Initial Reaction to the Specter

[Bunny.9834]

Scepter - This weapon is fluid and flows well with thief gameplay.  

Shadowstep Utilities - some of the animations are weird and seems unfinished like Well of Sorrow. 

Siphon - its ok. I like that the recharge has been reduced dramatically. 

Shadow Shroud - This is where a lot of improvements need to happen. First of all, a lot of the skills ARE very clunky. It doesn't have the same flow as the necro shroud. A lot of the skills are SLOW to cast and the after casts hinders a good flow. I know the harbinger is very similar to this but that one has a better flow.  Also, that's with the "Berserker" spikes when you enter shadow shroud? Seems to out of place. Can the devs at least change the Shadow Shroud mode animation into a more "smoky" "shroud-y" animation instead of that weird spikes. 

 

 

[frareanselm.1925]

I felt like the thief lost lots of mobility with the specter, no teleport when stealing for example. Also the support-healer+alacrity utility skills are similar to chrono-boon wells, too repetitive.

[Redfeather.6401]

[please delete]

Edited October 26, 2021 by Redfeather.6401

[Felices Bladewing.3914]

Dark Sentry and Panaku's Ambition are almost useless in soloplay.

 

Edited October 26, 2021 by Felices Bladewing.3914

[Puck.3697]

my question would be how does the loss in initiative feel in PvP?.... I mean it basically Reduces weapon Skill usuage massively does that have any toll?

[Tails.9372]

Deadly arts works really well with scepter / pistol but they should just remove the shadowstep from Measured Shot (both versions) and shadow shroud feels like a massive disappointment. It's so bad that I find myself avoiding using it entirely. Compared to scepter it just feels clunky and is a massive DPS loss on top of it, you can't even use it to effectively re-sustain yourself as SS blocks your heals from going through (which it shouldn't) so it's only really useful for some niche things thief can already do better through other means. The aftercast for most SS skills should be axed entirely (as at the end of the day specter is still a thief spec and shouldn't feel this sluggish, especially not the featured spec mechanic) and some of them could also use a damage buff.

The fact that you don't receive your own support is also a huge letdown and given SSs current state / in context of that you can only target one ally rather unjustified.

Edited October 26, 2021 by Tails.9372

[RyuDragnier.9476]

5 hours ago, frareanselm.1925 said:

I felt like the thief lost lots of mobility with the specter, no teleport when stealing for example. Also the support-healer+alacrity utility skills are similar to chrono-boon wells, too repetitive.

Wait, so the spec with 5 shadowsteps...lost lots of mobility? I...what?

[hatozeni.5721]

When I saw the video I already knew I wasn't going to let go of my deadeye for a purple thief healer with a scepter.
So I tested it today for 6 minutes. I never want to get my hands on this again.

[Doggie.3184]

21 minutes ago, hatozeni.5721 said:

When I saw the video I already knew I wasn't going to let go of my deadeye for a purple thief healer with a scepter.
So I tested it today for 6 minutes. I never want to get my hands on this again.

Be sure to mention why so they can improve it.

[AikijinX.6258]

Shroud is pretty much useless besides the instant heal Quick tapping, and  Every. Single. Skill. In. Shroud Is interruptible, There’s no evades skills in shroud. 

The #5 Stability channel skill takes 10,000 years to cast

I like the heal Well, but hate the cast time on it, and the range. And it feels lackluster too. Give me swiftness or something while casting it.  

The shroud #3 fear skill doesn’t dash towards the target and often just goes where ever the heck it wants to and gets easily interrupted. 
 

Shadow form is pretty much useless, besides barrier and instant heal.  
 

You need a target to use steal. Like what? I was fine with this design on deadeye, but with Specter. No. This better be a bug. Can’t even give myself self swiftness if I wanted to. Pack runes may be the move for this spec. (For Power)
 

SCP/D #3 is pretty strong, but MISSES or is just simply way too slow. And why it doesn’t pierce or hit multiple targets when it’s LITERALLY 2 separate air wave/blades is beyond me

And HELLO? There’s no combo or projectile finishers with this spec?

Honestly.. I was pleasantly surprised that initiative wasn’t too big of an issue. Even while playing and enjoying CS/ SA/ SCP (which I think I’ll main). Power is definitely the way to go, while playing this spec. You’ve got good ability to sustain but also dish out good dmg. Using trickery wasn’t really an issue. What I cared about more was how I can get more quickness and might onto this spec. (I should’ve added more sigils into my bank , like rage sigil or and might sigil or something ) 

All in all. The specter is definitely going to be very strong when solo roaming and also a good support option in small group. It’s definitely a higher skill cap type of spec. I like it, despite my complaints above. If they fix those. And a few more QoLs it’ll be okay. But I will say Shroud form is absolutely useless. I almost always forget to go into it when fighting. And then at times when I have that no death trait on it pops me into shroud and I’m like, oh right.. I have this.
 

and MECHANIST IS BROKEN stoopid strong and just EATS my Shroud with it’s damage. Might as well not even go into it while fighting a mech.

Edited October 27, 2021 by AikijinX.6258

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

Consume shadows seems a bit buggy, sometimes it grants healing and sometimes it doesn't. Seems to be more reliable if you use a skill in shroud before leaving it though.

Edited October 27, 2021 by Jugglemonkey.8741

[frareanselm.1925]

17 hours ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

Wait, so the spec with 5 shadowsteps...lost lots of mobility? I...what?

The range of core thief shadow steps is 1200, the pseudo teleport of specter range is 600 and the casting times are almost 2 sec... do you call this mobility? lol

[kash.9213]

I imagine after launch when I have a good build and gear and more familiarity with Specter that I'll have a system for Shadow Shroud. In beta mode, it's a little hard to build up even in zerg fights unless I'm just trying to be clutch with one thing.

It feels mostly fine in a moving fight, but I wish targeting while having a scepter equipped turned players in a cone in front of you or within a radius a percentage of opacity maybe with the player that the game says you're curser will target has a slightly brightened outline. I haven't used Yolo mouse in a long time, but one of the backgrounds for the circle reticle had an inverse or negative color and whatever I targeted had a kind of highlighted outline, that's kind of what I'm talking about. If it's going to remain targeted and not directional than I think that would be easiest for me in a scramble especially in Action cam.

Edited October 28, 2021 by kash.9213

[RyuDragnier.9476]

12 hours ago, frareanselm.1925 said:

The range of core thief shadow steps is 1200, the pseudo teleport of specter range is 600 and the casting times are almost 2 sec... do you call this mobility? lol

It moves you, so yes, that is mobility by definition. Just because it's not as far as you'd like it to be does not mean it's not mobility.

[Felices Bladewing.3914]

Well of Tears could apply blind and confusion (and lower damage), those conditions arn't used by the other wells, and would create the most "defensive" non-buffing well 

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

It moves you, so yes, that is mobility by definition. Just because it's not as far as you'd like it to be does not mean it's not mobility.

Eh, I don't think it's as cut-and-dry as that. If you had, say, a skill that teleported you 300 units but in the time it took to complete it you could have walked the same distance normally, it's hard to call that a mobility skill. I guess you could use it to feint by running in one direction while teleporting in another, but apart from that...

 

Spectre wells aren't that bad, but doing a bit of experimentation in Gendarran Fields (I wanted to make sure I didn't have the increased move speed in cities buff), if you run forward and put the well at maximum distance ahead of you, you'll have crossed about a third of the distance you'll teleport by the time the teleport happens. That's not much more than a single Jaunt worth per well. With such a short distance, it seems to be more of a matter of forcing the spectre to commit to being where the well is than something you'd use to nip off and decap far or to hit someone with a surprise +1. 

 

In that context, it probably isn't unreasonable to say that the spectre has lost mobility overall compared to core thief. No teleport on steal. Less initiative to power Infiltrator's Shot. Any well it does take, apart from the elite, is taking a slot that could be used for a core thief skill that offers more mobility such as Withdraw, Shadowstep, Roll for Initiative, Infiltrator's Signet, or Shadow Portal. Attaching a short shadowstep to the well just reduces the mobility loss by taking the skill.

 

And if you go back to the original post by @frareanselm.1925 the observation was "lost mobility compared to core thief" rather than "has no mobility". That's not an observation that can be countered with a simple "wells involve movement, that means they have mobility, just not as much as you want" - since the point of comparison isn't "no mobility at all", but the degree of mobility offered by core thief. 

 

For what it's worth, I think it's actually fair that spectre has less mobility than traditional thief, since it has the potential to have a much greater impact when it does arrive, and it has greater survivability reducing its need to be able to make quick entrances and exits. But the observation that it has less mobility than a core thief is likely to have does seem to be a valid one.

[Wintermute.5408]

On 10/27/2021 at 2:21 AM, Tails.9372 said:

you can't even use it to effectively re-sustain yourself as SS blocks your heals from going through

Welcome to the necro world.