Condi alac tempest?

[Valisha.8650]

I have been thinking whether or not such a mix would be any viable, since tempest is now able to provide alacrity. So far I have come up with something like this;

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGjEgEWmB7iRxqYk4o6Y2WB-zRJYyRDfZUQBkeC4wss7nGA-e

[soulknight.9620]

Ive tested some similar builds during weekend (although i found that GoEP and SoE works better than GoS and GoLE). Full ritualist is an overkill. The most optimal build i could get (thats with decent dps and perma alac) was full vipers with a few ritualist parts thrown in there to make alac somewhat perma (my build has 9.5 sec alac on OL). It gets me somewhat 20-22k dps and perma alac, but the catch is if i get disabled/chilled/etc alac falls off a bit. But if you are constantly casting OL (fire/earth/air) its perma. 

The sad part is that if you want to get more slack on to the build you need more ritualist which drasticaly lowers your dps. And... theres power ham... no tradeoffs, no stress, no risk. Yeah... 

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

Make sure to do tests mixing in various kinds of gear. I've found Celestial pieces to sometimes exceed more dedicated stats like Ritualist if you're mixing them with Viper, for example.

 

(Obviously, you need full Legendary gear to get proper testing.)

 

Here's a light variant of your build that I would run, with better Vulnerability uptime:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGjEgEWmB7iRxqYk4o6Y2WB-zRRYNBhJHNcnlRlJQIFgwzykS7B-e

 

Boon builds are not meant to get extremely high DPS output, Machinist is just the standout. Even Firebrand  sacrifices quite a bit of damage to bring 100% quickness to the group. That said, Alacrity is probably the worst boon to try and max in high-end PvE on a damage build, because almost every healer will have it.

 

Its only super useful if your party's healer is strictly a QHFB.

 

One thing to keep in mind: These builds are more viable in Fractals than in other end-game content, as the Fractal Mobility Potion means alot less boon duration is required.

Edited August 2, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[soulknight.9620]

48 minutes ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

Boon builds are not meant to get extremely high DPS output, Machinist is just the standout. Even Firebrand  sacrifices quite a bit of damage to bring 100% quickness to the group.

Well it seems like any decent dps support build nets around 20-25k dps. For heal builds dps is irrelevant. 

 

48 minutes ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

I've found Celestial pieces to sometimes exceed more dedicated stats like Ritualist if you're mixing them with Viper, for example.

Cele didnt worked for me, i get somewhat -20% dps (thats around 15-18k dps) compared to viper/ritu mix. But i guess ritu and cele provides more slack for alac upkeep compared to viper/ritu mix which is basically a second to second alac uptime. 

Edited August 2, 2022 by soulknight.9620

[Valisha.8650]

The problem with celestial pieces, is they will make you pretty much unviable in Raids, unless there happens to be a dedicated Chrono tank.

Guess I will stay with my alac specter, seems to work better than this tempest thingy.

[DEL.9468]

18 hours ago, Valisha.8650 said:

The problem with celestial pieces, is they will make you pretty much unviable in Raids, unless there happens to be a dedicated Chrono tank.

Guess I will stay with my alac specter, seems to work better than this tempest thingy.

Is that because of toughness/tanking? I am a celestial ele enthusiast and if that is the case you can't run it on pretty much anything, yes?

[Valisha.8650]

12 hours ago, LexIcon.2819 said:

Is that because of toughness/tanking? I am a celestial ele enthusiast and if that is the case you can't run it on pretty much anything, yes?

Celestial generates too much toughness, which would interrupt tanking.

[Mackdose.6504]

On 8/3/2022 at 2:31 PM, Valisha.8650 said:

Celestial generates too much toughness, which would interrupt tanking.

or just be a quickness cata tank?

Edited August 12, 2022 by Mackdose.6504

[ZenDrake.8316]

43 minutes ago, Mackdose.6504 said:

or just be a quickness cata tank?

That does depend on the boss though. Tanking KC, Dhuum, Gorse or other bosses with low damage pressure? Sure. But I wouldn't want to tank Qadim2 or VG with that tbh.

[Doomfish.8206]

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGgEgEWGBriRxuYk4oa13WB-zRZYVhcD2MKogYYjECqhyI9EojCwmDSQsBeNT4sCA-e

 

Fire/Arcane is the highest DPS Tempest Alacrity build I've seen, though this might change with the patch on the 23rd. Condi Tempest does a lot of power damage, so the power damage modifiers from Arcane along with the free boon duration and reduced attunement CD make it the strongest choice for the second traitline. If you can't run Cele run Diviner's instead.

[soulknight.9620]

On 8/13/2022 at 4:43 PM, Doomfish.8206 said:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGgEgEWGBriRxuYk4oa13WB-zRZYVhcD2MKogYYjECqhyI9EojCwmDSQsBeNT4sCA-e

 

Fire/Arcane is the highest DPS Tempest Alacrity build I've seen, though this might change with the patch on the 23rd. Condi Tempest does a lot of power damage, so the power damage modifiers from Arcane along with the free boon duration and reduced attunement CD make it the strongest choice for the second traitline. If you can't run Cele run Diviner's instead.

This build may be problematic in raids cause of the toughness. 
Ive tested this one out, seems like it works on par with fire/earth/tempest variant with a mix of ritualist/vipers gear. Its about a few % less dps, but a bit more slack for alac uptime. Ive also found out that ritu/vipers gear is better for fire/arcane too, its not like you make a lot of use of the 300 healing power with this build. There is an option to swap glyph of lesser elementals for GoEP, it doesnt rly affect your dps that much, but it is insta cast and a free stunbreak for oh sh... situations. 

[the krytan assassin.9235]

Hmmm... If you can only pull off ~20k dps for condi-alac i dont see much reason why to take it over a heal alac Tempest post balance patch. The earth traitline has been pretty much complete garbo since 2012 anyways. You don't lose to much dps and you'll cover a heal spot which is normally accompanied with a massive dps loss. 

 

I'd personally use something like this

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGgEsEWGBrhxgRijqkfrF-zxIY1ohvMqOBSvA8daCw1GA-e

For last utility either feel the burn, ice bow or lightning flash. You can also pick arcane 1/2-1-1/3 for abit more heal support if needed. 

 

[soulknight.9620]

1 hour ago, the krytan assassin.9235 said:

Hmmm... If you can only pull off ~20k dps for condi-alac i dont see much reason why to take it over a heal alac Tempest post balance patch.

Cause that depends on the role and need of the party. Cele will not perform better than condi alac for the designed role - dps with support. Cele is not good in raids cause of tanking by toughness mechanics. The problem with hybrid builds is that it cant actually keep up with pure builds on high intencity encounters (lack of healing and dps), thats why people prefer to take more specialised builds. Lets just say we have a group of 5 players - 3 dps, 1 alac, 1 quick. One of the supports must be a healer and the other can go dps. Whats the difference if lets say alac goes cele heal/dps hybrid (and quick dps) and HAM/HAT (and quick dps)? a few k dps? But that lack of healing/condi cleanse may put too much pressure on other group members which would underperform. 

[DaKillaOfHell.5907]

5 minutes ago, soulknight.9620 said:

Cause that depends on the role and need of the party. Cele will not perform better than condi alac for the designed role - dps with support. Cele is not good in raids cause of tanking by toughness mechanics. The problem with hybrid builds is that it cant actually keep up with pure builds on high intencity encounters (lack of healing and dps), thats why people prefer to take more specialised builds. Lets just say we have a group of 5 players - 3 dps, 1 alac, 1 quick. One of the supports must be a healer and the other can go dps. Whats the difference if lets say alac goes cele heal/dps hybrid (and quick dps) and HAM/HAT (and quick dps)? a few k dps? But that lack of healing/condi cleanse may put too much pressure on other group members which would underperform. 

 

Use water and tempest and you can do both. Provide condi removal as well as alac. Third traitline is as you please, depending on what you want to do exactly.

If you don't need Aura for the whole group, you can also use the regen condi removal trait. I have also Rune of Water on my gear, makes a nice application as well.

Celestial Ele has become quite strong with the update again. Pure DPS/Condi is still inferior to many other classes but has improvied. 

 

What's true, however, is that the tanking/toughness mechanics in raids isn't working out well for cele gear.

[the krytan assassin.9235]

3 hours ago, soulknight.9620 said:

Cele is not good in raids cause of tanking by toughness mechanics.

Not that big of a problem imo. Either remove a couple of cele for Harrier or just embrace the tanking. HAT is perfectly capable to tank most of the raids. Also plenty of room for extra surviveability on specific bosses if you get some minstrels/earth traits instead. 

 

Full cele gets you around ~1k healing while Harrier/magi nets ~1250 and minstrels ~1500. Since healing scales pretty bad, this only nets you around a 7.5% or 15% hps loss. For the vast majority of strikes/raids a HAT has already plenty of healing to upkeep with the boss mechanics. Simply adding some damage to the HAT at the cost of healing power therefore won't negatively impact its healing capabilities. Also the dmge output is quite important. Adding like 7k ontop of minstrel dps/ 3k ontop of Harrier/magi is pretty significant in my opinion (not to mention the significant surviveability bonus compared to Harrier/magi)

 

It is true that condi/alac will provide more dps then cele/alac, but i'd much rather either have a dps alac that is able to output competitive dps/provide usefull utility over a Tempest condi alac. At the same time heal alac is able to compete on healing, boonsupport and dps with current meta picks.

Sure in the scenario where no person is able to switch roles and you have no other character that is able to do alac dps you can bring your condi/alac temp, but for any other situation i dont really see any benefits for it. 

[Doomfish.8206]

On 8/24/2022 at 9:00 AM, soulknight.9620 said:

This build may be problematic in raids cause of the toughness. 
Ive tested this one out, seems like it works on par with fire/earth/tempest variant with a mix of ritualist/vipers gear. Its about a few % less dps, but a bit more slack for alac uptime. Ive also found out that ritu/vipers gear is better for fire/arcane too, its not like you make a lot of use of the 300 healing power with this build. There is an option to swap glyph of lesser elementals for GoEP, it doesnt rly affect your dps that much, but it is insta cast and a free stunbreak for oh sh... situations. 

 

You can reduce toughness by swapping Celestial to Diviner's or Ritualists. Diviner's is higher DPS overall, but it's more awkward to make the switch as it has more concentration, but no expertise whereas Ritualists can be swapped 1:1. On pretty much any version of condi alac tempest Celestial will do more damage than Ritualists, as the build scales so heavily with power stats, hence the recommendation for Diviner's. It's not about the healing power (though Cele HTemp is a strong build), Cele just has more useful stats than Ritualists.

 

 

> Ive tested this one out, seems like it works on par with fire/earth/tempest variant with a mix of ritualist/vipers gear.

 

How much did you get? This is the highest DPS version of alac tempest I've seen, both in terms of simulations and actual benches. This benches at 26k prepatch on small hitbox (probably higher if you're good) while using GoEP for a more consistent benchmark. That works out to around 27.3k on small with lesser eles, and maybe up to 29k on huge hitboxes. By contrast other builds bench lower while also using glyph of lesser elementals, which is usually not used while golem benching due to its RNG and precasting requirements.

 

 

If you need more boon duration by all means run more. The advantage of the Arcane traitline is that it gives you free boon duration, while also reducing the CD on overloads which further reduces BD requirements.

 

Glyph of Elemental Power is around 1300DPS less than glyph of lesser eles. Run GoEP in open world for sure, but in group content you should 100% stick to glyph of lesser elementals unless you really have no time to precast ( you usually will). You can just take Gale Song for a free stun break and stability on overload if you're concerned about being CCed.