GGG wants us to exploit this game

buying and selling to vendors for a profit takes enough time for it to be non-profitable. you're probably better off playing the game.

the kind of exploits i like, and i'm sure GGG likes, are the mathematical ones. i looove combo's. definitely attaching added lightning damage to my ice spear, which almost always crits. i'm sure convert to fire has some breaks in it. facebreaker build seems really fun, and its just a combo. by the end of next year, a good weapon switch combo will probably be very important. the 'never crit' axe and resolute technique keystone seem to exploit eachother. 'on max life' effects and CI seem to work. the opposite of that is blood magic+mana reserve auras+'on low life' effects, such as pain attunement, this is pretty strong. also, i hear perma-stun exists in this game - i'll aim for that one day. soo many combos with flasks.

these things aren't exploiting the game as much as they're exploiting each other. but on the other hand, some of the most powerful weapons have no exploits, they're just powerful. the items/skills are kind of like magic the gathering - combo, aggro(dps) or control(defense).

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Qarl wrote:

Just one thing I'd like to note, if someone does find a way to keep their Diamond Flask ever full, that number is going to be pushed higher than 80.

I have no problem nerfing short term fun for the greater good.

4 Perpetual Diamond Flasks means you really only need to kill ~16 enemies, to say nothing of belt mods or warlord's mark.

CI allows for 4 diamond flasks, and the entire right side of the tree is ripe with crit damage multi to abuse it with. There's no secret why CI+Ice witches are so incredibly dominant now.

I still can't wrap my head around how this hasn't been borne out since Diamond Flask inception back in 0.9.6. They (and Granite Flasks to a lesser extent) have never been balanced.

The only thing you gain by raising the count is pushing it farther and farther away from non-CI casters. Make it add X% increased crit chance instead, make it only apply to attacks and not spells, make it only refill with non-crits, just... something other than kicking the can.

I agree. I definitely love trying to find a way to beat a game. I have noticed more and more nowadays that you play the exact way the developer wants, or you don't play at all.

I guessed
"getting 2 Powercharges with 1 Powersyphon"
to be an "exploit" ...

There's a difference between exploiting and making unorthodox builds.

If you can find a way to make something broken while playing under the rules, it's not an exploit, it's simply pushing the system to it's limit (hello facebreaker!). In other words, unexpected and unwanted results while playing by the rules.

To me, an exploit is abusing something that is simply either limited by AI or a flaw in the code.

A good example of limited AI flaw is when an archer become "stuck" shooting at you despite him being unable to ever hit you. Doing anything harmful to that archer would be an exploit as you are exploiting a flaw in the AI/code.

Another exploit is ground slam through ice wall. Ice wall is supposed to prevent attacks from going through it, yet, it doesn't apply to ground slam due to a coding issue.

Then there's simply cheating, which is usually done by using third party programs and/or injecting code in the application. Bots, maphack, drop hack and so on fall in that category.

Also, I just saw over what kripparrian got banned and it totally fall in the first category (broken game mechanic but something that's 100% within the rules).

I guess when it comes to exploiting one has to ask, if it is reasonable to assume that a player could come to the conclusion that this is an exploit? I geuss ti comes down to how clever one can be, and if they are making use of intended mechanics to the fullest, or are using things that are not intended to work that one.

I remember in one game, in order to gain reputation, I set up a group to kill mobs that gave a good deal of rep. a few things that made this place good for that is that each mob gave a good amount, they were lower level, and they re-spawned quickly. the devs then felt a need to get the GMs to stop us form doing it, and Hot-nerf the area(change it without a patch or even taking the server down)

Another thing related to that was that some people would go afk in the group while standing in a safe location out of aggro range, but close enough to get a shared credit for the kill (as in this game, there was no penalty for grouping to acquire rep, all members got 100% regardless of being solo or in a large group so there was no incentive to kick those who were not currently killing)

No one that I know of was punished for this, but I could see that it might have been possible. in any case this was the first thing that made me understand that exploits are not always black and white.

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pneuma wrote:

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Qarl wrote:

Just one thing I'd like to note, if someone does find a way to keep their Diamond Flask ever full, that number is going to be pushed higher than 80.

I have no problem nerfing short term fun for the greater good.

4 Perpetual Diamond Flasks means you really only need to kill ~16 enemies, to say nothing of belt mods or warlord's mark.

CI allows for 4 diamond flasks, and the entire right side of the tree is ripe with crit damage multi to abuse it with. There's no secret why CI+Ice witches are so incredibly dominant now.

I still can't wrap my head around how this hasn't been borne out since Diamond Flask inception back in 0.9.6. They (and Granite Flasks to a lesser extent) have never been balanced.

The only thing you gain by raising the count is pushing it farther and farther away from non-CI casters. Make it add X% increased crit chance instead, make it only apply to attacks and not spells, make it only refill with non-crits, just... something other than kicking the can.

If you are a CI witch that can utilize 4 diamond flasks and only require 1 mana flask, you have an amazing build.

I think diamond flasks are fine in their current state, Granite Flasks, however, are way too spammable.

As for everyone's comments: You're basically refusing to accept the concept of an "exploit" as two opposing ideas. That's fine, I guess my language is nebulous in a way.

But I don't think there's anything inherently bad about buying a weapon 1/1000th a cost because a developer unintentionally set the cost of an item low. That is not a bannable offense because you are only using the game to its fullest. It's on ArenaNet to fix their game, not on you to restrain yourself from having fun.

Hacking/circumventing the client is not exploiting in the way I use the word, but is "breaking the game". It's obvious when you're breaking the game. It is difficult to define when you are "exploiting" a game "in a bad/unfair/unintended way" which is why game designers MUST clarify and take responsibility for such exploits; not punish players for their actions.

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If you are a CI witch that can utilize 4 diamond flasks and only require 1 mana flask, you have an amazing build.

This is incredibly easy. I have CI wand witch and can use 5 diamond flasks. I prefer using 2 diamond, 2 granite (or 1 granite and 1 resistance) and 1 life flask for minions (just because I like using stuff no one else uses and it works well). I could use 5 diamond flasks and this would totally work, but I have no problem killing weaker monsters without 100% crit and granite + diamonds are better for fight against very durable single opponent. When I get a chance to play more, I might actually try going for more damage and 5 diamond flasks, this should let me farm much quicker. This doesn't mean that those flasks are broken, you need a whole build to make their infinite duration work and it's similar to very tanky char using granites and endurance charges to easily tank lvl 69 maps.

As for granite flasks, they are a bit OP since they actually are too easy to chain. I'd like their duration shorter but chaining them should increase duration, not replace - this would make them not last forever but still possible to use as reaction, especially for people with high latency.
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About pretty much the rest of this thread: exploit means using something as much as possible. It mostly brings negative connotation since it is often used for people (and exploiting humans is obviously bad) or for bugs in games. There is no point fighting over whether buying items for chromatics is exploit and if what Kripp did in GW2 is one. If you are farming Dread Thicket as lvl 60, you are exploiting the fact that it's fastest way of getting loot and exp. If you are farming Fellshrine, you are exploiting the fact that monsters there can't do anything to you.

GW2 admins are dumb for banning people for "exploits" since everything that was exploited was just a profitable strategy and following game rules (even if it's extremely more profitable than other strategies). They could as well ban people for farming good spots instead of visiting every area once or using best crafting recipes instead of every recipe once - it's fitting dictionary definition of exploiting (and no one should care if they redefined this word for their own purpose).

And to GGG: Your design decisions are awesome and you should feel awesome!

(But 6% cold resist on armor was a bad example :P Maybe even items should not drop without less than 10% single resist since it's not much better than 4 mana ;] You can find items with much higher resists even early anyway.)