Rate catalyst

[Aru.2534]

1. Hammer skills are not bad, it's mostly numbers: range 600 is no good, great for taking punches in face, and not ranged fight at all: suggest 750-800 for ranged skills and 700-750 for air 4. Fire and earth 5 giving aegis or stability during cast. Water 2 gives front block during it's time. Water 5 range bigger. 5 air's charge blows faster, air 2 faster cast on same damage duration. Maybe some tweak on moving around in 2 earth. Make 4 earth a true block with longer duration, without dropping on first hit, giving an aura after cast based on attunement.

2. Jade sphere. Completely broken, worst is - charging by strikes, always-on-cooldown, static. In current idea it must be either high risk high reward or simply instant on-off field without any additions.

3. Utility skills. Total waste. Not even broken, simply trash. At first: new "Armament" type breaks all flow of hammer: it can't be cast during other skills, and not instant, combined with fast-paced class gameplay but long-channeling weapon skills it's one or another, in result none of them. Water heal: good heal idea, instant non-casting, BUT cleanse IF ONLY IN YOUR'S JADE'S FIELD, BUT ONLY WATER FIELD. Hello there, cantrips Ether Renewal and Cleansing Fire. Other four too have same conditions on effects. Make them usable off-field or in any field, not just IF IT'S YOUR'S JADE'S ONLY IN SAME ATTUNEMENT. Honestly, best thing just to throw them out and create new ones. New Revenant and warrior got instantly useful utilities, like "out of the box", but here you must do savage time-manage. If keep them, on the list: fire - 5 seconds is nothing; water - damage is low, need second strike or duplication of your blow, vulnerabuluty instead of chill to stack effectiveness, move to elite; air - regen of endurance 150-200%, superspeed to run out of your sphere as fast as possible?, lol, but best of all; earth - HELLO THERE, ARMOR OF EARTH cantrip that gives you ability to fight, not hold shield, HELLO THERE OBSIDIAN FLESH SKILL ON DEFENSIVE WEAPON FOCUS that don't waste your utility skill slot, HELLO THERE HAMMER EARTH SKILL IMMUTABLE STONE that should work like this skill, AND HELLO THERE EASY WEAVER'S BARRIERS STACK, just rework hammer's earth 4 and throw this skill away. Elite - high risk low reward - throw away this trash and make hammer weapon cooldown reasonable. Also insane cooldown on skill. Even Bladesworn's elite is better, even if motive is the same. To my opinion there was one like "feel the power" elite - weaver's, but it was bad at terms of clicking all attunements instead of playing and having fun, others are so highly situational that sometimes it feels like trash. But other classes got good elites.

4. Traits. As I've seen so far, on EOD specs there are lazy way to design traits like they are equipment (on necro it's 100% true at least): do you want to be tough, or deal damage, or, maybe, even support?! Here you are. But nothing more. Not interesting. Support line on jade sphere not needed at all, auras to me are good, but cooldown on every combo is ridiculous here, should be off or less, because making combo is not an ordinary thing.

Overall feeling after playing pve and watching videos with pvp and opinions, also reading here some: hammer as idea is not bad, but I was expecting a mix of mobility of elementalist with some heavy boxer power, or maybe some crazy train crushing all in front of it, like barrier build ups and juicy punches, but got not-so-easy auras and bad jade combo field. And want more impact on hits and effects like knockdowns on earth, 'cause it's a HAMMERSMASH!!!, but not here... Other people taking into pvp one catalyst utility out of curiosity, others are the same standard core goods. Catalyst's are trash. Traits that works great without the hammer and jade sphere is just SUCCESS.

And while playing spec I on weapon I tried to find some joy and and even found the excuses for hammer, and even found some of them, and compromises. Not for utilities, they just like CP 2077 - is there. Traits - there or not, IDK and forgot, trying to plant and catch a sphere who got separate own life like a girl who you like but got no chances to be together. Some Quidditch game, honestly...

And last - hammer 3 is not bad to me, but need more impact, prolonged time, and no cd on throw skill, like for instance - summoned fire, threw it, then other one if needed, and so on...How it is now feels like weaver's elite keyboard run, but we got it already there. Here it breaks the flow.

When players are finding excuses and compromises in your job it means one thing - job is no good.

Edited September 24, 2021 by Aru.2534
Phone bugged, added some info

[EpicName.4523]

In terms of overall concept, Catalyst does not appeal to me. Hammer on the squishiest light armor profession in this game simply does not fit. Nobody asked for this.

 

In terms of gameplay, I see nothing unique or fun in the way Catalyst plays. Especially compared to rev or warrior elite specs, this one feels quickly put together and VERY uninspired.

 

In terms of what new things Catalyst brings to the table...What are they exactly? The F5? If you want to melee you have Weaver, what role Catalyst fills that is not yet seen on ele?

 

In terms of performance and how effective it is...Yeah.

 

So why does this elite spec even exist, except to sell an expansion?

Edited September 24, 2021 by EpicName.4523

[gandlethorpe.2641]

7 hours ago, Sunshine.5014 said:

Going in a Solo Open World battle, immediately blew all the utilities, and still lost 40% of HP fighting trash mob. That's the reason you got so many "confused" emotes.

People have posted Weaver solo HoT champs. How about you take that Catalyst build and see if you can solo HoT champs? If you can post a good video on soloing HoT champs, then it will support your point much better.

 

I have soloed HoT champs. Maybe not as comfortably as I can with weaver at the moment, but we've had 4 years to master it while this have been out for 3 days. I'm getting there though as I'm actually put in time to learn how it works with 30+ hours.

 

6 hours ago, Flori.2194 said:

 

I can already solo like 99% of open world with my weaver. I can do anything besides world bosses and some really hard group events or stuff that requires too much work for only one player. I don't care if the new e-spec can do this because I already can WITHOUT the new e-spec. The thing is: Try to use your fancy sphere in a setting where your enemy moves away from it! In wvw or pvp this is just core ele with a different trait line that doesn't do that much. There is no point in using it in any competitive mode. But sure, kill some centaurs or veteran chaks and feel happy about it. But this e-spec doesn't make any sense for someone who mainly plays against REAL players.

 

The vast majority of PvP is standing in circles, so I don't see how a spec that makes its own personal OP boon circle will be bad. Sure it doesn't have the CC that weaver does, but maybe it's not meant to chase down things as opposed to holding down an area. I'll admit I haven't played it much yet in PvP/WvW, but I need to be comfortable with the skills before trying it against people who are playing things have been out years. 

 

I'm not claiming it's going to be the best thing ever, but the amount of snap judgements here saying it's trash and ANet should scrap the entire thing is disheartening. So much certainty about something that players have barely scratched the surface with.

Edited September 24, 2021 by gandlethorpe.2641

[Flori.2194]

20 minutes ago, gandlethorpe.2641 said:

 

The vast majority of PvP is standing in circles, so I don't see how a spec that makes its own personal OP boon circle will be bad. Sure it doesn't have the CC that weaver does, but maybe it's not meant to chase down things as opposed to holding down an area. I'll admit I haven't played it much yet in PvP/WvW, but I need to be comfortable with the skills before trying it against people who are playing things have been out years. 

 

I'm not claiming it's going to be the best thing ever, but the amount of snap judgements here saying it's trash and ANet should scrap the entire thing is disheartening. So much certainty about something that players have barely scratched the surface with.

 

If the sphere would be OP... It's OK to have, but not decisive, the augments even in the right sphere are still not viable and you get out of combat a few times and the sphere won't be ready in time...

 

And it's trash, sometimes things we create turn out to be useless. In the version we have right now this e-spec will see no play outside of some very, very niche scenarios. 

[scerevisiae.1972]

7 hours ago, gandlethorpe.2641 said:

I have soloed HoT champs. Maybe not as comfortably as I can with weaver at the I'm not claiming it's going to be the best thing ever, but the amount of snap judgements here saying it's trash and ANet should scrap the entire thing is disheartening. So much certainty about something that players have barely scratched the surface with.

The main thrust of the complaints are not about its power level, they're about how fundamentally broken the core design is.

* it's basically a mish-mash of sword weaver and D/D because ~2/3rd of the kit is melee range, *not* medium range
* the F5 is super clunky (unless you're stationary)
* the "energy" mechanic is way out of left field and really adds nothing over a normal fixed duration or duration + traits
* the traits are based on aura production with only 1 (clunky) field in the whole kit (how stupid is that) and moreover, auras were tempest's thing, why are we doing auras again?  
* the utilities are ultra bad and don't work with the any of the rest of the kit.

 

... it's a design problem not a number problem.  i mean look at the poll numbers - it's blatantly obvious there's a problem.

 

Edited September 25, 2021 by scerevisiae.1972

[SamCeption.6704]

On 9/25/2021 at 2:14 AM, scerevisiae.1972 said:

* the traits are based on aura production with only 1 (clunky) field in the whole kit (how stupid is that) and moreover, auras were tempest's thing, why are we doing auras again?  

Let's be real, auras are not even interesting. They are basically just placeholder effects for triggering traits (except in pvp maybe). So why do we get two elite specs focussing on something so mechanically dull within the same class??

Even if anet feels like Catalyst NEEDS aura synergies, why not make auras more impactful instead of introducing more passive 'trigger on aura' traits? Imagine, for example, a trait that enhances your auras by granting a small primordial stance effect. Burn pulsing on fire auras, chill pulsing on frost auras, etc. Suddenly auras feel like they actually do something.

EDIT:

I would love a trait that automatically transmutes auras applied to you at the end of its duration. The whole transmuting mechanic is already there, why not use it!

Edited September 28, 2021 by SamCeption.6704

[ScottBroChill.3254]

I just want to know what the catalyst is trying to accomplish because for the life of me I can't figure it out. I guess just another too complex class meant only for raid/golem benchmarks who needs total support from a party to accomplish anything. It's a carpenter who brought a hammer, but no nails or wood. Just a lot of zipties and bungee cords and other assorted junk that gets in the way. 

 

And i feel bad because I'm sure the designers felt really good about making this cool mage who weilds a hammer and surprisingly in the preview a lot of people were coming around to the concept and thinking it might work. but, cmon. You've literally already done the whole melee mage thing for half of our weapons and it always turns into the same thing. Super high mobility and evades with a lot of healing in order to survive and those things are nowhere to be found on hammer and are the only things that keep ele alive. So really, what was the goal with this besides just trying to be different for the sake of being different. 

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

On 9/24/2021 at 6:32 PM, gandlethorpe.2641 said:

The vast majority of PvP is standing in circles, so I don't see how a spec that makes its own personal OP boon circle will be bad. Sure it doesn't have the CC that weaver does, but maybe it's not meant to chase down things as opposed to holding down an area. I'll admit I haven't played it much yet in PvP/WvW, but I need to be comfortable with the skills before trying it against people who are playing things have been out years. 

 

I'm not claiming it's going to be the best thing ever, but the amount of snap judgements here saying it's trash and ANet should scrap the entire thing is disheartening. So much certainty about something that players have barely scratched the surface with.

 

Because it was the fact in pvp.
The F5 does ZERO damage and has ZERO effect on enemies; it has obviously bad energy management, long CD etc and for what ? Only to pulse ONE Boon per attunement, ... and a combo. I don't call One boon field "OP". The spec mechanic is useless in pvp. It also mean 3 traits are totally useless in pvp.

Same with hammer : no mobility no evade. A skill that blocks ONE attack. No combo field, poor combo finisher. Orbs with big issue of hitbox.

And traits ?The rest of them just stack buffs. It's cool in pve, but in pvp/wvw you expect some cd reduction, additionnal effect, Support, active sustain ... not -4% damage on aura.

Edited September 28, 2021 by Zhaid Zhem.6508

[SkinnyT.5382]

You know when kids copy and pastes an essay and submits it is? That's what the Catalyst feels like. A copy of the Weaver, except the changes weren't good enough to make it unique on it's own so it just look bad in all directions. I don't think it's a lost cause, but ANET needs to find what is suppose to be unique about the Catalyst and focus on making that cohesive and  different from the other E-Specs. When playing the Catalyst I didn't know what my character was suppose to be, or what it was suppose do. It was all over and yet no where. And the trait line which is suppose to give you more options on how to play, just made me more lost.

[Puck.3697]

Catalyst

- mechanic F5 lacks engaging gameplay. It's too easy to forget your not playing core ele. 

- charge up is just too slow 

- useless in alot of situations. 

Hammer

- too little survivability.

- needs a major DMG increase. 

- up the range from 600 to 900 on fire/air skills.

- earth needs barrier generation. 

- water needs better healing access. 

Utilities:

Weak and pretty uncreative. Imho needs a overhaul realistically. Imho 

Elite. 

Again too weak..

Traits:

Imho the only good part of the specc currently. 

I don't think it's so bad it needs a full rework, but there's defintly problems realistically. Hammer doesn't offer the survivability it realistically needs to, the utilities just aren't strong enough to be useful. And again the elites god awful. 

But yeah no where near uptoo par realistically 

[Touchme.1097]

A deeper look into the last 3 EoD Elite Specs including Catalyst: Guild Wars 2 End Of Dragons Preview - Catalyst, Bladesworn, And Vindicator (thegamer.com)

Even the game journalist was expecting a pure ranged Elite Spec instead of the Hammer hybrid. Rifle would have fitted better with Cantha technology. 

The Game Designer who designed the Catalyst will have a lot of work to do to adjust this Elite Spec before February. The damage is done already. More than half of the players who voted in this poll rated this new E-Spec bad or terrible, it's not even fun.

I don't know what the design team was thinking when giving Elementalist this Hammer Spec. It doesn't even feel unique, as it shares similarities with Scrapper Engi.

Edited September 28, 2021 by Touchme.1097
Grammar correction

[Flori.2194]

8 hours ago, Touchme.1097 said:

I don't know what the design team was thinking when giving Elementalist this Hammer Spec. It doesn't even feel unique, as it shares similarities with Scrapper Engi.

They didn't think anything, the water bottle dude said it himself: "So somehow we decided to give ele hammer." They clearly don't know why. I mean it's their game, they can create any lore they want to make it fit thematically but no, they probably just rolled a die.

And to top it all of, the cherry on this nightmare cake, is that they went for one of the conjured weapons. A massive flavour fail for me in this already conpletely failed e-spec: Why would Harry Potter summon another wand if he could summon an AK-47 or a bazooka or a tank? Why would we summon another hammer if we can already wield one? Oh I know, the conjured hammer is much better. But I think they totally forgot about the conjured mechanic at all just how they forgot about elementalist in general. Anyone who plays ele for more than 10 hours can brainstorm a better e-spec in 5 minutes. 

But yeah, elementalist is in a good spot right now. 

 

#reworkeleyoucowards 

[Lynx.9058]

I didn't get much testing in, but let's put it this way: I went into it thinking that hammer was a terrible choice and that literally anything would have been better for the elementalist spec.  After 5 minutes with catalyst I fell in love with it.   It is so kitten fun swinging that hammer around spitting fire and lightning that it has instantly become one of my favorite specs in the game on feel alone.

 

That said, like all ele specs, it needs to not be a paper tiger that dies to trash mobs.  Ele in general needs better healing and survivability.

[Lynx.9058]

hey, a spec can be terribly uneffective and still be fun =P

A couple more thoughts on it:

Hammer 3 needs the duration increased from 5 seconds to at least 10, maybe even 15.  It's cool that each atunement's hammer3 refreshes all existing orbiting elements, but I get the feeling that the design intent here was to have something that you build up with all 4 elements and then 'unleash' by hitting hammer3 again after all four are orbiting you, and with only a 5 second duration it's really easy to lose your orbs before you can refresh with the next element.  Plus, as someone else put it, the existing elementalist specs are encouraged to spend a little bit more time in each atunement, rather than rapidly swapping and putting them all on cooldown for one combo.

I'd like to be able to hit hammer 3 with one element, use at least 2-3 other skills/attacks from that element before moving on to the next one, so on and so forth until all four orbs are circling me, then be able to unleash them all as a big finishing move type attack on tougher enemies/bosses.

I also think that depending on atunement, one of the hammer attacks should always be a gap closer or creator.  With fire and air being ranged, while earth and water are melee, I think it'd be ideal if one of the fire or air attacks was a gap closer, so you'd use all of your fire/air abilities and then the gap closer before switching to earth/water - and similarly one of the earth/water attacks would be a leap backwards so you can use your earth/water abilities and then regain range when switching into fire/air again.

Final note: as someone else mentioned, the attacks - especially the melee attacks for earth/water - need to have some hard CC available.  Fighting in melee without the ability to knockdown/stun your target is suicide.

[Flori.2194]

3 hours ago, Lynx.9058 said:

 Fighting in melee without the ability to knockdown/stun your target is suicide.

I don't see a problem here, it's totally on theme with ele. 

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

The more I think about and look at others specs, the less I understand the spec : the field, the augments, the hammer ? Really, what's the purpose ? What I'm supposed to do with Catalyst ?

 

Aurashare / support ? Augments, traits, hammer have nothing to support/buff allies. Tempest can already spam auras too, with heal, with boons, with range. Even weaver can spam fire auras effectively. But not the stab (I admit, it's a good trait)

Boon fart ? Yeah ... ONE boon in the field, a field you can't maintain, not even in pve against a golem !? FB, scrapper, revenant etc, and soon Harbinger, do better with easier mechanic (shouts, mantras, wells, elixirs etc with no broken energy management) and other utilities.

Same with DPS. Hammer is Range ? Melee ? One target or cleave/aoe ? It is so confusing. You have a bit of everything, between attunements but even in each attunement. Plus once they'll fix the #3, boom, bye bye the  45k dps,

And the Elemental Empowerment I'm sorry, but this isn't a good mechanic, conceptually." increases all stats by 1%"
It's lazy. There is no idea, no purpose, behind but creating false perception of versatility.
Honestly, I don't care, I don't want weaver bis neither;  but 3-4traits ??? And it doesn't even work ;you will never pile up the 10 stack in pvp/wvw, and even in pve you need one or two aurashare arround to maintain the 10 stacks.

Edited September 29, 2021 by Zhaid Zhem.6508

[Zaxx.8125]

20 hours ago, Flori.2194 said:

They didn't think anything, the water bottle dude said it himself: "So somehow we decided to give ele hammer." They clearly don't know why. I mean it's their game, they can create any lore they want to make it fit thematically but no, they probably just rolled a die.

 I mean, the same guy made a joke about ele's being a meme downstate class. And yet, we get an espec thats half melee half weird mid range with almost 0 survival... That was like a blatant slap in the face of the whole Ele community 😕

Edited September 29, 2021 by Zaxx.8125

[Ragnarox.9601]

I like the hammer but its underwhelming, it needs some stability on earth, projectile reflect in lightning, better heal in water and better attacks in fire. 

 

 F5 needs to be better

 

Lightning #2 lock animation need to go. 

Earth #2 more dmg or make it projectile reflect.

 

Hammer  attacks are slow but it does not do good dmg, i tried celestial gear, marauder, damage just isnt there (in pvp and wvw). 

 

I get tripple better results with weaver in cele gear. 

[Aedil.1296]

Those 5 people that put "great" and "mostly fine no changes needed" are probably 5 troll warriors or thiefs 😂

[scerevisiae.1972]

The more I mull over catalyst skills & traits, the less likely I think it can even be made good. 

600 range is going to be really awkward with minimal mobility, no stab, no reflect, no way to reset attunement CD and only a single attack block.... it's so so bad.

The last thing I want is catalyst D/D that plays exactly like core ele D/D plus a boring F5 field. 

Anet please raeassure us you're making serious changes.

[Gorani.7205]

Nearly everything is odd with Catalyst, when I play-tested it (and I gave the beta character the full legendary treatment, so it was comparable to my normal Ele in terms of stats).

600 range on hammer is neither close nor "ranged" and needs some range indicators. The F5 energy thing his horrible, for what it allows you to do. Utilities are semi useful, only when you can bother to execute them in your clunky F5 field.

The default reaction of players should not be "D/D to make it kind of playable".

[Xanadrine.4352]

trash it and make a ranged spec thats mobile, i mean if you are going to be a glass cannon at least give it evades and some distance. 600 range, really? stay in orbs really? 

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

There was always one problem I had with Hard Light Arena on the holosmith:  by the time you get enough heat to have the increased size and boon duration, it is already too late.  Either the enemies you are fighting are dead, or you are dead due to a lack of protection and regen.  The toolbelt skill would make for a great pull, except you have to already be in combat for awhile before you get enough range to make it work.  Why am I talking about this?  Because the catalyst suffers from this kind of design flaw on multiple levels.

Take the f5 skill.  You need to build up energy to use it, which means you need to be in combat.  Only after you've built enough energy can you drop it to gain protection, quickness, or the other ones.  Except... the time you want these boons isn't 10 seconds into a fight.  You want those boons immediately and on demand.  Protection and quickness are no good if you don't get to choose when to use them.  

Consider Grand Finale.  It's a central part of the hammers toolkit, but it forces you to swap through all of your elements very quickly in order to maintain it.  This makes tactically receiving specific boons from Jade Sphere impossible, because otherwise you drop the orbs following you.  Then, if you fire off Grand Finale, all of your attunements are on cooldown and you're locked into one element.

Consider the Augments.  To get their full effect, AKA the effect that they're balanced around, you have to be standing within the Jade Sphere while attuned to a specific element.  This means they're like worse glyphs, since you can't access the jade sphere until you build up enough energy for it, and then you have a 240 radius in which to use them.  

Consider the traits.  One out of every 3 traits is dedicated toward auras, while the Catalyst has very low aura generating abilities.  You get one from the block in earth, and one from the leap in water if you have the jade Sphere up.  

I didn't bother to test out the beta specs, since they're incomplete.  But, on first glance and on extended viewing, it looks like the catalyst is constantly fighting against itself.  

[Shiyo.3578]

On 9/24/2021 at 2:56 AM, gandlethorpe.2641 said:

9/10 -  Just needs a few QoL changes to be perfect

I honestly feel bad for the designers that something so fun is getting so much hate

So you rate specs based on how well they can AOE level 40 monsters while you're using full ascended gear?

Well...ok. No one else does, though.

[Kodama.6453]

5 hours ago, Shiyo.3578 said:

So you rate specs based on how well they can AOE level 40 monsters while you're using full ascended gear?

Well...ok. No one else does, though.

That they have chosen this clip to show their enjoyment with the spec does not mean they haven't tested it anywhere else, you realise that, right?