August 2 Balance Update Preview

[Ragnarox.9601]

So mesmer is getting buff to alacrity and crit dmg? Where is the same buff for elementalists? We are under the bottom everywhere.

 

Give us same stuff, when we have alac we heal for 10% more or 10% dmg reduction or something. 

Buff mainhand dagger.  Our every traits are just tradoff. 

[Vlad Morbius.1759]

Reaper is in a terrible spot damage wise and never a peep out of the dev team with the exception of an axe buff. I've walked away until they give Reaper some DPS. Long overdue and still silence!

[Vlad Morbius.1759]

On 7/27/2022 at 1:40 PM, Bookah pls.9352 said:

Cool, prays for reaper buffs too.

Be real sweet to finally bench higher than a boon support as a pure selfish dps for once.

Couldn't agree more, and frankly i got tired of waiting so my wallet and I have walked away until they address this!

[Voyant.1327]

2 hours ago, Ragnarox.9601 said:

So mesmer is getting buff to alacrity and crit dmg? Where is the same buff for elementalists? We are under the bottom everywhere.

 

Give us same stuff, when we have alac we heal for 10% more or 10% dmg reduction or something. 

Buff mainhand dagger.  Our every traits are just tradoff. 

Only thing that really got buffed was Power Mesmer builds, Chrono change is utterly useless tbh. And it pales in comparison to what others (like Ranger) got. Don't worry you'll get your pointless "improvements" in the wrong areas here soon too. Warriors "Giant rework"... Chrono "yeah more crit damage on low crit builds and buffs to power weapons"

Its basically feels like trolling mesmers tbh. 

[Voyant.1327]

7 hours ago, Alsandar.7420 said:

You guys decimated Chrono shield 5, Tides of Time, in WvW. Just gutted it. And left us with nothing. We CANNOT play Mirage in WvW. Ever. It only has one dodge. And Virtuoso is a no show. You've forced us to play Chrono in WvW for years. And you nerfed it.

 

Please be the fun, thoughtful company, that appreciates players. 

While I agree with the other two, Virtuoso goes hard in WvW with the right set up.

[XenMaster.7165]

Looks like banner turn into engineer experimental turret boon? What.

[Nighthawk.2401]

As long as Mesmer is getting PvE buffs I would've liked to see Mesmer get more tweaks in WvW to go along side this. Especially focused on helping it where it needs the most help: large squad-vs-squad gameplay. Ideally without overbuffing the 1v1/5v5 roaming options available. Stuff like either increasing target caps on some abilities, or trading off more power into abilities which already have high target caps for less power in abilities which don't. Mesmer recently lost it's non-target-capped shied skill which it used to contribute a minimal amount in 20+ man fights in WvW. It wasn't a strong class even with that, but now it's very much struggling to bring any value once fighting actually starts, and it's just a portal-bot which squads might have one of for getting positioning before the fight. 

 

I think it's a very reasonable take to say that a goal should be for all 9 professions to be welcome in WvW squads, but unfortunately, Mesmer, along with thief and ranger, and ele even to a lesser extent, have been neglected in this game mode, and are at a point where many guilds refuse to welcome these professions into their groups.

 

I'm still disappointed that EoD didn't use the opportunity of adding 9 new elite specs to help out each profession with becoming more viable in the gamemode it struggled most in - including these professions which roughly a decade after launch all still fail to be viable in WvW-group play, and instead EoD's elite specs have a feeling closer to "9 walking Strike advertisements". 

 

Thank you for reading, I look forwards to a future where all players have viable builds available for all end game content, regardless of what their favorite profession is. (Which is intentionally phrased to not imply that all builds/playstyles need to be viable - but at a bare minimum, at least one should exist for each profession) 

 

I do appreciate the communication, and the actual changes here don't particularly affect me or my builds, so I won't comment on them.

Edited July 29, 2022 by Nighthawk.2401

[Mincsk.6028]

Thanks for the update and communication.

[Kougiou.5634]

ok

[FaeriFrie.1827]

Want to know why there are 2 power focus traits within the same line. It feels like a mistake to add the buff there. The buff also  does not state if it affects illusions. Chronos usually do most of their dmg through phantasms so it would be a shame if it doesn't

Wanted to add that danger time is also kind of hard to consider at times as power chronos don't have good self slow application in order to hit that crit-cap while Virtuoso has the easiest access to the 15% crit buff through fury. I would have liked to see an easier time to apply slow as a power chrono or a rework on that trait entirely.

 

I do like the direction of buffing the greatsword and sword. Power weapons besides dagger feels lacking. 

 

I really like the power and condi chrono build, it's such a fun build and has a cool theme. I hope to see it thrive as a viable dps option with other builds

[Ronnie Hu.1694]

Balthazar's Disciples thank you for the services

[Nimon.7840]

I guess those are some nice changes, even though I don't understand, why core Mesmer weapons get buffed, because that buffs virtuoso as well. And virtuoso is already one of the best DPS builds in the game (to be fair, there's only like 5 very good power builds right now).  Having range and access to mesmers utility + even more dps doesn't sound fair, if you look at specs like power berserker, holosmith, dragonhunter, reaper. All those classes are melee and do less damage! While something like dragonhunter has access to guard utility (aegis or stability for the group) the other mentioned specs don't really bring anything to the group. Though engi and warrior both have a good power spec, Necro, thief and guard don't have power specs that are worth playing in endgame PvE right now, because there are classes, that do more damage while having more utility or being ranged.

 

So I'm hoping to see quite a lot of work done for those specs in the next balance patch in October.

[Serephen.3420]

 

9 hours ago, Ragnarox.9601 said:

So mesmer is getting buff to alacrity and crit dmg? Where is the same buff for elementalists? We are under the bottom everywhere.

 

Give us same stuff, when we have alac we heal for 10% more or 10% dmg reduction or something. 

Buff mainhand dagger.  Our every traits are just tradoff. 

Ok, I know as much as anyone that ele needs love but that doesn't mean chrono isn't deserving of it either. Hopefully ele gets their chance in the next round. For now it's warrior and mesmer. Personally I think some blink skills of certain bloated classes should gettoned down, or at least update ele and mes core utilities to a more acceptable level.

[Ombras.2853]

2 hours ago, Nimon.7840 said:

I guess those are some nice changes, even though I don't understand, why core Mesmer weapons get buffed, because that buffs virtuoso as well. And virtuoso is already one of the best DPS builds in the game (to be fair, there's only like 5 very good power builds right now).  Having range and access to mesmers utility + even more dps doesn't sound fair, if you look at specs like power berserker, holosmith, dragonhunter, reaper. All those classes are melee and do less damage! While something like dragonhunter has access to guard utility (aegis or stability for the group) the other mentioned specs don't really bring anything to the group. Though engi and warrior both have a good power spec, Necro, thief and guard don't have power specs that are worth playing in endgame PvE right now, because there are classes, that do more damage while having more utility or being ranged.

 

So I'm hoping to see quite a lot of work done for those specs in the next balance patch in October.

I already wrote that several times, it takes very little time reading.

In short: while cVirtuoso is in a very good position, PVirtuoso (the only competitive Mesmer class which is actually using GS) is in a “meh” shape. Most of the fights where you want to be on power instead of Condi, cVirtuoso is still better than Power. PVirtuoso needed buffs. 

Edited July 29, 2022 by Ombras.2853

[Certero.2594]

  

I don't understand people being angry about only chrono and warrior being touched in this patch, when it was clearly stated in the "roadmap" that August 2 will have only Chrono and Warrior updates. Perhaps Anet should create a pinned thread called "Balance Roadmap" visible at all times people can refer to at all times in case some people forget to read some of the dev post? Is a much significant number than I was expecting, so I'm a bit dumbfounded .

 

Now for the actual patch.

The buffs to Chrono weapons are nice, but nowhere near enough if it wants to be competitive as a support option in PvE. I know over buffing virtuoso even more is the last thing anybody wants, but the damage has to come from somewhere. So either nerf virtuoso and buff core mesmer weapons, or straight up buff Chrono traitline.

 

I see a strange motivation from the Dev team to get chrono support to use shield and greatsword, but as someone who played Chrono support in raids for years, I can tell you the most important weapon in their kit is focus. So important that I take inspiration in Sloth despite the damage loss just to make sure we have good pulls.

 

Chrono has never needed specific weapons to give its boons, at the beginning of the chrono meta wells were enough, then quickness was added with StM, and greatsword is the best clone-generation wise, and had decent damage (until the greatsword trait in domination was changed to compete with the +15% illusion damage, giving a severe nerf to greatsword phantasms, the biggest damage skill on the weapon, for no reason) which synergized pretty well with the trait, not because greatsword was mandatory. Scepter can get the job done as well.

 

Shield is not that strong in PvE. The CC is strong, and the protection is nice, but as a mesmer you're not particularly lacking in CC to begin with, and the healer is going to be bringing the protection regardless (a role you can never hope to achieve thanks to no might, and inspiration being very lackluster). Is very hard to justify a utility loss giving up focus just to acquire extra alac and might with shield.

The only place Shield was used in a meta build was WvW, due to the no target cap, but that was removed. Despite changing the boon application of shield 5 being only on the initial cast, making it so it doesn't give boons anymore to players it goes through, and cannot break the 5 man boon meta in PvE, I gotta ask, why was the target cap added to shield????????? This decision nerfed the only niche place chrono was being used at. I'm really at a loss for words here, no idea what was the principle behind this change.

 

 

And now the worst for last, the chrono traitline.

What do you even want this thing to look like?

You have two Shield Traits competing with each other in the Major Grandmaster row, a Well Wrait in the Major Adept row and ANOTHER well trait in the Major Gandmaster row, and now in Major Master row you have 2 crit traits competing with each other?

So I can now choose between crit and crit, and between shield trait and shield trait.

There are two traits dedicated to wells, and they are still pretty bad even when double traited.

Since the July balance patch, you have been shredding the chrono traitline to create a support build where you spam a bad mesmer utility (wells) to activate the trait, then compensate the rest with shield 5, a defensive weapon with an okay~ish support

 

I know reworking skills is a more annoying process than reworking traits, but it hurts to see after the nerf of the 2 underused support wells into irrelevancy, a shield nerf for the only gamemode that used it, and now you're just messing around with the traitline with something I cannot call a clear direction of what chrono should be.

And mesmer is the only class with no crit compensation to its core profession. Chrono still has a problem reaching crit cap.

Edited July 29, 2022 by Certero.2594

[Massimoni.9453]

22 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

Firebrand players are so spoiled that being just competitive in DPS with two specs and still dominant as support actually feels the same as being "useless".  Welcome to being a little closer to following the same rules all the other classes have to play by I guess? 🤦‍♂️  

Nice job completely twisting my statement, seems like you also found a few friends with that which was to be expected in this anti-guard cesspool called forums.

You are useless with the other specs BUT firebrand, that is what I said until you made the opposite of it. Also what "two" specs? Firebrand is ONE spec. And competitive DPS? Benchmark makes it look okay-ish at 36k but I don't see a reason not to play better specs. Firebrand can't dip into many of the usual advantages of condi DPS whilst falling short here by a big margin and even sits below a few Power DPS specs with adequate ranged options (Rifle mech, pSlb which are also arguably easier to play). The only guards I see atm in any competitive environment are HFBs and QFBs (with the latter also slowly losing their worth) as everything else is easily outperformed. Btw a bit off-topic here but that got me wondering a bit lately: Why does it seem that noone of the people always bashing guard and calling it OP in the hard endgame content actually has a KP.me profile? Are you even playing the content or just repeating what other people tell you?

[DanAlcedo.3281]

14 minutes ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Nice job completely twisting my statement, seems like you also found a few friends with that which was to be expected in this anti-guard cesspool called forums.

You are useless with the other specs BUT firebrand, that is what I said until you made the opposite of it. Also what "two" specs? Firebrand is ONE spec. And competitive DPS? Benchmark makes it look okay-ish at 36k but I don't see a reason not to play better specs. Firebrand can't dip into many of the usual advantages of condi DPS whilst falling short here by a big margin and even sits below a few Power DPS specs with adequate ranged options (Rifle mech, pSlb which are also arguably easier to play). The only guards I see atm in any competitive environment are HFBs and QFBs (with the latter also slowly losing their worth) as everything else is easily outperformed. Btw a bit off-topic here but that got me wondering a bit lately: Why does it seem that noone of the people always bashing guard and calling it OP in the hard endgame content actually has a KP.me profile? Are you even playing the content or just repeating what other people tell you?

Be me. 

Be Warrior. 

Look at Wingman Statistics. 

Guard HUGE %. 

Warrior tiny %. 

Why that? 

Because Guard very good and Warrior bad. 

Me sad. 

Look at patch notes. 

Warrior gets ducked again. 

Me even more sad. 

Go to Forum. 

Get told that Guard is actually super bad. 

Me confused. 

How huge % = bad? 

 

 

 

[Mikael Ekvall.6039]

Chrono Shield is bad. Wells are bad. The two things that came with HOTS besides new traitline and CS. And both shield and wells are so useless nowdays. A shame really. 

Edited July 29, 2022 by Mikael Ekvall.6039

[Massimoni.9453]

33 minutes ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Be me. 

Be Warrior. 

Look at Wingman Statistics. 

Guard HUGE %. 

Warrior tiny %. 

Why that? 

Because Guard very good and Warrior bad. 

Me sad. 

Look at patch notes. 

Warrior gets ducked again. 

Me even more sad. 

Go to Forum. 

Get told that Guard is actually super bad. 

Me confused. 

How huge % = bad? 

 

 

 

Nice cherry picking popularity data which doesn't separate the playstyles of the spec whilst this "discussion" is currently focusing on the DPS part. Concerning the raid stats: Was Daredevil stronger than Dragonhunter for quite some time? I don't think so but by the logic of your comment it was. Of course firebrand has a huge player amount seeing how it was used as a primary or secondary healer alongside Druid and Quickness provider for a long time which is excepted as even on paper there wasn't much choice to be had. The percentages make complete sense when you transfer them to actual player numbers in an instanced content composition and then think about how you would get all your (class specific) buffs in (want a secondary healer which also covers Quickness as a nice side effect? Take a HFB -> BOOM there instantly goes 10% popularity), actually DPS firebrand looks pretty dead then if you do that. Firebrand was abused for Quickness + Stability (both not applicable if you even want a chance to hit your not-great benchmark number), Warrior for Banners. Your point regarding DPS firebrand here being exactly?

Edited July 29, 2022 by Massimoni.9453

[AliamRationem.5172]

1 hour ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Nice cherry picking popularity data which doesn't separate the playstyles of the spec whilst this "discussion" is currently focusing on the DPS part. Concerning the raid stats: Was Daredevil stronger than Dragonhunter for quite some time? I don't think so but by the logic of your comment it was. Of course firebrand has a huge player amount seeing how it was used as a primary or secondary healer alongside Druid and Quickness provider for a long time which is excepted as even on paper there wasn't much choice to be had. The percentages make complete sense when you transfer them to actual player numbers in an instanced content composition and then think about how you would get all your (class specific) buffs in (want a secondary healer which also covers Quickness as a nice side effect? Take a HFB -> BOOM there instantly goes 10% popularity), actually DPS firebrand looks pretty dead then if you do that. Firebrand was abused for Quickness + Stability (both not applicable if you even want a chance to hit your not-great benchmark number), Warrior for Banners. Your point regarding DPS firebrand here being exactly?

You talk like a 35-36k benchmark is bad.  It isn't in the top tier, but most specs aren't.  And while you want to write it off, guardian has two specs that are viable for DPS as well as a spec that is among the best for DPS hybrid support and healer support.  So, like I said, spoiled guardian players call that "useless".  Thanks for proving my point and welcome to the game as most specs have seen it for years.

[Massimoni.9453]

51 minutes ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

You talk like a 35-36k benchmark is bad.  It isn't in the top tier, but most specs aren't.  And while you want to write it off, guardian has two specs that are viable for DPS as well as a spec that is among the best for DPS hybrid support and healer support.  So, like I said, spoiled guardian players call that "useless".  Thanks for proving my point and welcome to the game as most specs have seen it for years.

The thing is: I never said I didn't also want the other stuff buffed, because I do. It's just that DPS guard is amongst that, if you like it or not and somebody gotta say it as people seem to be afraid of getting "confused" spammed which is an instant reaction if you mention anything about guard that doesn't clearly imply that you want it nerfed. You could also consider how that benchmark is reached instead of just taking the raw number, then you'd see how e.g. Rifle Mechanist 37k is actually a good chunk more than Firebrand 36k in real circumstances coming from things like DPS uptime. Eles were crying out when their 46k Power Catalyst was nerfed with the argument being how it's very hard to get those numbers in real encounters but on guard it's forbidden to point out how its ranged capabilities are almost nonexistent and a good chunk of its DPS comes from lingering AOEs while on top of that even its Golem DPS is lower. Definitely a viable spec there... And again you are completely twisting my words even though I explicitely made it clear what I meant, therefore I won't reply to your stuff any further as it's completely useless to do so. Maybe play the actual game a bit more instead of the forums and especially the late game content which you likely aren't seeing how there is no KP.me-profile set up on your account.

Edited July 29, 2022 by Massimoni.9453

[Jimbru.6014]

My GS Mirage is grinning from huge Asura ear to ear about the GS damage upgrade.

The warrior banner changes to me seem like Anet is struggling to give warriors something to make them NOT totally useless, while NOT removing the cumbersome mechanic of banners being attached to a fixed spot (I think banners should be on the warrior's back Space Marine style with the effects as a radius around them) and NOT addressing the fact that other classes (Firebrand, Harbinger, Mechanist et al) can already do everything better than what they're promising to give warriors now. It's a false solution, a band aid on an amputation.The problem is much broader than just the warrior class; it's the whole boon pile paradigm, with certain classes favored by a certain dev being drastically overpowered, and you know exactly what and who I'm talking about.

In related news, the Tyrian Wildlife Commission has officially added scrappers and holosmiths to its endangered species list. Something needs to be done before they're lost completely.

 

Edited July 29, 2022 by Jimbru.6014

[Karagee.6830]

On 7/27/2022 at 7:28 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

• Warrior

We badly missed the mark with banner changes in the June update.

Too little too late and we still have to see how all of this translates in-game. Mainly we need @Josh Davis.7865 to formally apologise for the June balance patch and not send a minion to do it for him and to clarify what steps have been taken to ensure that either Mechanist and Firebrand will be brought in line and possibly below all other hybrid and support specs or the other 25 specs will be boosted above them. Having enjoyed an unbroken run of being massively overtuned since Eod came out (Mech) or even longer (FB - albeit not as overtuned+braindead as Mech), they should definitely be in line to be second fiddle to everything else.

Edit: Having thought about this a little, a simple message stating that himself, solar and cmc no longer have any say or role in balance patches would probably be enough. I think the rest would follow seamlessly.

Edited July 29, 2022 by Karagee.6830

[Karagee.6830]

3 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Nice cherry picking popularity data which doesn't separate the playstyles of the spec whilst this "discussion" is currently focusing on the DPS part. Concerning the raid stats: Was Daredevil stronger than Dragonhunter for quite some time? I don't think so but by the logic of your comment it was. Of course firebrand has a huge player amount seeing how it was used as a primary or secondary healer alongside Druid and Quickness provider for a long time which is excepted as even on paper there wasn't much choice to be had. The percentages make complete sense when you transfer them to actual player numbers in an instanced content composition and then think about how you would get all your (class specific) buffs in (want a secondary healer which also covers Quickness as a nice side effect? Take a HFB -> BOOM there instantly goes 10% popularity), actually DPS firebrand looks pretty dead then if you do that. Firebrand was abused for Quickness + Stability (both not applicable if you even want a chance to hit your not-great benchmark number), Warrior for Banners. Your point regarding DPS firebrand here being exactly?

It's irrelevant what theoretical golem benchmarks are. All that is relevant is class representation. That is what the average player beating bosses in the content uses. The rest is fluff. If average people killing bosses in raids, or even statics, were able to play Catalyst anywhere close to the level speedrunners were, class representation would have shifted and you would have seen it ballooning.

Cfb and qfb were perfectly viable in all content including raids. All firebrand builds have access to the same utilities and most people played qfb not because cfb wasn't viable but because the drop in performance against a full dps cfb was pretty low and allowed other people to take different support specs without having to provide quickness.

Cfb has also been the easiest spec by far to solo Fractal CMs and they have been everywhere in that content since power builds were nerfed into the ground because people like grouch and solar struggle with the meaning of the word 'balance'. I'm frankly surprised there is someone, anyone complaining about the state of dps guardian tbh, in this patch, the previous patch and the n patches before Eod...

Edited July 29, 2022 by Karagee.6830

[AliamRationem.5172]

1 hour ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

The thing is: I never said I didn't also want the other stuff buffed, because I do. It's just that DPS guard is amongst that, if you like it or not and somebody gotta say it as people seem to be afraid of getting "confused" spammed which is an instant reaction if you mention anything about guard that doesn't clearly imply that you want it nerfed. You could also consider how that benchmark is reached instead of just taking the raw number, then you'd see how e.g. Rifle Mechanist 37k is actually a good chunk more than Firebrand 36k in real circumstances coming from things like DPS uptime. Eles were crying out when their 46k Power Catalyst was nerfed with the argument being how it's very hard to get those numbers in real encounters but on guard it's forbidden to point out how its ranged capabilities are almost nonexistent and a good chunk of its DPS comes from lingering AOEs while on top of that even its Golem DPS is lower. Definitely a viable spec there... And again you are completely twisting my words even though I explicitely made it clear what I meant, therefore I won't reply to your stuff any further as it's completely useless to do so. Maybe play the actual game a bit more instead of the forums and especially the late game content which you likely aren't seeing how there is no KP.me-profile set up on your account.

We mostly agree.  The problem is EoD ranged specs (especially mechanist and virtuoso) are overperforming due to their range and ease-of-play advantage.  This balance team needs to account for these things in their decision-making.  Did I need a KP.me profile to know that?