[Lethal Tempo Duration]

Even with alacrity, there's 4s of downtime of Justice's passive effect, which is just enough for Lethal Tempo's stacks to fall off even if you proc Justice at the last millisecond. 

Maybe you were using the Virtues traitline before? With the 15% cooldown reduction and perma alacrity, you can keep your stacks with only F1.

[Please revert jump shot animation]

17 hours ago, Arolandis.8360 said:

If they do, I hope they keep the scream my character used to do removed. I'm fine with any animation it has, I just couldn't stand that kitten scream every time.

Yes, that was the reason I shelved my male sylvari engineer, he screamed like his innards exploded every time I used Jump Shot.

[Engi changes next week]

9 hours ago, Endaris.1452 said:

You could always gain height from Jump Shot. Personally I even feel like it might be less than before.

At the end of the animation, you stopped midair and did the stomping animation, that made you lose height. You also couldn't jumpshot to higher platforms. For example, if you know the shortcut in Not So Secret JP where you go to the area below, climb a pipe and teleport to a platform where an aetherblade dude is chilling, now you can actually clear that jump with Jump Shot.

[Do you like playing with Engineering Kits?]

The thing is, if you actually like kits, then you shouldn't be satisfied with the current balance/implementation. Going into a kit to use 1-2 skills before dropping it defeats the whole point of having a kit, and you might as well replace it with a utility skill.

[Engi changes next week]

19 minutes ago, Vennyhedgie.5369 said:

The new jump shot animation is pretty lackluster compared to the old one.

The auto attack animation is now completely broken on charr. It also still has the old icon which isn't a big deal but it doesn't fit the "animation" at all. Also, all the other skills are still using the hip shot animation as well so it's all kinda moot. Incredibly rushed job. 

Jumpshot looks great for asura at least.

Edit: I can confirm that they indeed added more bounce, you can actually gain height using Jump shot now.

[Engi changes next week]

Quote

 

Rifle 

Hip Shot has been replaced with Rifle Burst. Rifle Burst delivers a quick burst of fire that pierces targets, followed by an explosive grenade. Total damage coefficient increased from 0.65 to 1.0 in PvE only.

Net Shot: Moved from second to third in the Rifle sequence. Immobilize duration increased from 2 seconds to 4 seconds in PvE only.

Blunderbuss: Moved from third to second in the Rifle sequence. Now additionally applies might to up to 5 allied targets within a range of 360. Might applied is 5 stacks for 8 seconds in PvE and 3 stacks for 5 seconds in PvP and WvW. Cooldown reduced from 9 seconds to 6 seconds in PvE and from 12 seconds to 8 seconds in PvP and WvW. Increased minimum power coefficient from 0.5 to 0.87 in PvP and WvW.

Jump Shot: Maximum range increased from 800 to 900. The launch blast is now an Explosion. Animation updated for more bounce. Reduced cooldown from 20 seconds to 18 seconds in PvP and WvW.

 

Additionally a dev commented on reddit that the autoattack will have a new animation (engi no longer shots from the hip), it shoots two bullets and a grenade, and the grenade counts as an explosion.

[Global Quickness nerf in order?]

On 6/2/2022 at 9:27 AM, JTGuevara.9018 said:

Um..excuse me lmao? Almost every class has access to quickness and a certain guardian spec is dubbed "quickbrand"!

Edit: To the confused emoji, where's the lie? You know I'm correct.

Boons are not a yes or no, duration matters. Permanent quickness requires investment, even to maintain only on oneself.  And the context of the discussion was in comparison to fury and might.

[WANTED: SOLO TANKY BUILD JUST FOR MAP META AND WORLD BOSS FIGHTS]

Please don't play cleric, you will do no damage.

Celestial Mech is already nigh unkillable, but you can actually fight mobs.

 

 

[Who's betting on major PvE Mech nerf incoming in the first round of 'adjustments' this summer?]

17 hours ago, Nash.2681 said:

Everything you wrote pretty much backs up what I said, so thx I guess.

Then you need to reread my post.

16 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Fractals are going to have a lag time since people who don't happen to have agony resistant equipment for a new build are going to keep using the builds that they do have geared until they have the resources together to gear a new build. You can switch to a new profession in raids or strikes with exotic gear in a pinch - it won't be as efficient, but you can do it. For high-tier fractals, you need ascended equipment with fractal resistance... and the most efficient way to get it is through doing high-tier fractals. And this goes double for people who might have only one or two sets of legendary armour and it isn't medium, making it a lot easier for guardian players in this situation to switch to renegade for alacrity, and for scourge players to switch to alacmirage or catalyst.

 

If renegades are still overrepresented in fractals compared to other alacrity providers, it's probably exactly this. It'll likely be more than a couple of months before what gets played in fractals catches up to what would be optimal if you had perfect gear for every build, especially if people have been taking a break from fractals to do the new stuff. Certainly, I don't see any obvious reason why mechanist would be less effective in fractals than in other high-end content, but I can see plenty of reasons why it might be less practical for people to make that switch.

Some lag is expected, but months is stretching it. The people who grind fractals have plenty of ascended boxes and materials to get ascended armour and infusions fast. And hmech uses harrier with monk runes, so anyone who played druid has that armour already.

Plus, this is not the first meta swift, there wasn't a huge lag when fb and ren overtook chrono.

[Elite Speculation for Expac 4]

On 4/28/2022 at 9:48 AM, Dadnir.5038 said:

The necromancer and it's e-specs are already as vampiric as they can be. There is little to no hope for a "vampiric spec" as such spec wouldn't bring anything new to the picture. (Life leech on hit? Check! Minion leeching life? Check! Weapon skills and utility skills leeching life? Check! Leeching life through %age conditions damage? Check! AoE leech? Check and even double check! Leeching life as %age of strike damage? Check!) If anything reaper is as close of a "vampiric spec" as the necromancer will ever get.

You can do more with the vampire theme than just lifesteal. It's more about the theme of darkness and bats and staff like that and of course the shroud transformation.

The shroud for example would be melee and mobile, with the necro attacking with their bare hands with claw animations. The life force could work similar to adrenaline, you start with 0, but you build it by dealing and taking damage, and you can only enter shroud when you have full life force. The life force doesn't protect your health, but you heal for all the damage you deal while in shroud.

It could have familiars as summons, like bats and ravens, that are more supportive than minions, like ranger spirits, but mobile.

[Elite Speculation for Expac 4]

On 5/8/2022 at 6:24 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

That's resolvable, though. Spellbreaker only gets level 1 bursts, so buffing level 2 and 3 bursts would buff core warrior without buffing spellbreaker. Mirage, IMO, really should get its own shatters even if the changes are relatively minor (if Desert Distortion was made baseline but F4 only granted one second of Distortion, then maybe it could get its second dodge back, but 4s distortion AND three mirage mirrors is just too much invulnerability and evade in one package). And core elementalist could do with some sort of bonus like core rev.

That still doesn't cover every core profession.

Ranger has nothing its elite specs don't have, it would need a new F5. 

Engineer has an F5 toolbelt skill, but there's only so much you can put on a single button, especially when holosmith gets an entire weaponset for an F5.

Similarly, thief has only one skill. They can't buff stolen skills without also buffing DD, and there's only so much you can do with Steal itself. I guess it could get an F3.

[Lets face it Scrapper needs a huge DPS buff]

45 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Well, the devs want to divide the roles in a party into "heal, dps, quickness and alac" with a supposed trade off of needing to trade dps stat for boon duration in order to keep up "strong boons".

Obviously we all know that it's an utopia but that's what the devs are trying to work toward right now. They will soon realize that the gear stat set aren't going to make this utopia easy to achieve.

I don't see what the problem is. Boon dps hybrid builds all have some damage tradeoff. Alacmirage is arguable a bit too high currently, but the rest are mostly fine.

[Lets face it Scrapper needs a huge DPS buff]

8 hours ago, Rosiep.9128 said:

Scrapper needs to be looked at all over again. The problem with buffing scrapper in its current state is that it has a major niche in WvW zerging in the form of its bulwark gyro, stability bubble, cleanse gyro, mobile smoke field, function gyros and hammer 5. This is coming from an engineer main who loves scrappers core identity, any buffs to scrapper in its current state would make it even more dominant in WvW zerging and to an extent roaming due to the condi roaming builds.

 

Therefore I think it's a better idea to rework scrapper (again) than to try and balance buffs and nerfs in its current state where it either becomes all powerful or ridiculously weak like it is now. 

Classes are split between game modes, any buff would be pve-only.

First of all, the support build is fine, both power quickness and heal variants. There are a few simple ways to buff dps scrapper, though. Applied Force is the obvious one, because it's competing with Kinetic Accelerators. Maybe Mass Momentum could also increase the damage of gyros, again since this trait is inaccessible to quickscrap.

Explosive Temper would also benefit a lot from the new EoD tech where stacks refresh duration, so it'll more consistent, and engi in general becomes less reliant on grenade kit.

 

 

 

[2 PART QUESTION: Sigil of Fire + Permeating Wrath (COUNTS AS HIT/MULTI HIT?)]

Anything that does strike damage should count as a hit for each enemy affected. So Sigil of Fire should be up to 5 hits.

[Who's betting on major PvE Mech nerf incoming in the first round of 'adjustments' this summer?]

On 4/27/2022 at 3:14 PM, Nash.2681 said:

I'm hoping for a nerf too, at least for the HealMech build. It's just the old Firebrand dilemma².

HealMech being able to provide pretty much everything for a subgroup besides quickness (heal over time- check. burst heal- check. condi cleanse- check. 100% Alacrity, Fury, Protection, Regeneration, Stability, Swiftness, Vigor- check check check. 25 might- check. Now let's add some barriers on top- check) just doesn't seem right to me.

And on top those mechs add some unneeded visual noise (won't argue about them being super ugly imo, that's a matter of personal taste I guess).

"Old" firebrand dilemma?

HFB can still pretty much do all those things you listed. Boon-wise they have the exact same coverage, just A->Q. Yes, mechanist has barrier on top, but FB has a lot more aegis and stability, better projectile denial, more CC (Sanctuary).

Take a look at class distribution (second-to-last column). In raids and strikes, mech and fb have equal presense. Then you look at fractals, and FB has a massive 31.8% to mech's 6.2%.

Plus, the summer patch introduces a major competitor for mech with alacrity druid, who again has the same boon spread as mech, but also has Search and Rescue, Spotter (pressumably) and Entangle. There's no such competitor for FB, all other quickness providers are dps hybrids.

[Turret rework when?]

For some reason, the pvp playerbase has unreasonable hate for ai skills.

Personally, I would like a turret rework that took inspiration for mechanist's Rocket Fist, i.e. instead of the turret attacking automatically, it attacked everytime you used your autoattack or something, with an icd, so they are less passive, and they stop the problem of afk farmers (not completely, there's still necro, rev and mech for that).

[Interesting quote from dev about the June balance patch]

12 minutes ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

It provided all the boons aoe. That was a problem then. Just might wouldnt be a problem. actually all the boons wouldnt be a problem anymore with hmech and hfb in the game.

It wouldn't be a problem regardless of mech/fb, all those boons could already be provided by druid even back then, they just wanted to remove some of the boon spam from chaos chrono.

[Is Condi Virtuoso Overhyped compared to Power Virtuoso?]

On 4/24/2022 at 8:33 PM, KeoLegend.5132 said:

2. JAGGED MIND. How much heal per second does it realistically gives? I want to be able to solo at least some champions HP, does this trait makes Condi build waay more beefy or is the HPS just overrated? PvE and open World

Jagged mind is nice for organised pve where your damage is higher and you don't have aggro, but virtuoso is not made for hard solo content. Compared other specs, you are not only giving up the clones that tank for you, but also mirage's dodge spam.

Not getting hit is always better than sustain. Mirage got a significant nerf with EoD, losing all the sustain from runes of tormenting, but it's still the best mesmer spec for the job.

20 hours ago, Lethion.8745 said:

I think the main reason is Condi Virtuoso stocks blade incredibly faster than Power Virtuoso. Infinit Forge is too slow and if gets buff Power might see play too.

Power virtuoso still take Bloodsong. That's just how bad the other grandmaster are. But yeah, without jagged mind, they only have Sharper Images for bleeds, so the blade generation is slower.

At the same time, both power and condi use the heal on cooldown for the phantasm resets, so you won't be getting any heals if you follow the rotation.

[Another Healing Question]

Necro has the shroud mechanic that replaces their health. They might appear to be low health, but what you're actually seeing is them having low shroud, their health could be full underneath, plus when in shroud, they cannot be healed anyway. It's very annoying for the healer, but the only way to tell is to pay attention to the squad icon, their health will actually be a different colour, like a dark green. So, yeah, keep doing what you're doing, the necro is fine.

But in general, when you are healing, you shouldn't stop providing your regular support and boons. Crisis Zone and Barrier Burst are free casts for you, you can use them when you are performing other actions since the mech is casting those skills. And you can have a lot of heals rolling at any given time (regen, Elixir Gun 5, Mortar Kit 5), so even if someone is low, they'll be back to full health very soon even without you switching to Med Kit.

[Boons in Gw2 and the slow removal of class specific purposes]

Ok, but what's the power creep? Permanent quickness and alacrity were a staple of raids ever since their launch back in HoT. Are we talking dungeons? (For what's it's worth, dungeons had 100% quickness uptime, too, because the boss was dead by the time Time Warp expired).

All modern pve endgame content was designed for a post e-spec world, with boon spam in mind. What's being increased are the available sources of those boons.

Anyway, that aside, I also don't get the boon doom talk. MightyTeapot makes an argument in that video, like if all boons are permanent, then they should be provided by the console. That's like me saying, if the boss is getting killed, then maybe they should just give us the loot and skip the fight.

Boon support is a role, the boon uptime exists because that player is doing its job. Why is that less appreciable than doing damage? Other mmos have their trinity, and nobody questions why healers and tanks exist. Gw2 has their own version of the trinity with dps, heal, boon support.

[Canonically, what classes/specs are the "strongest"?]

To rank them canonically, you'd have to decide if you are only judging the skills the players have access to, or what NPCs of that class can do. Like, for example, do mesmers get points for Queen Jennah, when she is clearly leagues above player mesmer?

There are two classes that break the rules, though: revenant and engineer.

Revenants can channel a legend and use their powers, so they can potentially have access to any and all skills other professions could do, and even use magic that no other class can tap into, like draconic magic or the jade winds.

Then there's engineer, which is the Tyrian version of "a wizard did it". It doesn't matter what, they can develop a device that accomplishes that task. Scarlet waged a war, destroyed a city and awakened an Elder Dragon armed with her inventions. Asura can open gateways continents away and even to the mists, Joon has an entire army of mechs and built a device that could depower an elder dragon. And countless other inventions we've seen over the years. 

[Single Main Class?]

4 hours ago, otto.5684 said:

@Daddy.8125 That is specifically the issue I have with ele. On low HP classes, I typically add 1-2k HP in open world. However, I am not going to build a none dps gear to play most of pve solo. I do not have to do this on any other class. I think the issue with ele is that it’s healing capabilities, outside of water, are really crappy. And water without healing power is not strong enough. Not to mention it rarely does any damage. The only limited exception is condi weaver, since the use of earth + signet of healing can help significantly. I was hoping that the EoD elite will allow the mage class to be able to play… like a mage class. However, we ended-up with another melee centric build, which is not as interesting as weaver or roboust as tempest.

Even without building extra gear, like Cele or Grieving, you can play Fresh Air Tempest that has perma 40% damage reduction. In full dps gear (+Jade core), a 12k health pool is 20k effective health.

[Ranger is getting Alacrity in June patch]

42 minutes ago, aymnad.9023 said:

I would guess the opposite. I think a ranger will need 3 spirits with some boon duration and the trait to have somewhere between 80%-100% uptime. This means going 3 spirits + moa on viper soulbeast (or 3 spirits and ritualist gear) or taking 3-4 spirits on druid.

Only 1 spirit seems very unlikely to me as it would make any ranger spec provide insane value without much investment.

edit : I might test how much damage this configuration does this week end to see how the damage compares with the other condi alac prodivers.

I think ultimately having 100% uptime is a given. But if you are forced to invest into 50% boon duration or more, you are looking at diviner gear at best, or harrier in case of druid, so you'd be losing a lot of damage. Or maybe something like condiSB with ritualist gear.  We already have alacrity hybrid builds doing 30k or more, so an alacrity SB doing the same wouldn't be out of line.

We are both certain that taking nature magic is going to be a factor, now the number of spirits is up there. SB can already take 3 spirits as is, so if it's 3 or less, the problem with future elite specs remains the same.

[Expansion Future Weapons]

They've already done 2 two-handed weapons, so I doubt they'll do a third. I'd like a rifle, but I'm expecting an off-hand just because it's the one weapon type ranger hasn't got so far. And between off-hands, shield is probably the one that can realistically have a different enough playstyle, as Alexandr points out:

On 4/15/2022 at 1:35 AM, AlexndrTheGreat.8310 said:

-Torch, offhand condi

-Axe, offhand power

-Warhorn, offhand support (mostly)

-Dagger, offhand “skirmishing” weapon (dodges, ranged cripple)

What's currently missing is a defensive option, and mobility, and shield could do either/both.

Ranged axe+shield lends itself to a viking-like aesthetic, so I can't sayI would be disappointed with such an outcome.

[Ranger is getting Alacrity in June patch]

1 hour ago, enkeny.6937 said:

It depends, If you need 5 spirit for permanent alacrity, then why not make a quickness elite spec. You can't use both. 

Chances are you won't need multiple spirits, let alone 5. I doubt they are tying alacrity to a trait, they are probably changing Frost Spirit to give alacrity, and the trait will double the boon duration or something.