Guild Wars 2 is in the absolute fast lane for gamers right now: the developers have finally firmly integrated DirectX11 into the game, the long-lost Living World season 1 is available with new rewards, and some cool comfort adjustments are making their way to Tyria. The latter includes this Elimination of equipment damage – but in the classic “be careful what you wish for” manner, this again brings with it a shortcoming: the developers don’t want to make anvils and repair canisters useless, so there is a new buff about them that increases health and defense for twelve hours offers. But what was supposed to elicit a “Yay” becomes a “Yay…oh shit” for me and other players. Our poor monitors!
The way buffs are rendered in Guild Wars 2 is terrible
Because the announcement of another buff, which we will keep permanently active, also means that the endless series of buffs that are displayed to us in the game will be even longer. But going back a bit: What is the problem with the buff display in GW2? Over the years, Guild Wars 2 has added countless bonuses to help our characters: food and utility effects, End of Dragons training benefits, card-specific increases in magic find, XP boosters, banner boosts, and and and… It’s not even about the combat-related blessings such as power, panache, anger, stability & Co. and states. These are simply placed in a row and constantly change their position as new blessings and conditions are added. In practice it looks like this:
End of Dragons final meta boss fight skill bar: And that’s far from the max buffs in Guild Wars 2.
Source: buffed
The funny thing is that this picture doesn’t even make it suitably bad. Firstly, the blessings and buffs are constantly bouncing back and forth, which is why it is difficult to see with a mouseover how long some effects will last or what exactly an opponent has now smacked my hero for a harmful effect. Secondly, that’s far from the limit of bonuses you can run around the world with. For some players (depending on the size of the interface), additional boosters, states and reinforcements quickly make icons disappear behind the in-game map in the corner of the screen.
In the boss fights of GW2, thanks to group play, we get countless states, blessings, bonuses, buffs and temporary effects – who should still see through the current interface?
Source: Arenanet
How to solve the problem of buffs?
The community has repeatedly made suggestions as to how the interface could be improved in this regard. For example, with fixed places for states, food effects and boons, so that players can always hover to the same place to check, for example, how long their vigor blessing or their snack bonus will last. Alternatively, you could also specify certain effects that do not have to be displayed in the interface. Who needs constant information that the birthday booster, which sometimes lasts for days, is running? A message would be enough here when such an effect ends. Or at least more than two rows for the different bonuses: one for guild banners, one for “permanent” effects (boosters) and so on. In any case, the status quo is almost unbearable. But what do you think? Does that bother you that much in the game? Or don’t you look so much at the blessings, states & Co.? Write us your impressions in the comments.
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