Alac Spectre - Ritualist or?

[Shantress.9065]

Hi guys, i wanna play alac spectre so much but farming ritualist ascended trinkets takes a lot (for my playtime atleast)... I'll slowly get them but meanwhile there is some other build for run as alac spectre? I've full ritualist armor and weapon, will they works with celestial trinkets? If yes, should i keep the Rune of the renegade like snowcrow shows?      Thanks for the tips 

[Zacchary.6183]

Don't use celestial on thief. You'll be wasting stats. I get along with alac uptime using diviner trinkets on my power build.

[Shantress.9065]

So u power alac? can i see ur build and skills?

[kash.9213]

I'm just using Plaguedoctors trinkets for now, hopefully I can get them in WvW in when they feel like opening that up. The Ritualist armor and weapons are nice but I'd like to have the rest of that Expertise.

[Zacchary.6183]

52 minutes ago, Shantress.9065 said:

So u power alac? can i see ur build and skills?

I have a few variants. This is what I started off with and it keeps alacrity up pretty well.

[Vidit.7108]

I'm using the snowcrows ritualist build and it's pretty effective. It's working out better than when I had tormenting runes and a couple other changes. It's the best use of the especs strengths for providing alacrity.

[RyuDragnier.9476]

Plaguedoctor's would be acceptable for trinkets. It's what I use on my alac spectre (also using Snowcrows build here) and I've been having no issues with it.

Edited March 23, 2022 by RyuDragnier.9476

[Shantress.9065]

Thanks all for the info

[ASP.8093]

If you cut a lot of Expertise from your build (compared to the "meta" full Ritualist alac specters), you'll probably want Rune of Tormenting or Rune of Nightmare to make up for it.

(Tormenting works because you're only really using Poison and Torment for damage, and your Poison duration already gets a huge boost from Deadly Arts. This is also why Specters never run Deadly Ambush despite it being "the condi trait.")

 

For example — if you have all Ritualist weapons and armor, but only Plaguedoctor (++Vitality, ++Condition Damage, +Concentration, +Healing Power) trinkets:

With Rune of Nightmare and Sigil of Demons: Poison duration capped, +90% Torment duration (nearly +100% with a food buff)

With Rune of Tormenting: +84% Poison duration (+90% with food), Torment duration capped

With Rune of the Renegade and Sigil of Demons: +84% Poison duration (+90% with food), +70% Torment duration

 

A different approach you can take is to skip out on Concentration instead and take Rune of Leadership to make up the shortfall — with no +Concentration in your jewelry slots, you'll still get up to about +48% boon duration (well Alac 100% sweet spot is about 45-50%) with that rune choice.

 

Caveat: most of these numbers are from messing around in gw2skills, so if they have a math bug you will get different numbers in-game.

Edited March 25, 2022 by ASP.8093

[Shantress.9065]

Thanks a lot ASP. 8093.  Since rune of tormenting cost a lot and this is just a momentary solution (before getting full ritualist), i'll use rune of nightmare and sigil of demons with armor+weapon ritualist and plaguedoctor trinkets. 

Very helpful ty

[Roche.7491]

On 3/25/2022 at 5:36 PM, Shantress.9065 said:

Thanks a lot ASP. 8093.  Since rune of tormenting cost a lot and this is just a momentary solution (before getting full ritualist), i'll use rune of nightmare and sigil of demons with armor+weapon ritualist and plaguedoctor trinkets. 

Very helpful ty

Rune of tormenting is not good on a full ritualist set. You easily over-cap torment because of your expertise & buffs.

[Ashgar.3024]

Ritualist is designed from the ground up for Specter (and Harbinger).

Cele isn't unusable, i used a few pieces until i finished farming my full set of trinkets.

Plaguedoctors also works but you lose damage versus Cele.

But seriously its worth taking the time to do Possession Collection as it gives you a Rit Scepter and 3 trinkets once you've done a few Strikes. After that all you need to do is the story achievements for chapter 1 and 5 and you'll be able to easily craft the rest 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ashgar.3024

[Roche.7491]

On 4/2/2022 at 1:10 AM, Ashgar.3024 said:

Plaguedoctotors also works but you lose damage versus Cele.

Plaguedoctor is just fine. You can easily cap duration with torment rune and won’t lose that much damage. I also think devs design spectre for healing too since his innate scepter trait, 2nd opinion gives healing power which complements his barrier, healing wells & heal from dual attacks.

Edited April 23, 2022 by Roche.7491

[Ashgar.3024]

8 minutes ago, Roche.7491 said:

Plaguedoctor is just fine. You can easily cap with torment rune and won’t lose that much damage. I also think devs design spectre for healing too since his innate scepter trait, 2nd opinion gives healing power which complements his barrier, healing wells & heal from dual attacks.

 

Yeah the primary purpose of Specter was supposed to be healing... but they designed something called Mecanist alongside it, which does absolutely everything Support Specter can do but better and more passively... so yeah.

 

Right now Specter's best use is Alac DPS.

Edited April 1, 2022 by Ashgar.3024

[LucianDK.8615]

the ui is not very successful in supporting specter targeted healing. definitely an overrated mechanic.

[Roche.7491]

17 hours ago, Ashgar.3024 said:

 

Yeah the primary purpose of Specter was supposed to be healing... but they designed something called Mecanist alongside it, which does absolutely everything Support Specter can do but better and more passively... so yeah.

 

Right now Specter's best use is Alac DPS.

I agree with you, majority of the players are definitely playing specter as damager than what was intended as it’s current dps is insane & healing/barrier is negligible.
 

The devs will definitely fix it in a year or less from now once they see their statistical data popping out in a different direction (targeting enemies than allies). I expect them to further nerf torment dps and buff healing for the meta-switch to happen. Can’t wait for that patch.

[ASP.8093]

18 hours ago, LucianDK.8615 said:

the ui is not very successful in supporting specter targeted healing. definitely an overrated mechanic.

There's a little-known option that can help you:

 

But, generally, the way to play Specter in PvE is to use Consume Shadows to apply group-wide Barrier + Rot Wallow Venom stacks and otherwise not really sweat your party healing. (You can also "precast" some Rot Wallow Venom by hitting people with your scepter while they're standing around between phases or waiting for the ready check, &c.)

[LucianDK.8615]

1 minute ago, ASP.8093 said:

There's a little-known option that can help you:

 

But, generally, the way to play Specter in PvE is to use Consume Shadows to apply group-wide Barrier + Rot Wallow Venom stacks and otherwise not really sweat your party healing. (You can also "precast" some Rot Wallow Venom by hitting people with your scepter while they're standing around between phases or waiting for the ready check, &c.)

I know theres keybinds to target allies, but I dont find it efficient to do.  Ive been using consume shadows to pour it out.

I know it says that it depends on stacks, but its not easy to see the buff icon. How long does it take to stack up? Also, does amount of shadow force left have any influence on the healed amount?

[ASP.8093]

2 minutes ago, LucianDK.8615 said:

I know it says that it depends on stacks, but its not easy to see the buff icon. How long does it take to stack up? Also, does amount of shadow force left have any influence on the healed amount?

5 stacks, "Interval: 1 per sec"

My best advice is to try it somewhere safe (training golem or just fighting some easy enemies), watch the stacks a few times, and get a counting rhythm. I usually just go "1… 2… 3… 4… 5…" and then I can pop it for max effect.

[LucianDK.8615]

2 minutes ago, ASP.8093 said:

5 stacks, "Interval: 1 per sec"

My best advice is to try it somewhere safe (training golem or just fighting some easy enemies), watch the stacks a few times, and get a counting rhythm. I usually just go "1… 2… 3… 4… 5…" and then I can pop it for max effect.

thank you

[ASP.8093]

2 hours ago, Roche.7491 said:

I agree with you, majority of the players are definitely playing specter as damager than what was intended as it’s current dps is insane & healing/barrier is negligible.
 

The devs will definitely fix it in a year or less from now once they see their statistical data popping out in a different direction (targeting enemies than allies). I expect them to further nerf torment dps and buff healing for the meta-switch to happen. Can’t wait for that patch.

I really don't want to see a nerf here. Specter is pretty cool as a secondary support build (it can't really be your one and only support both due to how the heals work and because it doesn't hand out much Might) that also uses its allies for extra DPS. It's performing pretty well thanks to the group utility and durability, but afaik still lags behind a more committed Deadeye Pistol/Dagger build for pure damage output.

The main thing I'd like to see are some buffs to Power thief builds, and some design that reinforces the value of Initiative in letting you adapt your "rotation" a little bit to different fights.

[Ashgar.3024]

3 hours ago, Roche.7491 said:

I agree with you, majority of the players are definitely playing specter as damager than what was intended as it’s current dps is insane & healing/barrier is negligible.
 

The devs will definitely fix it in a year or less from now once they see their statistical data popping out in a different direction (targeting enemies than allies). I expect them to further nerf torment dps and buff healing for the meta-switch to happen. Can’t wait for that patch.

 

Yeah, damage on Specter is probaly a bit overtuned, it shouldn't bench as high as Daredevil imo considering Daredevil's lack of utility besides good breakbar damage.

 

But on the support front, Specter will never, ever be favored over Mecanist the way things currently are. Even if Specter's numbers were better, Mecanist is ease of use and safety incarnate. It doesn't even need to press anything to guarantee perfect Alac uptime. There's not a huge need to micro the Mec either since Shift Signet combos into Barrier Signet and F3 perfectly.

 

Oh and in Harrier's gear it does 4-5k DPS without really hitting any DPS abilities outside keep the 3 Mace skills on CD and F1.

 

At least that's my experience with it so far. Just built my Mecanist last night and did a Strike world tour with it and i was almost pissed at how much harder i have to try on my Specter for less result lol.

 

Support Specter can't compete with that on a mechanical level.

 

Edit : oh and it has SYG built it on its F2 lol.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ashgar.3024