Alac heal tempest is almost there but

[Kuya.6495]

It lacks better access to stability and aegis. 

 

Now what does it do well? Harrier gear using traits air/water/tempest with d/wh using utilies such as heal shout, frost bow, earth shout and rebound can give out perma alac, might, fury, protection, regen and vigor. You can do this by cycling through fire overload>air overload>earth overload>sand squall>heat sync>fire overload and repeat. You use heal shout, wh 5>d 3, water overload and frost bow for heals. That all works fine.  You can even go staff for more healing although you might give up some alac uptime due to losing boon extension from earth wh 4.  The buff to alac duration has made it easier to dip into water for healing and not lose alac uptime but I do feel tempest could still use a bit more alac duration, maybe another second, so tempest has enough time to heal allies back to full and get back to alac rotation.

 

But for stab? Incredibly hard to provide on a moment's notice. You can take earth traitline to give stability when you switch to earth but the rotation i outlined above requires you overload earth for protection and alac uptime. Healbrand and alac heal mechanist don't have to make these sacrifices to give stab. They can maintain quick and alac respectively just fine. Hell, heal alac mech (HAM) has alac on the very same f2 that gives stunbreaks, cleanse and stab. Healbrand (HB) has a trait that lets it give quick on stab.

 

Aegis is another problem. Alac heal tempest has no access to this in practice. HAM can give it via the same overstacked f2. HB has an incredible amount of options to give aegis (shield 4, tome of courage 5, advance, etc). 

 

Now why is aegis and stab so important? A lot of mechanics in instanced content can be negated or made easier with stab and aegis. Minister li' s slash attack can be negated by aegis and stab. Mordremoth phase on HT can be made trivial with stab and aegis. This creates a real premium for classes that can provide these two boons. 

 

I can understand why HB has so much of it. Even if HB didn't have elite mantra and tome 3, core guard utilities still have aegis and stab. I think anet rightly understood that for HAM to compete as a support it needed stab and aegis. While tempest having higher healing than either of these two supports is a plus, overhealing has less value than aegis and stab as has been demonstrated by how the community approaches instanced encounters. 

 

Now I'm not asking for heal alac tempest (HAT) to have as much stab/aegis as HB. HB can keep its niche of having the most stab/aegis out of all the supports. But for HAT to compete, it needs more practical access to both of these boons.  My suggestions are:

1. Put some stability on earth warhorn 4.

2. Put aegis on fire warhorn 4

 

Now, I have a concern that putting stab and aegis on warhorn might make staff heal tempest undesirable so I also suggest:
 3. Aegis on fire shout

4. Stab on frost shout.

 

Now you could always use warhorn and take fire and frost shout to get double access to aegis and stab but you'd give up frost bow and lose even more access to healing (assuming you're always taking the glyph for rezzes) vs using staff and being able to sacrifice frost bow to take fire and frost shout due to superior healing on water staff and not needing frost bow to compensate. I dont want to put stab on earth shout because I feel the magnetic aura, protection and blast finisher already makes earth shout the best shout to take aside from heal and elite shout.

 

Now you might be thinking, "but doesn't this make HAT better than HAM? With these suggestions HAT has double the access to stab and aegis than HAM does." Yes it has better access now, but I feel HAM has the benefit of easier play, better alac uptime, and barrier that HAT does not, so I feel it's a fair trade. 

Let me know what you all think.

Edited July 4, 2022 by Kuya.6495

[Monchichi.9301]

I think putting it on the shouts would be better. Warhorn 4 is still part of a pretty tight rotation to keep up alacrity, so won't be available on demand. 

I also think the alacrity should start with the beginning of the overload because there is so MUCH stuff we have to dodge/jump, especially in the new encounters that we're going to end up canceling these a lot even if we don't want to.

And I think it needs a few more seconds. I'd like to see it up to 9 or 10 seconds. That makes warhorn less mandatory. And we can't actually heal when we're overloading, and can't heal much while not in water, so spending nearly half relying on just Wash the Pain Away just feels bad as a healer. Unless we're using water overload, which some might avoid due to being locked out of water. 

I'd like to see heal alac tempest be able to bounce between water and one other overload, rather than have to overload three each to keep alac up. Honestly, I think being able to spend more time in water and not overloading in other elements would be better than stability and aegis. Other classes can bring stab if needed. But less overloading would allow us to be more adaptable to circumstances. We can dip in to fire for might or air for static auras, depending on set up. But it feels awkward to have to add an unnecessary overload.  Or to rely on frost bow. 

[Erick Alastor.3917]

In my opinion HAT is not almost there, but still way off.

1. Good luck upkeeping perma vigor without Invigorating Torrent and good luck not having all your overloads interrupted if you won't pick Harmonious Conduit.
2. Having to use the shortbow to AA feels simply boring. I can tolerate that on a staff build, but forcing it on d/wh? Bah.
3. Not only earth is part of the rotation so it's not reliable for stab, but that stab duration via trait is abysmal even with BD cap.
4. Our (non cleave) damage is stupidly low compared to HFB.

Aegis is not a problem on HAT, it's a problem everywhere.
Anet should just get rid of it and compensate accordingly all respective classes.

Stability (IN PVE deincentivize active gamplay on non-heals specs and) feels almost like aegis, but since too many encounters take that almost for granted I suppose that it could be easier to simply spread it than fixing each encounter to force all people to actively avoid mechanics.
There would be a pretty easy way to implement it on HAT, reworking cantrips and making us able to share Armor of Earth (even at the cost of losing some stacks), but Anet doesn't like simple solutions, so I doubt that will ever happen.

And in closure... I still believe that alac on auras would have been way better and more easier to manage granting more freedom on our weapons and traits' choice, but if Anet is this stuck with overloads I'd at least increase alac by 1 more second.

Edited July 4, 2022 by Erick Alastor.3917

[Kozumi.5816]

18 hours ago, Kuya.6495 said:

It lacks better access to stability and aegis. 

No it doesn't, these boons shouldn't exist.

[scerevisiae.1972]

IMO the trait is still pretty bad, the tradeoff of losing heal on auras for alac is not worth it. The alac trait needs to do something else, or the alac should apply on the now 5-target shout trait, cause the shout trait is now pretty weaksauce.

[Bleikopf.2491]

I was wondering why it wouldn't be applied to the shout traits. Shouts is one of the Tempest identities and they're kinda.. Overlooked in favour of auras and Overloads. Give them shouts some love. 

[crosknight.3041]

58 minutes ago, Bleikopf.2491 said:

I was wondering why it wouldn't be applied to the shout traits. Shouts is one of the Tempest identities and they're kinda.. Overlooked in favour of auras and Overloads. Give them shouts some love. 

agreed, the shout trait itself is already overshadowed by the other 2 master tier traits

[Erick Alastor.3917]

"Tempest is gaining the ability to grant Alacrity ... We expect this to be viable with 'Fresh Air' overload builds, but will be watching to see what else the community does with it- and what further tweaks we can make in the future to help it succeed"

And now we know why HAT feels so clunky.
I find it weird that they prioritized "fresh air builds" when giving alac to the tempest (the ele healing spec) considering that basically all I've ever read from tempest players were suggestions to implement it for healing purposes.

I hope the tweaks they'll implement will be good enough to drop the bow and lessen the problematic nature of overloads.

[Vinny.7260]

2 hours ago, Erick Alastor.3917 said:

"Tempest is gaining the ability to grant Alacrity ... We expect this to be viable with 'Fresh Air' overload builds, but will be watching to see what else the community does with it- and what further tweaks we can make in the future to help it succeed"

And now we know why HAT feels so clunky.
I find it weird that they prioritized "fresh air builds" when giving alac to the tempest (the ele healing spec) considering that basically all I've ever read from tempest players were suggestions to implement it for healing purposes.

I hope the tweaks they'll implement will be good enough to drop the bow and lessen the problematic nature of overloads.

The fact they had Fresh Air Tempest in mind for Alacrity is kind of odd to me. I guess they were trying to pay a homage to DPS Tempest when it first came out. (It used Staff with FA/Fire to constantly overload for the 5% damage increase when it was in Harmonized Conduit.)

I really like the idea of Shouts providing Alacrity rather than Might. Elementalist as a Profession has plenty of avenues to provide Might... Even if some of them are horribly scuffed for the Elementalist itself.

Plus it being a Grandmaster would make Support Tempest decide between Regeneration/Vigor or Alacrity. I think that's an okay tradeoff compared to losing Elemental Bastion.

[Jski.6180]

I think its fine that tempest dose not have stab and aegis but the heal tempest realy needs barrier support in some way and means of aoe auras support out side of the water trait. I suggest giving tempest barrier on shouts and i think the overloads auras need to be build in aoe.

I think catalyst needs to have stab support on auras and maybe aegis from its F5 when traited.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

Problem with fresh air tempest: it is really bad. Sure benchmark seems "okai", but you rely a lot on big hitbox and utility skills like storm + hammer's storm + FGS's storm, really hard to maintain in long or mobile fights. Plus you needed spotter+banner.

 

Then you change Transcendant Tempest for Alacrity, and you lose half the dps, you're a bad dps with only alacrity to share.

[Stallic.2397]

Yeah, I've dabbled in it ever since they made the change. Alac tempest, or just dps, seems to be missing the mark. 

 

My own personal suggestions. Apply the Alac at the start of the overload because overloads are very easy to get interrupted, even with the stab. And then the whole point of your build is destroyed cause right now, you only get alac after a successful overload.

Or, apply alacrity on shout skills. Both are good ideas. 

 

I like the previous mentioned suggestion, to make overloads produce auras as a minor trait. Auras is so baseline for tempest. I wouldn't understand any other build that doesn't use that trait. I wouldn't even call it abusive to have that standardized cause catalyst produces auras every few seconds. So much more than tempest 

 

Lastly, fix conjures. Lightning Hammer, Alac Dps Tempest would be so much fun if conjures weren't such a mess. 

Edited July 14, 2022 by Stallic.2397

[Newholiday.8103]

buff staff

[Nash.2681]

I agree that Heal Tempest needs quite some fine tuning. Right now keeping alac (esp. when playing with staff) needs too much focus.

What I disagree with is, that Tempest needs better/more stab or even aegis. If needed, others can provide that already and Tempest seems to be kind of an issue in pvp/wvw already, so I don't think giving (more of) those boons would be healthy.

I'd rather wish they find a way to easier keep up  perma alac, might, fury, protection, regen and vigor and in return tone down the other support specs.

[Curennos.9307]

I would hope that we - anet - can find some unique way to make tempest a more viable, or desired, support other than copy-pasting boons everywhere. Aegis and stab are strong and valuable, but I REALLY do not want to see them go the same way of every other boon in the game - that is, everyone goes "well <x> needs them to be viable" and it gets to the point where everyone has them and every single support kit is ridiculously same-y. I can understand certain things are just...required and far too strong in certain scenarios, such as stab in WvW. Admittedly, I'm not a hard wvw player so I can't offer much perspective there, and I don't want tempest to NOT be a viable pick for wvw, but I don't want to just hand them stab and aegis for the reasons outlined above.

 

The way anet has set up the boon system is useful in some ways, but limiting in others. If there's a way to make the stability access tempest DOES have more something you can choose to apply or not, instead of something passively generated, I would be down for that. Maybe adding it to Rebound...? That way they can go into earth whenever to generate alac and prot, and have an option for stab that doesn't conflict with something else they have to do as part of the rotation.

 

I really don't want tempest to get much more stab access tho, and I don't want to see aegis anywhere in its kit. Firebrand being ridiculously overpowered doesn't mean we should spread it to every other class - it means nerf FB and reallocate things appropriately. Cause taken the other way, then every support will just be a boring variant of HAM and FB.

[Netko.9271]

6 hours ago, Nash.2681 said:

I agree that Heal Tempest needs quite some fine tuning. Right now keeping alac (esp. when playing with staff) needs too much focus.

What I disagree with is, that Tempest needs better/more stab or even aegis. If needed, others can provide that already and Tempest seems to be kind of an issue in pvp/wvw already, so I don't think giving (more of) those boons would be healthy.

I'd rather wish they find a way to easier keep up  perma alac, might, fury, protection, regen and vigor and in return tone down the other support specs.

 

Why would anyone take Heal Tempest in group and then hope than someone else provide stab and aegis when they can take HFB or hMech that can do all that Tempest can plus stab, plus aegis, better cc...? Without stab/aegis Heal Tempest won't be accepted in any harder group content. Only solution is that stab and aegis is removed from HFB and hMech and that won't happen because you need stab and aegis for some encounters or that Tempest get reliable group stability/aegis too.  

[crosknight.3041]

elementalist needs major rework in general, most of their core utilities/traits are mediocre. bring those up to modern gw2 standards and imo the elite specs can shine more.

one idea i have that i would like them to implement is the cantrip "stone armor" to effect allies in the group (so you get group stability). alternatively they could also add group stability to "aftershock" and earth overload. or just move staunch auras (stability on aura) to tempest or earth trait lines from catalyst, since tempest has much more access to auras.

adding methods to gain barrier would also help out alac tempest in the long run as well, especially if they add something like "barrier on aura" to make the "heal aura vs alac" debate more manageable (if your providing significant barrier then you can sacrifice some healing for more boons).

 

[Nash.2681]

On 7/15/2022 at 2:02 PM, Nash.2681 said:

I agree that Heal Tempest needs quite some fine tuning. Right now keeping alac (esp. when playing with staff) needs too much focus.

What I disagree with is, that Tempest needs better/more stab or even aegis. If needed, others can provide that already and Tempest seems to be kind of an issue in pvp/wvw already, so I don't think giving (more of) those boons would be healthy.

I'd rather wish they find a way to easier keep up  perma alac, might, fury, protection, regen and vigor and in return tone down the other support specs.

 

23 hours ago, Netko.9271 said:

 

Why would anyone take Heal Tempest in group and then hope than someone else provide stab and aegis when they can take HFB or hMech that can do all that Tempest can plus stab, plus aegis, better cc...? Without stab/aegis Heal Tempest won't be accepted in any harder group content. Only solution is that stab and aegis is removed from HFB and hMech and that won't happen because you need stab and aegis for some encounters or that Tempest get reliable group stability/aegis too.  

Plz read my post again. To make it easier for you, I included it in my quote and highlighted the part you seemed to miss. Thx.

[Jski.6180]

Tempest needs a way to cast its overloads from a range as well as its shouts. That what missing from healing support tempest the ability to be a mages support class and not just another bunker melee support that it currently is.

I would also like to see the WH get a nice support buff say water 5 Water Globe should be ground targeted and comes with an pulsing clear. A lot of the WH skills need to be ground targeted and come with a field and or added effect of support casting at you feet makes the WH into just a weaker dagger or foces.

[Vekks.6013]

I agree with a lot of the OP's ideas. But I think maybe, as others suggested, putting stability on tempest shouts, and aegis on warhorn abilities would be better.

 

Additionally, on the alacrity implementation, I think having it on overloads is fine, but I would rather it get moved to pulsing a smaller amount on a short interval instead of the whole thing applied at the end. That will make getting interrupted less of a big deal, and will decrease silly need for precasting before pulls.

[Serephen.3420]

On 7/16/2022 at 8:54 AM, crosknight.3041 said:

elementalist needs major rework in general, most of their core utilities/traits are mediocre. bring those up to modern gw2 standards and imo the elite specs can shine more.

one idea i have that i would like them to implement is the cantrip "stone armor" to effect allies in the group (so you get group stability). alternatively they could also add group stability to "aftershock" and earth overload. or just move staunch auras (stability on aura) to tempest or earth trait lines from catalyst, since tempest has much more access to auras.

adding methods to gain barrier would also help out alac tempest in the long run as well, especially if they add something like "barrier on aura" to make the "heal aura vs alac" debate more manageable (if your providing significant barrier then you can sacrifice some healing for more boons).

 

If the cantrips trait shared the boons from them with allies that would be amazing 😮

Edited July 20, 2022 by Serephen.3420

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

No need to remember we still have 2 traits with 300sec CD for the full effect, 3 with tempest.

[WizardXeze.2860]

Tempest needs but only one fix which is giving Tempestuous Aria 5s Alacrity instead of Might and that would fix most of the problems that Tempest has.

 

Then I think the topic of Tempest lacking Aegis and Stability should be addressed via Core Elementalist gaining access to Stability and Aegis so Waver and Catalyst could also tip to that. As it seems to be the direction Arena Net is heading with the Balance I would not be surprised to see this happen later down in the balance chances. We don't have to FORCE Tempest to be another Firebrand, but if you want to do so make sure Core Elementalist itself gains access to Stability and/or Aegis not only the Tempest.

 

In my opinion the current way of Tempest providing Alacrity is the worst way possible they could have made it in the whole game. Forcing you to finish Overload? Making it to compete with the main Healing trait of Tempest? They had so many other options here to do Alacrity. Honestly I think giving Tempestuous Aria the Alacrity would be the best solution. But to give ANet other ideas how to fix the Tempest Alac if they don't want to take the best way to fix it would be either making you pulse Alacrity while channeling Overload or when you Start overloading give alacrity, either one would be better and silence 90% of complains. This would remove the punishing nature of having to finish overloading or not give alacrity at all.

 

For Heal Tempest I believe that the whole point is you are trading The Stability and Aegis from Firebrand for pure healing via Elemental Bastion and you can easily have Firebrand giving you Stab in Raids and Fractals or some other profession like Engineer, Scourge or Revenant to name few who can Stab. Aegis is bit more rare where Chrono and Firebrand can easily give them. Heal Tempest in my opinion already has a lot of trades of compared to any other healer in the game when you think about it. Forcing you to choose Elemental Bastion or Alacrity is just addition to this list. First which weapon do you run? Dagger is harder to use and has more healing than Scepter but Scepter can generate more might, is easier to use and has more range. Staff is also on option and while Focus is not use in PvE in PvP it is strong choices over Horn and Horn would be the default for PvE but what if you run Staff instead. And then you have the trait choices you are already running Water/Tempest as Healer but the third option is based on what you need. Air allows you to lower Glyph of Renewal and Glyph of Elementalist cooldown while providing Swiftness and Fury. Earth gives you little stability, prevents crits and gives you easy access to 40% Protection (tough the tool tip does not show it?) Fire is taken when you need condition cleansing for Wing 2 first raid boss or against Condi builds in PvP. Arcane is best healing and gives you reviving well on top of that and you gain good self sustain from it which is super nice overall. So on top of all that we now have to choose to give Alacrity but Raids and Fractals is all about Role Compression so you take Alacrity giving up Halve of your healing for lack of Elemental Bastion and at that point you are just average healer with no stability and we come back to the your trade of as Heal Tempest is to take Elemental Bastion and be the best healer but no Stability. We also lost 10 target healing which is huge loss and the only saving thing was to be able to give Alacrity which now ruins Heal Tempest becasue you can't take Elemental Bastion in Raids.

 

 

But this is my opinion. My experience is being Support Main tryin most supports builds with roughly 1500 hours played and easily twice as much time spend studying the builds themselves.

 

TL;DR: I think Tempest Alacrity should be on Tempestuous Aria 5s Alacrity instead of Might and if you want to add Stability/Aegis give them to the Core Elementalist instead of Tempest.

[Jmvars.4501]

The main issue I have with this build right now is it gives alacrity when completing an overload. I wish it would pulse alacrity so if your overload fails or you need to prematurely end it you have at least given some alacrity.

 

Obviously I wish I didn't have to sacrifice aura healing to give alacrity but I actually think it's good design that you have a trade-off for giving this key boon. Problem is that other classes *cough* Firebrand and Mechanist *cough* have far less trade-offs.

 

[Serephen.3420]

18 hours ago, WizardXeze.2860 said:

Tempest needs but only one fix which is giving Tempestuous Aria 5s Alacrity instead of Might and that would fix most of the problems that Tempest has.

 

Then I think the topic of Tempest lacking Aegis and Stability should be addressed via Core Elementalist gaining access to Stability and Aegis so Waver and Catalyst could also tip to that. As it seems to be the direction Arena Net is heading with the Balance I would not be surprised to see this happen later down in the balance chances. We don't have to FORCE Tempest to be another Firebrand, but if you want to do so make sure Core Elementalist itself gains access to Stability and/or Aegis not only the Tempest.

 

In my opinion the current way of Tempest providing Alacrity is the worst way possible they could have made it in the whole game. Forcing you to finish Overload? Making it to compete with the main Healing trait of Tempest? They had so many other options here to do Alacrity. Honestly I think giving Tempestuous Aria the Alacrity would be the best solution. But to give ANet other ideas how to fix the Tempest Alac if they don't want to take the best way to fix it would be either making you pulse Alacrity while channeling Overload or when you Start overloading give alacrity, either one would be better and silence 90% of complains. This would remove the punishing nature of having to finish overloading or not give alacrity at all.

 

For Heal Tempest I believe that the whole point is you are trading The Stability and Aegis from Firebrand for pure healing via Elemental Bastion and you can easily have Firebrand giving you Stab in Raids and Fractals or some other profession like Engineer, Scourge or Revenant to name few who can Stab. Aegis is bit more rare where Chrono and Firebrand can easily give them. Heal Tempest in my opinion already has a lot of trades of compared to any other healer in the game when you think about it. Forcing you to choose Elemental Bastion or Alacrity is just addition to this list. First which weapon do you run? Dagger is harder to use and has more healing than Scepter but Scepter can generate more might, is easier to use and has more range. Staff is also on option and while Focus is not use in PvE in PvP it is strong choices over Horn and Horn would be the default for PvE but what if you run Staff instead. And then you have the trait choices you are already running Water/Tempest as Healer but the third option is based on what you need. Air allows you to lower Glyph of Renewal and Glyph of Elementalist cooldown while providing Swiftness and Fury. Earth gives you little stability, prevents crits and gives you easy access to 40% Protection (tough the tool tip does not show it?) Fire is taken when you need condition cleansing for Wing 2 first raid boss or against Condi builds in PvP. Arcane is best healing and gives you reviving well on top of that and you gain good self sustain from it which is super nice overall. So on top of all that we now have to choose to give Alacrity but Raids and Fractals is all about Role Compression so you take Alacrity giving up Halve of your healing for lack of Elemental Bastion and at that point you are just average healer with no stability and we come back to the your trade of as Heal Tempest is to take Elemental Bastion and be the best healer but no Stability. We also lost 10 target healing which is huge loss and the only saving thing was to be able to give Alacrity which now ruins Heal Tempest becasue you can't take Elemental Bastion in Raids.

 

 

But this is my opinion. My experience is being Support Main tryin most supports builds with roughly 1500 hours played and easily twice as much time spend studying the builds themselves.

 

TL;DR: I think Tempest Alacrity should be on Tempestuous Aria 5s Alacrity instead of Might and if you want to add Stability/Aegis give them to the Core Elementalist instead of Tempest.

Tempestuous aria is probably the easiest trait to replace I agree. Also think giving core ele better stab support would be nice. I care more about stab than aegis.