Guild Wars: Why the Paragon Hate?

In researching my Paragon article (Which, you know, should tell you just how long I've been meaning to get around to writing it.) I came across a curious attitude on behalf of the community: Paragons are teh suck.

Not just Paragons but, basically, any class and mechanic introduced since the original release. The idea, I guess, is that the game was much purer and balanced way back when without all the new stuff cluttering it up. To which I have to respond, were these people actually playing the same game as I was? Spirit spam, for example, originally applied to a Ranger with Oath Shot and a half dozen annoying spirits. Gale Warriors were fun but in no way balanced. Ranger spike, Bloodspike, Obs spike, hell, IWAY, there was just as much lame stuff back then, if not more, than there is now.

I don't get the attitude that new must equal wrong, I guess. Although there certainly have been some design missteps and unnecessary mechanics added. Shadow Stepping, for one, is about the worst thing to ever be introduced into the game. It destroys the idea of positioning and pre-kiting in favor of running your fingers down the keyboard. And the Dervish forms are almost broken by definition. So, they have something of a point but I think, here, it's too knee jerk of a reaction.

As I said, the proper comparison to a Paragon is a Ranger. And as the [QQ] boys say, how can you tell a bad Ranger? Because they die.

It's something of an exaggeration but Rangers have a lot of armor - up to 100 against elemental damage. And stances that make them annoying to target - as anyone who's been left in a "Got Snare" situation at the end of an Arena match with that one idiot Ranger with Escape who's determined to run in circles for as long as they can will tell you. With their range and ability to blind, cripple, daze and more from over the horizon as it were, they can cheerfully pick almost anyone apart from a distance. Their ability to interrupt and blow up your plans is second only to a Mesmer thanks to things like the ubiquitous D-Shot. Give them things like Natural Stride and you basically make them permanently untouchable.

Oh, and let's not forget that, with Expertise, this is a character that runs on an effective seven or eight pips or regeneration. It's that strong primary attribute that allows things like R/W thumpers or R/A or even R/P to thrive while there's virtually no one else who can afford to do the same thing with bow attacks. You don't see W/R notching an arrow, for example (Outside the Guild Lord and Ghostly, that is), even though it's technically possible. The Expertise tax makes it inefficient for anyone but a primary Ranger to, well, be a Ranger.

But I don't think anyone would argue that the Ranger is broken and should be removed from the game. Anymore than any reasonable person would argue that Warriors deal too much DPS or Healing is overpowered compared with damage. They're just good at what they do. And there's nothing wrong with that.

The Paragon only has one expansion worth of skills to play around with but, like a Ranger, they're a multi-faceted class that has a lot to recommend it. Sure, they get a lot out of using their shouts and chants thanks to Leadership but, you know, Mesmers use their skills better thanks to Fast Casting. It's just a given that there are some benefits to playing a primary. The grossest abuses of that energy engine, like Watch Yourself! (Which is one of those things that you seriously have to wonder how it slipped through the testing phase. I mean, no one caught that a moderately useful shout with a low adrenaline cost that you can spam for tons of energy unlinked could be a problem? It was the first thing I thought of when I heard about Paragons and I'm sure I wasn't the only one - but, of course, I have some experience abusing WY! thanks to old school smite spam.) seem to have been curtailed.

And, sure, their shouts and chants are useful and hard to deal with once they go up but, for the most part, they're very conditional. Things like Anthem of Flame only last for one attack while things like Anthem of Envy has so many caveats and exceptions that it's hard to get them to work right. Like anything conditional, when you can jump through those hoops you can really get something. But if you can't, you're pretty ineffectual.

As for how hard they are to counter, well, the skills that a Paragon uses that you really care about are generally chants, not shouts. There's nothing you can do about a shout but chants have a one second casting time, at least, so there's at least a chance you can interrupt them. And there are counters out there to the various shouts they just don't, for whatever reason (Probably because they're very narrow and not really necessary as shouts aren't really all that important to hate out compared with other things), get played. But things like Roaring Winds and Vocal Minority are out there waiting to be a safety valve if things ever get out of hand. They might need some tweaking to become, you know, good but just because they're not used doesn't mean they stink - Rust is a perfectly good counter to signets, it's just not going to see much use unless signets are a problem.

The only thing I'd really give to all the haters is Aggressive Refrain. It's just too damned good despite its enormous cost and the 25% boost instead of the normal 33%. Most IASes have significant drawbacks. Aggressive, on the other hand, has none provided you can sync the expiration of various shouts and chants. That never-ending faster attack rate boosts not only your DPS but also the adrenal gain and makes you that much more deadly. Especially since it's something that only a primary Paragon can use it's just not a very well-thought out skill. Still wouldn't catch me using a Paragon without it but it could definitely use some looking at.

Maybe it's just me and the fact that I've skipped in and out of the game so much, but I don't see how adding more complexity and depth to the system is automatically a bad thing. New skills and professions are something to welcome as they freshen the game and enliven it with new potential and possibilities. They need to be carefully monitored and balanced so they don't throw things out of whack and, you know, that could be done better, faster. But I'd rather explore those possibilities rather than complain that the game's changed.