Remember when regeneration used to be relevant?

Damage power creep for the win.

Well it's still the only reliable way for eles to cleanse and stay alive, and therefore a core mechanic of most ele builds.

@Apolo.5942 said:Damage power creep for the win.

It's revelant, because it's corrupted into poison. Fooooo.

i remember when dolyak runes were da fucking bomb lol.

I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.

@Cynz.9437 said:I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.Stability was never rare.

i remember stunbreak used to be a rare thing and landing bullcharge was actually rewarding

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.Stability was never rare.

You don’t play this game for long then...

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.Stability was never rare.

Um, yes it was lol. Did you join after HoT launch or something?

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.Stability was never rare.

Off the top of my head:Ele had armor of earth, tornado (elite) and the earth trait that nobody used. The stab on tornado didn't pulse so if you stripped it once... gg.Thief never had any stability outside non pulsing dagger storm (unless you count 1s stab on assassins equilibrium or something, trait got axed very quick though)Engi had purple elixir toolkit giving stab, and juggernaut trait.Mesmer... I'm not sure if that stab trait on shatter existed on release, I don't think so.Warrior had balanced stance and the elite (non pulsing).Ranger had rampage as one (elite, now SotP) and its non pulsing stabNecro had zero stability outside foot on the grave trait (never picked over the 50% crit chance increase) and the non pulsing stab on lich elite.Guardian has one shout that gives stab? Idk much about guardians.

Cue HoT and Ele gets stab on overload, thieflul, engi gets autostab on scrapper for evading(?), warrior gets autostab on berserker mode activation (hilarious when combined with headbutt's self stun, it might as well not have been there), ranger gets pulsing stab on elite, necro gets free stab on reaper shroud #3, guardian gets block after block and maybe more stab(?) idk much about guardians. Revenant and their autostab proc as well...

Was there a need for any of this? who knows? All I know is that it all went downhill when they turned stability into stacks as opposed to just being a duration effect.

@Razor.6392 said:

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:

Vanilla was a very ranged/kiting focused set of specializations, Necro didn't melee, Engi didn't melee, melee Rev didn't exist.

Engineer went from Mid range to close range,Necromancer went from long range to Reaper Shroud's close range kit,Druid always had Rampage as One stability btw,

The thing I'm really not liking right now is the amount of stability Firebrand brings. Mantra of Liberation's quickly recharging AoE stability Mantra, Courage Tome giving Stability on demand with the #1, and a big 600 radius group stability on 8s cooldown with #5, among a lot of other great buffs. Many still bring "Stand Your Ground" which just stacks.

If you rotate your Mantra of Liberation and Courage Tome, while supplementing with "Stand Your Ground" you can keep AoE stability up for a straight minute and beyond for whoever you're able to hit with your 600range cone & 180 radius Mantra/Courage #1, and 600 radius Stand Your Ground & Courage #5.

This is really the insane thing, we've never had anything even remotely close to this level of AoE stability access from one build. All throughout HoT we never really had any AoE stability, just various selfish ones on melee builds like Scrapper, Reaper, Berserker, Ret-Herald.

Compare Courage Tome to vanilla Virtue of Courage and HoT Shield of Courage, they didn't even give Stab unless you traited it with a Virtues GM.

Firebrand has massively power creeped the stability/support in this game, just as much as Scourge has power creeped the AoE corruptions. The only way to fight Firebrand boons are to corrupt them with Scourge. No Firebrand & Scourge, no win.

I hope Firebrand has the AoE Stability access goes way down and the AoE corruption access goes way down. In 2018 :trollface:

@Chaith.8256 said:

@Razor.6392 said:

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:

Quaggan thinks they should reduce stability duration, so Firebrand has to use it skillfuly to prevent incoming CC blowing his MoL or SYG during enemy skill animation, or use right after it lands to stun break.

@Razor.6392 said:

@GoZero.9708 said:

@Cynz.9437 said:I remember when stab was a rare thing. I remember when timing and resource management existed.Stability was never rare.

Mesmer's bountiful disillusionment (the trait in question) wasn't added until April 2014, and it didn't give stab until the June 2015 trait overhaul. But power break has given stab since release, though I think it was only 1 stack at release.

Anyway I agree with you, the amount of stab access has gone through the roof, and then through the atmosphere. Then again, the same can be said for access to all of the other powerful boons and conditions in general

Id like to see a stat about how much time was actually spent auto attacking on release compared to now.

@OriOri.8724 said:Mesmer's bountiful disillusionment (the trait in question) wasn't added until April 2014, and it didn't give stab until the June 2015 trait overhaul. But power break has given stab since release, though I think it was only 1 stack at release.

Anyway I agree with you, the amount of stab access has gone through the roof, and then through the atmosphere. Then again, the same can be said for access to all of the other powerful boons and conditions in general

Mantra of Concentration gave two seconds of stability on a fairly long cooldown. Ironically that would have been useful in GW1 to ensure the success of a Diversion cast, but it was pointless at launch in GW2 as there weren't any long cast times to protect on mesmer apart from Moa Form, which the target was better off dodging than interrupting. Aside from protecting casts, a mere two seconds of stability was hopeless for any other purpose (Blink and Decoy were both far superior as stunbreaks), so if you actually needed proper stability, getting a guardian to use Stand Your Ground was the only option for a mesmer.

Regeneration used to be a means of easing damage pressure as well. Nowadays the damage and condition spam is so ridiculous that you need damage immunity, where before just dodging the most powerful attacks would keep you alive.

Not that current GW2 isn't a worse mess than what this game was when it first spawned into existence, but it's not like effortless, passive, over-time healing is any more well designed/implemented than stealth-bomb OHKOs or "damage over time" which kills in 4 seconds.

@Ben K.6238 said:

@OriOri.8724 said:Mesmer's bountiful disillusionment (the trait in question) wasn't added until April 2014, and it didn't give stab until the June 2015 trait overhaul. But power break has given stab since release, though I think it was only 1 stack at release.

Anyway I agree with you, the amount of stab access has gone through the roof, and then through the atmosphere. Then again, the same can be said for access to all of the other powerful boons and conditions in general

I didn't say it was useful. I was just correcting his post. Jesus.

Likewise, just pointing out that Mesmer's access to stability was a token gesture at launch and didn't really count. Once upon a time there were classes that had no effective access to certain boons and conditions.

I suppose there still are, it's just that we've moved from protection/regen/stability being the rare boons to quickness and resistance instead. That resistance even had to enter the game was an indication there's something awry with power creep.

For some classes stability was practically non existent. Thief didnt need stability since it had feline grace. Necro was really hurt a lot by not having any decent source of stab. One of the reasons why it was the worst class ever created for nearly the entire game's life span.

Eveything hinged on tanking with shroud but you woul just get bounced around and locked until shroud ended. Lol we still dont have an explanation for it. Was it rare? well it wasnt something that could be spammed. Now if you dont have pulsing stability or infinite negates, you might as well just stay in spawn.

Man, I really missed the slightly slower pace of game back then. Can’t we just invent time machines already and be done with this?