PvP Balance: Adding Classes

[Asyntyche]

Having only really played this game seriously for ~6 months (i still haven't got into PvP, i fail enough at PvE :o ), i was wondering what the state of PvP play was like before the release of Factions and Nightfall compared to now.

Did adding the extra classes (with skill types that have no counter) make the job of skill balancing too difficult? Or is the main problem the sheer number of skills introduced?

Watching some of the top GvG battles recently, it seems the added classes are used, but in niche roles. This could be due to people being more familiar with the core classes, but is it just the limited uses of the new classes?

I guess at this point in time the main reasons to ask this would be to see if skill balance could be better implemented in GW2 over time using Expansion packs (just new skills) rather than new Campaigns (new skills and classes), assuming a similar skill setup.

[FlamingMetroid]

The six core classes were created to fill all of the MMO roles, so when new professions were introduced, they broke the game because there wasn't any room for them. Hopefully GW2 will equally distribute role positions for each class, or leave room open for new classes to enter.

[la_cabra_de_vida]

The added classes are for the most part, one trick ponies. There is either one build to rule them all, or a small set of skills the are only viable in pvp.

[FoxBat]

The six core classes were created to fill all of the MMO roles.

The "striker" role as the define it in D&D 4.0, fragile martial characters with precise high-damage, didn't exist. This has been in umpteen number of RPG games since as rogues, thieves, assassins, sniping archers, and what not. The assassin basically failed though and only became useful in PvE through Death Blossom buffs turning them into another tank. I don't know whether they could've done it better in GW's existing system, or whether it could ever make PvP any good, but this style of character is a staple of most RPGs. The rigid combo orders sure didn't help anything though.

The Rit and Paragon similarly plugged a hole in terms of "offensive party buffs" which is another staple of the genre. (Clerics, Paladins, Warlords, etc.) Relatively mindless "passive offense" a skill-testing thing, probably not, but these staples were designed for strategic dice-rolling games with minatures, not real-time esports.

The expansion classes were made narrow specialists by choice, so that there would be design room for more and more classes like it. Which again, is already shooting yourself in the foot from an "elite" PvP perspective.

[diff]

From a PvP Point of view, GW is not about classes, but about build templates.
The class is just a game mechanic that puts up restrictions on how you can set up a build of the skills you have. The most obvious is that you cannot take skills from 3 different professions in one skillbar.

In pure theory, having more classes could help with the the skill balance: If one could balance skills by moving them around between the classes, broken templates could be made impossible by sharing the skills of those templates between 3 or more different classes.

However, this will never happen in GW, since we also got PvE, where the classes have to be balanced in such a way that every class could find a group for a mission.

[MasterSasori]

Did adding the extra classes (with skill types that have no counter) make the job of skill balancing too difficult? Or is the main problem the sheer number of skills introduced?

Watching some of the top GvG battles recently, it seems the added classes are used, but in niche roles. This could be due to people being more familiar with the core classes, but is it just the limited uses of the new classes?

I guess at this point in time the main reasons to ask this would be to see if skill balance could be better implemented in GW2 over time using Expansion packs (just new skills) rather than new Campaigns (new skills and classes), assuming a similar skill setup.

Skill balances can never make everything perfect whether 6 classes or 10.

Niche roles are going to happen sooner or later the more classes you add. Though this is a big generalization, certain classes just specialize at roles better than others.

The new campaigns Anet keeps making is how they gain $$$ and the new skills are an incentive to entice players to keep buying.

[RiKio]

Stopped reading after this sentence, it's obvious you're a moron.

Er...his post was sensible. VERY sensible.

IMO, Assasins are the only class that deserved to be implemented....the other ones were mere hybrids of the others.

[Riotgear]

The Assassin class did have a niche to fill, unfortunately they filled it with a bad class design that didn't go well with how the game already worked. In particular, a class based on ignoring positioning and killing before protection can be delivered in a game that developed most of its strategic gameplay from the exact opposite, and forced skill chaining on narrow 8-skill bars.

Ritualists are conceptually monks with a few unstrippable buffs and spirits. Spirits are bad for the game.

Dervishes are conceptually warrior rehashes with enchantment cycling. The enchantment cycling stuff hasn't exactly added anything to the game because it sucks.

Paragons are conceptually an uncounterable support juggernaut. There never was a niche for them to fill, because the entire concept of them is broken.

[shoogi]

Game was way more balanced then. 12xx skills now, 6xx skills then. New classes were meant to satisfy pve audience (PLZ ANET PLZ WE MUST HAVE A BARD!!!!).
As some people said, only assassins were a bit more unique theoretically, but in reality that profession was a catastrophe (shadowstepping = BAD mechanic).

[toastgodsupreme]

PvP was also much more fun prior to Factions and NF.

I used to run a wammo (i know, lol, but this was to be an ass) and I'd use healing breeze + bonnetti's for energy and be invincible in the yak's arena, lol.

This was before timers on pvp matches and tomes. I once outwaited someone for just over two hours. I was stubborn. But that's what made it fun.

I do miss the old days. Before necros were nerfed in minions and soul reaping, before pvp timers, before tomes (when you actually had to work to get skills).

[Yichi]

Er...his post was sensible. VERY sensible.

IMO, Assasins are the only class that deserved to be implemented....the other ones were mere hybrids of the others.See this post from another thread on why assassins are a hugely bad idea...

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showpost.php?p=3704877&postcount=13

[Arkantos]

IMO, Assasins are the only class that deserved to be implemented

I think your opinion sucks. Assassin has been a flawed class from the beginning, should have never been implemented.

[The Meth]

Right now I would say the only non-core class that isn't completely lame is the ritualist.

Assassin's are inherently Lame and are against everything PvP should be in GW.

Dervishes are warriors with enchants. Then everyone who had an IQ of over 50 realized enchants suck so Dervishes are used for their God Mode ability that they have active half the time.

Paragons are warriors with a ranged attack an unstripable party wide buffs. Great Idea.

Ritualists started out as spirit spammers, then Anet decided spirits suck so Rit's are now channeling and restoration. Unfortunately their skills in each attribute are horribly skewed to a few skills (Splinter weapon and Ancestors rage are 100x better then any other channeling skill) which means they have basically 1 build they can ever use. But at least they fit in decently.

[erk]

A couple of obvious things Izzy could do to improve Dervishes and Sins is to make several powerful scythe skills adrenaline based so they can't just charge in and get a kill with the first few hits.

Shadow stepping of all kinds should cause exhaustion, I'd include Ride The Lighting, Vipers defense, Aura of Displacement etc. in the list of shadow steps.

Mind you, some of the old core skills are still too overpowered eg. Bulls Strike which should not cause any additional damage, the autocrit and knockdown are more than enough. On the subject of knockdowns I would like to see the Stonefist insignia require 13+ strength like Sentinel's does, the reason is simple, knockdown is the most powerful shutdown mechanic in the game short of death, so the build should have something to balance against that extra second of knockdown.

So it's not just Nightfall/Factions/EoTN that have outstanding balance issues, it goes way back.

[DreamWind]

Not this topic again. *smacks head* All the new classes were bad for the game. Period. I'm convinced only the clueless think otherwise.

[Krill]

Not this topic again. *smacks head* All the new classes were bad for the game. Period. I'm convinced only the clueless think otherwise.

^^

Rits have been a failed jack-of-all trades with more gimmick combinations than probably all other classes combined.

Para defense and spear spam being used on all classes is stupid. Defensive Anthem > Shields Up! > Watch Yourself!...woo hoo.

Dervs have incredibly stupid wham factor and scythes have been abused to the max on other martial classes.

I don't even want to start with sins, everyone but the people that play them know their skill set and concept doesn't jive with the the game.

I find it interesting, thinking back to proph days when the martial classes were very rarely interchanged, i.e. R/W with warrior weaps or W/R with bows. Now you see sins with scythes, rangers with scythes, everyone trying to use various spear builds as a primary or just for extra spam damage and it's just simply retarded in the end. The sad part is that most of the expansion skills for the core classes have generally been good and without the expansion classes the game would be still be great. I think anet would have retained more players and expansion buyers without the expansion classes, but I understand their motive in trying to add new stuff to entice buyers.

[RiKio]

IMO, REAL and not mere wannabe-ninja, also balancedAssasins are the only class that deserved to be implemented.

Fixed, but it seems now an uthopy :(

[Hyper Cutter]

thinking back to proph days when the martial classes were very rarely interchanged, i.e. R/W with warrior weaps
That may just have been because it hadn't caught on yet, since iirc the original thumper build was made of Core and Prophecies skills...

[erk]

^^


Dervs have incredibly stupid wham factor and scythes have been abused to the max on other martial classes.


It's not scythes, it's the energy pwered scythe skills, be sure you understand that.

[Paint_By_Numbers]

Yeah I was running r/w with various warrior weps (hammer favourite) for ages in prophecies, heck my first pve character was a r/w with warrior wep rofl, then I translate into pvp... but not warrior with bow lol..

[Asyntyche]

ok, seems like most people here agree that the new classes were a bad move. but i'm thinking that part of the problem was that the new skills added at the time (for core classes) didn't have enough focus on allowing the new classes to be countered (ability to remove weapon spells for example).

(although i'm not familiar with all the skills, so correct me if i'm wrong)

[The Meth]

ok, seems like most people here agree that the new classes were a bad move. but i'm thinking that part of the problem was that the new skills added at the time (for core classes) didn't have enough focus on allowing the new classes to be countered (ability to remove weapon spells for example).
(although i'm not familiar with all the skills, so correct me if i'm wrong)

Thats kind of the problem, though weapon spells aren't the best example.

Weapon spells are actually decently balanced at the moment, the counter to them being interrupts and the fact that they are unstackable and generally pretty short lived.

The bigger problem is with, for example, paragons. Yes they have a few necro hexes that will counter, but bringing a skill that is completely wasted if the opposing team doesn't have a paragon is a bad skill when you can only have 8 on a bar. Not to mention as soon as its on, the opposing team can just remove it.

Assassin shadowsteps and 1-2-3 spike are designed to kill an enemy before they can react to it with no warning. The 'no warning' part is particularly troublesome, because with assassins able to spike down anyone in casting range single target protection (the bread and butter of PvP) fails, because you can't predict what will be hit next. Teams end up needing to instead deploy large amounts of party-wide protection or 'defensive webs' which instead slows the game down into a stalemate.

Dervishes are bad because they are just another warrior. You can't have two professions designed to do exactly the same thing, or one will end up better then the other and be the only one used. There is only one way to smash someone's face in melee combat, trying to do it with two different professions is stupid.

[Age]

The six core classes were created to fill all of the MMO roles, so when new professions were introduced, they broke the game because there wasn't any room for them. Hopefully GW2 will equally distribute role positions for each class, or leave room open for new classes to enter.
Yeap the Faction classes killed the best of GvG.

[Trylo]

soo... how much QQing would pursue if anet started a proph + core skill only pvp weekend?

which in turn would show people (like the OP) what gvg was supposed to be.

[Riotgear]

The 'no warning' part is particularly troublesome, because with assassins able to spike down anyone in casting range single target protection (the bread and butter of PvP) fails, because you can't predict what will be hit next.
The typical gank class puts a tremendous tactical burden on everyone else, and gets powerful escape tools that minimize the burden on itself. They're virtually impossible to balance in PvP. Either they can escape reliably and are near-untouchable, or they can't and their otherwise-flimsy defenses cave in. Either they can kill things practically on command, or they can't, in which case the counterattacks will wreck them.

Gank classes have been either completely dysfunctional or absurdly overpowered with no middle ground in every MMO I've seen them in, because just about every aspect of their class has those characteristics.

Someone used the term "melee mesmer" to describe what the Assassin class could have been, which I think is the best real objective: A melee class less oriented around killing things and more oriented around disrupting the flow of combat.

[DreamWind]

soo... how much QQing would pursue if anet started a proph + core skill only pvp weekend?

which in turn would show people (like the OP) what gvg was supposed to be.

The problem is they would have to revert all the skill balances that have happened since then as well. (Which is never going to happen).

[Krill]

It's not scythes, it's the energy pwered scythe skills, be sure you understand that.

Yup.

[way of the master] + [wounding strike] + [Eremite's Attack] + [mystic sweep] or [crippling sweep] makes me cry.

Not to even start with the various native derv spike builds with repeatable +40+ attacks and instant deep wounds.

That may just have been because it hadn't caught on yet, since iirc the original thumper build was made of Core and Prophecies skills...

True, but I don't think the original thumper build with tiger's fury and ferocious strike was nearly as effective as the current mixed martial builds (e.g. sway, critical scythe etc.).

[-Pluto-]

As much as there are some annoying mechanics introduced in the expansion classes... I always have to remember that necromancers are probably just as poorly designed as anything that came after, from a pvp stand point. If we remove the expansion classes from pvp, can we remove necros too? (only being a bit facetious here)

[DreamWind]

As much as there are some annoying mechanics introduced in the expansion classes... I always have to remember that necromancers are probably just as poorly designed as anything that came after, from a pvp stand point. If we remove the expansion classes from pvp, can we remove necros too? (only being a bit facetious here)

I would agree with you except for the fact that Necros existed in a time when the game was at its balance peak.

[Shadowspawn X]

Game was way more balanced then.

The game was broken as heck back then, GW has never been more balanced. All this romanticizing about the past is not accurate.
Spirit spam (I'm talking laying down 5 copies of QZ at a time), air spikes, a year of IWAY, .25 sec ranger interrupts and out of control smite was not balanced. This embellishment of the past where there was a golden age of balance is a myth. Now we have balance on a much more complete scale. The new professions had to go though the same breaking in phase as the core six because the core six took forever to balance as well.

[DreamWind]

The game was broken as heck back then, GW has never been more balanced. All this romanticizing about the past is not accurate.
Spirit spam (I'm talking laying down 5 copies of QZ at a time), air spikes, a year of IWAY, .25 sec ranger interrupts and out of control smite was not balanced. This embellishment of the past where there was a golden age of balance is a myth. Now we have balance on a much more complete scale. The new professions had to go though the same breaking in phase as the core six because the core six took forever to balance as well.

Hmm...I don't really see where you're coming from here. The time period I am talking about is roughly before Factions came out, not at the beginning of Prophecies. Things like spirit spam and air spike were already nerfed. Iway was still played some but not overpowered and not dominating. Dual smite hadn't come along yet.

I agree with your point that the core six did have to go through balances, but many people agree that there was a balance PEAK in Guild Wars with the original classes. Many people also agree the 4 newer classes have yet to be balanced, and may never be because the mechanics behind them don't really belong in Guild Wars.

I don't know...maybe I'm wrong about all this. Maybe I just miss the Koreans or something. I do know games back then were so much better to watch than todays games. :(

[DutchSmurf]

Just before Factions came out the game was 'balanced'. Balanced as in everyone ran the exact same game, skill for skill. The condition/pressure heavy meta that came after that was far more fun.

[samcobra]

Scythes are imbalanced. Shadow-stepping is relatively imbalanced. Spirits in general are imbalanced. Spears and chants and party-wide shouts are imbalanced.

[kvndoom]

Scythes are imbalanced. Shadow-stepping is relatively imbalanced. Spirits in general are imbalanced. Spears and chants and party-wide shouts are imbalanced.

Therein is the big problem... each new class introduced a new mechanic, and none of those mechanics were good for the game.

Assassins: teleporting. no further discussion needed

Rits: spirits were already part of the game, but Ranger spirits helped or hurt your opponent as much as your own team. Spirits that benefit only the caster's team, and longbow-range turrets, just bad, bad design.

Dervishes: Autoattacks that hit up to 3 foes. no further discussion needed.

Paragons: shouts and chants existed too, but they were primarily in a line (tactics) that really sucked anyway. And they weren't an energy engine, which was a horrible design decision. Anet learned absolutely nothing from Soul Reaping and Expertise abuse. I'm not totally sold on Spears being bad for the game. A damage-oriented ranged weapon isn't necessarily bad, but their imbalance comes from my final point, which in itself has caused much of the grief that we've seen over the last couple years:

There never, ever, ever should have been any viable IAS in Guild Wars besides Frenzy.

[erk]

Best you can do is lobby A.net for a class limited version of your favorite PvP, most likely a tournament GvG series of some sort. The new classes are more powerful for a reason that's been stated time and time again, upgrade sales.

In WoW they do it by raising the character level cap by 10 for each new chapter you buy, in GW the do it by introducing more powerful classes and skills for the old classes, it's that simple, it all comes down to a sales strategy.

[DreamWind]

The new classes are more powerful for a reason that's been stated time and time again, upgrade sales.

In WoW they do it by raising the character level cap by 10 for each new chapter you buy, in GW the do it by introducing more powerful classes and skills for the old classes, it's that simple, it all comes down to a sales strategy.

What works for WoW is not going to work for most other games. Most games that follow the "we are trying to make money instead of the best product" philosophy are doomed to failure. I cannot count the number of games that went down the tubes because of this strategy.

I don't personally think Anet intentionally made more powerful classes strictly for sales though. They knew that any PvPer was going to have to buy the expansions for the classes/skills regardless of how good they were, and any PvEer was going to buy the expansions for the new content regardless of how good it was.

[Zui]

The new classes made the game worse (although this is somewhat of an oversimplification of the issue). There has been a lot of discussion as to why this is on these forums in the past, and I'm sure you can find those threads using the search function.

[In reply to Shadowspawn X's post] Hmm...I don't really see where you're coming from here. The time period I am talking about is roughly before Factions came out, not at the beginning of Prophecies. Things like spirit spam and air spike were already nerfed. Iway was still played some but not overpowered and not dominating. Dual smite hadn't come along yet."

The smite he is talking about would be ether renewal smite (at least that's what I thought when I read it). It was nerfed long before factions came about, and since the other builds he was talking about were also nerfed before Factions, it makes logical sense that he was including ether renewal smite in that same list.

Just before Factions came out the game was 'balanced'. Balanced as in everyone ran the exact same game, skill for skill. The condition/pressure heavy meta that came after that was far more fun.

I'll agree that the heavy condition/pressure meta was very fun to play in, and was some of the best times I had playing Guild Wars. Although, I also found the state of the game just before Factions came out to be a very good time for the game...

Ahh, if only ANET hadn't squandered the potential of their game...

[erk]

I don't personally think Anet intentionally made more powerful classes strictly for sales though. They knew that any PvPer was going to have to buy the expansions for the classes/skills regardless of how good they were, and any PvEer was going to buy the expansions for the new content regardless of how good it was. Classes are major new content from both a PvP and PvE perspective. Sure the storyline, maps, quests, are the PvE main draw cards.

From a PvP sales perspective:
Factions - AB, Battle isles/new halls.
Nightfall - Hero Battles, new halls.
EoTN - we can pretty much forget about for PvP changes.

But the Factions/Nightfall new classes and skills were the main PvP reasons to own those two chapters. If you didn't have the new classes/skills you would get pwned by them, that's a pretty good reason to buy them!

As I mentioned before there is a good opportunity for A.net to do something fun in the way of a special tournaments for say for "retro" GvG lovers, which does something like restrict the professions played to Prophecies etc.

Personally I would love to see some matches where you could only use skills from your Primary profession, so secondary skills, if you carried them, were disabled.

[urania]

Nightfall - Hero Battles

one of the best additions to the game ever made.

*sarcasm*

[Akaraxle]

one of the best additions to the game ever made.

*sarcasm*
Ohi Karla, herd u wuz pro hiro badles playa amirite?

[DreamWind]

But the Factions/Nightfall new classes and skills were the main PvP reasons to own those two chapters. If you didn't have the new classes/skills you would get pwned by them, that's a pretty good reason to buy them!

Of course thats true. I'm just saying I don't think Anet made the new classes intentionally more powerful for sales. I think Anet released the classes with no idea how overpowered they would be.

[Hyper Cutter]

I think Anet released the classes with no idea how overpowered they would be.
The Paragon, maybe. The Dervish was nerfed HARD by NF's actual release. I can only assume that the Paragon slipped under the radar due to how damn good dervs originally were...

[around]

The Paragon, maybe. The Dervish was nerfed HARD by NF's actual release. I can only assume that the Paragon slipped under the radar due to how damn good dervs originally were...

Only because it was completely ridiculous in the preview events. Seriously, it was an instant iwin button.

[Hyper Cutter]

Only because it was completely ridiculous in the preview events. Seriously, it was an instant iwin button.
Exactly my point. Compared to that, the paragons looked balanced...

[DreamWind]

The Paragon, maybe. The Dervish was nerfed HARD by NF's actual release. I can only assume that the Paragon slipped under the radar due to how damn good dervs originally were...

What about ritualists, assassins, and grenth/melandru dervishes? But yea, paragons were probably the most ridiculous though. Like I honestly wonder if Anet tested them at all in PvP before release.

[Riotgear]

The Paragon, maybe. The Dervish was nerfed HARD by NF's actual release. I can only assume that the Paragon slipped under the radar due to how damn good dervs originally were...
Energizing Finale got hammered as well, but the class as a whole strikes me as the kind of thing that was a terrible idea they could never quite shitcan because PvE players had invested too much in them.

[Akaraxle]

I think Anet released the classes with no idea how overpowered they would be.
Pretty sure a few people would claim that Anet very much had an idea how overpowered they would be... mainly because those people warned Anet beforehand, if you get my drift.

[Free Sigils]

Remember how long it took for us to incorporate Assassins and Ritualists into regular play? I read an interview with I beleive izzy once where basically he said they released the rits and sins as intentionally underpowered, and slowly cranked them up, to try to keep the meta balanced. For nightfall, they switched it. They cranked em high and worked the way down. The only problem is of course that they never really finished. It makes sense on a player level trying to introduce the professions into the game faster, but they just failed to nerf it properly.

Honestly, I like what Rits and Dervs did to the game. Sins are meh imo, I kind of enjoy shadowsteps, adn the crit buffs even when I am playing prot. But Paragons can go to hell. Please.

[Krill]

Honestly, I like what Rits and Dervs did to the game.

You like the instagib capability of scythes and binding rituals?

The only think I have liked about rits is that it got me playing ranger 90% of the time.

[DreamWind]

Pretty sure a few people would claim that Anet very much had an idea how overpowered they would be... mainly because those people warned Anet beforehand, if you get my drift.

If they did know, that is really bad. I'm not convinced anyone INSIDE Anet knew how overpowered they would be though, which could be the scariest thing of all. I can't think of a decent company that would release the clearly ridiculous Paragon and expect me to believe they can run a competitive game properly.

Honestly, I like what Rits and Dervs did to the game. Sins are meh imo, I kind of enjoy shadowsteps, adn the crit buffs even when I am playing prot. But Paragons can go to hell. Please.

Rit lords were broken. Derv forms were broken (and still are to some extent). Paragons were beyond broken (and still are to some extent). I'm don't know anyone who thinks shadowstepping was (and is) good for the game from a pure PvP mechanics perspective.

[Akaraxle]

If they did know, that is really bad. I'm not convinced anyone INSIDE Anet knew how overpowered they would be though, which could be the scariest thing of all. I can't think of a decent company that would release the clearly ridiculous Paragon and expect me to believe they can run a competitive game properly.
Let's put it in another way: do you honestly think that at Anet, the very company that developed their own game, no one implementing those skills realized they would be a little too much - even without their testers telling them?

Here's my conjecture: of course they did. And they probably reported that to their office manager, which in turn perhaps reported to the big bosses. But they were probably told "it's fine, keep going"; or maybe the direction acknowledged the issues but postponed their solving until long after the most fruitful features were taken care of, in the twisted and unfathomable queue of priorities (Soul Reaping one year after, anyone?) that Anet always adhered to for their post-release developing process.

[DreamWind]

Let's put it in another way: do you honestly think that at Anet, the very company that developed their own game, no one implementing those skills realized they would be a little too much - even without their testers telling them?

Possibly. We have seen a lot of highly questionable balance decisions over the years...

Here's my conjecture: of course they did. And they probably reported that to their office manager, which in turn perhaps reported to the big bosses. But they were probably told "it's fine, keep going"; or maybe the direction acknowledged the issues but postponed their solving until long after the most fruitful features were taken care of, in the twisted and unfathomable queue of priorities (Soul Reaping one year after, anyone?) that Anet always adhered to for their post-release developing process.

That is a possibility. Your theory is sound, especially the bolded.

[LockerLoad]

Even worse than Assasin Teleport skills are Rit spirits. Talk about a no skill class. It's like tower rushing in Warcraft(not WoW) just build as many as you can near the enemy and eventually you win.

Aside from blatant imbalance and redundancy the worst bit about the new classes was how they resulted in rewriting many staple skills of the core classes. Take "watch yourself" and "fear me" for example. Watch yourself and fear me were fine before Paragons existed, Now no Warrior would bother to clutter their bar with such utter crap.

[erk]

Spirt spammers seem to be easily able to maintain way too many spirits at once. Although they don't really get spammed in GvG, they are all too common in most other PvP.

Many Rit spirits probably need a PvP version with a shortened lifetime the eg. Pain, Bloodsong, Agony, Displacement, Preservation, etc. The rule of thumb I would use is the spirts lifetime should be no longer then the recharge on the skill, at the moment many spirits last way longer. eg. Make Bloodsong lifetime 30sec not 30-126 sec.

[wilson]

I don't think that giving spirits same duration as recharge will do much. Most rits put up spirits of the same type anyway before they die "naturally", killing their own creation, if you like.

Plus, spirits aren't really threatening. They are easyily dealt with.

[GourangaPizza]

Why nobody mentions Necro's imba SR attribute and their suicide bombing strategy?

[Divisor]

Soul Reaping has been mentioned already, and the "suicide bombing strategy" has pretty much always been bad, with a few exceptions. (Those being EoE bomb and bugged Cultists Fervor/Shadow Walk bomb)

[deya]

Guild Wars used to be the best game I've ever played - pre factions that is.

[DreamWind]

Guild Wars used to be the best game I've ever played - pre factions that is.

Winner winner chicken dinner.

[ensoriki]

Did adding the extra classes (with skill types that have no counter) make the job of skill balancing too difficult?

they focused the extra class's mostly in one direction without really trying to diversify them.
Core classes gained new skills each expansion as well but they're easier to fix because they don't have to just focus into one role or play to one style IMO.