Mevelios.4809

Ah, right, my bad - I misinterpreted it and just jumped at associating it with the quick, uninspired solution I had in mind. ☹️

My exact thought about nerfing the Sigil of energy on everyone, for the sake of a single e-spec that is mirage, because "I waste half of that bonus on my way of playing it while waiting for weapon swap CD". Note that any boon strip on you, for the few occurrences there are in PvE, do reduce the amount wasted; as for the meta builds I don't play that include dodging as a mechanic to deal damages (daredevil, vindicator) sure they could afford it as they don't need it today, but maybe some players out there actually found use for it or rely on that tool to solo content if we're only talking about PvE. I won't talk about WvW, because indeed it seems overperforming to my taste, but I'm not a fan of that game mode that's already plagued by several other unhealthy builds. In any case, I don't think that sigil is the primary issue about "alac mirage build inflexibility", because should the change be only made to the sigil for whatever compensation again related only to mirage, we'd still be stuck with at least the staff in one weapon set. Let's give more leeway for everyone to have their fun by getting out of that must-, or should I say "only-have".

I have to agree - it feels like the sort of nerf (at least here for a trade-off, unlike my coming example) that happened to the relic of Karakosa, being nerfed because it was overperforming on... revenant's mace. A single case impacted everyone. Without giving it much thought, the first thing that comes to mind for me consists in as simple a solution as making Mirage mantle give alacrity on any ambush, however with the loss of its few interesting effets there could simply be a complete rework of Mirrored axes. Let's be real: without the trait, the weapon doesn't shine, meaning it's great on mirage and barely average on all other (e-)specs without mentioning its ambush. The trait has already seen its CD reduction made baseline; the remaining effect could also be made as such, and maybe we could have a nice surprise on chrono thanks to it? In return, with that major master trait made available, another trait could be created to boost weapons' efficiency in various forms. It's uninspired but it could be extra conditions on those related, strike power on the others, and why not boons on a few exceptions? I'm thinking there of the rifle primarily, to have a quickness option instead of that meaningless fury. I'd think the same about scepter & staff, but it could deny them the possibility of being run as damage dealing options... Maybe something worth considering? There are future weapon proficiencies to consider as well. I'd love to see underwater weapons be made available on dry land so they actually see some use, but also at least one more support option especially to get out of the Illusionary defense must-have for protection (and thus by extension, mirage mantle's synergy with it). Tying it to a weapon isn't my favorite way to adress it, but it could at least open possibilites; some ideas I had for a duet mace+warhorn, but I'd rather post them later!

Dagger's vulnerability, rifle's fury (heh) & spear's might are definitely worth getting rid of, and we likely could afford losing sword's boon rip & axe's cripple (bit more doubtful about that last one since I don't care about GW2's "PvP"). The remaining effects (improved GS damage, trident torment, staff alac, scepter self-quick for competitive content) much less, hence my doubt!

It would definitely make it easier and solve the entire issue, however I'm not yet convinced it'd be the best move as Split surge's increased damages are very welcome coupled to the preview we got from next update about "power mirage", Imaginary axes' cripple and Ether barrage's quickness do help in competitive modes, Mirage thrust's boon rip still is a freebie even if it's redundant with domination's Vicious expression, and Wave of panic's extra torment also is very welcome for that dead underwater content (might as well adapt those weapons to make them land-based at this point, eh? An ever-chasing spear and the staff copycat -the trident- which could make one be more support-focused with boons and the other damages-centered?). But such a simple solution would however give a lot more leeway about bringing an alacdps mirage, without being forced into playing the staff!

It's just marketing shenanigans, because portals are (were?) an iconical tool in our arsenal. Don't mind the pointless advertising, it'll only mislead you; take the product for what it really is - here, a healing weapon. From my point of view, that useless flipover skill is just a hindrance worth deleting should you mistakenly use it, sending into a lengthier CD a good skill. I mean, there could actually be niche uses with good communication in a raid, but it's otherwise utterly pointless. Rather than bothering with that nonsense, I'd like them to look at what they could do to pair it better with alac mirage, since it feels like it was primarily designed to be used by chronoheal only. Those like me who dislike playing chrono for whatever reason (mine was the chronojail of the HoT/PoF years, still can't get over it today) are largely stuck with nothing new, aside some uses ordinary PUGs wouldn't bother with.

Of course mesmer had a foundation for this. All it took was making Bountiful disillusionment & Restorative illusions group-wide tools. Mantras were already there, other minor inspiration traits were already there, and a few tweaks brought the finishing touch. That's what had been discussed last october & november to make it happen, and it did! Now, gotta find ideas to avoid keeping chrono as the near-only support mesmer.

Hey, now. There are still dinosaurs like me who run the condi mirage axe/pistol & axe/torch! To hell with that boring staff! ☹️ That much we agree on, which is a shame considering the most handy condi relic is the one of the Fractal. The issue IMO simply is how efficient dueling (through viper gear) & chaos specs (through its many raw stats bonuses) are over illusions, only the Cvirt really has more interest in illusions. And that's still despite the buff they gave to the torch by making The pledge's CD reduction baseline, for a weapon capable of making use of dueling's Ineptitude! Even if the recent buff did reduce the gap in performance between each spec, illusions still comes as the least interesting of the three. JP portals? Oh wait, we made that joke before already. 😆

Lush forest works wonders for that and is heavily fed by the gunsaber + Tactical reload (if you're pretty sure your raid is safe enough to remove the Battle standard), so I find it fair - there are indeed a few tweaks I'd give it which I recommended in another topic. That went poorly with zero participation to the discussion, and now we have the bias with the staff as there isn't a satisfying mainhand support weapon (mace & axe somewhat, although clearly lacking compared to the staff skills). My stance on the staff is that it's an effective yet lazy answer, trying to squeeze a solution to every current issue into a single weapon. Let's be real, considering the fat heals +aegis +protection +long block (unlike the mace's counter) there isn't much incentive to play the warhorn anymore, especially if your boondps can somehow provide swiftness (with the amount of heralds around, you're quite likely to have one). So much efficiency goes into this new weapon that I'm worried it'll incite a nerf for everything else, at which point it ruins the whole principle: several traits are worth some attention, whereas a single weapon as the answer will only drain players down into a single build, which is currently either overhealing yet still unsatisfying for stab access (when picking Vigorous shouts), either clunky (if choosing Martial cadence) because of the issue often mentioned about dragon trigger/gunsaber offering no healing or any contribution whatsoever apart from feeding Lush forest (a risky thing in high pressure encounters). And that's only considering the PvE side; I don't like neither care about GW2's PvP/WvW because I can immediately figure out issues from that unrealistic implementation in a competitive mode. At least it's a blast to play in PvE! There are solutions, but the staff is clearly overperforming numbers-wise while having the clunky forced movement that makes you unwilling to use it for tanking. I wouldn't be surprised to see it getting a nerf, hence the approach I had before its release by considering the traits rather than a single weapon as the answer. That's why I'm worried it'll completely miss the mark and leave either one side of the coin lacking (the staff itself or the support traits), either nerf them altogether and turn the (so far) secretive healer warrior into a mere memory for very few players that actually played it!

I'd be curious. While I'd like a few finishing touches on top of that to really give a support potential to the e-spec beyond only providing alacrity, if it could be done without actually removing the alac option on bladesworn (let's be greedy and promote diversity!), I'd love to try it.

Well, what I meant is I'm really worried about just limiting it to a weapon, and maybe that's just me playing it wrong for the last two months (wrong enough to pass several CM marks at least 😆), but I can only see unsolved issues. Qheal zerk without Vigorous shouts will just want to keep two staves without even getting sigils with weapon swap effects, since you can't really disregard a +10% outgoing healing bonus while concentration/boon duration still being a limit to the pure healer build, you want to keep the +10% boon duration sigil as well; then you get the healsworn for which the whole point is to switch to dragon trigger/gunsaber to provide alac, meaning it'll be unable to heal while weapon swap's in CD without vigorous shouts, but if you trait it then you're back to missing a stab source AND overhealing so much it deserves a nerf. When I see the Karakosa relic was overperforming on revenant mace's triple blast finisher, so the relic got nerfed for everyone instead of looking at a single profession's weapon, I'm worried the same treatment will be applied to the warrior on a smaller scale: staff's the lazy answer to everything related to the healer warrior, so whatever was otherwise contributing to that role might be nerfed - effectively reinforcing the must-have aspect of the staff and bottlenecking again the profile to a single build. Time will tell... will it? It's still a good weapon for the sake of a healer role and provides, I suppose, a way of getting out of the vigorous shouts must-have that existed so far (for the sake of the "diversity" argument). But it does so with such efficiency that it shuts down the creative uses there were to X/warhorn, and goes in contradiction with one e-spec's mechanic that either makes it an overhealing asset, either takes such a risk for alacrity that you don't really want to touch it. I can't see it ending well.

Well, you saw and left a reply in my post about the heal warrior a month and a half ago; it's definitely playable, I'm using it in our CM trainings (HT aside for obvious reasons, OLC & KO are still on the to-do list, works well in raids). Real issue is the protection uptime, aegis & regen access restricted to a banner and how stability competes with other healing traits; to these points, the staff replies "screw Vigorous shouts and the rest, imma be your must-have". Provides regen on chain finisher, massive healing to disregard the shouts so you could trait Martial cadence for stab, while aegis & protection are on Line breaker. A lazy solution IMO when the warhorn already was a great tool despite a mainhand support weapon missing, although at least the mace had some use for a tank (doubled by extra CC for qheal zerk) while mainhand axe had a whirl finisher in light fields for extra condi cleanse & the Axe throw contributing to healsworn's Lush forest. There were several synergies promoting knowledge & anticipation (from combos to anticipating damages with barrier or your only aegis/stab every 30s), staff's lazily answering with massive heal amounts, and in doing so completely disregards whatever work could've been put in the actual support traits to promote variety, thus bottlenecking it to a single two-hander. Since it didn't look like there were many bold enough players to put the healer warrior to the test (only met one in two months) as long as it isn't labeled "meta", I gave up the topic; should a nerf hit the staff, back to square one!

Replace sharpshooter with Mage, observations are similar. Almost thought I was in the wrong topic!

Shatter boons aren't tied to the number of clones shattered though! It's only quick/alac for chrono.

It opened the way for the healsworn at least. A shame I don't meet more Daring dragons!