Specter Feedback Thread

[AquaBR.9250]

Stop ignoring the main feedback about specter: Theres not a single option in this spec for power build.
It makes no sense having all traits be support, that gives no build diversity, people will just take the ones that heal more, give us at least ONE trait for power builds, it can come in the cost of sustain.
This is a necro's shroud, again, if you wanna differentiate it from necro allow us to use regular weapon skills while on this shroud in some way, like pressing a button to change between weapon and shroud skills
 

[Zodryn.4216]

Siphon still doesn't do anything with steal traits when used on allies. 

 

Consume shadows draining all SF for small heals at 1, 2, and 3s feels as bad as I thought it would. Repeating my suggestion to make the SF drain proportional to heal rather than always 100%.

 

Shadestep also has issues. I have no good way to generate significant barrier on myself, so how does breaking my barrier to share with allies help? Consume shadows was the only decent barrier gen on self, but besides being nerfed hard it also already gives allies barrier so sacrificing the one decent self barrier to give friends more is a bit silly. It should just grant barrier on shadowstep, not take mine to redistribute. 

 

Animations/cast delays:

* Endless night wind up before the channel feels way too long, as does the first hit in the auto chain. Endless night also stops if anything breaks your line of sight. Most scepter animations are still spawning well above my head.

 

* Shroud auto animation is incredibly lame. Dawn's repose feels much better than before but range feels too short especially being at 900 range constantly with measured shot. Shroud skills generally lack a feeling of impact.

 

* Wells all having different cast times also feels weird.

 

[RyuDragnier.9476]

58 minutes ago, AquaBR.9250 said:

Stop ignoring the main feedback about specter: Theres not a single option in this spec for power build.
It makes no sense having all traits be support, that gives no build diversity, people will just take the ones that heal more, give us at least ONE trait for power builds, it can come in the cost of sustain.
This is a necro's shroud, again, if you wanna differentiate it from necro allow us to use regular weapon skills while on this shroud in some way, like pressing a button to change between weapon and shroud skills

It's not like Daredevil and Deadeye were both set up to have that ability...oh wait, they were. This ain't meant to be power, and we don't need another power spec, we already have 2 elite specs that can cover that.

[AquaBR.9250]

5 minutes ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

It's not like Daredevil and Deadeye were both set up to have that ability...oh wait, they were. This ain't meant to be power, and we don't need another power spec, we already have 2 elite specs that can cover that.

Boy, literally daredevil and deadeye both have condi builds and traits, kittening condi deadeye is the meta deadeye dps build, why can't specter have one power build?

[RyuDragnier.9476]

1 minute ago, AquaBR.9250 said:

Boy, literally daredevil and deadeye both have condi builds and traits, kittening condi deadeye is the meta deadeye dps build, why can't specter have one power build?

Because literally everything Thief already does is DPS. Let us have something other than DPS for once, FOR ONCE.

[Curennos.9307]

9 minutes ago, AquaBR.9250 said:

Boy, literally daredevil and deadeye both have condi builds and traits, kittening condi deadeye is the meta deadeye dps build, why can't specter have one power build?

Is it? IIRC power DE outpaces condi DE by a little bit, and that's just...does anybody care except raid min/maxers?

 

Anyway - PvP wise, power spectre already looks fine. In fact I've seen more power spectres than condi, but eh. I could definitely go for a trait that gives the thief a 5% strike damage boost and then shares that with whoever you tether to or something. Would be a nice bit of extra support + damage. Or, heck, make it increase both strike and condi damage.

 

Edit: Or just build it into rot wallow venom trait for when it's inevitably nerfed. Doesn't even need to be a separate trait.

 

Edit edit: Actually...Make it 5% out of shroud, then 10% for thief and tethered ally when in shroud or something. Give it that nice support feel and lining up the boost for an ally's burst phase or something. 

Edited November 30, 2021 by Curennos.9307

[AquaBR.9250]

Just now, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

Because literally everything Thief already does is DPS. Let us have something other than DPS for once, FOR ONCE.

You acting like i'm asking Specter to be a full power based spec, all i asked is for ONE power trait, if they reworked ONE trait to be power based you'd still have 8 traits for support, literally having one or two power trait won't change anything for the support builds, will only allow for more build diversity, why are you acting up?

[Zodryn.4216]

5 minutes ago, AquaBR.9250 said:

Boy, literally daredevil and deadeye both have condi builds and traits, kittening condi deadeye is the meta deadeye dps build, why can't specter have one power build?

Sind ran a power Specter in the last beta and it was actually good. Even so I'm fine with only support and condi traits. Not everything needs both power and condi.

[Doggie.3184]

Jus' toss'n this into the fire but I know Anet hates underwater but how come you changed the turtle's cannon mechanics underwater but didn't do the same for Thief's wells? 0 of them are useable. And Shroud 3 wasn't changed underwater to match the recent leap change.

[hugo.4705]

Ok so, if I understand well, the wells, (haha) are too boost ourselves, like heal or boons, whereas the shadow shroud is to deal damage. So basaically, the scepter skills are USELESS?

Comparend to v1 specter where i feel like the spec couldn't do damage and be forced into support, this time i feel like it can do damage but have to find a build for it. Interesting change, it is nice good job Arenanet, but I really feel like the wells could be stronger. REALLY. 🙂

[Vidit.7108]

I've done a little bit of testing today, and I feel as though Specter took a big step back. The healing feels worse. 

While i understand the idea behind the new allied targeting mode, the problem with it is the class depends on being able to hit an enemy with Siphon to get Shadow Force and to activate stealing traits to provide the party with further boon support. This creates bizzare gear shifting style game play where I want to turn it on and off and I have to mentally now keep track of whether or not it is on. It just doesn't work.

Unless i have 5 seconds in the middle of combat to spare, I'm finding myself just not using Shadow Shroud anymore, it's just useless in the heal build especially since I still want to get rot wallow venom out where i can.

Endless night's loss of 3 person barrier application feels like a huge shift. It's one of the reasons that healing now feels very weak. Cast it on one person and by the time you cast it again the original barrier is already gone.

Overall, I think the heal build/alac support build became more stressful to use. My patience for casting the wells to give the party alacrity has really dropped. I went into beta 4 not all that discourged though I was disappointed by the changes. Now I'm feeling pretty down about ever using Specter to heal or give alacrity.

[Lucinellia.9247]

Support Specter remains utterly miserable to play. I made this as a separate topic here because it is pretty long, but the UI, UX and content just doesn't support it.

 

It isn't fun and none of the new changes address the problems that the gameplay loop of targeting different allies in Guild Wars 2 is simply not enjoyable and much, much more cumbersome than any other support, for no additional reward.

[Lucinellia.9247]

1 minute ago, Vidit.7108 said:

I've done a little bit of testing today, and I feel as though Specter took a big step back. The healing feels worse. 

While i understand the idea behind the new allied targeting mode, the problem with it is the class depends on being able to hit an enemy with Siphon to get Shadow Force and to activate stealing traits to provide the party with further boon support. This creates bizzare gear shifting style game play where I want to turn it on and off and I have to mentally now keep track of whether or not it is on. It just doesn't work.

Unless i have 5 seconds in the middle of combat to spare, I'm finding myself just not using Shadow Shroud anymore, it's just useless in the heal build especially since I still want to get rot wallow venom out where i can.

Endless night's loss of 3 person barrier application feels like a huge shift. It's one of the reasons that healing now feels very weak. Cast it on one person and by the time you cast it again the original barrier is already gone.

Overall, I think the heal build/alac support build became more stressful to use. My patience for casting the wells to give the party alacrity has really dropped. I went into beta 4 not all that discourged though I was disappointed by the changes. Now I'm feeling pretty down about ever using Specter to heal or give alacrity.

 

I fully agree with the build feeling much more stressful and less rewarding. One of the big problems of course is that we are still going to want to use Measured Shot / Endless Night because it is our strongest healing and support option beyond long CD wells. But things don't feel as stable now and the interesting gameplay of moving around allies to improve the pierce for spreading barrier and regen is gone.

 

Add in that the gameplay loop of target enemy for Siphon, use Siphon, place Wells in world, move between allied targets for healing is just so much more work and effort than what any other healer or support needs to do and it just feels really pitifully unfun to play.

Allied targeting mode is wildly bad. We lose so much information (can't see when CC bars are up) and so many useful abilities (applying conditions or  CC to an enemy) by using it while it doesn't really benefit anything at all.

 

Support Specter feels totally miserable now.

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

On 10/27/2021 at 2:07 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

I'm not done testing the Specter, but some issues I've come across so far.

 

Issues:

- When "Snap Ground Target to Current Target" option is enabled, wells doesn't function correctly. I think it conflicts with the Ground Targeting: Instant option. Normally, when there is a target, Ground Targetting: Instant is overridden by Snap Ground to target.

 

Still an issue.

 

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- When "Action Camera" is enabled, target becomes invalid when using Endless Night (Scepter #3). Measured Shot works on the same target.

 

Still bugged,

 

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- Measured Shot does not indicate when target is out of range and it can teleport more than the max 900 from target depending on the terrain.

 

This seems to have been addressed.

 

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- Scepter auto-attack doesn't cancel when going in stealth causing an unintended Reveal. Seriously, projectile in flight should not cause Reveal. I rather have them deal no damage (auto-miss since projectile turns into shadows/smoke) than cause Reveal.

 

Thank you for this change.

 

Quote

Tooltips:

- Well of Gloom applies stealth granted by Concealing Restoration (trait) but doesn't indicate it in the tool tip.

 

No change.

 

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- Dark Sentry  ally heal is not boosting Merciful Ambush or Shadow Savior (traits) and Shadow Refuge (utility). Not sure if this is just a tooltip, it's difficult to check.

 

No change.

 

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- Panaku's Ambition doesn't show in Shadow Portal (utility) and Shadow's Refuge (utility).

 

The trait works as intended but doesn't update the skill tooltips.

 

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Useless Traits:

- Shallow Grave -- this trait should do something rather than just wait until someone dies. Until someone goes down, this trait is useless. This is a repackaged Last Refuge trying to creep back into the game. This functionality shouldn't be in the game.

 

Ugh.

 

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- Dark Sentry -- this trait is useless without a target ally. Rot Wallow should apply to any target you give barrier to, included yourself.

 

This trait needs to have a self-benefit. It's a dead trait when running solo.

 

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Useless Skill:

- Well of Tears -- this is just sad that it makes me cry. Compare to Well of Sorrow, why bother with this skill? If it applies stacking vulnerability AND immobilize, then it has some uses, but currently it's meh. Pitfall deals overall more damage due to the 3s KD and the big initial damage. When Well of Tears is used, no initial damage so if your target dodged...well, SOL. Nothing is keeping them inside the well.

 

sigh...at least make it a stunbreak.

 

New stuffs:

 

Siphon - the casting time is starting to bug me. This should be an instant cast.

Shadestep - the barrier granted by this boon is so low that distributing it to allies means so little, might as well nothing. Not to mention only 240 radius. Using Consume Shadows, I grant 6700 barrier to allies at full stack, while Shadestep only grants 1.1k after breaking my 6700 barrier. Nevertheless, the revive ally is a good touch and very very useful.

 

Other than these, I think this E.Spec is shaping up nicely.

Edited November 30, 2021 by Sir Vincent III.1286

[SirRocket.3516]

Just a small thought about the ally buffs.

 

Switch the specter and shroud 1,2,3 skills so that Shroud is the one offering the buffs.

Making shroud is where barriers and boons are distributed.

[Doggie.3184]

If you think about it, GW2 will probably be the first MMO in history to add a healer class that can't heal itself as much as it does others.

My Astrologian can target anyone including himself pretty easilly from the UI and cast all the same heals on either and easily track his card buff timers on allies from the party UI even if I'm nolonger targeting them.

What am I supposed to do with this GW2 UI of cubes that contain no information of anything and I can't cast anything on myself? I can also see the target or other targets to know whos getting beat on and heal them in other games but this has no proper aggro system for such.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Doggie.3184

[Zacchary.6183]

I like these numbers on Consume Shadow and Shroud. Also whoever said that shroud skills drain extra Force per use, you're wrong. I spammed the skills every time I entered shroud and found no change in force consumption. The only time I experienced drops was when I got hit and I let myself get hit hard. The force was filling so fast that I had an issue paying attention to the fight and force at the same time, so I most likely wasted a few shadowsteps, not like it mattered. As for what I was using:

• Marauder/Diviner vamp runes
• Sword, all wells
• Deadly Arts 2-3-2
• Trickery 3-1-2
• Specter 3-3-3

[Zacchary.6183]

7 hours ago, AquaBR.9250 said:

Stop ignoring the main feedback about specter: Theres not a single option in this spec for power build.
It makes no sense having all traits be support, that gives no build diversity, people will just take the ones that heal more, give us at least ONE trait for power builds, it can come in the cost of sustain.
This is a necro's shroud, again, if you wanna differentiate it from necro allow us to use regular weapon skills while on this shroud in some way, like pressing a button to change between weapon and shroud skills
 

Consume Shadows scales off shroud HP and shroud HP is 1.5x your max HP at 100% force. So equip marauders and vampirism runes.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Zacchary.6183

[Squigglez.1236]

I think it's really telling that the two things people used from this spec during the first beta were the heal when you leave shadow shroud and endless night, basically the two AoE heals this spec had. I think single target is a mistake and quite a few things on this spec are illogical. It almost feels better to slot shadow savior and traversing dusk and spam sword 2, each cast can give almost 2k heals (maybe more with good gear) to 5 allies. Then when you get shadow shroud pop in for 5s then leave for another huge burst heal. This is just better than having to select individual people to heal with scepter, with which nothing has been done to make it less cumbersome. Most of the scepters heals are actually barrier which disappear after 5s anyway. Shroud skills are still bad, giving healing to one ally that you have to wait for siphon to recharge to change. They mostly apply torment which the rot venom will apply anyway if you're giving barrier to your allies so I see no reason to stay in shroud for more than the 5s required to get the max heal strength, actually it's a detriment because staying in shroud reduces the max shadow force that you can pump into your heal. The point being the way this spec feels best to play is to purposefully avoid the single target premise of it and I think that's saying something.

Additionally I'd say it maybe be a good idea to swap endless night and the traversing dark trait, so wells give quickness instead of alacrity and endless night gives a single target higher alacrity uptime (if it stays single target). As others have mentioned thieves get reduced benefit from alacrity because they have no cooldowns on their weapon skills, but also quite a few classes can apply alac to themselves (through skills like frenzy, quickening zephyr, haste, etc..) but not many can apply self alac so it more valuable. Maybe make it so your tether gets healed by your actions no matter if you're in shroud or not, but if you're in shroud everyone acts as your tether letting you spread your heals out, something to make this more useable.

Playing in anyway that doesn't spam the AoE heals leaves you with very little self heals, you can't target yourself for scepter attacks or as a shroud tether, if you have no allies around the tether mechanic doesn't even do anything. Even in the 2v2 scenario that gets brought up with this spec I don't see why the other team wouldn't just shiv the specter first since they can't use their support on themselves. Also action camera the one thing that could possibly help is still broken with scepter 3 saying it lacks a target and siphon going on cooldown without doing anything. I think you guys need to be honest about single target mechanics for support, there's a reason why you haven't added it in the game until now, even if you use the party menu to select allies to heal you end up just staring at the UI for the entire fight, this just doesn't look promising.

Edited December 1, 2021 by XDeathShadowX.2619

[Trippenwhitz.4179]

Just here to add a couple things that have probably already been pointed out.

I play in Action camera:

 

- Siphon doesn't work in Action Camera, you can activate it but it goes on a 3 - 4 second cooldown but nothing actually happens as a result of activating the skill. 

- Twilight Combo (Sceptre/Dagger DW skill) doesn't work in Action Camera and is, in my experience, one of the more useful condi DPS options if built correctly, so I cannot activate a key DPS skill in Action Cam.

I tested and both work if I turn Action Camera off (I can't play the game in any mode but this unfortunately).

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

2 hours ago, Doggie.3184 said:

If you think about it, GW2 will probably be the first MMO in history to add a healer class that can't heal itself as much as it does others.

My Astrologian can target anyone including himself pretty easilly from the UI and cast all the same heals on either and easily track his card buff timers on allies from the party UI even if I'm nolonger targeting them.

What am I supposed to do with this GW2 UI of cubes that contain no information of anything and I can't cast anything on myself? I can also see the target or other targets to know whos getting beat on and heal them in other games but this has no proper aggro system for such.

GW2 simply has a different game play. Players who needs healing are expected to disengage, swap to range weapon to continue DPS,  and run to the healer for a top off -- then back into the fray once healed. You are meant to operate the activity in the game instead of operating the UI. Also keep in mind that each profession has their own healing skill, so you don't really need to top anyone off that often since they should be topping off themselves. In other words, you don't have to babysit anyone, you just need to supervise them.

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

4 minutes ago, Trippenwhitz.4179 said:

Just here to add a couple things that have probably already been pointed out.

I play in Action camera:

 

- Siphon doesn't work in Action Camera, you can activate it but it goes on a 3 - 4 second cooldown but nothing actually happens as a result of activating the skill. 

- Twilight Combo (Sceptre/Dagger DW skill) doesn't work in Action Camera and is, in my experience, one of the more useful condi DPS options if built correctly, so I cannot activate a key DPS skill in Action Cam.

I tested and both work if I turn Action Camera off (I can't play the game in any mode but this unfortunately).

Yeah Action Camera is a really buggy.

[Doggie.3184]

2 minutes ago, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

GW2 simply has a different game play. Players who needs healing are expected to disengage, swap to range weapon to continue DPS,  and run to the healer for a top off -- then back into the fray once healed. You are meant to operate the activity in the game instead of operating the UI. Also keep in mind that each profession has their own healing skill, so you don't really need to top anyone off that often since they should be topping off themselves. In other words, you don't have to babysit anyone, you just need to supervise them.

Then they toss specter into the mix as a babysitter in a world that doesn't want one. XD

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

Just now, Doggie.3184 said:

Then they toss specter into the mix as a babysitter in a world that doesn't want one. XD

Well, Specter is not a babysitter. Specters are nurses, not combat-medics, that's the Engineer's job. Healers are Druids. Coroners are the Necros. They do almost similar things, but in different ways.

[Doggie.3184]

15 minutes ago, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

Well, Specter is not a babysitter. Specters are nurses, not combat-medics, that's the Engineer's job. Healers are Druids. Coroners are the Necros. They do almost similar things, but in different ways.

Nope. They're the kinda babysitter that puts a toddler leash&harness on the kid and protec. But then they get mugged while protecting the kid from a kidnapping and die from an infected wound cuz their first aid kit doesn't function on adults cuz of a mysterious ancient curse.