Druid: a rework to make it feel good. This is a long text wall. Vol. 4

[anduriell.6280]

And this would be my redesign of the specialisations to make it feel unique and become a fairer and more fun to play with and against to. In opposition to Soulbeast i do think this class needs a complete rework because of the reasons i will explain below. It would not suffice to change a trait or balance some numbers. This will be my longest post because it needs so much rework so bear with me. As such this would be how i would have reworked the specialization...

Druid: When mixing together a healer and a ranged damager does not give the expected results

Druid always felt like an staple over the ranger, something which did not have anything to do with the core profession. It felt like the whole specialization was built around one phrase : Let's create a healer for raids. It even felt disjointed with the lore were Druids in HoT had other objectives than to be a healer. 

That will prove a challenging path to take  as a healer does have nothing to do with a profession where core traits are range and a pet mechanic. As it is already proven a profession which is based in kitting should not have access to many burst heals, as it allows the build to dedicate as much damage as it wants without sacrificing sustain, and that's because  the ranged weapons and the pet  allows the Druid to kite and constantly heal. 

This has been driving the Druid into a corner nerfing both healing and damage output to tackle that to the point the profession has not use other than in one very small specific mode (raids) and only because of the noob friendly healing output and unique buffs from the core profession. 

Druid: How the Druid fit in the HoT Lore, the eternal change of the cycle of life. 

Druids in the Gw lore aren't simple healer, a Druid is supposed to be devoted to life itself in the complete sense as such their dogma could be explained with this quote from GW1 "Darkness and light, good and evil...all are a part of nature. There is no regrowth without death...without decay." (1) . They represent the cycle of life and the constant change in balance.  The Druids accept the cyle and understand that all that is birth has a path that has to walk until it reaches the end just to be rebirth again and continue with the eternal cycle of life. 

As such Druids in HoT reaching the deep understanding of their truth do not interfere with the world and only intervene if a change threatens to corrupt the balance of cycle making one of the aspects to have more prevalence than the others. They understand change is part of life itself. 

 Druid: How to reflect their lore in game mechanics and interactions with core

Druids will be an strong deviation from Core in the sense it gives up the control over the pet for a better connection with the spirits of nature and the Druidic state.  

• Druid will lose access to pet skills F1 to F3. Druid will have only access to swap pets and put the pets in passive/aggressive mode. 
• Those F1 to F3 will be replaced by the 3 different Druid Aspects they can use: Druid of the Moon, Druid of the Stars, Druid of Wild. 
• F5 will allow the Druid to go back to its normal form without the need to go into another Druidic form. This is beneficial as it will be explained below. 
• Upon entering combat the Druid will have an small Wisp of light which will orbit the druid. 

 Wisps

The wisps(File:Astral_Wisp.png) will be the companion of the Druid which will be orbiting the druid during combat. The wisp has HP and can be killed, in which case it will go into CD and will resummoned when the CD expires. The wisp will orbitate at a radius of 130 similar to how currently Astral_Wisp attaches to enemies. 

The Wisp of light will apply special effects when crossing thru friendlies / enemies which depends of the last Druidic form the Druid has taken.  The wisp will affect up to a total  5 targets each rotation counting in those 5 targets foes as well as friendlies. 

Form of the Moon : The Wisp of light will heal allies and vulnerability to enemies.

Form of the Stars : The Wisp will burn foes and apply resolution to allies. 

Form of the Wild : The Wisp will apply cripple to enemies and apply resistance to allies.  

Druid: What about pets

Although their dedication to the spirits and nature took time from cultivating their link with the pets and thus the pets have become undisciplined and rebellious it does not mean the pets have no interaction with the Druid. The pets still retain their link to their companion and do have some notions about when to cast their special abilities. 

If well the Druid has lost access to F1 to F3 special skills the pets will still attack when the Druid is attacking a target and will cast F2 when the target is afflicted by an specific condition:

• - When the target is disabled (inflicted by stunned, dazed, knocked down,  launched or Immobilized foe )

Druidic Aspects

The Celestial Avatar and Astral force seems very disconnected from how the druids are represented in the game as such it would be best to rename the transformation to Druidic Aspect. 

This F1-F3 rework is to shift the class design while keeping their original intent of having a flow and a cadence based in the in and out from the different Druidic Aspect. 

 

Each Druidic Aspect will have a 10 seconds CD. If the Life flow is totally consumed the CD will be increased to 30s. 

Each Druidic Aspect will have an Living Flow bar which will be filling slowly over the next 30 seconds even while the aspect is on CD. 

While transformed that energy bar  will be drained over the course of the next 10 seconds. If the Druid swap form or goes out from the form (by using F5)  the Life Flow is reset. This is meant as to provide a reason to stay in the Druidic Aspect while being careful not to exhaust the Life Flow and at the same time not making the  specialization feeling too constrained behind too much resource management. 

The Druid can go into any Druidic Aspect as long as it is not on CD and has any Life flow left. 
The wisp merges with the Druid the Druid stays in Any aspect form, as such the effect is disabled during the transformation.

 

The Druidic Aspect has the same animation as the Celestial Avatar but it will have a different color depending upon the taken aspect as to allow others to identify the aspect taken.

• Druid of the Moon : Druidic Aspect related to the birth, rebirth and creation of life. This Druidic form is represented with a light blue similar to the current celestial avatar transformation and it focus in healing and life.  This is a healing and support aspect. 
• Druid of the Stars : Druidic Aspect related to the destruction and death on  the cycle of life. They are the representatives of the fires of the stars , tapping in the same energy as the Guardians, becoming the Hierophants of the cleansing ire. This is an offensive aspect with some support. Their color could be orange-yellow.
• Druids of the Wild :  Druid Aspect related to the Nature and all the living things, the path they take in life and have strong connection with the plants and the animals. A Green color will fit well with this one. This is a crowd control aspect which empowers the pet. 

Druidic form : skills

Each Druidic form brings a very different set of effects and skills replacing the current weapon skills. In a similar fashion of how it works currently the druid will have access to the utility skills while transformed.  There is not Druidic aspect skills with very short cooldown, each skill is designed to fit an specific role and as such are not to be spammed. 

While the skills can be represented in different form and have different effects the mechanics will be the same across the aspects as means to keep consistency. 

An small dent in the Druidic Aspects will mark the one that the wisp of light is currently attuned to (similar to how attunements are shown in the UI  for the elementalist)

Druid of the Moon

Healing with  access to cleanses and small  CC. 

• - Moonlight ray(short CD around 2-3s) . An small AoE  around the druid which will heal up to 5 allies and apply protection. 
• - Moonflower :  A ground target ranged AoE  moonflower(1) will blossom after a short while where the Druid is healing allies, cleansing 3 condition and apply resolution. 
• - Lunar Impact : A ground target ranged AoE  Lunar Impact is cast around the Druid healing allies and applying a very short daze  to enemies, as it is designed to interrupt enemies.
• - Rejuvenating Tides
• - Natural convergence. This skill is common to all the Druidic Aspects and it will have different effects depending on the Aspects which are not in CD. Check below. 

Druid of the Stars

Burning with access to cleansing and some CC. 

• - Solar wind (short CD 2-3s) An small AoE around the Druid wich will cause burning to foes  and burn 1 condition from allies. 
• - Blooming Star:  A small star will be cast as ground target AoE which will bloom after a short applying  burning to foes and  cleansing up to 3 conditions from allies.
• - Falling star: A Star will fall  as ground target AoE which will cause severe burning and blind to foes while cleansing 1 conditions from  allies. 
• - Solar storm:  Mechanically similar to Rejuvenating Tides but while pulsing the enemies will be pushed back and will receive burning while within the AoE. This effect will not cause any knockdown but it will push the foes farther from the druid while applying burning. 
• -  Natural convergence. This skill is common to all the Druidic Aspects and it will have different effects depending on the Aspects which are not in CD. Check below. 

Druid of the Wild

Focused in CC and boons which small access to cleansing.

• -  Meadow (short CD 2-3s) : An small  AoE around the druid which will cause cripple to enemies while cleansing 1 no-damaging condition on friendlies. 
• -  Red Iris . A ground target  AoE as Red_Iris_Flower will blossom after a short causing cripple and slow on enemies while applying regeneration and resolution on friendlies. 
• - Tsunami :  By reusing the animation from Glyph of the Tides the enemies are launched/pushed  away from the druid. 
• - Savannah:  Mechanically similar to Rejuvenating Tides but while pulsing enemies are immobilized(1.5s) and allies are cleansed of any movement impairing condition (chilled, cripple and immobilize) . The animation could be reused from the active from Signet_of_the_Wild
• -  Natural convergence. This skill is common to all the Druidic Aspects and it will have different effects depending on the Aspects which are not in CD. Check below. 

 

Natural convergence

This skill consume the remaining life flow from the all the Aspects not in CD , and it will have  different effects depending on which aspects where available (not in CD) when being cast. It can use the current animation Natural Convergence as it should fit correctly the current design, but some new additional overlay effects can be added to symbolize the aspects used in the skill. 

Using this skill will take the Druid out from the Druidic form after the channel  and put that aspect in the short CD. The other Aspects will be depleted of life flow. 

 

The skill will apply 3 pulses each to apply an additional a cumulative effect over previous pulse and additively to each aspect. 

• Aspect of the Moon:  Pulse 1 - Healing on friendlies,  Pulse 2 - healing and protection on allies  , Pulse 3 - healing, protection on allies and Daze on enemies. 
• Aspect of the Stars :  Pulse 1 - Burning on enemies, Pulse 2 - Burning and blind on foes  , Pulse 3 - Burning and blind on foes and cleansing 3 conditions on allies. 
• Aspect of the Wild : Pulse 1 - Stability on allies, Pulse 2 - Stability and resistance on allies   , Pulse 3 - Stability and resistance on allies and Binding_Roots on foes. 

As such a Druid with the 3 aspects available would cause in the first pulse healing and stability on friendlies and burning on enemies, the second pulse would cause healing, protection, stability and resistance on friendlies and burning and blind of foes and so on.  

Druid Staff : A better weapon

Visualizing staff as support weapon it would need a rework in how the weapon interacts with other systems in the game. The ranger already having plenty of better ranged weapons it does not need another weapon competing in that tier. As such the weapon will shift into a support focus weapon by losing the ability to target directly enemies and target friendlies instead. 

This could be an ally player or the pet such opening a support focus role for the Druid if the player feels like it while because the building of life flow is independent from the effects of the weapon allow the druid to be free to pick other weapons if it's looking for a more offensive role. The Druid does not need to use staff or use other clunky methods anymore to build the energy bar consistently. 

This will bring how the druid will use the staff to target enemies so the pet can attack enemies (as F1 is being replaced) . With this redesign basically it doesn't. The druid can use other effects (like using the other weapon, A wisp of light attuned to the Stars Aspect,  Vine surge, Druidic Aspects abilities  or utility skills ) but the main function of the staff is to be a support and not to be an offensive weapon . The damage it applies will be a consequence of positioning and utilization of allies positions.  In a Pve Open world setting the Druid would go with core weapons switching to staff when needed to support the pet/allies. 

 

Solar Beam -  This will target an ally directly. The skill is reworked to apply a constant beam on the target which apply an small healing every second. Additionally in a similar fashion as currently any friendlies crossing the beam may be healed. Any enemies crossing the beam will be inflicted by stacking burning as such it will replace the power damage by condition. Due the weapon can not target enemies directly it may have the condition dps increased to balance that. 

Wisp of light - With a similar mechanic as Astral Wisp it will attach a wisp of light to a friendly target. The Wisp will provide the same effects as the one orbiting the Druid depending on the last  Druidic Aspect used. 

Ancestral Grace : no changes. 

Vine Surge : Instead immobilising this  skill will cast roots in up to 5 foes hit by the skill. All other effects are unchanged. 

Sublime Conversion : no change. 

Druid. What about Glyphs

Right now Glyphs lack of any defining trait, the utility skills could have been named "shouts" or "instant"  and it would have worked the same. As such an small rework so they interact better with the Druidic Aspects would be needed. 

 

• Glyphs loses the dual aspect. Now with the 3 Druidic Aspects it makes no sense to have this. Also because of the short interaction with the current Avatar most of the glyphs lose any identity to become "another heal"  which does not benefit the specialization to feel useful. 
• Glyphs will use the tethering mechanic from Glyph of Unity. All glyphs are normalized and have a tether radius of 360 and a maximum leash range of 600. Enemies/allies tethered will receive pulsing effects depending on the specific glyph.  Multiple glyphs can be cast and multiple tethers can be present from different glyphs on the same target, but once the tether is broken it will not be restored even if the target gets in range. 
• All Glyphs are normalized to pulse 3 times. Effects on the Druid will be applied by each pulse too. 

 

• Glyph of Rejuvenation :  This glyph will work as the non-avatar version. Current heals are divided by 3 and applied each pulse onto allies. 
• Glyph of Alignment : This glyph will work as the non-avatar version and it will pulse the conditions onto enemies.
• Glyph of Equality :  This Glyph will work as the Avatar version. It will break stun and cleanse 1 condition by each pulse. As replacement of an skill wich provide stability this skill will provide some stunbreak capabilities for a very short time. 
• Glyph of Empowerment :  it will use the non-avatar version. Each pulse will apply the buff Glyph_of_Empowerment_(effect) for 3 seconds overwriting the last application (it does not stack). 

Glyph of the Stars :  This will use the Avatar version. To balance the fact that this will not require any channel but the pulses are much smaller than current version, the heal and revive speed needs to be adjusted. The amount of targets are reduced to 5. 

Druid the last point: Traits and make them work with all this changes. 

•  

After all this rework the traits will need also to be reworked so they can fit the desired design. Currently the traits may have some use but it does not feel the player has the freedom to build on their needs but it is forced to pick an specific set of traits depending on the game mode. This change will aim to give back some of that freedom while empowering the builds as the player imagine they want to play. 

Staff Proficiency don't need any change.

Celestial Being will need to be descriptive of the new Druidic Aspects as well as the new orbiting Wisp of light mechanic. 

 

Adept

this tier will be designed to  improve some passive mecqhanics of the specialization.

Verdant Etching . Greatly reduce Wisp of light recharge in case of being dispersed so the Wisp of light gets a very reduced downtime, Addtionaly when the wisp is dispersed an Aspect skill n.2 is cast on the Druid location.

Grace of the Land : The trait will be reworked to  Might grants also grant healing power to the Druid. Additionally the pet and the Druid will pulse might in a short radius (300)  when struck.

Druidic Clarity: This trait will be reworked to apply an additional effect on hits depending on Aspect attuned. The effects may have a short icd to reduce their impact in the game. 

Moon: The druid will heal by an small when struck by an enemy. 

Stars:  The Druid will gain resolution when is inflicted by a damaging condition. 

Wild: The druid will gain resistance when is inflicted by a movement impairing condition . 

 

Minor Master

 Live Vicariously no changes. 

 

Major Master

This tier will be designed to improve the effects of entering or swapping the aspects as a way to promote a more fluid and faster gameplay,

Natural Stride Addtionaly entering or swapping into a Druidic aspect will cleanse one movemen-imparing condition (chilled, immobilised, crippled).

Cultivated Synergy: Entering or swaping Aspects will heal around your pet. Addtionaly entering or swapping Aspects will cast the attuned Aspect skill 2  on the pet position.

Cycle of Echoes :  This trait reduced the recharge from staff skills. Additionally it will cause a short daze around the druid each time the Druid enters a Druidic Aspect. 

 

Minor Grandmaster

Natural Mender : Reworked to apply a extra 20% outgoing healing while in combat.  Additionally to the outgoing healing bonus it will make the spririts to pulse boons around them. The effect could be the same as the boons provided by the old revision of  Nature's_Vengeance. 

 

Major Grandmaster

Here the Druid picks to shine a light over an specific aspect of the specialization, being a better interaction with the pet, a better Druidic Aspects or focus into the Glyphs and their interactions. 

Cycle of Life : It will be reworked to "While in Druidic Aspect conditions are periodically cleansed"  .  Additionally entering or swapping a  Druidic Aspect will revive a defeated pet. 

Lingering Light : Druid Aspects will last 5 second longer. Aspects skills gain a reduced recharge. 

Glyphic enlightenment: Glyphs gain reduced recharge. Glyphs will gain an additional 2 pulses. 

And that's all i have

And that's all i have from my side. I do believe this would make the Druid a more rounded specialization gaining some access to offensive gameplay (by the Stars Aspect and some glyphs) while keeping the challenging mechanics in check (by reducing the amount of things the Druid can do at the same time and the use of the pets) and the supportish design . It would shift the gameplay closer to elementalist making a nice change of pace.

 

By removing the pet control the Druids get a propper trade off while still being able to get better usability of the pet in grand scale combat if picked the adequate traits . 

Also by removing some of the most problematic traits (Druidic clarity, celestial shadow and ancient seeds) and reducing the amount of things the specialization can do at the same time while giving a more consistent access to such mechanics  the specialization gets a more balanced role in small scale and a more flexibility in grand scale.  

By having access to an offensive Aspect the specialization may find a rewarding spot in Fractals and other PvE content. 

 

The specialization would be more rewarding and it would allow more variety of builds. Although i have to recognize this would be a a very big rework. 

 

Edited October 4, 2021 by anduriell.6280
Added Natural Mender pulsing boons. Redefined f2 activation, wisp functionally while in aspect from, missing information in traits. new iteration of some traits.

[AkantorCZ.8952]

You've got quite a few interesting ideas. But I'm affraid AN will never do the change of such a scope. I wish they would.

To be honest I never liked Druid design even thou I usually enjoy supporter classes.

But the problem is that the complete redesign would cost a lot of resources not to mention they would trow away work they've already spent resources on. And even thou many of us rangers desperatly hoping for such a change we are small audience when you compare it with a content that everyone can enjoy. Also among this small audience there are still people who actually like current Druid implementation and might get upset when AN rework the spec.

On the other hand I got frustrated by certain poor design choices for the Ranger in the past to the point I stopped playing the game completely. I kind of want to be vocal about the fact that such people exist as well.

Funny fact is that they actually hooked me with the druid trailer back in the days when HoT was introduced. Still remember wolf rushing forward with the Druid behind sending the vines. I was thinking cool pet will be stronger do the damage and I will support it with buffs and stuff. Unfortunatelly it was nothing like that and for someone who never really got into raids there was very little value in that spec. And look now... pet is even weaker for some reason and all damage boosting abilities were nerfed to the ground because of some raid group elitism.

Edited September 21, 2021 by AkantorCZ.8952

[BadSanta.6527]

unfourtnatliy we will not get druid rework any time soon , since arenet is bussy with the new elite . it is sad the place that druid turn out 

[Lazze.9870]

The thing is, druid doesn't need such an extensive rework. It needs a number of solid changes. I'm also highly in favor of doing a few changes to core that will create better synergy with druid other than spirit support and create opportunities for a support role to exist for druid in competetive modes.

- Celestial Avatar needs changes to how it is gated. This mechanic could obviously be completely reworked, but I don't think Anet will bother. A simplier redesign would be a reverse heat mechanic using the astral force, draining AF slowly while in the avatar and more or less removing the cooldown. Skill #1 should be a cone similar to engie med kit or firebrand tomes. Skill #2 needs a larger radius. The rest is fine, but skill #4 should scale better with healing power.

- Pets could also be completely reworked, but I don't see it happening either. Even removed in favor of unique Druid F1-F4 skills. But, to keep it simple, change the trade-off to affect offensive stats and buff defensive and supportive stats. Some rework/buffs on support oriented pets would be nice. Perma stowing would also be a nice bonus for WvW, where you'd have to manually summon the pet even if in combat.

- Staff needs a new #2 that isn't useless, a lazy suggestion is to copy staff #2 on guardian. The wall on #5 could/should be larger, maybe even reworked into a dome.

- Glyphs needs a couple of changes and a complete rework to Glyph of Unity. Just make it useful. Stars needs to be less clunky, but the general idea is fine. Alignement could drop the bleed in favor of slow, or just revert it to poison which is more useful in a competetive setting. Swap the normal version and the avatar version of Tides? Buff the support radius of all the glyphs except Stars.

- Traits: those affecting entering/exiting the avatar would need a redesign to allow the removal of the avatar cooldown. They can keep the cleanses and the superspeed, possibly the stealth, but have the traits alter the avatar skills to provide those effects. Primal Echoes should be a lesser Glyph of of Equality. Lingering Light should be increased outgoing healing at all times and aoe blind and heal when entering the avatar (with a fitting ICD). Ancient Seeds should still be about CC, but remove the roots - a short immob and area heal when hitting someone with a hard CC, as an example. Keep the rest as is, most importantly Grace of the Land - this is the only trait the PvE crowd cares about.

- Nature Magic needs some support buffs. Make Evasive Purity aoe similar to the ele's Stop, Drop and Roll. Invigorating Bond could literally be anything usefull for support in competetive, the current trait is worthless. Preferably not a F2 trait. Something that enhances regenration and/or application of it, maybe. Allie's Aid should drop the Search and Rescue proc and instead summon a lesser Healing Spring while also granting a revive % to Healing Spring. Lastly, in Wilderness Knowledge, changing Empahtic Bond to something more effective for self-sustain would help druid in PvP.

Edited September 28, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[anduriell.6280]

I understand the points brought about the amount of effort anet and the devs are willing to put into the game. 
Even if that is true this is how I would redesign the druid, so I did not take into account the effort wich would take.

Any other changes in my opinion would be just half measures which would bring up issues in other areas. Thus I though about this rework. 
 

1 hour ago, Lazze.9870 said:

- Nature Magic needs some support buffs. Make Evasive Purity aoe similar to the ele's Stop, Drop and Roll. Invigorating Bond could literally be anything usefull for support in competetive, the current trait is worthless. Preferably not a F2 trait. Something that enhances regenration and/or application of it, maybe. Allie's Aid should drop the Search and Rescue proc and instead summon a lesser Healing Spring while also granting a revive % to Healing Spring. Lastly, in Wilderness Knowledge, changing Empahtic Bond to something more effective for self-sustain would help druid a lot for competetive support.

I agree core needs fixing too, and Nature Magic could get some changes but that’s not related to druid. 
i do think druid as minor should provide the effects from Nature vengeance trait and that trait reworked to it does allow the spirits to share the passives instead.

 

As such passive mobile spirits  would follow the ranger and apply the passive only to the ranger and pet in a reduce radius by baseline and the ranger would pick NM to open group support options, thus limiting the offensive a build can be while offering group support. 
 

I will open a vol5 recollecting ideas for changes to core traits and skills at some point in the future.

[Lazze.9870]

40 minutes ago, anduriell.6280 said:

I agree core needs fixing too, and Nature Magic could get some changes but that’s not related to druid. 

Except it is related to druid. It's not about "fixing core", it's about providing the necessary synergy between core and druid so that druid is allowed to exists as a support option in competetive modes without overloading druid with buffs and reworks.

I provided a set of changes that they could implemented if they wanted to. You're providing a massive overhaul which 1) will never happen and 2) has a ton of changes that is nowhere near necessary to make druid work. Like, a spirit trait as a minor on druid? That's borderline stupid.

Edited September 22, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[anduriell.6280]

2 hours ago, Lazze.9870 said:

Except it is related to druid. It's not about "fixing core", it's about providing the necessary synergy between core and druid so that druid is allowed to exists as a support option in competetive modes without overloading druid with buffs and reworks.

I provided a set of changes that they could implemented if they wanted to. You're providing a massive overhaul which 1) will never happen and 2) has a ton of changes that is nowhere near necessary to make druid work. Like, a spirit trait as a minor on druid? That's borderline stupid.

I don’t understand why you take a position of conflict in any interaction you have in the forums, there is no need to be calling names to defend your point. 
 

About NM and druid: No, it’s not related to druid unless you make it so. Current druid has nothing to do with our naturalistic spirits skills or nature magic traitline. 

I am not saying your ideas are “stupid” I just pointing out that half solutions or bandage fixes most probably will not work as it has been proven time and time again and it would be faster and easier ( and cheaper) to just rework it as a whole

 

I also happens to think Druid providing the buff to spirits to share boons is not that stupid and it perfectly fitted to be baseline to druid in any iteration but do not deserve an actual trait spot. It is just not written here because it would not make sense with current NM traitline. 

 

The same as I think current Nature Vengeance has nothing of Vengeance and it does not reserve a GM spot. 

Also Only Anet devs know what they are willing to undertake or not, we have seen reworks in other classes.
I would not presume I know better.

 

In any case ranger as a whole profession is overdue to a deep rework as the strategy of fixing the class with the new specs seems not to be working as expected. 

[Lazze.9870]

On 9/22/2021 at 5:23 PM, anduriell.6280 said:

About NM and druid: No, it’s not related to druid unless you make it so.

You're taking things too literally. When your reaction to me bringing up Nature Magic in a thread about druid reworks is "this isn't about core", then you fail to understand what I'm actually saying.

Nature Magic is lackluster. It has room for improvements that can offload druid and create better synergy between them. It is related if you think realistic about things, instead of tearing everything down and coming up with new concepts that will never happen.
 

On 9/22/2021 at 5:23 PM, anduriell.6280 said:

there is no need to be calling names to defend your point. 

 

I haven't called anyone anything. I'm calling out your ideas for what they are. Moving spirit traits to druid is dumb and unnecessary. I'm not gonna sugarcoat it.
 

On 9/22/2021 at 5:23 PM, anduriell.6280 said:

I just pointing out that half solutions or bandage fixes most probably will not work

 

Nothing of what I wrote are half solutions or bandages, those are real fixes to the low hanging fruits druid has, and it would make druid viable at what it tries to do across all three game modes. That's the point. And it's a realistic approach. Your ideas are not.

Edited October 2, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[RyuDragnier.9476]

I feel like the main things Druid need are the following.

 

1. Our healing abilities in CA need to be doing damage (even if low amounts) when they hit an enemy to give us offense while supporting.
2. The glyphs of alignment and unity should be reversed, so we send damage back to our enemies while in CA and heal others while out of it (since you're likely taking Lingering Light if you're wanting to go heavy healing anyway).
3. This is gonna be controversial, but lower the targets on the utility spirits to 5 people even with Nature's Vengeance on or make them give regular boons instead of special ones so they're not so mandatory all the time, SERIOUSLY. Water and Nature are fine because they're healing, but the rest? No, Druid cannot be brought back up or have any kind of build variety until these spirits are less valuable, and I personally cannot stand being shoehorned into having both Sun and Frost spirits on my bar at almost every encounter in a raid.

[Swagger.1459]

All of these suggestions are a bunch of needless and unnecessary designs. It’s almost as if you want to make this espec worse off than it is. And kind of, well, idk… to even suggest that a weapon can’t target an enemy… There is way too much to nitpick here, so I’ll just say that your ideas aren’t really something that should ever be considered. 

[HotHit.6783]

The identity of Glyphs is Utilities that change function depending on the user's mode. Elementalist's vary with Attunement, while Druid's being whether in Celestial Avatar. As a theoretical example, Necromancer could get Glyphs that change function during Death Shroud. So, yeah, with your rework it would need to change the utilities from Glyphs or have 2 or 4 versions of the skills.

 

As for your staff rework; it's unnecessary, goes against GW2 healing design and would feel extremely awkward with the change in animal companion controls. The current version of staff is, in my opinion, a very good design and the restrictions it was built around make it naturally overcome the lack of manual pet control.

 

As for the overall mechanical changes I don't like this design direction so long as the third elite spec isn't some kind of beastmaster. Druid has a strong focus, it would be better to integrate that support/healing focus with the animal companion, rather than have it further replace it. Replacing Beast Skills with supportive "Celestial" variants, for instance.

Edited September 29, 2021 by HotHit.6783

[mistsim.2748]

I've been asking for Druids to lose access to animals, and gain invulnerable wisps that can be microed for years. It only makes perfect sense.

Staff tweaks like u outlined are also essential if staff is to be worth anything outside of JUST raids. Losing the i-frame on #3 was a bad kick in the nuts.

Great write-up, will never happen.

 

Edited September 29, 2021 by mistsim.2748

[anduriell.6280]

14 hours ago, HotHit.6783 said:

As for the overall mechanical changes I don't like this design direction so long as the third elite spec isn't some kind of beastmaster. Druid has a strong focus, it would be better to integrate that support/healing focus with the animal companion, rather than have it further replace it. Replacing Beast Skills with supportive "Celestial" variants, for instance.

I really hope the new spec is not a beastmaster thingy. First that should be a core functionality and second pet will not provide any functionality in teams fights. 

What you should be asking is to improve core so it becomes the beastmaster profession is supposed to be. 

[wolfyrik.2017]

This is a really nice idea but sadly it won't happen.

I was so angry about the druid at launch, not least because you are absolutely correct. It has nothing to do with ranger. It always felt like it was designed for another class, then hammered onto Ranger like a square peg into a round hole. The colour scheme didn't match, the animations didn't match, at least in most cases. The lore absolutely doesn't match, even in HoT itself and certainly not now! At HoT launch it seemed like they'd forgotten the pet even existed as far as druid was concerned. It had no interaction with the pet whatsoever. This has been somewhat hand-waved away as "balance" in the current design philosphy, having downsides to especs, codified with the relatively recent lowering of pet stats.

Over time Anet have managed to stick plasters over some of the cracks, sanded off some of the edges so that there's at least some usable druid builds outside healing but it's existence still makes me fear every expac. Soulbeast was a great choice, tho I maintain what soulbeast does should be baseline for the class and it still has some OP moments. Druid tho, I still worry about what they will do next expac because druid still stings.

In my opinion, ranger has yet to receive an elite spec. Druid was made for a different class,  basically a hand-me-down from a pile of another class' rejected ideas and soul beast is what core-ranger should be, it just hasn't been properly integrated. I guess we'll see what's next.

Edited October 1, 2021 by wolfyrik.2017

[Axl.8924]

On 9/22/2021 at 5:23 PM, anduriell.6280 said:

I don’t understand why you take a position of conflict in any interaction you have in the forums, there is no need to be calling names to defend your point. 
 

About NM and druid: No, it’s not related to druid unless you make it so. Current druid has nothing to do with our naturalistic spirits skills or nature magic traitline. 

I am not saying your ideas are “stupid” I just pointing out that half solutions or bandage fixes most probably will not work as it has been proven time and time again and it would be faster and easier ( and cheaper) to just rework it as a whole

 

I also happens to think Druid providing the buff to spirits to share boons is not that stupid and it perfectly fitted to be baseline to druid in any iteration but do not deserve an actual trait spot. It is just not written here because it would not make sense with current NM traitline. 

 

The same as I think current Nature Vengeance has nothing of Vengeance and it does not reserve a GM spot. 

Also Only Anet devs know what they are willing to undertake or not, we have seen reworks in other classes.
I would not presume I know better.

 

In any case ranger as a whole profession is overdue to a deep rework as the strategy of fixing the class with the new specs seems not to be working as expected. 

 

In my opinion if they can rework scourge then they can rework druid, its just a case of keep calling it out over and over. and pointing out flaws and otherwise being vocal.

Edited October 1, 2021 by Axl.8924

[Dadnir.5038]

On 9/28/2021 at 1:26 AM, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

I feel like the main things Druid need are the following.

 

1. Our healing abilities in CA need to be doing damage (even if low amounts) when they hit an enemy to give us offense while supporting.
2. The glyphs of alignment and unity should be reversed, so we send damage back to our enemies while in CA and heal others while out of it (since you're likely taking Lingering Light if you're wanting to go heavy healing anyway).
3. This is gonna be controversial, but lower the targets on the utility spirits to 5 people even with Nature's Vengeance on or make them give regular boons instead of special ones so they're not so mandatory all the time, SERIOUSLY. Water and Nature are fine because they're healing, but the rest? No, Druid cannot be brought back up or have any kind of build variety until these spirits are less valuable, and I personally cannot stand being shoehorned into having both Sun and Frost spirits on my bar at almost every encounter in a raid.

I do agree with point 1. Personally I'd make them doing damage and not heal by default and I'd make use of lingering light to make the kit heal instead of dealing damage.

I'm neutral on point 2. It's probably the way it is currently for thematic purpose.

On point 3, I both agree and disagree. It's true that their uniqueness make them madatory pick, however If you nerf this uniqueness they will just be invisible skills that nobody use. The spirits are balanced at the moment due to them only seeing niche use. You'd have to rework spirits into skills usable in a greater variety of content to justify any kind of nerf to them.

[Dadnir.5038]

1 hour ago, Axl.8924 said:

 

In my opinion if they can rework scourge then they can rework druid, its just a case of keep calling it out over and over. and pointing out flaws and otherwise being vocal.

Can they even rework scourge? So far I didn't see any "rework", just pointless adjustment to perceived issues (mostly nerfs). The big difference being that Scourge have a wider range of possible use than the Druid ever had. You can't expect a control/heal spec to see as much use as a control/damage/boon hate/protect spec in a game where healing other wasn't really an option until the first expansion.

[Axl.8924]

1 hour ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Can they even rework scourge? So far I didn't see any "rework", just pointless adjustment to perceived issues (mostly nerfs). The big difference being that Scourge have a wider range of possible use than the Druid ever had. You can't expect a control/heal spec to see as much use as a control/damage/boon hate/protect spec in a game where healing other wasn't really an option until the first expansion.

Scourge is fairly tough to change due to the way its built with built in barrier and condi dps combined and likelyhood to be nerfed.

People are asking for druid to be viable in pve as support, which i fully support. If necros can why can't druids offer something too that is competitive in pve raids?

 

Also scourge got barrier buffs ages ago made so barrier was meta and it got buffed again making it stronger and scourge is used in cm100, so yeah its good.

[Dadnir.5038]

23 minutes ago, Axl.8924 said:

People are asking for druid to be viable in pve as support, which i fully support. If necros can why can't druids offer something too that is competitive in pve raids?

"Viable" and "competitive" are different things. "Competitive" have a higher treshold of requirement than "viable" will ever have.

As such, Druid is and have always been 100% viable as a support in PvE. It got powerful unique party/squad buffs, can provide many boons (among which might and fury), cleanse and heal it's allies. As a bonus it got more than enough tools to help in breaking the defiance of the more powerful foes you find in PvE.

Furthermore, technically, Druid is already "competitive" thanks to it's unique buffs, the only reason it isn't currently meta is because it doesn't fit as well within the current meta groups/squads than the other options. If you give it even a little push it will just leave the other options in the dust.

What people want isn't for Druid to be competitive in PvE, what people want is for Druid to be more flexible than just being the group/squad healing-boon bot that he is. Also, the main motivation isn't PvE, where druid has been at the center of the meta for many years, but PvP (or competitive modes if you prefer).

Ultimately, to achieve the flexibility wanted, what the druid need is an avatar that's less pidgeonholed into (over)healing. What it need is for it's mechanism to provide a variety of choice instead of the single one that it currently provide: healing.

[Axl.8924]

Sure having druid be flexible is good but how would you accomplish that without causing huge mayhem in being able to heal and dps?

[Swagger.1459]

With all due respect, when a player plays a ranger, they want to play a ranger. They don't want to play a quasi-elementalist that fiddles with 25 skills based off of timers, swapping, plus resources to manage... On top of all this, you suggest that their main weapon can't target an enemy, so it makes it a completely useless weapon solo and a pain to play in groups because you are only laser-beaming 1 person for the equivalent of a poor man's regen while hoping a baddie enters the beam... That really sound like quality fun to you?

 

There is also a trend of changing something to something its not, or just for the sake of change. Case in point, make soulbeast into a better support character than druid. And make soulbeast into a better power spec when the main design of the spec was to be a hybrid power/condi spec melee spec with daggers and beast infusion. Obviously that area lacks behind in all game modes, but you completely ignore that and don't bother to figure out how to improve that. No, just give it lots of extra power because why not. 

 

You honestly have to start thinking these thing through better. I get that we all have some crazy ideas and inspiration, but these suggestions are full blown off the mark for this profession and do nothing to address the real issues with the druid, or ranger for that matter. It would probably be better if you focused on what classes and specs are supposed to be, and how to make those better. Not throw a thousand random ideas in a blender hoping it comes out palatable.   

 

Again, when a player loads up a ranger, they want to play a ranger. They do not want to play an elementalist with designs and skills that are nonsensical and all over the place.  

Edited October 1, 2021 by Swagger.1459

[RyuDragnier.9476]

11 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

On point 3, I both agree and disagree. It's true that their uniqueness make them madatory pick, however If you nerf this uniqueness they will just be invisible skills that nobody use. The spirits are balanced at the moment due to them only seeing niche use. You'd have to rework spirits into skills usable in a greater variety of content to justify any kind of nerf to them.

It's something I hope they can somehow pull off in the future. Spirits shouldn't be the defining feature in a Druid's repertoire, but they also shouldn't be useless utility skills.

[Dadnir.5038]

19 hours ago, Axl.8924 said:

Sure having druid be flexible is good but how would you accomplish that without causing huge mayhem in being able to heal and dps?

By doing exactly what I said previously:

- Take lingering light and you got the currrent avatar skills.

- Don't take lingering light and the healing values on the current avatar skills are damage value instead (obviously not the exact same value since damage value can crit and healing values can't)

I'm not suggesting damage and healing, I'm suggesting damage or healing. No other change needed than this, the fact that the majority of the traits focus on healing is fine since you'll still have glyphs for that. Outside of Lingering light, that would put the Druid at a level of sustain and damage that's not to far from Scourge while with lingering light you'd go all in on healing.

 

10 hours ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

It's something I hope they can somehow pull off in the future. Spirits shouldn't be the defining feature in a Druid's repertoire, but they also shouldn't be useless utility skills.

If we look back to GW, Druids originally are all about spirits and traps. I would say that it's GW2 Druid which is an heresy with it's focus on healing.

[Lazze.9870]

23 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

it's unique buffs

 

The unique buffs are not "its", those are unique ranger buffs and unrelated to druid in all ways except for one: druid is the most efficient way for ranger to play as a spirit bot.

 

As for changes, the ones I adressed in my comment earlier in the thread are what druid actually needs without massive design overhauls. It's a healer first and foremost, but it's too gated too do that job effectively. Fix that, instead of changing what it is. Deal with the fact that this is the ranger support elite spec.

Edited October 2, 2021 by Lazze.9870

[Dadnir.5038]

29 minutes ago, Lazze.9870 said:

 

The unique buffs are not "its", those are unique ranger buffs and unrelated to druid in all ways except for one: druid is the most efficient way for ranger to play as a spirit bot.

 

As for changes, the ones I adressed in my comment earlier in the thread are what druid actually needs without massive design overhauls. It's a healer first and foremost, but it's too gated too do that job effectively. Fix that, instead of changing what it is. Deal with the fact that this is the ranger support elite spec.

I think the fact that you see the ranger and the druid as 2 separated entities is the problem here. Whether one like it or not all the ranger's support tools are available to the druid and thus belong to the druid as much as they belong to the ranger. So whether it's the spirit's buff, spotter or the easy access to group fury, regen, vigor, swiftness they all belong to the druid as much as they belong to the ranger. Druid's support isn't just "heal, cleanse and the few boons on glyph of the stars".

I've read your suggestion and, well, they are arguable. At least they aren't any more valid than mine (And mine ask for a lot less work than yours). You think that druid's issue is that he is "too gated to be an effective healer", I think that druid's issue is that "the avatar is to focused on healing". I believe that druid don't need the avatar to be so focused on healing to perform well as a healer and that acting on this point is the most effective way to free the spec from it's predicament. You, on another hand, want many things in many areas that touch the core ranger as much as it touch the druid and thus would probably create many issues on their own on other e-specs.

I respect your philosophy. Making many small changes to the whole profession in order to ensure that a mechanism end up working well isn't a wrong way to try and fix things, after all that's the way ANet's devs balance this game. However, personally I don't think it's the right way to fix the druid.