[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.

[Ranger is getting Alacrity in June patch]

Alacrity being part of core ranger will mean that there won't be a quickness e-spec for ranger down the line, unless they want another chrono situation.

[Mendatory heal/alac build]

On 4/18/2022 at 4:58 AM, Requiem.9648 said:

But point of those class in pass where needed people at least with a minimum of talent to play. Heal mech player can easy just press 1 and give perma alacrity /barrier being afk.

Mechanists use 3 skills for alacrity/barrier. Like, it's hardly complimented, but it's not 1 alone.

Renegade literally presses F4 every 16 seconds to give perma alacrity. Mirage dodges+autoattacks for alacrity. 

[Mendatory heal/alac build]

Where were those threads when alacrigade was "mendatory"?

Also, 90% of lfgs I see just say "alac", and I've had plenty of alacmirages on my team.

[20k DPS 1 button Rotation Mechanist]

On 4/16/2022 at 11:53 PM, Daddy.8125 said:

Alac mirage does 31k DPS on a golem benchmark? it's defintly not out dpsing pure DPS builds.

Renegade is still a 40k Condi DPS. Renegade is still very strong. The problem is machinist can role compress alacrity into a support build which just simply is really strong. 

Snowcrows has alacrity mirage at 37.3k

Why are you mentioning dps renegade? We are specifically talking about alacrity here. You are not doing 40k as alacrigade.

On 4/16/2022 at 11:53 PM, Daddy.8125 said:

Spectre DPS is bloated as the venom share ability counts as personal DPS on meter.s however pure DPS spectre does 34k DPS without allies 😂 it's defintly not out dpsing other builds. 

It IS personal dps. If we are talking about sharing alacrity, having allies is a given, like ???

[4th espec wants and desires?]

Not! Another! Good! Guy!

Revenant was marketed and released with an equal split of good and evil legends. Glint made sense because she was the single most influential character of the dragon story. 

But now rev has totally lost its edge, where is the idea of channeling forbidden power, the deal with the devil kind of fantasy?

[Heal Mech Tips Needed, How to heal well?]

3 hours ago, Jalad Lantana.3027 said:

Man thanks, I can see there is a lot to work on here.

 

Is there any way to practise, like a target golem that needs to be healed, or just jump into Strikes and try?

It sounds a lot, but just using Mace 3,  Elixir Gun 5 and Mortal Kit 5 along with your standard barrier stuff that you need for alacrity anyway (Barrier Burst, Barrier Signet, mace auto) is 95% of the job done. Everything tied to traits you can ignore, as they work on their own.

So, that leaves you with the Med Kit, that's like the engi version of druid avatar/firebrand tome. You pop it when you need more burst healing (skills 1/2/4), regen (5). It also has some condi cleanse, but you won't have to worry about that in strikes.

There's no easy way to practice healing, unfortunately. If you have a friend, you can go in the target golem area, activate area damage and practice healing your friend, but yeah it's not very easy to set up. I would say just to strikes and get some firsthand experience. 

[20k DPS 1 button Rotation Mechanist]

2 hours ago, Kulvar.1239 said:

According to gw2 wingman statistics, mechanist is still growing and renegade is still shrinking. This give credit to your hypothesis.

It also means that MightyTeapot was mostly wrong about mechanist and renegade coexisting because the trend is not stabilizing. It'll just take some time for the transition to happen. (unless ANet does something in the next balance patch)

It's not just mechanist. Renegade's selling point was its high dps for an alacrity provider. Now you have alacrity mirage that outdpses pure dps builds. Specter is pretty high, too. Renegade still has its amazing CC, though.

[I shouldn't have to change my gear to take Pinpoint Distribution]

1 hour ago, LuRkEr.9462 said:

Providing any sort of group support typically comes at a DPS loss. Pinpoint distribution is no different, seems fine to me as is.

It's not group support, it's a damage buff.

And it will still be a personal dps loss, you lose Thermal Vision's +5% condition damage and 20 stats.

The only difference is that you don't lose a stat that requires changing gear. As it is, the traitline is in an awkward spot that power builds can more easily pick the trait than condi builds, because they only lose ferocity.

Compare it to Assassin's Presence, where you have a clean choice between either +250 power for yourself or +150 ferocity for your group.

[Heal Mech Tips Needed, How to heal well?]

You have your heal over time fields in Elixir Kit 5 and Mortar Kit 5. Those you should probably use on cooldown, since they also provide AoE might through HGH trait (they count as elixirs). Elixir Kit 5 in particular has a 12s duration, so with alacrity and HGH, it should only have around 2-3 seconds of downtime. 

Now, if you want to actively heal, that's what the Med Kit is for. Med Kit 4 is your only burst heal, you save that one for when your group took a big hit. The tooltip number might not seem high, but combined with healing effectiveness and Medical Dispersion Field, it should be around 5-6k heal. 

Then you have Med Kit 2 for another AoE heal. Finally, you can always spam the Med Kit "auto", it's actually a huge amount of healing when the group is all booned-up, but you usually don't need to do that when you have all the regen, heal over time and barrier running.

There are also some heals you get from your traits (Alchemy + Inventions):

All your mech commands are AoE heals if you have the Soothing Detonation trait, and every boon applied to yourself is healing with Compounding Chemicals + Medical Dispersion Field.

[I shouldn't have to change my gear to take Pinpoint Distribution]

This is a super simple change. Currently, if my group wants me to take Pinpoint Distribution, I have to account for the lost expertise, if I'm playing a condi build.

Just swap the stat bonuses of Chemical Rounds and Thermal Vision.  Keep the other effects the same, so you can choose between the personal condi damage of Thermal Vision, or the group buff of PD, without having to mess with your gear.

 

Chemical Rounds

Gain condition damage. Your pistol skills gain increased condition duration.

Duration Increase: 33%

Condition Damage: +120 <-----

 

Thermal Vision

Gain expertise. Increase your outgoing condition damage when you inflict burning.

Thermal Vision (4s): +5% Condition Damage

Expertise: +150  <-----  Just swap these two

[Boon Duration / Concentration goals for Quick Scrapper + Alac Mech?]

Personally, I made two sets, one berserker for Holo, and one harrier for both scrapper and mech.

You make so many tradeoffs when you are trying to squeeze that bit of damage from support builds, and even then, a ritualist build will do it better than power.

[Vindicator Dodge, not immune to DMG / CC?]

On 4/4/2022 at 12:13 AM, Ragebru.1397 said:

I think the vindicator jump should hardly be considered a "regular dodge". You disappear from the screen because your character jumps. Similar to mirage having a prolonged invulnerability, vindicator should have a prolonged and wider range (in terms of what abilities it can avoid) of immunity. 

 

edit: and I realize some people might like to point out the dodge being unique in the sense that it has a high heal or damage option, but in the sense of dps AND healing- it's a sacrifice, because during that duration we are unable to unload other sources of damage/healing (which ultimately lowers our dps/hps).

That has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I answered to whether it was a bug or not. It's not.

Now if you feel like it should work differently, that's a different matter entirely and has nothing to do with what I was saying.

Daredevil can't activate other skills either, and for what it's worth, changing it to invulnerability will have unintended consequences in pvp as it will prevent point capture.

 

[Vindicator Dodge, not immune to DMG / CC?]

5 hours ago, LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:

There ARE effects in the game currently that CC Vindicator mid dodge and are not being properly evaded by the dodge.  These are NOT latency issues. 

For example: 
Soo-Won's hand slap wave attack will CC and knock the Vindicator out of dodge.  Not latency
Samarog's Spears can taunt and CC the vindicator mid dodge.  Not latency
Elite Mordrem Flopper in Octovine meta can use AoE taunt to pull the vindicator out of its dodge.  Not latency

There are more.  Is latency possibly also a cause in some situations?  Possibly, sure, but it's not THE cause.  All of the ones I have listed above are reproducible 100% of the time.  The dodge is not currently functioning the way it should in all scenarios which means it's mostly a coding error/bug within certain situations, not random latency. 

I don't know about the first two, but the third one is working as intended. That taunt cannot be evaded by regular dodge rolls either.

Same for dragonhunter spear, it has always been able to pull the tethered target mid-evade.

[Might be an unpopular opinion on mechanist]

13 hours ago, Depths.4051 said:

Not sure you've been here for the entire thread but I kinda addressed why I would like the spec to have no mech. Again. Im not asking for the mech to be taken away, just that we be given the option to not use it.

You didn't exactly address it, you just said you don't like pets. You can still play the other two specs, "well I wanna play petless mechanist, too" is not really an argument.

I like the mech, should I make a thread asking that scrapper and holo are given a traitline that grants them a companion?

[Might be an unpopular opinion on mechanist]

1 hour ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Not everyone has all previous rounds of elite specs. Doubly so for the most recent release.

Ok, but the game can't be balanced around those people. The devs were bold enough to make something like druid when there was no alternative.

[Might be an unpopular opinion on mechanist]

1 hour ago, ThrakathNar.4537 said:

The person I was responding to was saying that mechanist was never going to be viable in PvP and WvW - that comment about bad design was made based on the assumption (of the person I was responding to) that mechanist would not be allowed to be good. It has nothing to do whatsoever with flavour-of-the-month balance.

 

And as I keep pointing out, the cooldown for a player to use their WASD keys is 0 seconds - anything more than that gives the player inherently less control than other boon support classes. Is there actually any drawback from making the currently unused f5 skill a ground-targeted "Move to position" button with no cooldown?

 

I don't play LoL so I can't comment on the accuracy or validity of your statement, although I imagine there is significantly less frustration because in LoL your opponent cannot kite off nav-mesh, since there is no real 3rd axis. Also I find it slightly funny that the OP's suggestion for mechanist is to make the mech more turret-like, and the primary example of AI you use is turrets.

You remember how much whining there was the last time Engi turrets were usable in pvp?

Then they removed the crit and condi immunity and killed them off.

There's no reason why turrets should be in the state they are in, outside of a very vocal PvP community.

Also, other boon classes absolutely have to deal with their own limitations. Firebrand's mantras have very small coverage, which is hell in pugs, chronos have delayed wells, revenant can only provide alacrity with a long cooldown, so if you miss someone they will be without the boon for a bit. And mechanist can also provide alacrity with the mace, so missing someone with your mech is not the end of the world.

Of course I wouldn't mind an extra button like you described, but I'm also being realistic in that it probably won't ever happen.

41 minutes ago, MrForz.1953 said:

Because they are turrets, static AI with short range, this very condition makes it simplier to deal with and they act as denial zones; it also doesn't give much passive power if at all to Heimer when it's about attacking. Tibbers doesn't bear much power on its own after the nuke from the summon and can anyways be controlled by hand. Daisy shares a large part of Ivern's power but she's still just a CC machine that is prone to being casually bursted down and again, can be controlled by hand. The Maiden of the Mists, well it's little more than a giant creep.

Not even Riot Games is willing to give actual mobile killing power to pets these days despite the game's style allowing good manual control, the last time such a concept was live it was with the old Mordekaiser was he able to get a hold of an important, possibly ranged target with the ult and he's gone now.

I don't want to detail the thread and start taking about other games, but I specifically mentioned turrets because engi had them too, yet they are meme-tier like you said. As for other pets, riot specifically said they wanted Tibbers to do more damage with its aura and AA, and it was changed as such, and there's also the example of Malzahar that is the closest to gw2's ai, minions that he can't directly control outside of designating an attack target.

[Giwebo, the Rune of Humility Help]

Pop your mentor tag and type in map chat, people will show up. Also, if you get the map closing window, go to the new map first to find more people.4

[3 Elite specs is enough. We shouldn't get more. Time for something new.]

On 3/31/2022 at 10:02 AM, Mungrul.9358 said:

I've always thought that Elite Specs were a brave, but flawed attempt to bring some of GW1's innovative dual-class system in to GW2.

Ultimately, I feel it was always going to result in power-creep, devaluing core specs and any Elite Spec that preceded the most recent one. And they would have been better served doing things the old GW1 way, simply introducing more skills with each expansion / living world episode.

Not in the excessive way that each expandalone extended the amount of skills available in GW1, but maybe 4 skills per traitline per expansion.

In addition, adding additional weapon skills could have worked and also served as a way to balance loadouts beyond excessive nerfing. My idea being that each numbered skill would have alternatives available, selectable in the same way utility skills are, by clicking the arrow above the skill. They could also have used a system like this to address the issue of weapons being pigeon-holed in to either power OR control OR condi.

How is that solving the problem of powercreep you mentioned? If anything, it just makes it worse, because if you keep adding to the core class, you run into two situations: either everyone does everything, or the new skills are just powercrept versions of old skills. 

At least with elite specs, they are exclusive with each other, not an additional layer on top. And the data doesn't agree with your argument, the EoD specs didn't invalidate the existing ones. And I'm not talking about Untamed that short of flopped, you see for example Harbinger and Scourge used in equal amounts.