65 replies to this topic

[Briar]

Just as the title suggests. Is it just me or is GW2 really "mathy" for no reason. I may be bias because I was never a fan of those "spreadsheet wars" games where you have to painstakingly plan every attribute allocation to assure maximum effectiveness. I played WoW but hated it for exactly this reason.

In GW1 I could judge every build effectively just by looking at it... Numbers were low, usually you only had only one "put points here for dps" attributes. All of the complexity was clearly displayed right there on your skill bar. The game even did the majority of the number crunching for you in the tooltips.

Now in GW2 its like "30% chance to gain might on a critical bla bla bla" and you have to ask

Is it worth it to invest more points into precision so that this triggers more often?
Will I get my damage back if I lower my power to put more points in precision
What about "X" rune that makes me deal more damage while under might
If I use that other rune with a 30% chance of lightning bolts
Or that other one that's 5% more damage then I don't need to put points into precision to get the maximum effect
Wait! What if I put too many points into precision so that it procs might too often ala 10 second internal cooldown

How is anyone suppose to decipher this mess without pulling out the dreaded calculator or preforming rigorous scientific tests on a dummy! Then people complain about all the FoTM builds running amok! More people would experiment if it was not such a headache to compare builds


It's really sad but 99% of the time I just follow KISS (keep it simple stupid) take my +5% damage and 5% crit and be done with it. I would use divinity runes on all my characters too if they were not so expensive (probably why they cost so much in the first place)


TLDR Math sucks, there is a reason why accountants are paid so well. No on wants to do this in a game.

[Desild]

Compared to WoW? Nah, Guild Wars 2 isn't all that mathy. A bit maybe... Most of our power comes from constants that are constantly exploited for the sake of min-maxing.

Over the course of a few months, WoW uped their tiers (and the math) three times while all we got was a partially "optional" tier. WoW has what? 16 tiers now? All we have is exotic gear and a handful of Ascended items. Which technically are Legendary Armor with a different name and a coat of pink paint.

In the end, if we ignore agony and scrappy boss mechanics, most of the shortcomings of gear and statistical power can be patched by good old skill. Like Cleric and Beserker armor actually being good instead of crap. Skill makes it all possible!

Edited by Desild, 15 January 2013 - 09:45 PM.

[Sandpit]

It depends on how you want to play. early on I decided that I wouldn't do what I did in GW1, I would just play for fun, not bothering to be "optimal". I'm sure GW2 could be more "mathy", but only if you let it. You could always get optimal just by doing what everyone else does too, not caring why.

[MisterB]

I'm really baffled by your implication that GW2 is more complex mathematically than GW. Did we play the same games? It is true that GW2 has many cases where the numbers are not displayed for an effect, or the numerical effect is incomplete or just incorrect.

Regarding your last line, speak for yourself.

[Krazzar]

I've been paying far more attention to the qualitative attributes than the quantitative attributes in GW2.  Once you have your coherent build concept the numbers and most choices are completely straightforward. The effects like might on crit reinforce the things you want to do with your build or are aren't coherent (so it doesn't fit) and in the same way if you're a supportive guardian putting points into precision might not be coherent either. It's far more important to have a set of abilities and effects that compliment what you want to do than have the "optimal point distribution".

[Gileas898]

MisterB, on 15 January 2013 - 09:55 PM, said:

I'm really baffled by your implication that GW2 is more complex mathematically than GW. Did we play the same games? It is true that GW2 has many cases where the numbers are not displayed for an effect, or the numerical effect is incomplete or just incorrect.

Regarding your last line, speak for yourself.

Why are you baffled? It's true that GW2 combat contains a lot more RNG, similar to WoW.

[BuddhaKeks]

I never play GW2 without my trusty calculator.

On more serious note, I actually think it's less mathy, or atleast I did less math while doing my build. The thing is, when I made PvP builds in GW1, especially spike builds, I alsways had to calculate, if it will do more than 600 damage in a short amount of time. Something like this never occured to me in GW2 yet. I never had to use a calculator, I can pretty much see with first look it something is better or worse than before.
Honestly, I miss doing the math, like I did in GW1. Building PvP builds like we once did doesn't seem to be necessary anymore, it's just, everyone grab a build that he feels comfortable with and go. I miss spikes and pressure builds. :/

[MisterB]

Gileas898, on 15 January 2013 - 10:06 PM, said:

Why are you baffled? It's true that GW2 combat contains a lot more RNG, similar to WoW.

I refuse to play WoW, nor was I comparing it at all. GW had a fair amount of RNG, although it feels like GW2 has more. I haven't done a direct comparison between the two. I was not referring strictly to random number generation anyhow.

[Gileas898]

MisterB, on 15 January 2013 - 10:23 PM, said:

I refuse to play WoW, nor was I comparing it at all. GW had a fair amount of RNG, although it feels like GW2 has more. I haven't done a direct comparison between the two. I was not referring strictly to random number generation anyhow.

But you do realize that OP is complaining about RNG? Like 30% to get might on critical hit etc.

[Krazzar]

Gileas898, on 15 January 2013 - 10:28 PM, said:

But you do realize that OP is complaining about RNG? Like 30% to get might on critical hit etc.

Is that where you stopped reading and posted? Seems like it because that's not the complaint at all. For more details read the post, look at the thread title, the thread tags, or any other posts in the thread.

[Gileas898]

Krazzar, on 15 January 2013 - 10:29 PM, said:

Is that where you stopped reading and posted? Seems like it because that's not the complaint at all. For more details read the post, look at the thread title, the thread tags, or any other posts in the thread.

Your reading comprehension is off the charts mate. Here, I will help you. Important stuff is in bold.

Briar, on 15 January 2013 - 09:39 PM, said:

Now in GW2 its like "30% chance to gain might on a critical bla bla bla" and you have to ask

Is it worth it to invest more points into precision so that this triggers more often?

Will I get my damage back if I lower my power to put more points in precision

Will the might stacks I get from RNG surpass the power I lose by putting points into precision?

What about "X" rune that makes me deal more damage while under might

Will RNG Might procc enough to make this rune worthwhile?

If I use that other rune with a 30% chance of lightning bolts

Or that other one that's 5% more damage then I don't need to put points into precision to get the maximum effect
Wait! What if I put too many points into precision so that it procs might too often ala 10 second internal cooldown

Will RNG might procc too much if I point X points into precision?

In case you still don't get it; it's hard to get a good estimate of what different abilities is the best for you, since the X RNG that is determined by Y stats is difficult to calculate.

Edited by Gileas898, 15 January 2013 - 10:49 PM.

[Jump_N_Move]

Wait people run things besides straight Berserker armor?

I mean i should of stopped reading after the first two sentences. But i paddled on. It can't be more "mathy" than GW1, due to the fact that there are less skills, less damage 'ranges' on those skills, and less skill effects. The math isn't really math but lots of RNG sitting on top of a flat base determined by your armor and traits. That base is also linear (To gain a point in one place, one must be sacrificed from another). After that skills and skill damage/effects are static.  So even then the only math needed is RNG, which really isn't math, but statistics, which is more akin to the philosophy of math than actually being math.

[draxynnic]

Jump_N_Move, on 15 January 2013 - 11:20 PM, said:

Wait people run things besides straight Berserker armor?

I mean i should of stopped reading after the first two sentences. But i paddled on. It can't be more "mathy" than GW1, due to the fact that there are less skills, less damage 'ranges' on those skills, and less skill effects. The math isn't really math but lots of RNG sitting on top of a flat base determined by your armor and traits. That base is also linear (To gain a point in one place, one must be sacrificed from another). After that skills and skill damage/effects are static.  So even then the only math needed is RNG, which really isn't math, but statistics, which is more akin to the philosophy of math than actually being math.

I think the distinction is that the RNG statistics are more difficult to do the maths on, and less intuitive to see how you should go about improving yourself.

In GW1, it's usually fairly clear what you should do in order to improve your character in a particular area, at least within the confines of having a particular skill set. If you need more damage, pump up the attribute that determines your offensive capability. Need more defense, pump up the attribute that improves your defensive abilities. Having energy management problems? I think you can see where this is going.

For GW2, though, you have multiple ways of going for the same objective. Increasing power is pretty simple, but can a setup that gives you 30% chance of gaining Might on a critical hit be better than a flat 5% increase to attack power? Then you're looking at figuring out your chance to crit, how many might stacks you can expect to get and thus how much extra power you can expect to have from those might stacks, compensating for the effect of internal cooldowns on the buildup of Might stacks, how much extra damage you're going to get directly from having more critical hits from weighting more towards Precision versus any tradeoff you have from Power... and that's without considering defensive abilities or really any decision making beyond building around a Sigil of Force versus a Sigil of Strength.

GW1 did have a more complex set of skills to choose from, but once you had, gear and attributes were fairly straightforward - you might pull the calculator out occasionally to get the perfect mix, but it's going to be an attribute point here and there rather than a complete overhaul of your build. GW2 has made skill choice a lot simpler, but added a lot more complexity in gear and attribute allotments.

[FoxBat]

I think the idea is that dungeons aren't truly difficult and you can more or less run whatever you want and still win. Obscuring what is "best" means more casual players can run a variety of random things without feeling too bad about them. I have hardly ever seen pugs gear let alone build check so this seems to be working as intended.

[Westwater]

But anyways, yeah there can seem to be a lot of numbers to keep track of.  In contrast though, with the limited skillbar if they only had 4 stats for everything, say DPS, defense, endurance and healing, the game would get really brainless.  Say if you want to go half offense and half defense, you can go about that a few different ways on GW2.  Would focusing on crits be more important than raw damage?  Then you can look at the armor sets and see if any of them have precision and defensive stats.  If that layer of depth wasn't there it would be really pointless to learn what every stat means and exactly how useful each one is.

Edited by Leyana, 16 January 2013 - 03:38 AM.
Uncalled for

[ben911993]

Actually, I quite enjoy how "mathy" GW2 is. I have fun with optimizing builds and finding the butter zones for my attributes, and crunching all the numbers to figure out just how much of each attribute/trait line I need. However, what I don't enjoy is that experimenting and switching attributes can be a very prohibitive process, considering how much gold you have to invest in your armor, weapons, jewelry, runes, and sigils.

With all of my characters thus far, I've tried to look at traits and skills ahead of time to crunch all the numbers and figure out what build will be most optimal for my play style. Usually I can be fairly on par with what I aimed to achieve, but I still want to be able to experiment. That's where GW1's system was much more favorable for me; it was far more open to experimenting and tweaking things here and there, and less costly, albeit with less options overall.

Edited by ben911993, 16 January 2013 - 03:32 AM.

[Trei]

No meters = no need to crunch numbers.

For the first time in a long while, I could actually leave all the numbers behind when I play.
When I choose a spec, I do so not because its the best spec, but simply because the names and descriptions sound like what I want my character to be good at.

Take my guardian alt.
He will forever be using a big ass hammer as main weapon. For everything. For no reason other than I want my asura to wield a weapon bigger than himself and I like Fus Ro Dah the skill Banish.

[Yui San]

Briar, on 15 January 2013 - 09:39 PM, said:

In GW1 I could judge every build effectively just by looking at it...

This makes me wanna cry. This is exactly the "ping your build", *don't see all the "must have skill"*, "omg noob" reaction attitude that hurt the game so much. (I appologize for the free style syntax ^^).

I'm glad that GW2 is a bit more complicated and gives us more possibilities (even though it has not nearly as many skills as GW1). I don't think it is as "Mathy" as it seems in the first place, it just takes some time to come up with something nice because there are many interesting builds and stat/equipment combos. And thank god, it's not possible to ping builds in this game.

[Briar]

draxynnic, on 16 January 2013 - 12:10 AM, said:

What I meant to say written in a way that makes coherent sense

Thank you Draxynnic this is what I was trying to say but I was having difficulty's explaining. The game has disposed of the complexity of skill interactions and has replaced it with numerical interactions. Which are much more subtle on first glance.

RNG by itself is not the problem, but yes it is the vast majority.

Other culprits include

• Power, Precision and Critical Damage interacting with each other in a trinity of confusing
  
• Diminishing and exponentially increasing returns (ala attributes and condition stacks/might stacks)
  
• Undocumented mechanic interactions such as Sigil internal cool-downs
  
• Runes that do similar things (Power or +4% damage! wait what?) this may also play on the fist point
  
• Condition stacks interacting in weird ways... Go for 25 bleeds BUT NOT MORE that's wasted dps

I am sure there is more I cannot think of. But as you can see it can get very complex, very fast

Edit:

Yui San, on 16 January 2013 - 04:21 AM, said:

This makes me wanna cry. This is exactly the "ping your build", *don't see all the "must have skill"*, "omg noob" reaction attitude that hurt the game so much. (I appologize for the free style syntax ^^)

To be fair I was never one of those people. FotM builds were pretty generic to any area of the game while my builds were always fine tuned to the area I was in. More often than not I was running Counter-FotM and you can bet that the second Searing Flame became popular in halls my monk was already running Mantra of Flame before the rest of the population even caught on

Edited by Briar, 16 January 2013 - 04:51 AM.

[Krazzar]

Gileas898, on 15 January 2013 - 10:48 PM, said:

Your reading comprehension is off the charts mate. Here, I will help you. Important stuff is in bold.

In case you still don't get it; it's hard to get a good estimate of what different abilities is the best for you, since the X RNG that is determined by Y stats is difficult to calculate.

Your ability to miss the point is only matched by your ability to speak about yourself unknowingly. I would comment on your reading comprehension, but it is non-existent. This thread is about decisions in GW2, of which RNG is only one part, but nice try shoehorning in your narrow agenda. Next time don't post as soon as you see a word you don't like jump out at you.

It might be hard for you, but that's a long list.

Yui San, on 16 January 2013 - 04:21 AM, said:

This makes me wanna cry. This is exactly the "ping your build", *don't see all the "must have skill"*, "omg noob" reaction attitude that hurt the game so much. (I appologize for the free style syntax ^^).

I'm glad that GW2 is a bit more complicated and gives us more possibilities (even though it has not nearly as many skills as GW1). I don't think it is as "Mathy" as it seems in the first place, it just takes some time to come up with something nice because there are many interesting builds and stat/equipment combos. And thank god, it's not possible to ping builds in this game.

The ambiguity or complexity has kept the build wars at bay in all the content I've done (which is pretty much everything).  That's a major point because the build wars destroyed what guild wars was supposed to be (after it was changed from what it was originally supposed to be) rather quickly.

Edited by Krazzar, 16 January 2013 - 04:49 AM.

[I'm Squirrel]

Not exactly "mathy." But it is damn confusing without any research. I've been playing since release and I have no idea how condition damage, clone/phantasm damage, mesmer shatter damage, or off-hand damage works. Not sure how regeneration or magic find works either.

[Bryant Again]

I, on 16 January 2013 - 04:46 AM, said:

Not exactly "mathy." But it is damn confusing without any research. I've been playing since release and I have no idea how condition damage, clone/phantasm damage, mesmer shatter damage, or off-hand damage works. Not sure how regeneration or magic find works either.

I was pretty much going to say the same thing until I saw this post.

[matsif]

overall it is definitely more mathy than gw1 but nowhere near as complex as other rpg's I've played.  I had at least 3 or 4 times the amount of spreadsheets when I played eve than what I have for gw2, and I really don't need a few of the ones I have for gw2 anymore due to websites and other things tracking them better.

[Shiren]

What I find ironic about GW2 is that it seems to offer far more complexity when it comes to creating builds, but far less diversity. In GW1 builds were intuitive and easy to understand and there were countless possibilities available to you. In GW2 there are less possibilities avaialable to you yet it still finds a way to be far more complex, less intuitive and much harder to understand. There are so many numbers, sources for those numbers (traits, armour) and mututally exclusive options (special rune effects which competes with runes based on stat choices, gaining stats from traits but missing out on traits from other schools etc) and so much hidden information (this game is one of the worst I've ever played when it comes to displaying hidden information) I find it far harder to make sense of anything.

[Arquenya]

Shiren, on 16 January 2013 - 04:57 AM, said:

What I find ironic about GW2 is that it seems to offer far more complexity when it comes to creating builds, but far less diversity. In GW1 builds were intuitive and easy to understand and there were countless possibilities available to you. In GW2 there are less possibilities avaialable to you yet it still finds a way to be far more complex, less intuitive and much harder to understand.

Personally I find GW2 FAR MORE confusing than GW. Especially all the trait stuff, with healing/crit in one line for one class, crit/condition damage in another and all the skills that may have or may not have to do with the stats that come with it. And it's different for every class.

Sometimes it doesn't make a lot of sense, for instance guardians and warriors hardly have any viable weapon setups with conditions, yet there's seperate trait lines for condition damage and duration, Are they both useless? Do I waste my points or do the skills make up for them? Or like the warrior shout build, generally accepted as one of the best warrior builds.While I actually don't want even more vitality (as warriors already have an abundance of it) but rather toughness - but shout means vitality so you have to take it.

I fail to see the logic behind it. GW was far, far more straightforward.

[Fenice_86]

Sometimes i think GW1 and GW2 were made by different companies, with different developers, and so on...

Btw lol at math in GW2, you should see theorycrafters in Diablo 2 or 3 than!

Complexity and study brings more efficient and better solutions, if you are too lazy for math than enjoy what you can achieve without it or copy/past mindlessy what other ppl do.
But asking to simplify a game because u dislike to put efforts in understanding mechanics and numbers well... it's not our fault or developer's fault LOL

(that being said i agree that descriptions are always wrong or lackluster or bugged or unspoken and all this doesnt help players at all)

[Calebrus]

What's a spreadsheet?
Is that what happens when you wake up really early and ignore making your bed so that you can start playing and having fun faster?

[Arduin]

Considering I can clear any content with a full set of whatever rare gear, I'm not sure if anyone needs to bother with spreadsheets. Maybe if you are aiming for lvl 80 fractals, Arah explorable mode or make a name of yourself in tPvP you need to spend some time with calculations.

For the rest, knowing what to dodge and what not to dodge seems to me like of more importance than +200 toughness, for instance. Knowing when to rez and when to help downed players rally by themselves by assisting at killing a foe is more important to me than +50 power. Playing with people you know, knowing how they play while using voice software makes even more of a difference.

You are of course welcome to spreadsheet all of you want and I'm sure you'll be able to eke out a bid of advantage compared to someone that simply slaps some gear together, but in the end it'll probably only allow you to clear any content faster.

So no, GW2 doesn't seem overly mathy to me. You can play this game perfectly well without ever using a spreadsheet or look up builds and such stuff.

[davadude]

Briar, on 15 January 2013 - 09:39 PM, said:

TLDR Math sucks, there is a reason why accountants are paid so well. No on wants to do this in a game.

Without math, no computers.  Just a fun fact!

[Veltoss]

GW2 is probably one of the least mathy games I've ever played. I've not had to do any math besides when playing the TP. Compared to something like Torchlight, Diablo, WoW, etc, there isn't much.