How will the "Exposed" change impact the meta in the 3/29/22 update tomorrow?

[Tyrant.1270]

Exposed

The Exposed effect is applied when a creature's defiance bar is broken and causes the creature to take additional power and condition damage for a short duration. Previously, there was no consistent duration for Exposed. We are standardizing its applied duration to 10 seconds, which is longer than the previous durations.

With increased duration, we are also adjusting the effect to compensate. Previously, Exposed caused the target to take 30% increased damage from strikes and 100% from conditions. This short window of Exposed overrewarded certain builds with high burst capability in content such as fractals. Moving forward, Exposed causes 10% increased damage from strikes and 20% from conditions over its longer duration of 10 seconds. This allows more time to take advantage of this window of opportunity while more consistently rewarding a variety of builds. We will be keeping a very close eye on the effects of this change.

TL;DR: Exposed will now be ten seconds (longer) and the damage bonus to conditions will drop from 100% to 20%. The damage from Power will drop from 30% to 10%.

Edited March 29, 2022 by Tyrant.1270

[Serephen.3420]

I think it will reduce the gap between power and condi in content like fractals.

[LucianDK.8615]

Will definitely close the gap, though condi will still be superior because of conditions. Both for breakbars, as well for longer durations on them compared to power.

[Gorem.8104]

Well be entirely unnoticeable, they are essentially removing a core game mechanic by making both values so low. There is no point to chase that, no point to cc for damage anymore after that, cause you could just take damage abilities instead and just do more damage all the time. It is an incredibly ill thought and bad update. 

[Astralporing.1957]

It will just be a straight nerf to power, and to bursty condi builds. At least there won't be as much need to cc as before, though, so it will be easier to forget this mechanic exists.  I am sure that's the exact result they wanted to achieve [/sarcasm]

[Makuragee.3058]

Are people saying CC bar will become ignorable?

[LuRkEr.9462]

1 minute ago, Makuragee.3058 said:

Are people saying CC bar will become ignorable?

Depends on if its a fight that "has" to have the CC bar broken to not get a negative side effect like invuln or big damage hit. 

Purely for damage it will be ok to break it still for the 10 second window of slightly higher damage, but overall it will bring those groups that don't CC much closer to those that do.

[Wolfb.7025]

Its a nerf almost exclusively (or at least aimed) to Fractals CM. People will start using Power more often on 99 and 98.

[Nephalem.8921]

6 hours ago, Gorem.8104 said:

Well be entirely unnoticeable, they are essentially removing a core game mechanic by making both values so low. There is no point to chase that, no point to cc for damage anymore after that, cause you could just take damage abilities instead and just do more damage all the time. It is an incredibly ill thought and bad update. 

Exposed didnt exist in the core game.

[Xerxez.7361]

32 minutes ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

Exposed didnt exist in the core game.

 

Exposed has existed as long as I've been playing which is around the past 2 years. Its just an easy mechanic to miss since it only lasted 2 seconds after your broke an enemies Break Bar.

No, idea when it was added to the game because I've only played 2 years and have no recollection of the year I played at launch.

Edited March 29, 2022 by Xerxez.7361

[ardhikaizecson.3697]

Didn't Ai will go phase as soon as she recovered from the stun? The extra 5 seconds of exposed would be useless if she got stunned for only 5 secs if thats the case

[Nephalem.8921]

9 hours ago, Xerxez.7361 said:

 

Exposed has existed as long as I've been playing which is around the past 2 years. Its just an easy mechanic to miss since it only lasted 2 seconds after your broke an enemies Break Bar.

No, idea when it was added to the game because I've only played 2 years and have no recollection of the year I played at launch.

It lasted mostly 5 seconds if you broke a bar. sometimes 4 and sometimes 9. very inconsistent. Was introduced together with defiance bars with hot launch.

[Gorem.8104]

10 hours ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

Exposed didnt exist in the core game.

When I came back it felt that way as it was all over PoF zones, you had to break the DJinn's bar in order to do any damage - when I meant core I really just meant it is in open world, and was added to core later essentially as I know it used to be different, but we've always had some kind of CC break bar. 

Basically, to me It feels like a core base mechanic. Something that make GW2 different to other mmo's, that they are almost entirely removing with this update on anything that doesn't have breaking its bar as a requirement itself. There is no point to break the bar for damage anymore. 

11 hours ago, Makuragee.3058 said:

Are people saying CC bar will become ignorable?

Yes. Unless you have to break it due to mechanics, there is no point with dps values this low, everyone will just be doing less damage on everything that has a bar forever. 

Edited March 30, 2022 by Gorem.8104

[Vidit.7108]

Unless there is a reason to break the bar, like Arkk doing a big attack, there isn't a great reason to take cc over a skill that does damage. Unless you want your healer to go on a smoke break i guess. 

Previously in fractals without CC bars condi overperformed relative to most power builds because power builds were burst reliant. Most power builds now will have to be aimed at consistent damage over time to stay relevant but more likely they will disappear almost entirely. It will be a reverse of what it was like before the May update where there are a couple of fractals where power is better than condi but condi will probably dominate.

Build diversity will simply keep shrinking if I had to guess. T4s will get more toxic as power builds are driven out. CMs will always be the same.

The biggest loss though is to t2 and t3 pug groups. The exposed buff was where a lot of underperforming groups made up for their sloppy rotations or bad builds. With that gone I would expect t3 clear times in particular to balloon. The casualness of t2 is going to be eroded. Newer and casual fractal players already avoid certain fractals (like Shattered and Sunqua) I expect that list to grow.

Edit: After doing some more fractals there were a few where condi was hit harder than I was expecting. The balance between where condi or power is better might be closer to 50-50 and so I can't say for sure power builds will die off completely.

Edited March 30, 2022 by Vidit.7108

[Nephalem.8921]

10 hours ago, Vidit.7108 said:

Unless there is a reason to break the bar, like Arkk doing a big attack, there isn't a great reason to take cc over a skill that does damage. Unless you want your healer to go on a smoke break i guess. 

Previously in fractals without CC bars condi overperformed relative to most power builds because power builds were burst reliant. Most power builds now will have to be aimed at consistent damage over time to stay relevant but more likely they will disappear almost entirely. It will be a reverse of what it was like before the May update where there are a couple of fractals where power is better than condi but condi will probably dominate.

Build diversity will simply keep shrinking if I had to guess. T4s will get more toxic as power builds are driven out. CMs will always be the same.

The biggest loss though is to t2 and t3 pug groups. The exposed buff was where a lot of underperforming groups made up for their sloppy rotations or bad builds. With that gone I would expect t3 clear times in particular to balloon. The casualness of t2 is going to be eroded. Newer and casual fractal players already avoid certain fractals (like Shattered and Sunqua) I expect that list to grow.

Edit: After doing some more fractals there were a few where condi was hit harder than I was expecting. The balance between where condi or power is better might be closer to 50-50 and so I can't say for sure power builds will die off completely.

T2 and T3 groups never cc so no changes there.. Breaking a defiance bar should be a requirement to survive oneshots and not an insane dps boost.

Power will dominate in short fights again while previously condi was able to outburst power builds. Pugs cant insta cc. before you had 0% for power because they bursted before boss was broken while condi ramped up and cfb spiked when bar got broken. If anything this buffs power in pug fractals.

[Nephalem.8921]

17 hours ago, Vidit.7108 said:

Edit: After doing some more fractals there were a few where condi was hit harder than I was expecting. The balance between where condi or power is better might be closer to 50-50 and so I can't say for sure power builds will die off completely.

I tried it myself now. Its equal on bosses like ensolyss and arts if you dont reflect but on all the other 99 and 98 bosses power wins hard. Cfb/willbender still king in normal t4s.

Power builds and especially holo or slb which i tested are very good now. Havent tried virtuoso yet but i expect it to be very good aswell.