Sir Vincent III.1286

This is not a good start. Few hours in and progress is hindered by a bug/feature that makes no sense why it even exists. So if you happen to be unlucky that no one is doing tiered rift, you're just SOL. This needs to change ASAP.

Here's a break down of what I found when using the Spear (PvE). Pro: Both Lead attacks costs 3 init, so if the finisher is followed with Skill 4, it's a cheap Lead attack plus a damage buff. Skill 3 is a movement skill. Even though it is not technically a dodge/evade skill, it can be easily used to evade projectile by repositioning. Plague Doctor/Shaman seems to work well with Specter using the Spear. Vampiric Slash is bonkers -- too good. If Distracting Throw is used as Lead attack, +50% lifesteal plus the damage buff. Lead can be used to target 1 and use Follow-up to target 2 and Finisher to target 3. Mix and matching skills is allowed. For instance, target can be Dazed if Distracting Throw follows Skill 2 Lead and Skill 2 Follow-up. The target can literally be Dazed locked. This is the best costed skill set, even my Specter is not initiative starved. Con: The 3/4 casting time needs to go away. For instance, Shattering Assault (Skill 3 Finisher) has 3/4s casting, but only 1/2s Evade -- huh? That 1/4s window allows for interrupt and I have been interrupted. It completely invalidates the payoff of completing the combo. Falling Spider (Skill 2 Finisher) states "nearby enemies" but this skill has no Radius. Skill 3 Lead states "leap" yet it's not a leap finisher. Vampiric Slash (Skill 3 Follow-up) states "foes" and "them" (plural), yet Number of Targets is 1. I think this should be 3 just like the other skills. Shadow Veil (Skill 5) is removed when another skill is used. So when used after a Finisher, it animation locks the Thief for 4s (instead of 2s) and it goes away when another skill is used. That's way too clunky and unreliable. Just make it a buff instead of animation lock -- I mean it's a "veil". Other than that, it has potential, it just need to execute faster and more smoother.

You do realize that you are also recuperating when you get out of combat, right? So even if they jump out of stealth again they are back to square one. It's too easy to call something "broken" without defining what makes it broken -- so how can you expect anything to change without specifying what you want changed? Jumping in and out of stealth doesn't make it broken. Stealthed characters deal no damage else they get revealed. It's perfectly balanced.

I get the inspiration of this weapon skill from the LoL champion Xayah, but the implementation of the skills are clunky and simply doesn't feel right and definitely doesn't fit the Thief. We already have an axe thrower in the game (Ranger) and that weapon set feels better due to the fact that the auto-attack attacks twice as fast, throws 5 axes in skill #2 instead of 3, and the skill #3 actually deals damage. Thief's axe #3 does nothing by itself which makes it rather useless. It forces me to use skill #1 and #2 before I can use skill #3 -- what? The best thing about GW2's combat is it doesn't dictates how I play my profession and I'm sure the Devs won't start now -- right? Right?! I'm not sure what's the purpose of the axe. What does it bring to the Thief that the profession doesn't already have? Simply put, what value proposition is the axe offering that I would pick it over a Dagger or Scepter? IMO, nothing. Suggestion: The next weapon that the Thief community is expecting is the Greatsword. I don't believe I've read someone in the Thief community ever suggested a throwing axe. In any case, I hope you have enough time to scrap this idea and make the Greatsword Thief Ninja a reality. Thanks for the beta.

This is the only one I find problematic. Acrobatics is about survivability, it's not supposed to be a source for damage boost and tying it to shadowstep makes it even worst. Shadowstep is in the realm of Shadow Arts, not Acrobatics. I'm still salty when you changed Hard to Catch to trigger on shadowstep -- it doesn't belong in Acrobatics. You can't just squeeze a trait in there without consideration to the core design of the trait line. Also the +50% effectiveness on Vigor is what gives Acrobatics its trait identity. If you're planning of removing Endless Stamina, at least keep this effect and move it as a passive effect for Feline Grace. This effect is vital to certain Thief playstyle. To be honest, I'd prefer that you remove Guarded Initiation from the game (don't bother reworking this) and leave Endless Stamina alone. Then you can replace GI with Fluid Strikes -- this way the trait is not forced on the players, they can pick it if they want it. That's all I have to say.

So basically, it's just a Guardian Shout. 🤨 The uniqueness of the banner is that it can be picked up. Just let the Warrior pick-up the banner and attach it their back for the duration.

They just need to make the shadowstep as always forward and make Endless Night an AoE burst (instead of chanelling) where the effects affects the appropriate targets (ex. enemies take dmg and debuffs; allies are buffed and healed).

The synergy they are aiming for is for the Specter to rapid revive allies. The stealth will come from the Merciful Ambush, that's why it's being forced down our throat. In an open world events, I see the following as an effective combination: Merciful Ambush + Cover of Shadow + Panaku's Ambition + Dark Sentry However, these traits combination are useless if nobody goes down. You are better off taking traits that prevent allies from going down in the first place.

I logged out in The Silverwastes and I get sent back to Lion's Arch (or other city near where I logout on my other character) when logging back in -- even though in the character selection screen says that my character is in The Silverwastes.

Over all, I understand the purpose of these changes -- they are removing "perma-stealth", but they need to make sure that they preserve the utilities that were tied to the stealth-based mechanics. 1) The removal of Concealing Restoration is irresponsible. This was a trait that grants Withdraw an access to condition cleanse without needing to take Trickery. I have used SA for a long time and never in my life I've ever picked Merciful Ambush and now it is forced down my throat. Merciful Ambush is a useless trait that it's only valuable if you also take Cover of Shadow -- which was already perfect where is was at. Barrier doesn't belong in Shadow Arts, the effect from Shielding Restoration belongs to the Specter traits. Suggestion: Replace Shallow Grave (Specter) with Shielding Restoration. Move Merciful Ambush back to where it used to. Return Concealing Restoration as minor adept, but reduce the stealth duration to 1s. 2) The changes in Shadow's Embrace, Meld with Shadows and Shadow's Rejuvenation are very near-sighted. These traits has been working very well together for a very long time. If they introduced more ways to go in stealth plus the removal of Revealed, these changes might not be too bad. They forget that Thieves has Initiatives, not skill cooldown. Suggestions: - Shadow's Embrace should remove all listed conditions when entering or exiting stealth. - Meld with Shadows should retain the Deception 20% CDR that was removed from Hidden Thief. Otherwise, the long CD on Deception skills no longer makes sense. If the 20% CDR will not come back, then at least the Deception skill with stun break should not have CD greater than 30s. - Shadow's Rejuvenation, in addition, should remove Revealed and grant 1s of stealth when using a healing skill. The stealth doesn't have to have a long duration. 3) Hidden Thief as-is doesn't help to hide the Thief. To hide the Thief without stealth is to prevent the Thief from taking damage -- stealth was very effective in hiding the Thief. Suggestion: Make it that Hidden Thief drops a Lesser Smoke Screen around the target that lasts for 5s. This applies the Blindness they wanted, but also block projectiles for that duration. 4) Flickering Shadow was very effective against opponents or mechanics that put Revealed on the Thief. With its removal, the Thief has nothing to defend themselves. Cover of Shadow is obviously a replacement, but if the Thief cannot even go in stealth due to Revealed -- what's the purpose of this trait? Suggestion: Cover of Shadow, in addition, should apply Protection every second while the Thief and allies has Revealed status.

During the dialogue cutscene, the dialogue text are too tiny to read. I think it has something to do with the DPI scaling. No other texts are affected.

Wardrobe, Dye, Outfit, etc. are not showing the preview of changes.

I sent a bug report about this in the game. There was an update; I restarted, and still not fixed.

Minor correction about the wait time. When you enter Shroud, you get 1 stack of Consume Shadows, which means you only need to wait 4s for full stack. At 2-3 stacks, you can heal a large amount about 5k-6k AoE burst. At full stack, I applied barrier at 6.7k (based on my build) so the difference between 4 stacks and 5 stacks is not that big. In my playthrough, it's better to heal than to apply barrier so you get a full stack of Consume whenever you need the heal. Barrier only lasts 5s, used or not, but a healed HP stays until depleted by damage. The idea that you have to stay in Shroud for 4s (not 5s) to get full stack is unnecessary since even at 3 stacks (2s wait) is enough to deliver a lot of healing. Also in my playthrough, Consume stacking was never the problem when Consuming the Shadows...it's the shadow force generation. In order to make Consume Shadows efficient, you need to generate shadow force and stay in Shroud of at least 2s. The only way to consistently build up shadow force is to use Siphon on ally which cut's the CD by half...but that's still 9s CD. So to further shorten the CD, I have to take Trickery with Sleight of Hand, which I believe my CD was about 7s-8s when used on ally. This is inline with the F2 (Shroud) CD. So to access the full power of Consume Shadows, it's not about waiting in Shroud, it's about how much shadow force you've generated because that's the major factor on how much you can heal/barrier. "...each stack of Consume Shadows that you have, 10% of the consumed Shadow Force is converted into healing for nearby allies." That is the key here. So even if you have 5 stacks of Consume Shadows, but only have 25 shadow force, you won't get the full power of the trait.

My UI is locked for almost 10 years and all of a sudden that one flipped. It triggered my anxiety when I cannot put it back the way it was. Thank you very much.

The Chat Panel is on top left blocking about 1/3 of the screen -- it's horrible, I have to turn it off. Fix this bug or allow players to modify the UI. Please put it back to the lower left corner.

You gotta have to make this easy, Anet. Instead of improving the visual, you even removed it. Now I can never tell. Change the icons making the human face icon looking to right at the very least -- or something. It's really difficult to differentiate them in combat. Make it a pulsating green glowing orb on the chest and back of the player/pet. Something. -sigh- Yay for more damage -- I guess. You make an E.Spec called "Unleashed" yet you leashed every Hammer skills with "disabled enemies" requirement. Remove the unfun "disabled enemies" condition. Unleash the Unleashed, for crying out loud. Since you changed the functionality of the skill, you might as well change the name. Perilous Gift no longer makes sense. Suggestion: "Time to go" as a new name. Because I can see myself using this when low on health and trying to run away. The new functionality is a very good improvement. The update to the skill is very good. It seems that the spores also pop faster. Why do you insist on trying to kill the Untamed by using their skills? For crying out loud, make a fun skill, not a debilitating one. /sigh The update to the skill is good. With the cage plus Quickness. I can see the use of this. Gain defensive boon yet it doesn't grant Protection. This should grant Protection when UR instead of Super Speed. The updated version is much, much better. The only reliable weapon to use for this trait set is using an off-hand axe. The Axe #4 skill gives a consistency that all these traits will trigger regardless of Unleashed state. The hammer is useless for this trait set since all the disabling skills are when the pet is unleashed. They didn't bother to make any changes so it's safe to assume that this is their intention -- to have a set of useless traits even when using a hammer. If you're going to make "disable enemy" as a key requirement for the skills and traits, make sure the the Unleashed has access to disabling skills. Otherwise, you get what you got now -- useless unfun traits and skills. The updated version of the trait set is acceptable. Very tamed and very boring. Yeah well, I don't know anymore. I guess Ferocious Symbiosis is good, but why does it have a CD? Vindicator gets 15% damage just by dodging. I'm very sad to those who main a Ranger. Compare to how OP Harbinger is, Unleashed is just a sad spec and more than likely be DOA at launched. Too many leashes for something that's supposed to be Unleashed. The whole E.Spec is very selfish, more selfish than a core Thief. No party buff, no AoE support -- just the Ranger and her pet. This E.Spec is so boring and monotonous that it gets even worst when using other weapon set. Unleash Ambush is a good idea. don't get me wrong, but to manually trigger it makes it really clunky. I gotta say, I really really do not like this E.Spec -- at -- all. Having the constantly bounce Unleash just to have something happen is not only annoying but it become really frustrating. Suggestions (if not too late): - The idea behind the Bunny Thumper build is to attack fast to build-up adrenaline, use all adrenaline for a hammer KD, then attack fast for you and your pet. The key skill in the build is Rampage as One (Quickness + Swiftness) which is the missing component. - Make Unleash passive that bounces every 5s, which makes Unleash Ambush triggers every 10s. - Make F5 to "Rampage as One" unleashing both the Ranger and the Pet giving them Quickness and Swiftness for 4s duration with 10s CD. - Remove the "disabled enemies" from the equation. - Unleashed Thump should cause KD not the other way around. - Make sure there is a party support trait -- even the selfish Soulbeast has Leader of the Pact. - Scrap all the traits and start over with the suggestion above in mind. If it's too late, then you have a DOA E.Spec that looks like a leftover Soulbeast. It seems like all the skills and traits that didn't made it into Soulbeast was mixed and matched together to make the Unleashed. That's why there's no cohesion and the whole spec makes no sense -- not even close to the original GW1 Bunny Thumper.

Come on ANet, don't be lazy now. Give each elixir icon different bottle size and design, not just colors. You did it with Engineers, you should do it for Harbinger. I guess this is intentional. Not a good idea, but ok. My Harb has 2,058 condi damage without boons. With Elixir of Ambition, it's 2.8k. 2.9k with 10 stacks of Sigil of Corruption. 31.6k HP 2.7k armor with 30 stacks of carapace. This is out of hand. Not the change I expected, but it seems it is intended to function this way. Elixir of Risk now doubles the damage. I guess I should be happy? The recent change is opposite to what I'm suggesting. I don't know anymore. If Anet want's a broken E.Spec at launch, so be it. Conclusion: - Harbinger is so OP that Anet decided to make it even stronger. - Harbinger makes the other E.Specs undertuned.

You exaggerate too much, your nurse office is in stealth mode.

The Mech AI in Beta 4 is very responsive and the Mech stays close at all times. Great update. The Mech responds to command well and promptly. However, they should be a visual cue when the Mech is disabled. Maybe a short-circuit animation around the skill icons to indicate that the Mech cannot receive commands at that moment. It's really hard to see what's the status of the Mech even when running solo --- imagine in a group. This is really a bummer. Now that I got the runes and sigil, these traits seems to have been nerfed. I suppose the changes to the Mech's stats affected a lot of these traits and not in a good way. It feels really weak. These traits are still good, not as impressive as the earlier beta, but still good. Conclusion: - The wow factor from the earlier beta event has diminished, which is unfortunate since I was planning to play this E.Spec. - Although the Mech has really improved in terms of AI responsiveness, the overall feel of the E.Spec is lacking. - If the Mech's power level is downgraded, the Mechanist should be upgraded. The traits should also affect the Mechanist. - The changes to the mace skills and signets are good changes. - Right now, it feels like I'm simply an observant instead of a participant.

Wow, man, irrelevant but funny. lol. Specters are not there to protect anyone, that's the Guardian's job. Specters are nurses, you run to the nurse office to get patches up -- not healed, cured, or resurrected, but patched up. If you need a band-aid, you go to the nurse (Specter), that's it's only job, to give away band-aids, maybe some candy if you're not naughty.

Well, Specter is not a babysitter. Specters are nurses, not combat-medics, that's the Engineer's job. Healers are Druids. Coroners are the Necros. They do almost similar things, but in different ways.

Yeah Action Camera is a really buggy.

GW2 simply has a different game play. Players who needs healing are expected to disengage, swap to range weapon to continue DPS, and run to the healer for a top off -- then back into the fray once healed. You are meant to operate the activity in the game instead of operating the UI. Also keep in mind that each profession has their own healing skill, so you don't really need to top anyone off that often since they should be topping off themselves. In other words, you don't have to babysit anyone, you just need to supervise them.

This^ Definitely needed, badly.