Wells after the profession update

[Xaylin.1860]

8 hours ago, Veprovina.4876 said:

Yes, well... I still haven't seen Specters in group comps in WvW so maybe they didn't get the memo

To be fair, while I consider Specter Wells to be overall better and more versatile than Chronos, the Shadowstep on them is not that great for large scale WvW. Totally different topic in smaller fights, though.

 

2 hours ago, godfat.2604 said:

I think their only goal is making it impossible for Chronomancer to maintain both quickness and alacrity in PvE. Everything else they don’t care.

Agreed. But I also agree with Blood Red Arachnid.2493  that it feels lazy. Then again, they basically did the same for Ranger and Herald. And Warriors got it even worse. I still can't wrap me head around who approved on the Banner changes. Personally, I agree that unique (group) effects need to go or at least be reduced. But the Banner change is on 300s CD trait level.

[draxynnic.3719]

3 hours ago, Xaylin.1860 said:

To be fair, while I consider Specter Wells to be overall better and more versatile than Chronos, the Shadowstep on them is not that great for large scale WvW. Totally different topic in smaller fights, though.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I was thinking - for WvW purposes, throwing a black hole at the enemy is probably more useful (or, rather, less likely to get you killed) than jumping at the enemy and sucking them towards you. Sure, I could see situations where you might really want the shadowstep on Shadowfall, but as a rule, Gravity Well probably has a better risk/reward ratio.

[Zenith.7301]

19 hours ago, godfat.2604 said:

I think their only goal is making it impossible for Chronomancer to maintain both quickness and alacrity in PvE. Everything else they don’t care. It’s a joke that they claimed to make wells easier to use by moving the effects to the first pulse, and then still keep last pulse effects and even add some new last pulse effects (this kinda reminds me a new 300s trait), as if only quickness and alacrity are something, and everything else are irrelevant.

They clearly don’t even care how Chrono performs in PvP or WvW. Zero consideration put into it. Not even one bit.

 

 

I mean, this same patch left Untamed and Vindicator where they are while leaving Mechanist, Specter, and FB untouched. What did you expect?

 

These developers are never seen in the forums, so how do you expect them to know what's going on in the game when all they respond to are Reddit campaigns for elementalists.

 

They literally release their notes the Friday before the notes drop on Tuesday, and despite massive backlash release them without adjustment to feedback. They don't respect their players in the slightest.

 

Developers in this game always design with the crappy philosophy that their position affords them better insight than the players. Good developers balance iteratively alongside the community, not despite it.

Edited July 3, 2022 by Zenith.7301

[godfat.2604]

5 hours ago, Zenith.7301 said:

What did you expect?

I read through a lot of discussions, including the leek, along with my experience over the years, yeah one wouldn’t expect much and those didn’t really have hopes must have quit the game long ago, just like I quit about 3 years in the middle when they started adding the crazy concept of “trade offs”, removing Illusionary Persona and Distortion. When I came back I realized they gave us back Illusionary Persona, but still no Distortion for Chrono nor 2nd dodge for Mirage. No, who would really expect much, if anything?

However they said this in the June 22 update: (Intentionally ignored other professions otherwise we’ll go off topic pretty quickly)

Quote

• Mesmer: Chronomancers will be able to effectively choose to provide either quickness or alacrity based on their grandmaster trait selection and do so more easily, with increased radius and application methods that are easier to keep up with moving groups.

From https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/arenanet-studio-update-june-2022/ at the bottom of the post on June 22.

Beside “implying” that Chrono will no longer be able to grant both quickness and alacrity, this description did somehow seem to reflect a very small portion of the community ideas, especially for the part that “keep up with moving groups”. We had extensive discussions around these topic over the years. Maybe I am too naïve, but didn’t that also imply that the wells might now start moving like Scrapper’s wells, or at least no important effects in the last pulse? Or a way to consume the wells to force the last pulse to come earlier, like the other suggestion in this forum?

My point is, even when we had no expectation, Anet should still understand that we didn’t really expect nothing… We’re still here after all, aren’t we?

Edited July 3, 2022 by godfat.2604

[draxynnic.3719]

5 hours ago, Zenith.7301 said:

I mean, this same patch left Untamed and Vindicator where they are while leaving Mechanist, Specter, and FB untouched. What did you expect?

Condition guard DPS was nerfed fairly hard, both directly (through the nerf to Amplified Wrath) and indirectly (turns out that burn-focused builds got more out of Sun Spirit than most, so losing that means losing a lot of DPS).

[Xaylin.1860]

1 hour ago, godfat.2604 said:

Maybe I am too naïve, but didn’t that also imply that the wells might now start moving like Scrapper’s wells, or at least no important effects in the last pulse? 

You are not naive. However, the sentence is still true when looking at Quickness and Alacrity. I think the expectations regarding Wells were mostly fueled by a post made on Reddit because Chrono Wells were so bad for ages. And even that post can't really be labelled intentionally misleading.

While the patch certainly is disappointing (scale and scope), people really need to chill and manage their own expectations. Not talking about you here. Just in general. I find it hard to have a conversation on the forum currently if everything is so heated and most rants boil down to "Hurr durr, my class wasn't buffed to FB/Mech level!".

[Levetty.1279]

45 minutes ago, Xaylin.1860 said:

You are not naive. However, the sentence is still true when looking at Quickness and Alacrity. I think the expectations regarding Wells were mostly fueled by a post made on Reddit because Chrono Wells were so bad for ages. And even that post can't really be labelled intentionally misleading.

While the patch certainly is disappointing (scale and scope), people really need to chill and manage their own expectations. Not talking about you here. Just in general. I find it hard to have a conversation on the forum currently if everything is so heated and most rants boil down to "Hurr durr, my class wasn't buffed to FB/Mech level!".

Yeah I don't know why people were expecting Wells to be finally fixed when a week before the patch a dev said they were going to fix the problems with how they work. Come on guys keep your expectations in check!

[Xaylin.1860]

22 minutes ago, Levetty.1279 said:

Come on guys keep your expectations in check!

Oh come on now. Don't behave like this is crazy talk on my behalf. I get the salt. But they didn't say they are going to remove the "big effect on final pulse" thing, did they? I can't find the quote to double check.

It surely is tiresome to argue about semantics and technicalities. But ANet has established a historically rather low level of change in balance patches. Personally I'd rather not read too much into statements and then be butt hurt when what I, as an individual, think should happen, regardless whether my thoughts or expectations are reasonable. Not saying this is the right thing to do. But it surely helps myself enjoying GW2.

[Levetty.1279]

5 hours ago, Xaylin.1860 said:

Oh come on now. Don't behave like this is crazy talk on my behalf. I get the salt. But they didn't say they are going to remove the "big effect on final pulse" thing, did they? I can't find the quote to double check.

It surely is tiresome to argue about semantics and technicalities. But ANet has established a historically rather low level of change in balance patches. Personally I'd rather not read too much into statements and then be butt hurt when what I, as an individual, think should happen, regardless whether my thoughts or expectations are reasonable. Not saying this is the right thing to do. But it surely helps myself enjoying GW2.

They didn't outright say they were going to remove the final tick effects but they acknowledged the problems of how they work and said they were going to be dealing with that.

[Mell.4873]

On 7/1/2022 at 5:49 PM, Tseison.4659 said:

What support skills are you referring to?

Stretched Time is good in the sense of using the shield  and tides of time, but that’s the only “pass” I’d give in terms of giving boons to allies. 

If you’re operating in small scale like you say and you’re getting rushed, why on earth would you stand there in a well just to wait for the final pulse (I.e Superspeed/boon removal, whatever)? 

Chrono or MESMER in general does have its uses in WvW via the countless utilities as was already mentioned by another person in here. Even if a player is spec’s as Chrono, they are likely taking it for the utility refresh via continuum split and gravity well…

There’s a lot of people who DO understand the game and the Mesmer class better than you so that last statement is empty here.

I don't use continuum split on gravity well its to hard to time. I normally used it on the heal skill to burn through Zerg damage when clashing . This is also when you want to use you other Well, by placing them on your own Zerg you will catch enemies inside to. Again mass invisibility is much better since it will let you escape.

The primary problem before was the support skills where so hard to land with Well since it was the final pulse, but now that is no longer the case. Throwing wells on the Zerg means they do land right away, "The first pulse of a well also applies alacrity to allies near the well". Anything else you get is just a bonus.

I mean its hard to describe how hard it was to apply support skills consistently in WvW. Guardian was about the only class that could do it reliably, now we have at least two more. One being Mesmer and another being Warrior, Ranger not so much.

Engineer and Revenant can to but are never really played supportively in WvW, at least I never see them run that way.

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

They didn't outright say they were going to remove the final tick effects but they acknowledged the problems of how they work and said they were going to be dealing with that.

They kinda did, but in close to the worst possible way. 

[Zenith.7301]

21 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Condition guard DPS was nerfed fairly hard, both directly (through the nerf to Amplified Wrath) and indirectly (turns out that burn-focused builds got more out of Sun Spirit than most, so losing that means losing a lot of DPS).

 

 

When I refer to FB I mean the support variant. Yeah, FB in fractals and in raids was still rather strong, but pales in comparison now to Specter, Virtuoso, and Machinist as DPS classes when you consider these 3 classes bring total range flexibility.

 

FB is not problematic as a DPS class, or even as a quickness DPS hybrid. It is only a problem as a support spec alongside mechanist.

Edited July 4, 2022 by Zenith.7301

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, Zenith.7301 said:

 

 

When I refer to FB I mean the support variant. Yeah, FB in fractals and in raids was still rather strong, but pales in comparison now to Specter, Virtuoso, and Machinist as DPS classes when you consider these 3 classes bring total range flexibility.

 

FB is not problematic as a DPS class, or even as a quickness DPS hybrid. It is only a problem as a support spec alongside mechanist.

Healbrand, then. Precision is important.

Mind you, healbrand has generally been subsided by healmech since EoD, so I'm not sure that build specifically is so dominant. It's just that firebrand is still generally the most versatile quickness applyer.

[Uete.3805]

I understand why they decided removing quick/alac from the wells and tides of time was a good idea, but it has stripped down the boon buffing identity of the spec, IMO.

As many of you have pointed out it's still difficult to land any final well pulse on moving fights, to the point where trying to keep both alac and quick through those means it's quite difficult. The new grandmaster traits grant us the ability to provide either boon consistently, however.

I personally think it was overkill to remove all quick/alac from the base chrono kit, and against its theme and original design, specially when playing with smaller groups ourside of high-end pve. It's good we can't consistently provide both with a 100% uptime, but it's also nice we can provide some of them when not specializing on it if we've invested in boon duration gear. I'm hoping at least the well-provided boons get re-implemented as they were in a future update.

[Tseison.4659]

13 hours ago, Mell.4873 said:

I don't use continuum split on gravity well its to hard to time. I normally used it on the heal skill to burn through Zerg damage when clashing . This is also when you want to use you other Well, by placing them on your own Zerg you will catch enemies inside to. Again mass invisibility is much better since it will let you escape.

The primary problem before was the support skills where so hard to land with Well since it was the final pulse, but now that is no longer the case. Throwing wells on the Zerg means they do land right away, "The first pulse of a well also applies alacrity to allies near the well". Anything else you get is just a bonus.

I mean its hard to describe how hard it was to apply support skills consistently in WvW. Guardian was about the only class that could do it reliably, now we have at least two more. One being Mesmer and another being Warrior, Ranger not so much.

Engineer and Revenant can to but are never really played supportively in WvW, at least I never see them run that way.

How do you find gravity well hard to time but the heal well you don't? If you're having trouble in having enough time to use the skills, I suggest taking scepter and shield to help with clone generation so you can have a full duration of CS to give you enough time to position yourself and use gravity well. If you use the heal skill when 'clashing' with other zergs, I'm pretty sure you can do the same for gravity well.

Mass invisibility I agree is a good skill and I myself bring it especially since I have it traited for the extra long duration. However, if you yourself are in a bigger group that has scrappers who have a better stealth gyro, and if you're playing chrono, you're better off in taking gravity well for extra cc for your group.But at the end of the day, it's whatever you want to take.

In regard to the Wells, yes the Initial cast is nice in giving alac, but then we go back to there already being other professions that do the same but ten times better, so you're better off in bringing other utilities like Null Field, illusuon of life, Feedback, Portal etc... Because again, just because someone specs Chrono, doesn't force them to only bring Wells because when I'm running support chrono in WvW, I'm taking Gravity Well and then the rest is situational.

Once again, if Anet wants to make the Wells better, they can keep the grant a boon/effect on initial cast PLUS, on the final pulse, increase the radius and have a more unique effect go off. But most importantly, make Wells go off at the Mesmers location aside from Gravity Well.

Edited July 4, 2022 by Tseison.4659

[OniniKanabo.4758]

On 6/30/2022 at 1:32 PM, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Ohhh no.... A build that you can't stack.... The horror 😱. 

You always want 3-4 Chronos in a 50man squad. The utility that they bring is way to good to pass up. 

Yes, Chrono is S Tier in Wvw. Just not in the dmg or support roll. It's  a utility class. 

 

 

Chrono used to do a descend dmg before EoD tbh.....since that..things went down in spiral....Whish well`s efect to appl on cast not on final pulse and clone to not be target specific....Also you know after 1st pulse of Gravity Well you can just dodge if by chance you get in to?...Just saying.... Chrono in zerg can be much better ....but hey Anet think is all good now aren`t they 😄