Field to Rotting flesh (aside from the 5 second area degen beforehand). Getting Disease in an 'area' is pretty handy for using Necrosis. I won't argue against a buff for it, but there are a few skills that are more deserving.--Skye Marin 01:29, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the main advantage of the summons is acting to fill a requirement for other skills. For example, the Mursaat summon inflicts Weakness, that may then be used by Necromancers or Mesmers or Elementalists as part of their own skills, without having to waste attribute points just to get a skill to do that. So the fact they're at low level until maxed rank (which at least to me means they'll never be at high level : P) doesn't bother me. If they were supposed to be tanks or had only direct damage, it would bother me terribly given how level is important for those tasks, but as it is...Erasculio 00:46, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh I'm not arguing for a numerical buff to Radiation Field, I just don't think that what it does is very good. Some skills are just weak because what they were designed to do is weak. It's similar to how, say, Smooth Criminal is never going to get a slot on a PvE bar. What it does isn't relevant. -Ensign 21:07, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

But smooth criminal is as bad-ass as Micheal Jackson :O. Who isn't bad ass in the least bit! Readem Hate Mail Goes Here 21:42, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Smooth criminal would only be useful if it stole monster only skills. Think echo chain twisting jaws. Lord Belar 16:56, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Smooth Criminal

I don't get what role this skill is supposed to fufill, Was it some kind of twisted synergy with Signet of Illusions? Why do we have this skill when we have Arcane Theivery and a duplicate of that too? Yes it gives back positive energy as if it were "Inspired Spell", but is that really what we want in PvE? Maybe if it stole elite spells only (for for the purposes of disabling them you understand) or if it did something else entirely, people would notice, as it is, it's just a good name and cool icon going to waste. --Ckal Ktak 13:55, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Can totally shut a boss out of one of his skills indefinitely, same with the other "duplicate" skills you mentioned, however, this does not require any points in Domination. --Deathwing 16:18, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes it can, but signet of humility would work so much better no? Yes, that would need points in inspiration, but then you'd be able to take the edge off all bosses with certainty, rather than just caster ones, if you get lucky. Like I say, stealing elite skills only would be pretty godly. --Ckal Ktak 08:13, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Ebon Vanguard Assassin Support

I am not saying this skill is weak is just that it would be nice if it could do more than one combo against something other than Charr since its lead has a 20 sec recharge. Done25 23:16, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

I Capped Signet of Ghostly Might yesterday and was disappointed to learn that though it claims to work on summoned allies and the Ebon Vanguard Assassin Support describes itself as a summoned ally, the Van' 'Sin isn't a valid target. Is this a bug or oversight? I'm guessing the other GW:EN summons (Ruby Djinn et al) have the same issue. Crystalion 23:44, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Way to go A-Net. Done25 00:44, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

This needs some buffing. No sane assassin uses a 20 cooldown lead atatck as their ONLY lead attack. He needs at least one on 10 cooldown or below. --Life Infusion «T» 04:03, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Better yet give it Sneak Attack --Life Infusion «T» 04:49, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The point of his skill selection is that his combo is unblockable. Otherwise he would be useless against a foe that has a chance to block attacks. But maybe his duration could be buffed a bit so he could use a second combo. --SkyHiRider 18:07, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Monster

Brutal Mauling

this makes the most popular pet (bear) weaker than the rest of them. It has been 3 whole games! Why hasn't this been fixed? Done25 18:41, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Because it isn't exactly high-priority or damaging... lol. Just delete it IMO, its a worthless relic. — Skuld 18:44, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Kinda what I ment by fix. At least make it the same speed of the other attacks. Done25 18:48, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

It would actually be quite ncie is each pet had a unique attack skill that had a small random chance to activate, maybe causing a condition. Bear = 5s Deep wound, spider = 10s poison, wolf = 12s poison etc. Would make pet choice more interesting. Maestro Ed 00:15, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I dunno about random skills with actual effects... PvP characters would be stuck with Wolf forever, and if people realized that Spiders had a better effect then something else, either prices on Spider runs would go way up, or everybody would be doing spider runs. Just fix this one; either remove it completely (might make some bear owners sad with that), give it an attack speed in-line with the rest of the attacks (so bears don't end up with the currently slightly slower attack speed), or just give this to every pet. My vote's on the middle one; let it stick around, just change it so it's not lowering the bear's damage like it is now. -- Jioruji Derako.> 09:12, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Way better would be each pet having brutal mauling equivalent (but without terrible casting time, just normal attack) doing NOTHING. It would be used to trigger "Attack Skill used" requirements on paragon shouts (if there are skill shouts working for allies outside party :-/ ) or other skills. On downside, it would also trigger shield bash or Wary Stance. Pets could use Paragon synergy outside returning 1 energy per pet shout used. Zweistein 10:36, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

If you gave it regular pet attack speed, bears would be imba cus they could use anthem of envy with no disadvantage, something no other pet could do. Delete it - its the only way. — Skuld 11:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

True... it seems only fair, with that logic, to just delete it. I wouldn't mind seeing normal Pet Attack skills counting as Attack Skills for the purposes of Anthems and whatnot, but that's a different discussion altogether... -- Jioruji Derako.> 11:57, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

If you read again you would see that i suggested equivalent skill for all pets. Thou, it is either that or simple skill removal. Zweistein 21:23, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Just food for thought, you can't really assign different skills to different pets without giving pvp characters the option to pick their pet - otherwise you're back to a situation where pve characters have an advantage in pvp. The fastest way to patch this up is just to remove brutal mauling from the bear. --Tankity Tank 01:51, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

PvE characters already have an advantage in pve with pets - Dire, Hearty, Elder etc. I'm just pointing out that basic pet stuff is neglected even more than worthless skills. -- 00:54, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Removing it would be the best option. However, either it would have to be removed just from the pets once they're charmed or remove Breaking Charm along with it, or else it is impossible to Charm a bear in Pre, since you need that long cast to chew up time when the ranger is trying to charm it --66.67.187.203 00:54, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Really, overpowered...they can attack more/less then other pets! Nerf plx! Readem Sorry, I'll stop trolling now. 00:56, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Player characters are overpowered too, remove the skills that they (we) use pl0x. And monsters and NPCs and Heroes. Remove all skills from the game. Wandfights only!

Since it's obvious that ANet won't remove the skill, I suggest that pets be rebalanced by giving every other pet Brutal Mauling as well. That's right, I want to see the Dune lizard rear way up so it balances on its tail, then falls on the enemy yelling "tiiiimmmmberrrrrrr". Upright pets like Cranes and Moas would obviously instead pivot horizontal and deliver a slow-motion drop-kick. Not only would it solve the balance issue without ANet having to delete a skill they obviously love, it'd be entertaining. --Epinephrine 19:18, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Devourer Bite

I think this skill could use something to make it more than just the skill you use while Siege Devourer Swipe is recharging. -- Gordon Ecker 01:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Luxon / Kurzick Title Track

This title is much harder (read: time-consuming) to progress, rank-wise than the Sunspear title. I know this title is account wide. Taking that into consideration what should the time-sink ratio be between this title and the Sunspear Title? 1:2? 1:6?

Well, doing some fun math I've concluded the following:

• Halfway on each track, comparing rank 5 sunspear to rank 6 faction, the ratio is 1:400.
• Maxed out, comparing rank 10 sunspear to rank 12 faction, the ratio is 1:33.

I don't have 33 PvE characters.

Here are my calculations:

• Sunspear Run: 3,250/hour with Wurms outside of the Gates of Desolation.
• Faction Run: 10,000/hour doing repeatable quests (FFF), which is 20k/hour on the Title if donated.

This means per hour, you gain about 6 times as many Faction points than you would Sunspear points.

• Rank 10 Sunspear is 50,000. Rank 12 Faction is 10,000,000.
• Taking the time to do 50k Sunspear, doing Faction instead, is 6 times that, so 300k.
• That's 3% of Rank 12 Faction. Repeat 33 times, you get almost 100%.

Now compare 500 Sunspear vs 1,200,000 Faction (Rank 5 vs Rank 6)

• 6 x 500 = 3,000
• 1,200,000/3,000 = 400 Characters

It takes 400 times the amount of effort to get a character half-way to power a PvE Faction skill than a PvE Sunspear Skill. This is why simply reducing the maximum tier won't be enough to fix it. Note that these calculations consider the fastest farming methods for each title, and take into consideration the double-faction donation bonus and new Faction Title progression. Before those changes, the ratios would be even higher.

My suggestion would be to add even more ranks to the Faction title, and have the skills' power scale Only between 10,000 Faction and the current rank 3 Title (400,000 Faction) in a manner similar to how the Sunspear ranks scale. This would make the Faction PvE skills more functional and appealing, allowing them to do what they were designed for. The higher tiers of the title can stay high, for whatever reason they are.--Skye Marin 15:22, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

"in a manner similar to how the Sunspear ranks scale." what do you mean by this? --Ckal Ktak 13:59, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I mean, exponentially, so that the last few ranks are the hardest to obtain, compared to the first few. The jump from rank 9 to 10 Sunspear is similar to the jump from rank 8 to 12 Faction. The titles should be very front-loaded Rank-wise so that it's easier for the PvE skills to be more readily usable for those that don't intend to max out a title.

• http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Allegiance_rank
• http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Sunspear_rank

--Skye Marin 15:22, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Expect that for almost all PvE only skills increases in the associated title only have marginal effects on the skills themselves. You can stop at about rank 3 for the allegience tracks and have effective skills. Maestro Ed 15:33, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it marginal. The Kurzick / Luxon skills are generally about twice as powerful at rank 12 as they are at rank 1. On Talk:Gaile News I suggested splitting the Kurzick and Luxon title tracks into a "regular" title track used by the skills which maxes out with roughly the same amount of faction as rank 4-6 on the current title track and a "legendary" title track which does not affect the skills and maxes out at the same place as rank 12 on the current title tracks. -- Gordon Ecker 02:07, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I would tie the L/K skills to total faction earned, with a progression of 10000...402000...500000 Faction for equivalent attributes of 0...12...15. 500k faction is peaches for the AB'er, faction farmer, or FA frequent, but a nontrivial amount of effort for the casual joe. But 500k is attainable by putting in a good amount of effort without making the whole thing feel like a grind. ~Seef II <☎|→> 04:04, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

It took me 5 weeks to get 9k faction. I even had help from some friends. We lost interest the first game of so, and left 5 minutes in. Can anyone solve my problemo? <--Iizrkoolkidnowhuh? Readem Promote My Ban Here 06:21, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

The luxon/kurzick skills are part of the worrying trend to reward farming with stronger (PvE) skills instead of better looking gear. Just because it is PvE doesnt mean that the "skill > grind" principle should not be upheld. I bet if anything like this was introduced in PvP, the outcry would be huge. --Xeeron 14:39, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Bizarrely enough, grind is wanted in PvE to add a sense of purpose, it isn't wanted in PvP since that would go against the mantra of skill over hours played. --Ckal Ktak 15:03, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Grind should be limited to cosmetics. This is a game mechanic and should be grind-free. Sadie2k 22:36, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

That is what diminishing returns and alternate ways of gaining faction are for. Making grind less required and more fun without taking away the "purpose" for PvE. The hard to gain ranks in any faction title should always only get minor bonuses compared to those obtainable by the casual player and there should always be an effective non farming way of acquiring faction. Thats why i liked the dramatic improvement in faction gain through Master Dungeon Guide and Hero's Handbook with one of the last patches. That way you can actually gain faction with playing the game rather than spending all day farming for it. Beetlejuice 14:33, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Allies

Deldrimor Dwarves

This may be a stupid question but...are they supposed to help you at all? Done25 19:32, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

specifically which ones? --Ckal Ktak 20:57, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Any of them really. The Dwarven Soldiers that "guard" the king in THK for example.

Those guys? They provide much-needed comic relief by Frenzy-Healsigging while you're sitting back and waiting for random chaff to attack the king. ~Seef II <☎|۞> 21:11, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, these guys could really use a buff. At least make them somewhat comparable to their Stone Summit counterparts. I mean, how the hell is Deldrimor still standing when their own defenders fight like the merchants do in Gates of Kryta? x__x --Srakin 19:30, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

If I remember I think I saw one Stone war take out 3 dwarf archers while taking almost no damage. Done25 21:17, 26 February 2008 (UTC)