Why Pet Swap Nerfed for Soulbeast?

[singanushiga.5803]

I was watching old Wvw/Pvp Soulbeast videos on YouTube, and realized that we were able to do pet swap in combat before. I understand why Anet nerfed Soulbeast's base damage but can't really understand why they nerfed pet swap. I feel like they killed versatility and fun of this class by doing that. Why Anet really nerfed pet swap for Soulbeast? For balance wise, were you happy about this change?

[Lazze.9870]

Elite spec trade-off, the same reason druid pets have -20 % to all stats.

 

The ranger trade-offs are amongst the laziest ones they have done and detrimental to build versitality on both e-specs. They feel like nerfs (because they essentially are) and not thought out trade-offs being made in parallel with the design of elite spec. 

 

Personally I can live with the soulbeast trade-off, but it simplified a spec that had a lot of potential. The druid one is worse simply from a design perspective. Offensive stats should have been nerfed in favor of increased vitality, thougness, healing power and concentration (along with a rework of supportive pets).

[Fueki.4753]

A bit ago, Arenanet got the weird idea that giving "trade-offs" to the Elite Specializations is better for the game than fixing core professions. Soulbeasts having no pet swap in battle is one of them.

Edited September 19, 2021 by Fueki.4753

[Levetty.1279]

The concept of elite specs was revealed before the trait redesign that elite specs would fit into. Thus when talking about them while trying not to give away the new trait system they said something about having to give something up to equip an elite spec (which turned out to be equipping 3 core trait lines). This stuck in a vocal minorities head and they have been repeating this ever since sometimes combined with the idea that core specs should be on par with elite specs (which is going to be impossible as more and more elite specs come out) till eventually after the second set of elite specs released without downsides released they went back and shoehorned in a negative or downside on every elite spec.

[Kodama.6453]

6 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

The concept of elite specs was revealed before the trait redesign that elite specs would fit into. Thus when talking about them while trying not to give away the new trait system they said something about having to give something up to equip an elite spec (which turned out to be equipping 3 core trait lines). This stuck in a vocal minorities head and they have been repeating this ever since sometimes combined with the idea that core specs should be on par with elite specs (which is going to be impossible as more and more elite specs come out) till eventually after the second set of elite specs released without downsides released they went back and shoehorned in a negative or downside on every elite spec.

Except that some elite specs were designed with a trade off from the very beginning, while others didn't....

If reaper would have been designed like soulbeast before the removal of pet swap, then it wouldn't have the reaper's shroud on F1 (replacing death shroud), but on F2 as an additional choice.

If holosmith would have been designed this way, it wouldn't have the photon forge replace the elite toolbelt skill on F5, but would get the photon forge added as a new F6.

Dragonhunter? Give them the new virtues as F4, F5 and F6 instead of replacing F1, F2 and F3.

You get the idea. The whole concept was not equal, some elite specs traded stuff for the updated mechanic, while other specs (like soulbeast) just got something added without replacing anything.

[Ehecatl.9172]

13 hours ago, Lazze.9870 said:

Elite spec trade-off, the same reason druid pets have -20 % to all stats.

 

The ranger trade-offs are amongst the laziest ones they have done and detrimental to build versitality on both e-specs. They feel like nerfs (because they essentially are) and not thought out trade-offs being made in parallel with the design of elite spec. 

 

Personally I can live with the soulbeast trade-off, but it simplified a spec that had a lot of potential. The druid one is worse simply from a design perspective. Offensive stats should have been nerfed in favor of increased vitality, thougness, healing power and concentration (along with a rework of supportive pets).

 

The druid's pet just being weaker is such a weird trade off too. What, is the druid so busy studying the stars that they forget to feed their pets? Are our druids bad pet owners?

 

What's really frustrating is it wouldn't be hard to make the pet feel like an actual part of the druid spec rather than something tacked on. Like you said; reduce or remove the pet's offensive damage and buff its survivability significantly. Then make it so certain Astral Form abilities project a second casting from your pet so that you're healing allies around you and allies on the front line through the pet without getting into melee yourself.

 

Suddenly the pet is a part of your elite spec mechanic and its placement is a part of the druid support playstyle.

 

Druid as designed is so awkward. I don't hate the spec, but the astral form definitely feels glued on rather than something that fit naturally into the class design.

[Abyssisis.3971]

Other classes wanted soulbeast nerfed, it’s that simple. It has nothing to do with giving it a trade off as other classes are still rolling around pretending to have a trade off when realistically they have a trade up.

[anduriell.6280]

8 hours ago, Kodama.6453 said:

Except that some elite specs were designed with a trade off from the very beginning, while others didn't....

If reaper would have been designed like soulbeast before the removal of pet swap, then it wouldn't have the reaper's shroud on F1 (replacing death shroud), but on F2 as an additional choice.

If holosmith would have been designed this way, it wouldn't have the photon forge replace the elite toolbelt skill on F5, but would get the photon forge added as a new F6.

Dragonhunter? Give them the new virtues as F4, F5 and F6 instead of replacing F1, F2 and F3.

You get the idea. The whole concept was not equal, some elite specs traded stuff for the updated mechanic, while other specs (like soulbeast) just got something added without replacing anything.

I do get what you are saying but i can not agree with anything you wrote there. There is no tradeoff on dragonhunter, the virtues got replaced by  better ones, that is not a trade-off but a plain improvement. 

 

Holosmith is another improvement over core. The "trade-off" was the heat management which will harm you if you are careless. Reaper is the only one which had a trade-off which was diminished by the buff to the trait Reaper's Onslaught to give quickness pulses.  Most other new specs don't even have a tradeoff with the solely exception of daredevil which got the range of the steal to 600 from 1200. 

 

Now i have to say i wouldn't  mind the trade-off to not to be able to swap the pet during combat if Anet would have redesigned the spec to work around that, because the original design wasn't designed to work with just one pet. In fact the spec was designed to work better to be able to swap pets while in beastmode so it would be a fluid combat when having to un-merge to swap was breaking the pace. 

At the same time they removed the possibility to swap pets the devs should have added the possibility to pick the archetype independently from the pet. 

 

Right now is just so clunky and simply annoying to deal with. 

 

 

[Kodama.6453]

3 hours ago, anduriell.6280 said:

I do get what you are saying but i can not agree with anything you wrote there. There is no tradeoff on dragonhunter, the virtues got replaced by  better ones, that is not a trade-off but a plain improvement. 

 

Holosmith is another improvement over core. The "trade-off" was the heat management which will harm you if you are careless. Reaper is the only one which had a trade-off which was diminished by the buff to the trait Reaper's Onslaught to give quickness pulses.  Most other new specs don't even have a tradeoff with the solely exception of daredevil which got the range of the steal to 600 from 1200. 

 

Now i have to say i wouldn't  mind the trade-off to not to be able to swap the pet during combat if Anet would have redesigned the spec to work around that, because the original design wasn't designed to work with just one pet. In fact the spec was designed to work better to be able to swap pets while in beastmode so it would be a fluid combat when having to un-merge to swap was breaking the pace. 

At the same time they removed the possibility to swap pets the devs should have added the possibility to pick the archetype independently from the pet. 

 

Right now is just so clunky and simply annoying to deal with. 

 

 

Think about it that way: a soulbeast used to be able to do literally everything a core ranger could do, but got the ability to merge with their pets added on top of that. It was a literal ranger+ spec.

Now looking at some of the specs you called out as not having trade offs:

• Holosmith: Is not able to do everything a core engineer can do. The elite toolbelt skills, which are unique for the engineer, are lost for this spec. You won't get the full condi clear and healing from the bandage drop from supply crate. You won't get the AoE moa transformation from elixir x. You won't get thee blast finisher and ranged damage from the orbital strike associated with mortar kit. You get the photon forge instead, it is replacing these skills. Is it a favorable trade? Yes, it is, no questions asked. But you are still not able to do everything a core engineer can do, which makes the spec not a literal engineer+.
• Reaper: The ranged death shroud is gone. You can't auto attack enemies from range with your shroud anymore. You don't get the torment from the shackles anymore. You get the idea. Once again, it is a favorable trade. But still, some skills for you are lost, replaced with new skills. Not a necromancer+.
• Dragonhunter: Again, skills are replaced here. It might seem like the new virtues are straight up upgrades, but there is a difference which gives the core virtues an advantage in some situations: they are instant cast. Meaning that you can use the heal or aegis even while CCed, something dragonhunters can't do with their virtues. Replacement of skills here once again, not a guardian+.

This is how Anet is looking at trade offs. Holosmith's heat system is not really a trade off, because an experienced holosmith will never get negatively affected by it.

With this out of the way, I don't get why you think soulbeast is "not designed to work with a single pet". There is not really anything in the class design which favors switching between different pets, just stuff which favors weaving in and out of beast mode, which is still perfectly possible to do. And while I get that it is tempting to want to pick the archetype of the pet freely, I think it is better for balancing that this is not possible. It limits the combination options, which makes the spec easier to balance. There might be some really scary stuff possible with free recombination, which might lead to nerfs for the class as a whole once again then.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[anduriell.6280]

1 hour ago, Kodama.6453 said:

With this out of the way, I don't get why you think soulbeast is "not designed to work with a single pet". 

At some point the spec was designed around swapping pets in beastmode, probably was rolled back because then Soulebasts would camp continuously in beastmode and somebody said that should not be the general design of the "pet class" .

Pet swap CD was kept while in beastmode, which meant if you had a 45s CD in pet swap in you went into beastmode the CD wasn't reset. You still had the CD active if you unmerged. 

Pets skills in beastmode kept cooldowns. You could use a long CD skill, unmerge and merge again the CD would be there. 

As such the beastmode was designed around swapping while in beastmode, there already was the mechanics to prevent abuse (CD on swap, CD on pets Beastmode skills) the only part missing was to show that information on the gui and allow the swap action. 

Also in-swap traits were not designed to work like currently or older iterations, their CDs are adjusted to 20s which does not fit with current 10s CD beastmode and the same was to old requirement to unmerge before being able to swap.

The archetype linked to specific pets felt out of place in those iterations . The archetype mechanic does feel very clunky as old implementation, extremely limiting in current. The spec was designed to have access to at least 2 archetype skills during combat by using the pet swap. Wordly impact is not stronger than a Maul, Spiritual Reprieve isn't that strong heal for the 40s CD the skill has those skills seemed to be designed as part of a rotation and not as the definitive skills they are supposed to be now. 

Some pets do have a very crappy beastmode skills (felines or devourers for example)  and that is because they were designed to work a part of a rotation and not to be the only utilities and the build defining option.

Edited September 20, 2021 by anduriell.6280
Keeps adding extra new lines

[Abyssisis.3971]

Soulbeast had a trade off in that when it merged, it lost its pet fighting beside it. Removing an entire pet was just anet caving to the other classes that complained for years about soulbeast being “core plus”

Holosmith has a trade up, it trades the elite tool belt skill for 5 additional skills. 🙄  A fitting trade off would be holosmith losing access to all toolbelt skills, that’s the kind of trade off soulbeast got when losing its second pet. Blah blah tool belt skills is engineers professional mechanic blah blah blah. Well guess what? Pets is the ranger class professional mechanic. 

Edited September 20, 2021 by Abyssisis.3971

[Kodama.6453]

42 minutes ago, Abyssisis.3971 said:

Soulbeast had a trade off in that when it merged, it lost its pet fighting beside it. Removing an entire pet was just anet caving to the other classes that complained for years about soulbeast being “core plus”

Holosmith has a trade up, it trades the elite tool belt skill for 5 additional skills. 🙄  A fitting trade off would be holosmith losing access to all toolbelt skills, that’s the kind of trade off soulbeast got when losing its second pet. Blah blah tool belt skills is engineers professional mechanic blah blah blah. Well guess what? Pets is the ranger class professional mechanic. 

Losing the pet temporarily (or other skills temporarily) is not a trade off. Soulbeast still was able to do everything a core ranger could do. You were able to unmerge and have the pet, let it cast beast skills, command it to attack, etc.

If you really think that losing your pet temporarily is a trade off, then put photon forge on F6 and give holosmith the elite toolbelt back. Because guess what, when you go into photon forge, you lose access to your weapon skills and kits are also unavailable for 5 seconds. If losing access to something temporarily is enough of a trade off, then holosmith has it already in the photon forge itself and doesn't need to give up F5, right?

That's not how this works.

About replacing the entire toolbelt: this is brought up alot by people, but the problem is that Anet has designed themselves in a corner with engineer, they can't replace the entire toolbelt without the entire class stopping to function. For example, med kit stops working as a healing skill alternative, since the actual healing skill is placed on the toolbelt (F1, bandage self). For this kind of trade off to get considered, engineer requires a serious rework first to open up design space.

And losing the entire toolbelt is not equal to losing a second pet... losing the entire toolbelt means losing the ENTIRE class mechanic. Losing a second pet means losing one half of the class mechanic, not the class mechanic entirely. You still have one of your two pets available.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[Lazze.9870]

15 hours ago, Kodama.6453 said:

Except that some elite specs were designed with a trade off from the very beginning, while others didn't....

 

They change the core functionality, which can be seen as a trade-off, but imo is more in line with what elite specs should do in that they fundamentally changes the core mechanic. In the case of engineer it's more of a straight up upgrade. Functioning Gyro and photon forge are better than the elite toolbelt skills. When they redesigned scrapper, the change they did to functioning gyro was better than its previous iteration with a very small cost. The vitality hit isn't as bad either, as the same trait gives it barrier as well. And yes, I'm well aware that making a trade-off with the toolbelt skills is easier said than done, but that doesn't change the fact that it currently serves as an upgrade.

Which is why I'm "fine" with  the soulbeast trade-off, because it essentially changes the core functionality of pet swap with pet merge. Yeah, it's still tacked on, but it makes decent sense.

The druid trade-off on the other hand. Awful. An extension of how badly designed druid has turned out to be after all the other nerfs it has recieved. The trade-off (which was basically meant to reduce damage output from pets) should have been a part of a larger, more extensive druid rework/overhaul where pets either were more integrated with the spec as a whole, possibly with reduced offensive stats in favor of increased supportive stat, or outright removed from it.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[Lazze.9870]

6 hours ago, anduriell.6280 said:

Most other new specs don't even have a tradeoff with the solely exception of daredevil which got the range of the steal to 600 from 1200

 

It makes steal unblockable. Which is closer to fundamentally changing a core mechanic than a straight nerf, even though the core version is better overall. What DD got was an additional dodge with enhanced dodge effects. You could make the comparison to druid and say that it should have gotten the same treatment (aka the avatar being the addition and trading off offensive pet stats for supportive being the equivalent to the steal change, which would still serve as a damage loss).

Edited September 20, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[Kodama.6453]

8 minutes ago, Lazze.9870 said:

Functioning Gyro and photon forge are better than the elite toolbelt skills. When they redesigned scrapper, the change they did to functioning gyro was better than its previous iteration with a very small cost. The vitality hit isn't as bad either, as the same trait gives it barrier as well. And yes, I'm well aware that making a trade-off with the toolbelt skills is easier said than done, but that doesn't change the fact that it currently serves as an upgrade.

Agreed with the general message, just wouldn't chose the word "upgrade" here, since the functionality of the skills changes heavily. But yes, it definitely is not an equal trade. We are basically trading junk we don't care much about anyway for good skills, this trade heavily favors us, but technically there is still an exchange of mechanics.

 

9 minutes ago, Lazze.9870 said:

The druid trade-off on the other hand. Awful. An extension of how badly designed druid has turned out to be after all the other nerfs it has recieved. The trade-off (which was basically meant to reduce damage output from pets) should have been a part of a larger, more extensive druid rework/overhaul where pets either were more integrated with the spec as a whole, possibly with reduced offensive stats in favor of increased supportive stat, or outright removed from it.

Heavily agree on that, the stat reduction really feels lazy when they could have done something different.

There is alot of stuff they could have done, like replacing pets with nature familiars which might stop attacking the enemy all together in favour of assisting allies instead or similar stuff, but instead they went with a generic stat reduction. It is a shame, sine it could have been way more interesting.

[Lazze.9870]

15 hours ago, Ehecatl.9172 said:

The druid's pet just being weaker is such a weird trade off too. What, is the druid so busy studying the stars that they forget to feed their pets? Are our druids bad pet owners?

 

I personally don't care too much about the lore aspect of it or whether or not druid are "bad pet owners". Having a lesser bond with your pet because you're tuning into celestial magic is a good enough excuse in my book, silly as it is. But from a mechanical standpoint it is just lazy, and introducing proper trade-offs to elite specs that didn't have one (except from having to forgo a core specilization, which in the case of druid means you're damage is worse in exchange for better support anyways) should have been taken as an opportunity to better integrating the pet into the e-spec in a way that would make druid better at what it is meant to do. Or even remove it, if they were to do a rework. Both alternatives would serve as a way to reduce the druid's damage output and serve as a trade-off in of itself while also being a fundamental change to the core mechanic. It would also make an otherwise dead mechanic more useful in terms of giving druid better support builds in competetive modes, especially wvw.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[Amadeus.5687]

Playing a lot of Engineer and Ranger I feel the entire "Trade off" is just unbalanced...
 

You don't "really" trade anything for an Elite spec as Engineer. The Elite Toolbelt skills were never part of Core Engineer and were added later on in the game. They don't really feel that impactful and are replaced with far superior options.
I have never once stopped up making a build for my Engineer and said "ahhh if I swap out of core I miss out on X Toolbelt skill"

Holosmith is as much as a "Core+" offender as Soulbeast if not even more. It have messed with the balance of the entire Engineer class over and over. 5 new abelites all far superior to what the toolbelt skill do? It's a no brainer 

While on the other hand druid and Soulbeast feels like very impactfull and major "nerfs" and not just "replacement" which is what Reaper shroud is an example of. 
I do wish for core specs to be viable and I think every elite spec should come with tradeoffs. But atm it's just unbalanced how heavy a "trade off" price some elite specs pay and someone of the tradeoffs are downright frustrating to deal with, like no pet swap in combat for soulbeast.

[Apolo.5942]

On 9/19/2021 at 6:53 AM, wolkzel.9706 said:

I was watching old Wvw/Pvp Soulbeast videos on YouTube, and realized that we were able to do pet swap in combat before. I understand why Anet nerfed Soulbeast's base damage but can't really understand why they nerfed pet swap. I feel like they killed versatility and fun of this class by doing that. Why Anet really nerfed pet swap for Soulbeast? For balance wise, were you happy about this change?

Because soulbeast was completely broken in wvw at least and in reality it still is.

[AkantorCZ.8952]

Honestly I like the idea of elite specs having certain drawback/give away so that the core specs still remains desirable. However the way I expected it to happen was to give the core ranger its own F5 ability.

[AlexndrTheGreat.8310]

The idea that elite specs should have some kind of trade off was because the original idea for elite specs was so that classes could have roles different than what the base class offers.

This changed though as players and the devs realized that more often than not, an elite spec made a base class better in basically every situation. Taking Soulbeast as an example, in every case you had a Ranger build there was a Soulbeast build that was better with literally no downside. Why would you ever play base Ranger ever again when you can instead play Soulbeast and always do better. You can always have 2 pets, on top of any new utility and synergy with the base class as well as an entirely new mechanic with pet merging. So to make a distinct difference between SB and Base Ranger, pet swapping was removed to focus solely on the pet merging mechanic.

Overall that should be a good thing for the game. Elite specs really should flesh out missing roles / gameplay styles for the different classes without always making an elite spec the go-to choice. Unfortunately it’s at the point where the synergy that comes from the elite spec with the rest of the class is by itself way more powerful than anything the base class can offer (example being Skirmishing + BM + Soulbeast and bring able to merge with pet having much better power DPS synergy than say Skirmishing + BM + Marksmanship) , as well as the trade-offs not being equal for each elite. Engineers not having their elite toolbelt skill is not nearly as impactful as say Scourge not having their Life Force to be used as health. Another great example would be Revenant who’s base mechanic was added many years after the class was introduced because it was designed without a trade off in mind. Guardians for example don’t really have trade offs, losing the base guardian Virtues isn’t impactful because Dragonhunter ones are just as good, if not better. Not going to mention Firebrand for obvious reasons.

[Lazze.9870]

1 hour ago, Apolo.5942 said:

Because soulbeast was completely broken in wvw at least and in reality it still is.

 

That wasn't the reason. It's currently one of the best roamers, but that's fair as long as it is one out of two professions without a proper meta build for large scale fights.

 

If ranger ever gets an elite spec that can compete in organized, large scale fights, then sure, tone down soulbeast. Until then, so what? Guardian is completely busted and even mandatory for large scale fights, and that's ignoring the fact that it can act as a great damage dealer in those fights as well on core/DH. Guardian is more broken in large scale fights than soulbeast is as a roamer.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[anduriell.6280]

On 9/20/2021 at 9:19 PM, Lazze.9870 said:

 

That wasn't the reason. It's currently one of the best roamers, but that's fair as long as it is one out of two professions without a proper meta build for large scale fights.

 

If ranger ever gets an elite spec that can compete in organized, large scale fights, then sure, tone down soulbeast. Until then, so what? Guardian is completely busted and even mandatory for large scale fights, and that's ignoring the fact that it can act as a great damage dealer in those fights as well on core/DH. Guardian is more broken in large scale fights than soulbeast is as a roamer.

Are we talking now about the sicem soulbeast with a burst attack once every 60 seconds? If the targets would know how to use dodge roll they would not need to come to the ranger subforums to derail every single thread. 

 

Let's get this straight,  It is not one of the best roamers it is just a good roamer, an A where the best is an S. Best roamers are power mesmer, dp thief, one shot weaver, nade scrapper and revenant (in multiple builds). 

 

I would say soulbeast is on the same tier as DH, a good noob stomper which loses effectiveness the more seasoned the target is. If the soulbeast misses the burst there is little they can do for the next 60 seconds except stall and kite the fight. 

Edited September 27, 2021 by anduriell.6280

[Abyssisis.3971]

8 hours ago, Kodama.6453 said:

Losing the pet temporarily (or other skills temporarily) is not a trade off. Soulbeast still was able to do everything a core ranger could do. You were able to unmerge and have the pet, let it cast beast skills, command it to attack, etc.

If you really think that losing your pet temporarily is a trade off, then put photon forge on F6 and give holosmith the elite toolbelt back. Because guess what, when you go into photon forge, you lose access to your weapon skills and kits are also unavailable for 5 seconds. If losing access to something temporarily is enough of a trade off, then holosmith has it already in the photon forge itself and doesn't need to give up F5, right?

That's not how this works.

About replacing the entire toolbelt: this is brought up alot by people, but the problem is that Anet has designed themselves in a corner with engineer, they can't replace the entire toolbelt without the entire class stopping to function. For example, med kit stops working as a healing skill alternative, since the actual healing skill is placed on the toolbelt (F1, bandage self). For this kind of trade off to get considered, engineer requires a serious rework first to open up design space.

And losing the entire toolbelt is not equal to losing a second pet... losing the entire toolbelt means losing the ENTIRE class mechanic. Losing a second pet means losing one half of the class mechanic, not the class mechanic entirely. You still have one of your two pets available.

Merged soulbeasts couldn’t do everything a ranger could do, they didn’t have access to their pets while merged. Regardless of whether it was temporary or not, merging and doing away with the pet was the trade off. It also came with some drawbacks, a lot of traits that applied to the pet, didn’t function when soulbeasts were merged for whatever reason, and still don’t after all these years. So if that’s not a trade off, then I don’t know what to tell you. 

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for having trade offs, but having trade offs should be somewhat equal for all classes. Nerfing soulbeast down to 1 pet is just a heavy handed way of applying a trade off, especially when other classes either don’t have one or got a light touch up and that they are still an upgrade over core. Elite specs should be fundamentally different over their core counter parts, ie different mechanics. Merge instead of pet swap is a good example of that.

[AlexndrTheGreat.8310]

1 hour ago, Abyssisis.3971 said:

Merged soulbeasts couldn’t do everything a ranger could do, they didn’t have access to their pets while merged. Regardless of whether it was temporary or not, merging and doing away with the pet was the trade off.

It’s not really a trade-off though when you can unmerge on your next button press. Soulbeast quite literally lost nothing when merging. You can still argue that not having your pet at that exact moment is a trade off, but it’s temporary. You can get back to that, it’s not a permenant trade-off for taking that elite. It was a lot like old Berserker where you had normal bursts as well as Berserk mode. You had nothing to lose when taking the Berserker elite spec.

Edited September 20, 2021 by AlexndrTheGreat.8310

[anduriell.6280]

6 hours ago, AlexndrTheGreat.8310 said:

 

It’s not really a trade-off though when you can unmerge on your next button press. Soulbeast quite literally lost nothing when merging. You can still argue that not having your pet at that exact moment is a trade off, but it’s temporary. You can get back to that, it’s not a permenant trade-off for taking that elite. It was a lot like old Berserker where you had normal bursts as well as Berserk mode. You had nothing to lose when taking the Berserker elite spec.

The temporary argument is very weak, the soulbeast gets the trade off of losing the pet when it gets access to the sepcialization mechanics : the merged pet and the extra bonuses from utilities and traits.

While is not in beastmode the soulbeast is just a ranger with access to stances and there is no need for any tradeoff in those moments.

In other words it is not like a Firebrand or an Scourge where the bonuses and mechanics from the specialization can't be turned  off. 

 

I am not opposed to the soulbeast to have access to just one pet thou, but then the specialization needs to be reworked to reflect that with a rework to beasmode abilities so they are designed to be more relevant.The lazy solution to lock out the swap during combat without reworking the specialization mechanics makes the soulbeast to feel extremely limited and clunky.