[Love letter to ANet] Mechanist is opening up the game for lower skill levels.

[PixelHero.5849]

I got my wife, who was not a gamer, into GW2 this past summer..  She really doesn't like combat-only games, but she heard me explaining some of the lore to my daughter and thought it sounded fun and was willing to give it a try.  Of course she got hooked and has been steadily plinking away as a Ranger (longbow, but recently axe soulbeast), but she is NOT a high-tier gamer.  She's has small hands, has trouble with the number keys, and activates all her utility skills with her mouse, and honestly, a lot of the weapon keys.  She's slowly improving (and she's actually pretty good with movement), but her biggest struggle has been we always play together and she's absolutely terrified of going off on her own in the game AT ALL.  She does (and will readily admit) get lost extremely easily and only likes ranged play, with a meat shield there to help keep monsters off of her.  If I'm not there to guide her around, peel mobs off her, and be the tank, she doesn't want to play. 

 

She does not play without me around.

 

She saw me playing around with Mechanist and had a spare lvl-80 boost lying around from EOD preorder, so we created her a new character (which she immediately color-coordinated), I showed her how the pistols had the same range as her Ranger axes, and gave her the flamethrower kit so she'd have some stability generation for HoT and open world meta bosses.  She immediately latched onto how you can customize the mech for different roles, and started asking questions.  She likes supporting, but Druid was waaay too complex  (Celestial Avatar in particular.  She'd activate it just to try and read the skills in the few seconds before she'd lose it), but her current favorite is to leave the mech in 3-3-3, so it's tanky for her, and lets her use her signets without losing the passive benefit (she loves that.  Thank you, whoever designed that).

 

You can imagine my surprise when I came in the room today to find her playing today, on her own, with a huge smile on her face and a gleeful giggle.

 

That's never really happened before.  The mech helps be that frontliner she always wanted out of her ranger pets (but they never seemed to) and rescues her if she gets in trouble, the signets allow her to learn and master it at her own pace, and the elite signet provides her with a "oops, I did something wrong" rescue resurrect of the mech (though she sometimes presses it too early, before the mech has returned to the sky, so it just wastes it?).  With celestial, she has enough healing from the heal signet to help her recover from mistakes, and none of the signets punish you for using them at the wrong time (with the right trait choice).   And flamethrower helps her handle bosses she hasn't memorized the attack patterns for.   She's loving it, and for the first time, has the confidence to actually go and explore on her own, to get into an event that she hasn't seen before and experience it for herself.

 

She isn't soloing bosses, or afking end-game content like some people are in an uproar about.  She's doing 2-4k dps damage.  I checked.  It's just enough to actually kill the bad guys and feel like the hero.

 

I understand that maybe some mechanics of the spec need to be tweaked, or some numbers adjusted to prevent the top-end players from constructing a build that does it all (dps, boons, and healing), but please don't cripple this spec or the idea of it.  Some might cry that it requires no skill, or that it's ruining the game.  For my wife, it's opened the game in a new way, and for the first time, she's actually playing it.  She was even asking me about how to switch her mech to barrier, so she could help during boss fights, and she actually switched her mech out to adapt.  Was she the best at it?  No, other classes do it far better, but she *could* adapt, and she didn't have to understand deep mechanics or interactions.  It was as simple as "choose this option, lose this bonus, gain area shield on allies".  She can play greedy when alone, or support others, and it is simple to make the change.

 

That the new focus that Guild Wars wants to achieve (that you should be able to play any class or playstyle and be able to play any role) is so brilliantly achieved in such a simple to play, yet flexible specialization that may not be the best at anything, but can adapt to the situation has been some of the most fun we've had.  For high level play you need the other boons, especially quickness and alacrity, but by keeping those as options with effective tradeoffs and allowing it to be simple, adaptable,  with a slight focus on damage and self-healing has helped my wife and other players like her experience this game in a way they never have before.

 

 

Thank you for remembering people like her.  And to everyone else, no, I don't want to invalidate the way you play either.  Nor do I wish to belittle your opinions.  I understand that you can do far more with the specialization, and I believe you should be rewarded for that.   But I am glad that there is a "lower skill" valid specialization that helps her to contribute and have fun.

Edited August 9, 2023 by PixelHero.5849

[Aravind.9610]

Glad to see someone else enjoying the mechanist. Its a really neat spec.

It doesn't have a build that "does it all", it just has tons of different builds with different uses and for people of different skill levels.

Edited March 25, 2022 by Aravind.9610

[Howluffu.7259]

Anet nerfing gun is loaded and ready for this to get stopped.

Reminder of the low skilled e-specs getting gutted in the xpac patch just for the sake of: but you have new toys, play them! (even tho most of them are inferior from their precessors).

Maybe I'm wrong and they let mechanist enjoyers happy with their spec untouched but I've seen plenny of complaints for their overtuned performance in every scenario. I've seen Anet killing specs for less...

[Aravind.9610]

16 minutes ago, Howluffu.7259 said:

Anet nerfing gun is loaded and ready for this to get stopped.

Reminder of the low skilled e-specs getting gutted in the xpac patch just for the sake of: but you have new toys, play them! (even tho most of them are inferior from their precessors).

Maybe I'm wrong and they let mechanist enjoyers happy with their spec untouched but I've seen plenny of complaints for their overtuned performance in every scenario. I've seen Anet killing specs for less...

Yes, plenty of complaints from the same players over and over again. And what low skill specs got nerfed in the expansion patch? Only thing that was nerfed was sustain traits. Minionmancer still works wonders, mirage still does 28k dps for being afk.

Edited March 25, 2022 by Aravind.9610

[Cherubino XV.2384]

2 hours ago, Howluffu.7259 said:

Anet nerfing gun is loaded and ready for this to get stopped.

Reminder of the low skilled e-specs getting gutted in the xpac patch just for the sake of: but you have new toys, play them! (even tho most of them are inferior from their precessors).

Maybe I'm wrong and they let mechanist enjoyers happy with their spec untouched but I've seen plenny of complaints for their overtuned performance in every scenario. I've seen Anet killing specs for less...

 

It's because there is a small really loud group of people that screams asking for nerfs, that I replied in threads like this to help the developers team understand that there is some good in the new elite specs not only Mechanist.

 

Having the choice to play hardcore or comfy mode should be allowed it's a game, we work to pay the bills etc...

 

If you want the challenge you can use a more technical hard to master build that crank big numbers and do whatever you want, it's what I usually do, but sometimes I just want to play more laid back.

 

This is an online game with a good community that should welcome anyone with different skill levels.

Edited March 25, 2022 by Cherubino XV.2384

[Infusion.7149]

2 hours ago, Howluffu.7259 said:

Anet nerfing gun is loaded and ready for this to get stopped.

Reminder of the low skilled e-specs getting gutted in the xpac patch just for the sake of: but you have new toys, play them! (even tho most of them are inferior from their precessors).

Maybe I'm wrong and they let mechanist enjoyers happy with their spec untouched but I've seen plenny of complaints for their overtuned performance in every scenario. I've seen Anet killing specs for less...

If by every scenario you mean PVP.

[Valisha.8650]

Yes, Mechanist is in very good spot rn. Good at everything (as long as specialized), perfect at nothing. And if people want it nerfed, how about we nerf g*ardian as well? Then again, nerfing everything just creates equal misery. Buff other specs instead.

[Opun.3824]

2 hours ago, Valisha.8650 said:

Buff other specs instead.

 

Totally agree!

[frareanselm.1925]

22 hours ago, Aravind.9610 said:

Yes, plenty of complaints from the same players over and over again. And what low skill specs got nerfed in the expansion patch? Only thing that was nerfed was sustain traits. Minionmancer still works wonders, mirage still does 28k dps for being afk.

Are you talking about the minionmancer build for pvp? because blood magic got nerfed.

[Aravind.9610]

Nope, only PvE.

[Grand Marshal.4098]

Wish it was the same for me with most specs...4th expac train lesgo?

[Crackmonster.2790]

It's honestly a very touching story - however, it's still is what it is, a result of overloading far too many things both offensive and defensive into one specc. That said, there should be room in there for building the mech as a support/tank and you could always have a condispecc and do good damage yourself with pistols and thrower. So i dont think she will ever lose the ability to hide behind that mech or throw some dmg.

Thinking about it further i think the sensible future for mech is honestly if it isnt a top tier dps specc, but retains a lot of the tankyness and support, it just got way too much defensive powers for it to be fair for others if it has top level dps.

Another way i suppose is if they specialize even more with the trait choices - which means you lose a access to more dps if you go support, and you lose access to most of the support if you go max dps, etc. Such that okay you can do each role fine but need a gear set and a specc change for each and you don't get a ton of crossover generic op powers in each.

In fact if they do it like this, there isn't a thing mech couldnt do well then, it just cant be a super faceroller dps + a super tank + megadefensive char at the same time.

The signets have to be looked at, as someone said in mesmer forums just the shift signet alone you have to take 2-3 mesmer ability and a traitline to get the same effect. The signets are the difinition of BLOATED. It blows my mind how broken they all are. Theres no reason for shift signet to give movement speed or condi cleanse, that just superbloat. You could even remove the stun break from it too and it would be a top tier ability still, easily.

Edited April 3, 2022 by Crackmonster.2790

[Zzik.5873]

2 hours ago, Crackmonster.2790 said:

It's honestly a very touching story - however, it's still is what it is, a result of overloading far too many things both offensive and defensive into one specc. That said, there should be room in there for building the mech as a support/tank and you could always have a condispecc and do good damage yourself with pistols and thrower. So i dont think she will ever lose the ability to hide behind that mech or throw some dmg.

Thinking about it further i think the sensible future for mech is honestly if it isnt a top tier dps specc, but retains a lot of the tankyness and support, it just got way too much defensive powers for it to be fair for others if it has top level dps.

Another way i suppose is if they specialize even more with the trait choices - which means you lose a access to more dps if you go support, and you lose access to most of the support if you go max dps, etc. Such that okay you can do each role fine but need a gear set and a specc change for each and you don't get a ton of crossover generic op powers in each.

In fact if they do it like this, there isn't a thing mech couldnt do well then, it just cant be a super faceroller dps + a super tank + megadefensive char at the same time.

The signets have to be looked at, as someone said in mesmer forums just the shift signet alone you have to take 2-3 mesmer ability and a traitline to get the same effect. The signets are the difinition of BLOATED. It blows my mind how broken they all are. Theres no reason for shift signet to give movement speed or condi cleanse, that just superbloat. You could even remove the stun break from it too and it would be a top tier ability still, easily.

For the signets, dont forget that we lose our toolbelts and most of our stun break and condi cleanse are on our toolbelts.

[Cherubino XV.2384]

6 hours ago, Crackmonster.2790 said:

It's honestly a very touching story - however, it's still is what it is, a result of overloading far too many things both offensive and defensive into one specc. That said, there should be room in there for building the mech as a support/tank and you could always have a condispecc and do good damage yourself with pistols and thrower. So i dont think she will ever lose the ability to hide behind that mech or throw some dmg.

Thinking about it further i think the sensible future for mech is honestly if it isnt a top tier dps specc, but retains a lot of the tankyness and support, it just got way too much defensive powers for it to be fair for others if it has top level dps.

Another way i suppose is if they specialize even more with the trait choices - which means you lose a access to more dps if you go support, and you lose access to most of the support if you go max dps, etc. Such that okay you can do each role fine but need a gear set and a specc change for each and you don't get a ton of crossover generic op powers in each.

In fact if they do it like this, there isn't a thing mech couldnt do well then, it just cant be a super faceroller dps + a super tank + megadefensive char at the same time.

The signets have to be looked at, as someone said in mesmer forums just the shift signet alone you have to take 2-3 mesmer ability and a traitline to get the same effect. The signets are the difinition of BLOATED. It blows my mind how broken they all are. Theres no reason for shift signet to give movement speed or condi cleanse, that just superbloat. You could even remove the stun break from it too and it would be a top tier ability still, easily.

So would you trade ALL of your shatters for our 5 signets?

Edited April 3, 2022 by Cherubino XV.2384

[Thon.3780]

Just my opinion 

 

I think it is good start for new player. 
coz this grade open for too long , so current player are veteran.

if you compare for many game , it die down because no new player although you try to make new content.
 Why? 
coz new player feel noob or big gap when face with experience player or difficult game mode or mechanic that design for experience player. 
 

This is one solution for ANET to pull new comer and give them stand point.   And… it also make complain from old player about how powerful it is.

 

[DragonMoon.6098]

I have small hands and trouble with the number keys and I still activate my skills with the mouse... 😄

The only things I use keybinds for are Raptor and Skyscale...tab to select enemy...weapon draw...and weapon swap. It works for me...