Friendship ended with Revs, now Engineers are our best friend

[Sena.2761]

Seriously I've been running a qbrand/heal mech duo for like everything and it's absolutely nuts. I cover everything they don't while still having like 80% of my usual damage in just two slots.

I think the only time we saw any issue was during a T4 Siren's as when the Engie gets blown into the water, they take the robot with them which screws up healing and boons.

 

Other than that one hiccup the duo feels just as strong as the old Healbrand+Alacren duo but with way better damage.

Edited March 13, 2022 by Sena.2761

[Atomnium.1532]

Yep alacgade got absolutely replaced in the meta, if druids and BS no longer have unique spirit buffs after the rework be prepared for double mech double Qbrand + literraly anything

I'm sure there are some bosses where mech clunkiness will be problematic tho

Edited March 13, 2022 by Atomnium.1532

[Shaogin.2679]

20 minutes ago, Sena.2761 said:

Seriously I've been running a qbrand/heal mech duo for like everything and it's absolutely nuts. I cover everything they don't while still having like 80% of my usual damage in just two slots.

I think the only time we saw any issue was during a T4 Siren's as when the Engie gets blown into the water, they take the robot with them which screws up healing and boons.

 

Other than that one hiccup the duo feels just as strong as the old Healbrand+Alacren duo but with way better damage.

Mechanists belong to Quick Harbingers, you can keep your AlacRens.

[Noah Salazar.5430]

 

On 3/7/2022 at 12:38 PM, Sarius.9285 said:

So Mechanist finally made me love engineer, especially the support Boon/Heal Build.

 

 

But something I think I struggle with, is having no Burst Heal. You have alot of regen and constant heal with the Medkit, but I always feel like I'm missing something like Druid Avatar or HFB Tome 2/Staff 4

As engi main i confirm it, quickness harbringer brings more resses as mechanist lack it, and Vampirism is nice to have

I mean Cele Mech+Condi Quickness harbringer with Vampirism (blood magic)

Or Magi Mech+ pure Condi Quicknes harbringer (33k)

With that combo Mech can only focus to spam 3-5k perm barrier while Harbringer will offheal anythink that pass tought

Edited March 15, 2022 by Noah Salazar.5430

[Kulvar.1239]

On 3/13/2022 at 9:05 PM, Atomnium.1532 said:

Yep alacgade got absolutely replaced in the meta, if druids and BS no longer have unique spirit buffs after the rework be prepared for double mech double Qbrand + literraly anything

I'm sure there are some bosses where mech clunkiness will be problematic tho

ANet: We want to give more options when it come to party composition.

META: There is no options. *kick revenant out and put mechanist in its place*

 

Fortunately, not all players are adamantly and exclusively playing meta comp and ANet wish will be granted.

Or they'll nerf Mechanist so it's closer to Renegade.

[Atomnium.1532]

As long as there is alacrity and quickness in the game, there will be a meta and 4 rigid slots taken per raid. Same for BS and druid so 6.
Anet thinks that they'll diminish the enforcement of the most efficient tactic available by rendering it less valuable (nerfs) or harder to access but it is quite pointless and might actually have the exact opposite effect as the 10->5 targets doubles the slots that people have an incentive to fill with a specific profession.

I've been a long-time proponent of removing alacrity and quickness from the game altogether. Sure it'll be back to 'Stack best mathematical dps in hardcore groups', I  think it's more healthy than :

'Oh I'd like to try out raiding in this game, let's try to enter a group'
'BS Dudu Alac Qfb Ctank or gtfo because 7 of the slots of the game are hardlocked'

METAslaving is not an error of player behaviour but a feature, and developpers need to design around it, for it or despite it. Heavy-handed buffs like +~25% dps (Quickness) are so overtuned that it feels more like a punishment for not having them rather than a reward for having them.

Meta will be severely enforced as long as some buffs are of that magnitude. This applies to banners and spirit as well.

Edited March 15, 2022 by Atomnium.1532

[Shaogin.2679]

23 minutes ago, Atomnium.1532 said:

As long as there is alacrity and quickness in the game, there will be a meta and 4 rigid slots taken per raid. Same for BS and druid so 6.
Anet thinks that they'll diminish the enforcement of the most efficient tactic available by rendering it less valuable (nerfs) or harder to access but it is quite pointless and might actually have the exact opposite effect as the 10->5 targets doubles the slots that people have an incentive to fill with a specific profession.

I've been a long-time proponent of removing alacrity and quickness from the game altogether. Sure it'll be back to 'Stack best mathematical dps in hardcore groups', I  think it's more healthy than :

'Oh I'd like to try out raiding in this game, let's try to enter a group'
'BS Dudu Alac Qfb Ctank or gtfo because 7 of the slots of the game are hardlocked'

METAslaving is not an error of player behaviour but a feature, and developpers need to design around it, for it or despite it. Heavy-handed buffs like +~25% dps (Quickness) are so overtuned that it feels more like a punishment for not having them rather than a reward for having them.

Meta will be severely enforced as long as some buffs are of that magnitude. This applies to banners and spirit as well.

You're being incredibly over dramatic here. The meta was rigid before due to some design flaws that are now being fixed. For example, Renegade providing 10 man alac meant that there was no point in ever bringing any other alac since it would take two boon supports to replace the single Renegade. Then you still need quickness and fury for subgroup 2, which means you had to take a Firebrand. You could bring a different healer for subgroup 2, but would you do that when the Firebrand can already consolidate that role too? Then in subgroup 1 the healer is already set to Druid since you need it for 25 man might. Since the Druid is providing fury, this gave us our only actual option to either bring Scrapper or Chronomancer for subgroup 1's quickness.

 

Now with the new changes, there is no more 10 man boons, and there are a larger variety of boon supports which allow more combinations to exist. There is more flexibility. There will always be a meta, but it will be nowhere near as punishing as before to play off-meta. Also, when the spirit and banner changes happen, we will only need 4 support players instead of 5, so dps players rejoice.

[Kulvar.1239]

On 3/15/2022 at 2:50 PM, Atomnium.1532 said:

As long as there is alacrity and quickness in the game, there will be a meta and 4 rigid slots taken per raid. Same for BS and druid so 6.
Anet thinks that they'll diminish the enforcement of the most efficient tactic available by rendering it less valuable (nerfs) or harder to access but it is quite pointless and might actually have the exact opposite effect as the 10->5 targets doubles the slots that people have an incentive to fill with a specific profession.

I've been a long-time proponent of removing alacrity and quickness from the game altogether. Sure it'll be back to 'Stack best mathematical dps in hardcore groups', I  think it's more healthy than :

'Oh I'd like to try out raiding in this game, let's try to enter a group'
'BS Dudu Alac Qfb Ctank or gtfo because 7 of the slots of the game are hardlocked'

METAslaving is not an error of player behaviour but a feature, and developpers need to design around it, for it or despite it. Heavy-handed buffs like +~25% dps (Quickness) are so overtuned that it feels more like a punishment for not having them rather than a reward for having them.

Meta will be severely enforced as long as some buffs are of that magnitude. This applies to banners and spirit as well.

Rather than removing Quickness/Alacrity, there is other possibilities.

Example 1. Alacrity could increase recharge speed by only 10% and quickness increase attack speed by only 20%. It would make them less required and you may see the quick/alac reserved spot in team comp become flexible spot "dps or quick or alac".

Example 2. They could become personal boon only. If you can't give them to other players, it's good to have in your build but it would kill quick/alac as roles.

[Atomnium.1532]

2 hours ago, Kulvar.1239 said:

Rather than removing Quickness/Alacrity, there is other possibilities.

Example 1. Alacrity could increase recharge speed by only 10% and quickness increase attack speed by only 20%. It would make them less required and you may see the quick/alac reserved spot in team comp become flexible spot "dps or quick or alac".

Example 2. They could become personal boon only. If you can't give them to other players, it's good to have in your build but it would kill quick/alac as roles.

I'd argue with example 2, quick fact it was the case before for quickness...
Example 1 I've thought about and I have 0 trust that quickness would be skipped with even 20% by ppl. I think the enforcement would be just as toxic and present in the groups.
 

[cat.8975]

I think quickness and alacrity are fine as they are at the moment. They're much more impactful on *how* you play compared to most other boons (e.g., might, fury, swiftness), making them much more interesting for gameplay.

The complaints about them making a rigid meta are nonsense imo, as the current meta is more flexible than it's ever been. Each 5-player group will want: might, alacrity, quickness, healing, and access to other auxiliary boons (swiftness, fury, prot). The number of ways you can achieve this now is kind of nuts, but it's usually done by compressing the healer and might roles into the quick or alac ones. I'm eager to see what happens to group comps once banners and spirits get reworked.

If you've tried putting together a pug group for strikes/raids since EoD, you'd know what I'm talking about w/ the diversity. It used to be brainless to ask for the same single class for each role, but now you practically need a notepad to keep track of who is supplying what because it's not so cut-and-dry anymore.

[Infusion.7149]

Mechanist CC is pretty bad in comparison to renegade unless you specifically bring CC utilities.

[Sena.2761]

6 hours ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Mechanist CC is pretty bad in comparison to renegade unless you specifically bring CC utilities.

This is true, but fortunately we have Sanc.

Now, my SO can and does run with Sigil of Transference/Paralyzation when Renewal isn't needed explicitly for such a purpose.

 

[Infusion.7149]

The condi alac also has boon rip for NPNG.

[Fwog.9387]

On 3/15/2022 at 6:13 AM, Kulvar.1239 said:

ANet: We want to give more options when it come to party composition.

META: There is no options. *kick revenant out and put mechanist in its place*

 

Fortunately, not all players are adamantly and exclusively playing meta comp and ANet wish will be granted.

Or they'll nerf Mechanist so it's closer to Renegade.

That is just pugs. Mechanist is the pug pick of choice because it kisses the booboos when people mess up. 

[Valisha.8650]

both mech+quickbrand and hfb+alacren are perfectly viable options

[Vidit.7108]

Haha, what do you mean? Alac rens are great, they're not going anywhere. We would absolutely never give up on them, they've been great partners for like 3 or 4 years. 

Now let's talk about Aegis spam, some say the heal skill is the best aegis but as I will explain it's not that simple... It's all pretty complicated and lengthy so I'll spoiler tag it.
 

Spoiler

...Okay now that all the alac rens are gone. Yes Alac Mech is better to pair with, heals or no the alacrity is more reliable. If someone is accidently out of range it's pretty easy to pick them back up. If the Alac ren misses someone they are SOL until the the cooldown is over.

The only thing it can't really do well is stability, but let's be honest we never needed revs to help us give the party stability, we're just being nice. I think maybe their fury upkeep can be spotty but it's not that big a deal and it's not like alac ren helped a ton with other boons most of the time anyway. Especially now that they made it really easy for firebrand to upkeep resolution and protection alac rens aren't as helpful as they used to be.

We just have to start off giving the party might and maybe sometimes upkeep it when there aren't enemies to attack. Chip in an axe 2 once and while just to be safe. I think Alac mech is pretty solidly number 1 alacrity heals or dps unless maybe alac Spec is top dps or something. I'd just rather have it in whatever group composition over the other alacrities.

And don't even get me started on bow of truth haha.