pure balance vs spike in GvG

[coldplay]

Recently, I have observed lots of GvG battles and found something might be interesting.

Most of top 100 American guilds run spike build, all kinds of spike builds, such as, pure ranger spike, ranger/necro spike, ele spike, ele/ranger/necro spike.

But I have never seen any top 100 Korean guild run any kind of spike build, they often run what a call "pure balance" build which is 2-3 warriors, 1-2 ele, 1 mesmer or 1 necro, 1-2 rangers, 2monks. their build looks crappy cuz it cant do instant kills, yet somehow it owns spike build most times, this build gets a number of Korean guilds in rank 100.

from what I have heard, I heard, even EP lose the most to Korean guilds

I dont mean to offend any guild here, just want to have a discussion here :
in GvG, how come a balance build running by Korean guilds gets to win over spike build often.

BTW, if you can log on game after 11pm EST. you will get to see a lot of top 100 Korean guild in GVG.

[a cadet]

Spike teams need all 7-8 people to spike effectively. A "balanced" team as you put it is really a split build (I'm guessing thats what you meant in any case). If a team splits up, they can threaten both the flagstand and the Guild Lord at the same time. Since most spike teams cant split up well, it gives the other team a huge advantage.

Im probably over simplifying everything, but thats the very basic idea of a 'balanced' team.

[Everyname Is Taken]

Spike teams don't become as strong until the other team starts to build dp. The more dp the less people they need to spike. So if the balanced team starts taking them down at the begining, makes the spike teams stop, and slow down their spikes cause they need everyone up at the begining.


Team union probally runs the best split team out there.

[Murder In China]

Spike teams are for short matches, not meant for any battles to last long. As they are weak in long run.

[crimsonfilms]

It's just a different playing style.

Koreans do prefer a pressure build with 2 monks. This is consistent damage provided by warriors and elementalist. Once in a while they will do a mini spike. This is not as fast and hard as US/Euro spikes but with the pressure added already on the monks, they are very effective (although in 4-6 second time span pressure builds can actually do more damage). The downside of pressure build is that it is susceptible on degen builds because conditions and hexes are very energy consuming to remove.

Spike builds are meant for quick coordination that can take anything down - even warriors in 1 or 2 volleys of attack. Spike builds are weak when the team splits. Pressure builds usually do well against spike because 2-3 missed spikes (either not well coordinated, interupted or blocked by infuse) becomes an opening for pressure builds. There will be a sudden drop in offense because of exhaustion, spell recharge and/or lack of energy.

Degen builds like SNA is usually a slower process compared to spikes because of the obvious and not to mention they usually bring only 1 warrior and/or ele for pure damage. The rest are hexes and conditions from Mesmer, Necro and ranger.

There is also energy denial buildthat works well against degen builds but can be quick death with warrior based pressure builds.

All of these are "balanced" builds. They do carry melee damage, condition, hexes, corpse control and etc. Each build just emphasize different aspects of GW combat.

[Lampshade]

Just about everyone has a counter-spike build now, so pressure is the way to go now it seems.

[Goonter]

Ive been watching too, and I was some what surprised by korean tactics.
Ive noticed a lot of W/E with gale, rangers with poision arrow and cripple shot, prot boon monks and air eles with mes secondary to remove hexs and enchantments.

The warriors disrupt the spike with gale (great to kill kitting too) and add steady damage along with elementist. Rangers snare and poision everyone.
If someones health drops low enough he is finished with a mini spike.
3 monks cant stop a good spike but 2 monks can manage a team that faces a spike team that fails to spike.

Something like this^ is most of what I see korean teams do.
I dont know if I would call it a "pressure" build, because if any build doesnt apply pressure its not going to win period. But it does apply preasure better to certain corrdinated spikes.

The funny thing is that the builds look so simple and plain but they end up winning and I think to myself, "why the hell is there even top guilds if this is what wins?"


I enjoyed watching some of the american spike teams. iQ had one that was pretty nimble or flexable. EP as some crazy enchanment overload spike. Both drop a player faster than I can blink. I dont know who started them, but lots of teams seem to run variations of these builds.

[Thom]

To the original question: "how does balance break spike"? A poorly executed spike is easy to break. I'm a mediocre infuser, but I break spikes in a two monk system. If you are expecting spike, it is even easier to break. Split team has been mentioned as one standard counter, but once you have an idea what the spike is you can normally disrupt it enough to make the save easier.

Even if you lose a player or two to a spike, a few saves should be enough to make the pressure kick into effect. Once you have the spike team on the defensive they are playing your game. While a perfectly executed spike is near unbeatable, everyone knows who is running perfectly executed spikes so they can prepare accordingly. Top teams already knew who was running what, the rest of us are just now getting to peek in.

[Livpooolsupafayn]

Spike teams are for advanced noobs, 1 step above iway. Very repetitive and boring and almost no skill. Balanced teams are the way to go and require diverse and impulsive gameplay, you win by a different means every time and not just 321 spike.

Spiking is very cheap, once you play with it, you'll know why.

[Patrograd]

Spike teams are for advanced noobs, 1 step above iway. Very repetitive and boring and almost no skill. Balanced teams are the way to go and require diverse and impulsive gameplay, you win by a different means every time and not just 321 spike.

Spiking is very cheap, once you play with it, you'll know why.

Ah, this is said by someone who has never tried to run a spike build in high end GvG I'd guess. its alot harder than that, especially in the top 250 or so of the ladder where there are loads of counters around. Try telling Rus Corp or Grim Monolith or any of the other top 50 guilds that spike that they're advanced noobs :)

Any team, whether spike or not, needs to be able to split squad and still operate effectively. It needs to be built into your build. if your team cant split (like the old EP build with the barrier monk) then you are extremely vulnerable to gank teams, as you cant control the stand and protect your Lord at the same time. This makes such teams very easy to beat, you just need to split and gank, there's nothing they can really do about it without making a huge sacrifice somewhere.

The trick to running a spike team is to hit hard, hit fast and hit often. You absolutely have to make the first kill on an enemy damage dealer before you engage really and keep those kills coming every 10 seconds or so. Make sure there is enough damage in your build to compensate for the lack of a team member through death or disabling.

So bearing in mind that:

1) The build needs to be able to split
2) The build needs alot of redundant damage
3) The team needs near flawless co-ordination
4) The team needs to be led by a target caller who *really* knows what they're doing
5) The team caanot afford a single mistake or they will lose

I think that it is rather more difficult to run than is said in this post. It is much easier tactically, its true, than running a split gank squad effectively at high end GvG. Its been great fun these past days beating up on copy cat builds that dont understand the tactics of ganking. It has given us alot of points. Long may it continue :-)

[coldplay]

I really enjoy watching good team running balance build in GVG.
The build looks so simple, seems counterless and counter everything else, all about skills.

[Kabale]

4) The team needs to be led by a target caller who *really* knows what they're doing

Quoted for truth! You can be the best players in the world, but if you've got a leader that doesn't know exactly what's going on, then you're basically screwed. You can usually tell this is the case when everyone else starts speaking out of line on vent/ts... it just gets chaotic, and people end up thinking for themselves/not thinking.

[Livpooolsupafayn]

Ah, this is said by someone who has never tried to run a spike build in high end GvG I'd guess. its alot harder than that, especially in the top 250 or so of the ladder where there are loads of counters around. Try telling Rus Corp or Grim Monolith or any of the other top 50 guilds that spike that they're advanced noobs

Any team, whether spike or not, needs to be able to split squad and still operate effectively. It needs to be built into your build. if your team cant split (like the old EP build with the barrier monk) then you are extremely vulnerable to gank teams, as you cant control the stand and protect your Lord at the same time. This makes such teams very easy to beat, you just need to split and gank, there's nothing they can really do about it without making a huge sacrifice somewhere.

The trick to running a spike team is to hit hard, hit fast and hit often. You absolutely have to make the first kill on an enemy damage dealer before you engage really and keep those kills coming every 10 seconds or so. Make sure there is enough damage in your build to compensate for the lack of a team member through death or disabling.

So bearing in mind that:

1) The build needs to be able to split
2) The build needs alot of redundant damage
3) The team needs near flawless co-ordination
4) The team needs to be led by a target caller who *really* knows what they're doing
5) The team caanot afford a single mistake or they will lose

I think that it is rather more difficult to run than is said in this post. It is much easier tactically, its true, than running a split gank squad effectively at high end GvG. Its been great fun these past days beating up on copy cat builds that dont understand the tactics of ganking. It has given us alot of points. Long may it continue :-)

Ah, this obviously said by someone who relies on spiking to get into the top 250. Yes, T-space bar dual shot requires such skill and miraculous co-ordination. :rolleyes:

Ive spiked for and against top 250 guilds and it just doesent appeal to me blowing holes through a team every 8-10 seconds with the same motion over and over. Id say even iway is more complex that spike, although harder to run in gvg.

As long as the spike team gets the first clean kill off, which is the whole point of spike, they should be near to unstoppable after that. If they dont get off the first clean kill then they are an extremely bad spike team. Who needs to split and gank when youve dped the living daylights out of the opposition.

People who spike know its cheap, an easy and quick way to win. I spike sometimes, and do so knowing that its cheesy. And I do not give it more credit than due to it.

True about the target caller though, it can make or break a spike team. But its a team game and shouldnt rely on one guy to hold everything together.

[Patrograd]

Ah, this obviously said by someone who relies on spiking to get into the top 250. Yes, T-space bar dual shot requires such skill and miraculous co-ordination. :rolleyes:


Well, we used to run ranger spike, but not any more, too easy to counter in GvG (the maps/terrain are a real pain for rangers) which is why most GvG spikes involving rangers only have two of them these days, the rest of the damage coming from blood spike.

Yes we spike, everyone does to a point, but you know the build is constantly evolving. If we were still running the original spike build we started with then we wouldnt have got into the top 200. Its all about evolution. it took a while to learn as well, as most GvG is about tactics and positioning rather than build, and how to handle the endgame correctly, and how to handle various enemy tactics. Sure at lower levels of the ladder you could turn up with 8 (poorly) trained hungover monkeys and win most battles, but it just isnt true in the top quarter of the ladder.

If you think 'pure' spike is as easy as t-space bar-skill then you might like to explain why isnt everyone doing it? Most competitive guilds are out to win, and if spike was the be all and end all, and uncounterable, and so easy to run, all the top guilds would be spiking, which they clearly arent.

So perhaps those guilds like us, who have worked hard at evolving a spike build that actually works for the most part, in the face of most counters, are doing something more than just mindlessly spiking.

Now dont get me wrong, we know full well that to move onto the next level we will need to evolve again, and that evolution will be forced on us by us hitting a plateau when we stop climbing, but for now, in our part of the ladder (rank 186 at the time of writing), spiking gets us wins, and we get our fun from winning, so until we stop winning with it, or discover something that gets us wins easier and quicker, then spike is what we do. Such is the nature of competition.

[coldplay]

I wonder how EP is doing so well at spiking. from what ive seen in videos,they use ranger spike combine 2 necro orders and bunch of enchants. In theory, this build would be countered as hell yet somehow they are still in top 5.

[crimsonfilms]

Spiking is not for noobs. Far from it. It requires a tremendous amount of coordination and team communication - in fact, more than pressure and degen builds where 1-3 players are "on their own."
You have to watch out for things like Cry of Frustration and Wild Blow. You can easily drain yourself of energy. And most spike builds are difficult to play in split situations.

If you are running a rainbow spike you have coordinate cast times, factor in lag, enchanment removal, stance removal, weapon/spell range, etc, etc. This is why a lot of ranger spike is so popular. It is much simpler form of spiking compared to other spike builds. No warrior Eviscerate/Deep Wound sync problems, you dont have to track when all spells are recharge, and it neglects protective spirit pretty much.

iQ, Rus Corp, EP and many top 50 teams run/ran spikes one time or another. Their spike (usually rainbow or ele based) are far from the spikes you see above the 100 rank ladder.

[tafy69]

Lately we just resurected the old rainbow spike build out of the grave and gave it a go.

Spiking is not as easy as it looks! Against inexperienced teams without an infuser its just too easy, but when facing pressure builds...

So Pressure Vs Spike - You gotta have a great caller for this, take out their damage as hard and as fast as possible which usually is the warrior or mesmer typically. Then you got the super monks with aimbot infuses to deal with

Korea doesnt run spike because they got a totally different way of playing the game, ever seen korean iway? They play pretty seriously and they wouldnt put their eggs all in 1 basket.

[coldplay]

Korea doesnt run spike because they got a totally different way of playing the game, ever seen korean iway? They play pretty seriously and they wouldnt put their eggs all in 1 basket.

Koreans play at cyber-cafe a lot, it is possible that entire guild plays at 1 cafe. What is the better communication way than "just shout".

[Chev of Hardass]

Spike Build: Contains one way to play the game. If the team that you play brings the counter they need to stop your spike, you are pretty much done.

Balanced Build: Bring every counter to every type of build. If a spike team can spike one of your players you are vunerable and the chain reaction comes, but if you can stop some of the first spikes, you will ruin the other team.

The build/teamwork required to maintain a balanced build IS far more difficult than in a spike build, but there are so many spike builds running that a balanced build will run against it's nemesis type spike all too often.



BTW, iQ and EP base their spikes off of Phantom Pain and Shatter Delusions, not Rangers, or Eles, or Warriors.

[crimsonfilms]

Bring every counter to every type of build.

In theory this sounds good. But in reality it is much harder to come up with a build that covers everything just because the limitation of having 8 players and 8 skills.
Not to mention you become Jack of All Trades and Master of None. You either have a decent build for most builds or your subpar.

The build/teamwork required to maintain a balanced build IS far more difficult than in a spike build

I disagree in general. If you watch in Ob mode and ever listen in Vent, you will see that warriors have often a free reign on the battlefield. For the most part they are on their own to target. They are opportunistic players. Of course the team sometimes need coordinated attacks on certain targets but for the most part, they just run around hacking the right targets (with intelligence). There is no calling or counting down or waiting for the right spell to be casted before unleashing your adrenaline. Then you have trapping or crippling ranger just harassing soft targets. Mesmer/Nec usually shutting down their targets on their own (calling it but again no heavy coordination). Pressure builds like this depend on EACH player knowing what to do without heavy coordination from team leader. It requires a more skilled player on each position but as a whole it is easier to run IMO. Spike build is the opposite you have one caller (with a backup of course) keeping track of enemy position, casting time, recharge and etc. Each spiking player does not have to be as skilled as your caller but team coordination must be perfect in many instances or spikes will fail.
A warrior down in a pressure build is not as a big deal as an spiker down. Damages are calculated in the nth degree. One spiker gone means 1 volley spike is out of the question for the most part.

Look at the top teams with pressure builds you will see often it is a chaotic battle where teams are split up in 2,3 and even 4 locations.
A spike build needs a Borg approach. Move us one and target one. Let us not even motion fake spiking.

BTW, iQ and EP base their spikes off of Phantom Pain and Shatter Delusions,

Actually iQ was running an air spike build prior to their current split pressure build. It was 3-4 Eles - not pure air but mostly air (Strike and Orb). I saw them face Te and SNA with it about a week ago.
I saw EP I think with their monks running Vampiric Gaze. It was the 2.5 Monk build as many would refer to it. They had 2 rangers to help on the spike.

.02

[Chev of Hardass]

In theory this sounds good. But in reality it is much harder to come up with a build that covers everything just because the limitation of having 8 players and 8 skills.

I never said it was easy


I disagree in general. If you watch in Ob mode and ever listen in Vent, you will see that warriors have.......

See your first point, or......
Umm, try it. Try to get two warriors to Wild Blow, then follow up with a Cry of Frustration and see if it does not take the whole team to help out.


Actually iQ was running an air spike build prior to their current split pressure build. It was 3-4 Eles - not pure air but mostly air (Strike and Orb). I saw them face Te and SNA with it about a week ago.
I saw EP I think with their monks running Vampiric Gaze. It was the 2.5 Monk build as many would refer to it. They had 2 rangers to help on the spike.

.02

You are wrong. Look at the game film again.

iQ- three Air eles a Phantom pain/Shatter delusions mesmer.
EP- two Rangers with orders and a Phantom pain/Shatter delusions mesmer.

The Air Eles are just there to do some damage at the same time as the Mesmer spike.

[crimsonfilms]

I never said it was easy

There was no implying you said it is "easy." I said it was "harder."

Try to get two warriors to Wild Blow, then follow up with a Cry of Frustration and see if it does not take the whole team to help out.

As I said, there are times where there is a coordinated sync gank. Almost every build style does during the match. But if you look in practice from any guild, be elite or non rated, pressure build warriors are on their own to find proper targets in order to pressure monks healing/prot skills.


iQ- three Air eles a Phantom pain/Shatter delusions mesmer.

That is only to apply deep wound. The majority of the damage is from the Strike and Orb. If we follow your logic that is like saying a ranger spike is an Order spike. The Deep Wound is an important part of the spike but nevertheless secondary to the coordinated air spike. If you want to even give it numeric value - compare the damage done by Orb and Strike to Deep Wound/Shatter.

Another way of looking at it - Phantom Pain/Shatter happens prior to the actual spike.

Sarus or Ensign - you want to settle this?

[Patrograd]

The damage from the pp and shatter is actually pretty high, although as you say its not the main part of the spike

lets say target is unprotected and has 500 health (for ease of working out)

Phantom pain at 0 illusion for less than a second- neglible damage
Shatter delusions at 16 domination = deep wound + 79 damage

I think the shatter dleusions is taken first, so 500-79 = 421
Deep wound lowers max and current health by 20%, leaving target with 337/400 health, a total hit of 163 which isnt bad, but is a long way from being fatal.

An air spike team will then hit for 3 x orbs which does 3 x 106 with 20% armour penetration (which I think comes to 3 x 145 onto a 60Al target). Throw in a couple of vampiric gazes from the monks at 46 each, and possibly even something from the flag runner if he's on site and you should have an insta kill spike, of which the pp/shatter is a significant, but not dominant part. if the target happened to have some form of enchant on, or one of the spikers was disabled then a follow up with shatter enchant/lightning strike is usually needed just to finish off. This is the one second window where an infuse monk earns his money ;-)

Personally I dont like orb spiking because of the line of sight requirement, but it is surely powerful against low armoured enemies.

[Vermilion Okeanos]

well, if you are truly "BALANCED", nothing can break you very easily, nor will you break anyone easily.

I think the most fearsome are the shape shifters (a build capable of changing play completely until it need to change), mainly because usually they got very talented people doing this too.

Now... I just wonder where should I stick "Completely shutdown"? If a build is truly "completely shutdown", there are no match out there, unless the same build.

Personally, I feel that it would be hard to justify any kind of build being better than every single one; as even thou IWAY is widely played, but almost none of them are complete clone of each other, instead with a large variation, some are better and some are worse.

[Hannibel]

as for EP loosing to korean guild..... they lost to The Last Pride, which is top ranked guild on ladder.