August 23 Balance Update Preview

[gsharkboy.1958]

Did Heal Scrapper need the nerf to the engineer healing tools?  Honest question.

[Powerfat.7294]

 

Quote

We're also making targeted reductions to stability and might uptime on Firebrand and Mechanist builds to make room for other professions. Firebrand's high on-demand stability from Mantra of Liberation is too essential in Fractals of the Mists and other group content, while Mechanist's barrier and might upkeep are cementing it as a build that pairs together too well with a Quickbrand to meet a group's support needs.

1. Nerfing Mantra of Liberation to the point is it worse than a non elite mesmer skill is not the answer. If you want to lower firebrand stability access, take it away from tome 3, at least the other ways firebrand acquires stability actually require a tradeoff.

2. The stability options previewed are lackluster. Druids don't have the privilege of saving celestial avatar for the sake of providing stability at the correct time, and as someone else has mentioned the elementalist shout effects are noncomplementary. Even just swapping the stability to earth and aegis to air would make more sense. Unless you want to do something fun like have a trait that gives stability to auras you provide (which I still think would be a better way to do alacrity on tempest too, add it to the heal auras trait, giving up healing auras on heal alacrity tempest is just a massive feels bad).

3. Firebrand is a quickness provider, it competes with other quickness providers for comp slots. So you should be looking at adding stability to the other quickness providers or nothing will change.

4. Removing might generation from from mechanist and guard also does nothing to increase comp diversity. The might from a heal firebrand was already redundant when paired with a dps alac mech, and heal mechanist will still solo cover might while condi quickbrand doesn't even run staff nor does it provide meaningful might generation. So if anything you are even more incentivized to run a dps alac mech with a heal firebrand because you will want the might it still provides, and you are definitely not less incentivized to run a condi quickbrand when you have a heal mechanist.

5. Reducing alacrity mirage damage and might generation is also not going to help this.

 

[Zyreva.1078]

2 hours ago, Lazze.9870 said:

As for other stab sources on ranger: Spirited Arrival trait. Remove the fury which ranger has an abundance of and add a short single stack of stab. Again, would also be great in pvp/wvw.

I'd rather not give even more stab to boonbeast bunker builds ...

[ZOF.1986]

As a long time engi player, the Holosmith changes are very concerning. A while back the damage boost while in photon forge mode was reduced, for really no good reason. Today Holo stands as one of the lowest DPS for open world, and mediocre at best for PvE. It's currently not even on Snowcrows. What's concerning is the further nerfing of Holo in this patch.

• Seeing refraction cutter buffed a little is great, although the impact will be small and hardly change anything it's certainly welcome for those who use sword (most Holos).
• The damage buff to radian arc, however, is confusing. That ability has never been a damage ability due to it's low damage combined with it's long cast time. Instead, it's used as a source of quickness. What would've been better is to make the ability execute faster (making it more viable for damage) or increase the quickness time either directly, or even better, make is so you get access to the 6s boon duration at a lower heat level. Either way, the change for this ability, while it's nice to have any DPS boost for holo, is largely useless as, again, this ability isn't used for damage and this tiny damage boost isn't going to change that.
• Finally corona burst. This one really has me confused. Traditionally Holo has been fine at providing area might, this change doesn't due much for party support but it does significantly reduce personal DPS. Although Holo can provide might, it's almost always done by other classes better, as they can do more DPS and provide more might along with other boons at the same time. Moving already poor DPS from yourself to others while not being a support build, and therefore you have minimal access to even personal boons, makes any DPS class feel really poor to play.

 

TL;DR:

The change to refraction cutter is great. The changes to radiant arc and corona burst don't make any sense and are minor nerfs to a class which certainly doesn't need nerfing seeing as it's so bad it's not even on Snowcrows. If I had a say in it, I would say to apply the refraction cutter change and bring the photon forge damage back up a bit. Maybe then a DPS focused Holo could be on the DPS charts even if it's a the bottom.

Edited August 13, 2022 by ZOF.1986

[Falseprophet.1502]

Power Willbender needs some love and it is a shame that it has been excluded from this. Offhand sword is terrible. The power build is already worse than Dragonhunter and  is SOLELY built around Restorative Virtues. If you don't spec that trait, it's even worse.

 

Close this gap by making offhand sword create dual skills with your main hand three skill. It will allow you to tweak numbers without powercreeping Condi Willbender.

 

Quote

 

Zealot's Defense becomes a dual whirl attack, three stacks of vulnerability if both attacks hit. Projectile block is now removed.

 

Chains of Light becomes a channeled beam skill with a 1 1/2 cast, 900 range, 6x attacks, burn is applied if all six attacks hit. Immobilization is removed. -or- this can operate as another flip skill, a 600-900 range port in, a strike, then the second flip can teleport back to original position. The theory would to port in, dump sword skills, get a couple scepter AA autos in (lol @ scepter auto attack pathing) and port out. 

 

Protector's Strike becomes a flip skill. Aegis and Protection upon successful block is removed, instead, the first skill is a single strike hits the target and applies vulnerability. The second activation of the second skill dazes if the target is above the vulnerability threshold, quickness if the target is not above the vulnerability threshold.

 

 

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

How about engineer pistol rework? Or for holosmith make your heat level affect other weapons as well, such as boosting pistol skills, maybe adding some burning to some of the skills or something. Pistol 5 could add burning damage for example instead of being just sticky goo, rifle could have increased explosion damage, etc. This could definately increase viability for a now obsolete spec. I played holo forever after pof came out. Now it doesn’t even have a spot in my 8 templates.

[Jaden.1420]

I'm positively surprised by the extend of these patch notes after the mini patch in the beginning of August. I'm sure there is a lot of good stuff in there, but damage coefficent changes are hard to evaluate at first sight so I'll only comment on a few things that I noticed might be problematic.

Thief:
Haven't calculated it, but only buffing staff auto attack could lead to just spamming 1 being the max dps rotation on power DD. The venom nerf was necessary though, the damage distribution between them and weapon skills was way off (as you pointed out correctly) . I hope that after the patch condi DD as a selfish melee build has a higher dps than Specter, a ranged build with integrated group sustain.

Ele:
I miss a mention of condi Weaver. As squishy, melee, really hard to play condi build without group support, it really should be top dps in this game. And yes, dagger is somewhat competitive, but (a) the rush skills are annoying (if not dangerous) in real boss fights and (b) the specialization weapon should imo be a better option, but condi sword Weaver struggles atm. I'm also missing Catalyst, especially the hitbox dependence of the hammer orbs really needs a fix.

Mesmer:
I don't think the Mirage nerfs are necessary. Condi Mirage is definitively a strong build, but also hard to play; it's actually the only build that has a Snow Crows 5 star difficulty rating. Sure, it excels at two or three bosses, but so what? Also worth mentioning that the buffs to Scrapper and Berserker could already negate the buffs to qChrono from last patch.

[Angesombre.4630]

There's a little bit of improvement on the revenant but still not enough compared to everything he lost.
Cool hammer damage increases but it would be nice to make skill 2 useful in the case because there is still the change you made with a space where the targets in the case don't take damage
GS, thanks for the improvement but Bug skill 3 is talking to you? No still no fix?
And the vindicator traits improvement no we forget....

Edited August 13, 2022 by Angesombre.4630

[golemka.2157]

On 8/11/2022 at 4:59 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

A message from the Skills and Balance Team:

Hi, all,

In our August 2 balance update preview, we mentioned that we added yet another balance update to our schedule for August 23 to address some lingering feedback from the June 28 release. Below you'll find the comprehensive preview of that update. While there are a handful of updates that impact all game modes, our focus for August 23 is largely on PvE gameplay.

 We'd like to hear your feedback on this. Please take today and the weekend to read through it, think it over, and share your thoughts. We'll be keeping an eye on the conversation and listening to what you have to say.
 

Core Weapon Tuning

In this update, we focused on improving the number of viable core weapon choices across many professions in PvE. This included increasing base damage on many ranged weapon autoattacks to a higher baseline damage per second. These changes should help reduce the performance gap between players using suboptimal and optimal weapons.

Guild Wars 2 is designed to encourage social gameplay–you should be stronger playing together than alone. With that in mind, we took another look at how boons are given out. Several weapon skills have been updated to grant might to nearby allies as well as the user in PvE, further contributing to boon availability in group events.

Damage Build Improvements

Our player community develops builds that are considered the gold standard for effective play, so we review them regularly. We made changes to some elite specialization weapons and traits to make various builds more competitive. Our goal is for every profession to have viable power- and condition-based damage builds.

• Power Tempest
• Condition Tempest
• Power Weaver
• Power Scrapper
• Power Holosmith
• Power Dragonhunter
• Power Reaper
• Power Herald
• Power Vindicator
• Power Daredevil
• Power Deadeye
• Power Berserker
• Condition Berserker
• Power Spellbreaker

Improving Support Diversity

Firebrand and healing Mechanist are currently dominating group compositions. In this update, we're improving support-role diversity by adding stability and aegis to Tempest's shouts and giving Druids increased access to those boons as well.

We're also making targeted reductions to stability and might uptime on Firebrand and Mechanist builds to make room for other professions. Firebrand's high on-demand stability from Mantra of Liberation is too essential in Fractals of the Mists and other group content, while Mechanist's barrier and might upkeep are cementing it as a build that pairs together too well with a Quickbrand to meet a group's support needs.

In the immediate future, we want to make sure more builds can be used successfully. In future updates, we'll expand this further by shoring up more support and healing build options.
 

Elementalist

We've firmed up the role of Fire Attunement skills in condition builds and improved Air Attunement skills' direct strike damage. Tempest's Transcendent Tempest trait has more than doubled in power to set it apart as the keystone choice for damage builds.

Staff
Fire

• Fireball: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 1.4. Now also inflicts 1 stack of burning with a 1-second duration.
• Lava Font: (PvE only) Now inflicts 1 stack of burning with a 1-second duration on each strike.
• Flame Burst: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.01 to 1.0. Burning stacks applied increased from 2 to 3.

Air

• Chain Lightning: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.8.
• Lightning Surge: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.44 to 1.8.

Earth

• Stoning: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.5 to 1.2.
• Shock Wave: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.5 to 2.5.

Scepter
Fire

• Phoenix: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 20 seconds to 10 seconds. Burning stack count increased from 1 to 2.

Water

• Water Trident: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 20 seconds to 10 seconds.

Earth

• Rock Barrier: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 15 seconds to 8 seconds.

Dagger (Main Hand)
Water

• Vapor Blade: (All game modes) The aftercast animation duration before another skill can be used has been decreased by 0.5 seconds.

Air

• Convergence: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 1.8.
• Shocking Aura: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 25 seconds to 10 seconds. Duration increased from 4 seconds to 10 seconds.
• Transmute Lightning: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.5.

Earth

• Ring of Earth: (PvE only) Final impact damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 1.5.
• Earthen Rush: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 18 seconds to 12 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.8.

Dagger (Off Hand)
Fire

• Fire Grab: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 25 seconds to 20 seconds, matching PvP and WvW.

Water

• Frost Aura: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 10 seconds. Duration increased from 4 seconds to 10 seconds.
• Cleansing Wave: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 20 seconds.

Air

• Ride the Lightning: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 20 seconds.
• Updraft: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 40 seconds to 20 seconds.

Earth

• Earthquake: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 16 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 3.
• Churning Earth: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 20 seconds.

Trident
Fire

• Magma Orb: Now also applies 1 second of burning on explosion.
• Boil: Now also applies 1 second of burning on hit.
• Steam: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 15 seconds to 10 seconds.
• Lava Chains: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 20 seconds to 16 seconds.

Water

• Ice Globe: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 10 seconds to 8 seconds.
• Ice Wall: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 15 seconds to 12 seconds.

Air

• Electrocute: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 2.4.
• Air Bubble: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 25 seconds to 20 seconds.

Earth

• Rock Anchor: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 20 seconds.
• Murky Water: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.

Weaver

Sword

Fire

• Fire Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.8.
• Fire Swipe: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.77 to 0.9.
• Searing Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.6.

Water

• Seiche: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.33 to 0.5.
• Clapotis: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.45 to 0.6.
• Breaking Wave: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 1.0.

Air

• Charged Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.77 to 0.8.
• Polaric Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.88 to 0.9.
• Call Lightning: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 1.2.

Earth

• Crystal Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.8.
• Crystalline Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.9.
• Crystalline Sunder: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 1.4.
• Earthen Vortex: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.8.

Tempest

Traits

• Transcendent Tempest: (PvE only) Damage modifier increased from +7% to all damage dealt to +15% to all damage dealt.

Shouts

• "Feel the Burn!": (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 2.5. Might stacks applied increased from 3 to 5.
• "Eye of the Storm!": (PvE only) Cooldown reduced from 40 seconds to 30 seconds. Now also applies 1 stack of stability to allies for 5 seconds.
• "Aftershock!": (PvE only) Cooldown reduced from 35 seconds to 30 seconds. Now also applies aegis to allies for 5 seconds.

Engineer

The previous update's Mechanist-only damage reduction to Aim-Assisted Rocket left us with room to add damage to the core trait Big Boomer, bringing up the damage output of Holosmiths and Scrappers. That's not enough to close the gap on its own, so we're also making specialization-specific damage increases to Scrapper and Holosmith on sword, hammer, and Blast Gyro–which, in addition to more damage, will now stun enemies rather than knocking them away.

We're reducing the output of dominant Mechanist healing builds to give other support options more breathing room. We're also slightly reducing the output of condition damage builds with reductions to the Mech Command skills Rolling Smash and Discharge Array.
 

Harpoon Gun

• Homing Torpedo: Animation time reduced from 1.5 seconds to 1 second. Damage multiplier increased from 0.84 to 1.0. Applies 1 second of burning. This is now an explosion.
• Scatter Mines: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 10 seconds to 6 seconds.
• Timed Charge: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.75 to 3.5.
• Net Wall: (PvE only) Immobilize duration increased from 3 seconds to 6 seconds.

Utility Skills

• Throw Mine: (All game modes) The animation aftercast before another skill may be used has been reduced by 0.5 seconds. The mine will now detonate immediately if there is an enemy target in proximity when the mine lands. Now causes knockdown instead of knockback, with a duration of 2 seconds in PvE and 1 second in PvP and WvW. (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 2 to 3. Boons removed from targets increased from 1 to 3.

Med Kit

• Med Blaster: (PvE only) Healing power multiplier reduced from 0.2 to 0.1, matching PvP and WvW.

Elixir Gun

• Super Elixir: (PvE only) Duration reduced from 10 seconds to 5 seconds.

Explosives

• Big Boomer: (PvE only) Damage increase changed from 10% to 15%.

Holosmith

Sword

• Refraction Cutter: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.4.
• Radiant Arc: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 1.8.

Photon Forge

• Corona Burst: (PvE only) Might stacks per pulse reduced from 2 to 1, but they are now applied to up to 5 nearby allied targets.

Scrapper

Hammer

• Electro-whirl: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 2.4 to 3.
• Rocket Charge: The aftercast animation duration before another skill can be used has been decreased by 0.35 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 3.3 to 3.6 in PvE only.

Gyros

• Blast Gyro: (PvE only) Now stuns enemies for 3 seconds instead of knocking them back. Damage multiplier increased from 2.65 to 3.5.

Mechanist

Mech Commands

• Rolling Smash: (PvE only) Bleeding stacks applied reduced from 8 to 4.
• Discharge Array: (PvE only) Confusion duration per hit reduced from 5 seconds to 3 seconds.
• Crisis Zone: (PvE only) Stability duration reduced from 15 seconds to 6 seconds.
• Barrier Burst: (PvE only) Base barrier value per pulse reduced from 434 to 260. Might stacks per pulse reduced from 3 to 2.

Mace

• Barrier Blast: (PvE only) Base barrier value reduced from 434 to 260.

Signets

• Barrier Signet: (PvE only) Base barrier value per pulse reduced from 434 to 260.

Traits

• Barrier Engine (Passive): (PvE only) Base barrier value reduced from 434 to 260.

Guardian

Multiple stored uses of on-demand stun break and stability have made Firebrand mandatory in Fractals, Strike Missions, raids, and even WvW. In this update, Firebrand's Mantra of Liberation is reduced from 3 to 2 ammunition, with an increased cooldown. Together with an added source of stability for both Tempest and Druid, this will provide better parity across different professions' support builds in PvE. Firebrand's multiple sources will be countered by higher recharge.

The greatsword damage increases benefit Dragonhunter builds, and hammer improvements will help close the gap between it and other damaging weapons while living up to that weighty feel a hammer should have.
 

Greatsword

• Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.8 to 0.9.
• Vengeful Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.8 to 1.0.
• Wrathful Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.4. Might is now applied to up to 5 allies in a radius of 360.
• Leap of Faith: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 12 seconds to 10 seconds, and damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 2. Healing per foe hit increased from 235 to 1,053 in PvE, matching PvP and WvW.
• Binding Blade: (PvE only) Damage multiplier on initial hit increased from 1.0 to 1.5.

Hammer

• Symbol of Protection: The aftercast animation duration before another skill can be used has been decreased by 0.65 seconds.
• Mighty Blow: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 2.1 to 2.4.
• Glacial Blow: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 6 seconds to 4 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 2.4 to 2.5.
• Zealot's Embrace: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.8 to 1.5.
• Banish: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 3.

Staff

• Bolt of Wrath: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.55 to 0.65.
• Searing Light: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.65 to 0.75.
• Seeking Judgment: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.75 to 0.9.
• Holy Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.8.
• Empower: (PvE only) Might stacks per pulse reduced from 4 to 3. Might duration reduced from 12 seconds to 10 seconds.

Firebrand

• Mantra of Liberation: Ammunition reduced from 3 to 2 in PvE and WvW. Recharge increased from 25 seconds to 45 seconds.

Dragonhunter

Longbow

• Puncture Shot: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.85 to 1.0.

Mesmer

In the August 2 update, we reviewed and updated the greatsword and sword core weapons. In this update we're increasing Chronomancer's alacrity duration from Stretched Time and increasing the damage of Tides of Time, the fifth shield skill. This will give a slight bump to boon-focused Chronomancer builds.

We also wanted to reduce some of the longer cooldowns on staff, but Mirage's high-performing condition damage builds made that tricky. We're making very small cuts to condition damage on Mirage's axe and staff ambush to maintain parity with other professions' builds. The reduced cooldown on the Phantasmal Warlock and Chaos Armor weapon skills will improve the Mesmer's leveling experience when using a staff.
 

Staff

• Phantasmal Warlock: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 18 seconds to 15 seconds.
• Chaos Armor: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 25 seconds to 20 seconds.

Utility Skills

• Blink: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 30 seconds to 20 seconds.

Chronomancer

• Stretched Time: Alacrity on well cast increased from 4 seconds to 5 seconds.
• Tides of Time: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 1.5.

Mirage

Axe

• Lingering Thoughts: (PvE only) Torment duration decreased from 4 seconds to 3 seconds.
• Imaginary Axes: (PvE only) Torment duration decreased from 4 seconds to 3 seconds.

Staff

• Chaos Vortex (Staff Ambush): (PvE only) Might stack count reduced from 8 to 5, and might duration reduced from 15 seconds to 10 seconds. Torment, bleeding, and confusion duration reduced from 8 seconds to 7 seconds.

Necromancer

Necromancer changes are focused on improving damage and skill-recharge timers for several weapons and abilities.

Staff

• Necrotic Grasp: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.666 to 1.
• Mark of Blood: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.33 to 1.5
• Chillblains: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 16 seconds to 12 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 0.55 to 1.8.
• Putrid Mark: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 20 seconds to 15 seconds.
• Reaper's Mark: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 32 seconds to 18 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 0.275 to 3.

Dagger (Main Hand)

• Life Siphon: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 10 seconds to 8 seconds.
• Dark Pact: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 15 seconds to 12 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 2.4. Immobilize duration increased from 3 seconds to 6 seconds.

Dagger (Off Hand)

• Deathly Swarm: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 18 seconds to 16 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 0.6 to 1.2.
• Enfeebling Blood: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 25 seconds to 20 seconds. Damage multiplier increased from 0.5 to 1.5.

Focus

• Soul Grasp: (PvE only) Ammunition recharge reduced from 15 seconds to 12 seconds. Ammunition count increased from 2 to 3.
• Spinal Shivers: (PvE only) Recharge reduced from 20 seconds to 16 seconds. Damage multiplier on targets with no boons increased from 0.5 to 1, one boon from 1.125 to 1.625, two boons from 1.875 to 2.375, and three boons from 2.625 to 3.125.

Reaper

Greatsword

• Fading Twilight: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.3 to 1.4.
• Chilling Scythe: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.7 to 1.8.
• Death Spiral: (PvE only) Damage multiplier per hit increased from 0.425 to 0.5.

Reaper Shroud

• Life Rend: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.875 to 0.9.

Shouts

• "You Are All Weaklings!": (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.7 to 2.5.
• "Nothing Can Save You!": (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.7 to 2.
• "Suffer!": (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.7 to 1.5.

Ranger

Feline pets' autoattacks aren't affected by quickness, a long-standing issue that makes them subpar in group play. Meanwhile, the iboga is the most powerful pet in any PvE boss encounter because its base attack damage scales with number of conditions on the target. A release note from 2018 indicated that this was fixed, but the change didn't make it to the live game.

A recent fix to the calculated critical-hit-chance values in the pet stats UI caused pet critical-hit chances to appear to drop by 17.8%. This was a display issue only, and the text now reflects the real value.

We're using this as an opportunity to improve pet balance in PvE overall by delivering that long-delayed reduction to iboga damage while bringing all Ranger pets' performance up by giving them a flat 17.8% critical-hit chance across the board.

Ranger pets and spirits will now also have a locked defiance bar in PvE, making them immune to crowd-control effects. This quality-of-life improvement will ensure that their skills are available for use when needed and that pets will perform more consistently in all PvE content.
 

All Ranger Pets

• (PvE only) All ranger pets' chance to critically hit has been increased by 17.8%.
• (PvE only) All ranger pets are now immune to crowd control when on a PvE map.

Feline Pet Family

• Slash (Autoattack): Now affected by quickness.

White Tiger

• Fixed a bug that caused a delay before this pet could act when summoned.
• Guardian's Roar: (All game modes) Casting time reduced from 1 second to 0.4 seconds. (PvE only) Cooldown reduced from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.

Other Pets

Wallow

• Fixed a bug that caused a delay before this pet could act after being summoned.

Phoenix

• Fixed a bug that caused a delay before this pet could act after being summoned.

Siege Turtle

• Fixed a bug that caused a delay before this pet could act after being summoned.

Iboga

• Consuming Bite (Autoattack): Reduced the base damage of this skill by 33%. Reduced the damage per condition by 40%.

Spirits

• (PvE only) All ranger spirits are now immune to crowd control in PvE maps.

Druid

• Glyph of Equality (Celestial Avatar): Range increased from 300 to 360 in all game modes. Now applies 5 seconds of stability to allies in PvE only.

Revenant

For core revenant, we're improving hammer as a ranged damage option. All revenant specializations will receive damage increases from Invocation trait updates.

Hammer

• Hammer Bolt: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.95 to 1.1.
• Phase Smash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.75 to 2.
• Drop the Hammer: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 2.3.

Invocation

• Rising Tide: (PvE only) Damage increase changed from 7% to 10%.
• Ferocious Aggression: (PvE only) Damage increase changed from 7% to 10%.

Herald

• Reinforced Potency: (PvE only) Bonus damage per boon increased from 1% to 1.5%.

Vindicator

Greatsword

• Mist Swing: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.9 to 1.0.
• Mist Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 1.1.
• Arcing Mists: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.3.
• Mist Unleashed: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.9 to 2.0.
• Phantom's Onslaught: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 1.6.
• True Strike: (PvE only) Base damage multiplier increased from 1.0 to 1.5. Damage multiplier added per blocked attack increased from 0.4 to 0.5.

Thief

In group content, venoms can account for as much as 25% of a thief condition damage build's total damage. Their solo damage is lacking in comparison. We're shifting some of that damage from venoms to direct attacks with increased condition duration on Death Blossom, Specter's scepter, and Shadow Shroud autoattacks, as well as a 50% increase to the condition damage attribute granted by the trait Deadly Ambition. The net effect of this change is to increase condition damage dealt in solo and open-world play.

Deadeye and Daredevil both get power damage increases as well, giving those builds stronger top-end damage potential.

Dagger (Main Hand)

• Backstab: (PvE only) Front damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 1.5. Back damage multiplier increased from 2.4 to 3.
• Death Blossom: (PvE only) Bleed duration increased from 10 seconds to 15 seconds.

Dagger (Off Hand)

• Dancing Dagger: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.6 to 0.9.

Pistol (Off Hand)

• Head Shot: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.25 to 1.

Sword

• Slice: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.8 to 0.85.
• Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.8 to 0.85.
• Crippling Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.3 to 1.4.
• Infiltrator's Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.75 to 1.8.

Venoms

• Skale Venom: (PvE only) Torment duration decreased from 5 seconds to 3 seconds.
• Spider Venom: (PvE only) Poison duration decreased from 4 seconds to 3 seconds.

Deadly Arts

• Deadly Ambition: (PvE only) Condition damage attribute bonus increased from 120 to 180.

Specter

• Shadow Bolt: (PvE only) Torment duration increased from 3 seconds to 4 seconds.
• Haunt Shot: (PvE only) Torment duration increased from 5 seconds to 6 seconds.

Traits

• Traversing Dusk: Alacrity radius on well cast and healing radius on shadowstep increased from 240 to 360.

Deadeye

• Premeditation: (PvE only) Bonus damage per boon increased from 1% to 1.5%.
• Iron Sight: (PvE only) Bonus damage dealt to and damage reduction taken from your marked target increased from 10% to 15%.

Daredevil

Staff

• Staff Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.75.
• Staff Bash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.66 to 0.80.
• Punishing Strikes: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.672 to 1.8.
• Hook Strike (Stealth Attack): (PvE only) Knockdown duration increased from 2 seconds to 4 seconds.

Traits

• Weakening Strikes: (PvE only) Damage dealt to weakened foes increased from 7% to 10%.
• Bounding Dodger: (PvE only) Damage bonus increased from 10% to 15% in PvE, matching PvP and WvW.

Warrior

Warrior's longbow updates will make Arcing Arrow relevant in PvE and turn Smoldering Arrow into a useful defiance-bar breaker. We've also increased damage for several core weapons, elite specialization weapons, and traits.

Greatsword

• Greatsword Swing: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.7 to 0.8.
• Greatsword Slice: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.95 to 1.05.
• Brutal Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.5.
• Arcing Slice: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.32 to 2. Damage multiplier against foes with less than 50% health increased from 1.98 to 3.
• Bladetrail: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.75 to 1.5.
• Rush: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.7 to 2.5.

Sword (Main Hand)

• Sever Artery: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.6 to 0.8.
• Gash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.6 to 0.8.
• Hamstring: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.2.
• Savage Leap: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.66 to 2.

Sword (Off Hand)

• Impale: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.5 to 1.5.
• Rip: (PvE only) Might is now applied to up to 5 allied targets within a range of 360.

Longbow

• Dual Shot: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.44 to 0.525.
• Arcing Arrow: (All game modes) The aftercast animation duration before another skill may be used has been reduced by 0.5 seconds. (PvE only) Increased ammunition count to 2. Now applies 5 seconds of burning on hit.
• Smoldering Arrow: (PvE only) Now applies 1 second of dazed on hit.

Rifle

• Fierce Shot: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.605 to 1. Might is now applied to up to 5 allied targets within a range of 360.
• Explosive Shell: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.25 to 1.5.

Hammer

• Earthshaker: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 2.
• Hammer Shock: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.8.

Arms

• Furious: (PvE only) Condition damage per stack increased from 10 to 15.

Berserker

• Shattering Blow: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1 to 1.5.
• Sundering Leap: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 3.

Traits

• Bloody Roar: (PvE only) Damage bonus increased from 20% to 25%.

Spellbreaker

Dagger (Main Hand)

• Breaching Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.5 to 2.5.
• Precise Cut: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.55 to 0.6.
• Focused Slash: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.6 to 0.65.
• Keen Strike: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 0.85 to 1.05. Might is now applied to up to 5 allied targets within a range of 360.
• Aura Slicer: (PvE only) Damage multiplier increased from 1.2 to 1.8.

Dagger (Off Hand)

• Bladestorm: (PvE only) Damage multiplier per hit increased from 0.35 to 0.5.

Traits

• Pure Strike: (PvE only) Damage bonus increased from 7%/14% to 7.5%/15%.
• Magebane Tether: (PvE only) Damage bonus to tethered target increased from 10% to 15%. Might stacks per second reduced from 3 to 1, but they are now applied to up to 5 allied targets within a range of 360.

 

Did you know there is a gamemode called spvp too?

[borisslav.9026]

Reaper needs a little more than that, seriously. It should either be able to bring DPS and some group utility like literally every other spec, or if it's just gonna be 'selfish DPS' its DPS should actually be good. You've literally forced me to switch from Reaper to Firebrand because my Firebrand has better DPS than my Reaper while also able to poop out stability, aegis, quickness and every other boon known to mankind. The changes you're making to Reaper aren't likely to change that.

 

Buffs to the damage multipliers of Fading Twilight, Chilling Scythe, Death Spiral, and Life Rend are minuscule. I don't think increasing the multiplier of a skill by less than 3% is going to solve anything, especially comparing to what buffs weapons of other classes are getting.

 

There's no buff to axe - a core power weapon typically used by power reapers. I'm not convinced staff is a power weapon now.

 

Outside of maybe some open world situations, there's still no incentive to pick shouts over wells. Even buffed, they're still going to be lower DPS than wells, and with less utility. And, practically, with a third of the range of a well. And what about the other 3 shouts? It's not like they're any more useful than the ones that are getting buffed.. Hell, if I'm just in need of some might, why would I pick "You're All Weaklings!" when I can run Well of Power and share that might with my party?

 

What Reaper needs is more than just some inconsequential number tweaks. It needs trait and skill changes to bring it up to the standard of other specs and make it more than the limp one trick pony it currently is.

 

 

It'd be great if Reaper could fill in a boon support role for example. Just humour me for a moment:

 

- Relentless Pursuit: instead of (or in addition to) reducing the duration of movement-imparing conditions, also grants alacrity to nearby allies when I enter or exit Reaper's Shroud. 

- Blighter's Boon: in addition to its current effect also makes my shouts grant alactiry to nearby allies.

 

Boom! Alacreaper. 

 

 

 

[akipappi.3917]

On 8/13/2022 at 1:19 AM, Double Tap said:

Quick clarification:

Previously, we included a change to the Dragonhunter skill "True Shot" that would allow you to move at 50% speed while channeling. The True Shot movement change won't be releasing on August 23rd - the release note was included here erroneously and has since been removed.

We've been experimenting with the change to help improve longbow usability in PvE content, but the change could have some negative implications to PvP and WvW, where the skill's current telegraph is very important for counterplay. We're going to keep thinking about how to address the problem and may revisit it down the road.

Apologies for any confusion!

this is where you draw the line on balance? walking? when necro and guardian can do whatever they want lol

besides is it not possible to put walk only in pve then or i guess you could put the walk in pvp too but take one dodge away, that seemed to "fix" mirage too

[Bookah pls.9352]

Regarding Reaper.

Repeating my previous feedback from last time:

Revert the 23% crit reduction on death perception and give us fury on chills (or even crits on chilled targets) via either Shivers of Dread trait or Cold Shoulder trait.

You could even throw in some utility to it by having a major trait like Augury allow the fury to be aoe.

 

The real meat though still comes down to doing less damage as a full blown dps with no option to support yet still doing less dps than typical boon support builds. Like if we're being honest here, you could slap in a hotfix that let Reapers Onslaught be a quickness provider for little to no investment for uptime and very little would change about reapers current desirability.

The changes are a start but are by no means the solution, we need more, much more.

One of reapers strengths is also its greatest weakness for balance, we do great cleave, but this is often useless when it comes to fighting a boss. Could we get something that let us do more damage in single target?  Like a major trait that ramps up in stacks with each auto attack made to a single target but lose stacks when hitting multiple targets.

 

Greatsword? Buffs are insignificant, and thrown in as a token gesture because you're updating pretty much every weapon.

Shouts? Damage is usually irelevant, the shouts are just not worth the utility slots compared to other utilities that we need to function properly. 

 

 

In general terms, the other weapons are kinda meh.

Staff auto damage numbers are interesting and have potential but i still feel like these dmg buffs are a placebo buff. The impact damage of triggering marks is pretty low on my priority list of using staff.

Dagger mainhand? Can you just rework it already? 

I'm extremely biased here because i oh so want a dual wielding dagger necro which is kinda impossible with how different both daggers are.

Dagger offhand? It does what it does but better. Thematically i wish dagger offhand and focus abilities were swapped, then we could have a proper main hand dagger rework to work in tandem with offhand dagger, allowing necro a power based melee weapon prior to level 80 reaper. Dual daggers could be a wonderful whole new archtype/playstyle for necros.

Focus? Again does what it does but better, cool. Still wish dagger and focus swapped abilities though.

Edited August 14, 2022 by Bookah pls.9352

[Fabulous Faprio.2718]

Buff necro dagger main pls ^^

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

I have a bit of feedback on the Necromancer notes, since Power Reaper is still going to be weak in comparison to other power builds after these changes.

 

1. The focus changes do nothing for PvE.  Spinal Shivers is a good boon removal tool, but that's rarely a concern in PvE.  The main issue on why nobody uses Focus in PvE is that Soul Grasp is a life siphon that can't crit and doesn't work with damage modifiers (even vulnerability).  A skill that caps out under 1200 damage for a 1/2 second cast time is godawful.  Giving us more uses of a skill that isn't worth its cast time doesn't improve anything.  Soul Grasp needs a truly massive damage increase to be worth using in PvE.  Even converting it to proper strike damage will require a coefficient buff to be on par.

 

2. The mainhand dagger changes likewise miss the mark on why the weapon sees virtually no use in PvE.  It just doesn't deal enough damage/doesn't provide group utility.  Since you were looking at weapon skill aftercasts this patch, I would suggest looking at the Necro mainhand dagger autos, as nearly 1/3 of that chain duration is just aftercasts.  In addition, if Life Siphon were made to heal nearby allies instead of getting the cooldown reduction, it would find a home in supportive Necromancer builds.

 

3. Overall, though, Reaper's Shroud and Greatsword just don't deal damage on-par with other power specs in the game, and the relatively tiny adjustments being made in this patch compared to those on other professions is likely to just widen the gap.  I appreciate that the sub-50% damage rotation will now include Death Spiral, as it has a faster cast time than Gravedigger while dealing identical damage overall.  This will help Reaper keep up life force in the sub-50% rotation.  Still, it isn't so much of an increase that Reaper as a whole will keep up relative to all the other professions' power builds that are getting buffed. The buffs on greatsword and Reaper Shroud are in the right place, just not large enough.

Edited August 14, 2022 by Drarnor Kunoram.5180

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

@Rubi Bayer.8493, as always please extend a heartfelt thanks to the teams for the hard work that they do.

That said, please those of us that enjoy the competitive modes as well would LOVE to see some of this kind of balance love in those game modes. Can you please pass along to the balance team to incorporate some of this types of changes over to WvW/PvP?

Especially anywhere where functionality is being added to weapons. It is not a good thing at all for players to have a weapon that does completely different things based on game modes. It messes with muscle memory. This is the same reason why the hard CC damage nerf was not a good thing in the end.

Please, it has been 2 and a half years since the 300s CD trait nerfs that effectively killed some traitlines in competitive play. The balance team then promised that they would be reworked. This promise needs to be fullfilled.

As to warrior specifically, please fix the tracking issues on Savage Leap and Rush. Please change Hundred Blades to either not be rooted or to have a much shorter cast time. Rifle will still need more damage on it to be viable as a ranged weapon.

[black orca.1583]

Edit: Anyone that wants to know how this convo started, my original post reacting to the balance changes is on page 11, please read that one for my upfront criticisms to the balance update.

Okay, I am assuming you are not joking and actually want me to take you serious. So, I will try again to convey my point in a way you understand. I have exclusively played cfb in fractals for the last year and a half because of how insanely easy the rotation is. Doing a rotation for 6s does not constitute a rotation.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

How about no? The numbers you are proposing are an absolute joke and you know that. The only reason there isn't more backlash at this currently is that it's directed against firebrand.

I said cap at 28k-30k sustain. That is not a joke. I dont care what the burst is for any build. Make cfb burst 100k dps for all I care, but if you are only auto attacking after, you should never be able to do 30k+ sustain for 30s+. I never exclusively said cfb is the only build that has this problem. There are plenty of builds I disagree with. But when I go into cms and 4 out of the 5 classes are firebrand I want to puke because no one ever does a rotation past 6s. 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

It is literally not on any phases where the word sustain actually makes sense... Using sustain in the context of 6 second long phases where you are still "cooling off" from your burst makes zero sense. Also PRE-PATCH firebrand auto attacks with full buffs were almost precisely 20k on GOLEM, which is quite a good chunk lower nowadays with less burning damage from the trait and no sun spirit, so in order to reach your magical and outrageous number of 40k auto attacking, fractals would roughly have to increase your DPS by 2.6x which they do not. You CAN sustain 40k (which shouldn't be surprising to anyone and is far from being exclusive on firebrand which benches 36k atm which of course gets boosted to 40k with fractal modifiers) but only when you do your rotation, NOT with only auto attacking as you are clearly stating! You obviously mainly have a problem with the current rifle mech but somehow transfer it over to condi firebrand where different rules apply.

Again, you clearly dont understand or have never try harded firebrand before. Here is the log: https://dps.report/yhOJ-20220804-225847_skor this is even one of the worse examples, im pretty sure I did not prestack aotj in that log. Click on phase 1, click on player summary, then click on graph. look at my rotation. after 6s it is only auto attacks. I would have done 39k if I didnt use torch 4 or axe 2-3. "which benches 36k atm which of course gets boosted to 40k with fractal modifiers) but only when you do your rotation, NOT with only auto attacking as you are clearly stating!" THAT IS THE PROBLEM, what rotation? after 6s there is no rotation. rotations do not exist on condi firebrand after 6s. You auto attack that is it. "Using sustain in the context of 6 second long phases where you are still "cooling off" from your burst makes zero sense." - Yes, it does. literally the definition of sustain is anything after your burst. After you stop pressing all of your burst buttons, what do you do to do sustain dps? on cfb you press your 1 until the boss phases. I do not mind that, what I do mind is that it sustains 40k.

 

Please for the love of god compare that log to this log: https://dps.report/Sspx-20220610-115148_skor  Again, click on phase 1, click on player summary, then click on graph. Do you or do you not see the problem here? Do you want warrior only pressing 1 after 6s and at the end hitting 35k? if the answer is yes, THANK GOD you are not on the balance team. If your answer is yes then there is literally nothing more for us to talk about but at least you will be consistent. Hopefully I have proven how insane your thinking that this is okay, is wrong.

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

I don't know if you are actually joking or if you hate firebrand so much that you drop some random outrageous stuff. You really think cFB hits those numbers by simply auto attacking? I think you haven't played firebrand that much if you make such statements.

Again, im trying to not be insulting, but when I am literally a tier or 2 under dT level, please do not say things so insulting. Why would I talk about anything if I do not have substantial experience in it. UNLIKE YOU, I actually use real situations to explain why I believe in something. You are the only person here saying random outrageous stuff. You clearly never played warrior but tried to explain to me, someone with 4.6k hours on warrior, why warrior is bad and good? lmfao. You clearly have never played soulbeast but put your two cents in it. I had to educate you on both of those classes, and you are saying that I am using arbitrary outrageous random stuff? lmao...... again, okay mate. I clearly have to school you on CFB as well. "I think you haven't played firebrand that much if you make such statements." yikes. again, YOU LITERALLY JUST SAID RANDOM OUTRAGEOUS STUFF about warrior and soulbeast. And after I educate you on them you still dont believe im a real player and im just randomly calling cfb bad? dude, you have to give credit where credit is due. No one with 4.6k hours on one class is going to just arbitrarily say things. If I then make a comparison judgement between warrior and cfb, why for a second would you think I havent put 1k hours into cfb before stating an opinion? you think I hopped onto cfb played for 1 hour and just pulled this info out of thin air? really? You are one dense person mate. And again, for whatever dumb reason I have to explain myself to someone that insists on arguing a horrible position and does not understand the core mechanics of class you claim to main...

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

It's certainly less that it was before but still way higher than outside of fractals. There is still a 15% boost from potions and up to 7% from title, plus regular breakbars which - despite not being quite as strong as previously - still add a lot of DPS.

Yes, no one is debating that, so this point is moot. I am well aware you do far more damage inside of fractals than outside of fractals...... I have fractal god and have been doing cms for 3 years. Again I do not know why you think I do not know this info....

When I said it isnt like that now, again you clearly do not understand what I mean. 2 years ago, 100cm was shattered, guess what? Condi did not exist in fractals. Pug cm groups did power and on average could phase skorvald in 10s. 10-12s IS burst big boom dps lets go for pugs. The problem is that with condi the way it is now, pug groups will spend 20s on skorvald p1, but because they pressed 1 for 14 of 20 seconds they did 30k+ dps at the end and think they are good. ONTOP of that, they never have to care about cc because it breaks at 6s+. They never press their cc buttons. They never have to care about dodging, cc, or conditions on them because HFB handles it all. Cfbs will just take signet of wrath instead of sanc because they dont even know that its a dps increase. Again, we are allowing people to turn their brains off, not care about mechanics, literally dont even have to look at the screen to play "hardcore end game content". I am not just talking about cfb, ANY BUILD that lets you press 1 and average more than 30k+ dps for 30s should never exist.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

At least we can agree on that, seeing how it misses a huge chunk of its burst there and sustained DPS especially in real scenarios is very meh. However I don't get how you can say this and also say how you wanna nerf it to 28k-30k sustain.

I literally do not know how to convey this to you in words you will understand. If we are talking about raids, any raid where you can do consistent constant dps, cfb actually excels in. And again, it is insane to compare fractals to raids but because you are so insistent, lets talk about it. Have you ever played cfb on Soulless Horror or Dhuum, or MO? There is a reason some classes are really really good at certain fights, and why they are bad at others. In a pug setting, If we do not have GODLY Snow crows players, I will consistently be top or 2nd best dps on all of those fights with cfb. Why? Because the sustain is so good because you only auto attack. Fights like Trio, or Sabetha, Slothasor, or Twin Largos, are particularly bad for CFB because they move around a lot and cleanse condis every phase, you have multiple targets, etc etc. That is why CFB is not taken that much in raids. In the couple of encounters where you do take it, you are TOP DPS (in a pug setting) AUTO ATTACKING FOR MOST OF THE FIGHT. Obviously when your tome 1 comes off cool down you have to do that rotation.... again for 6s..... then you invuln with elite... then do that rotation again... then weapon swap and axe 2-3, then auto for 15-20 seconds till tome 1 is off cd again. How come auto attacking for 15-20 seconds in raids, sustains 30k+? I would be just as pissed if I was a raider playing any class that actually has a rotation and then see any build that autos for 15-20s average the same or more dps than me.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Fractals is the only mode I even play cFB anymore, if it gets dropped to such numbers I definitely won't, rendering the spec variation completely dead, even for people who prioritise fun over performance. 

Okay, now finally again, I can get back to explaining fractal mechanics to you. Did I say to kill cfb? no. I said nerf the sustain. make the burst from tome 1 so insanely op. I do not care. I do not care what classes have burst. Burst is not the problem. if you are actually pressing your buttons you should be rewarded. Make tome 1 burst alone 70k for all I care, your average dps at the end will still be 30k+ but at least, when you start pressing 1 exclusively you get punished for it same as power.  However, I think this is a particularly bad idea because it makes dT players even better, hence why I said, force people to actually press their buttons. Make cfb actually press everything in a proper order and still hit 40k dps that is not just auto attack, then I dont care and it actually is fair and balanced compared to power.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Also even fractals have a good amount of encounters that don't fully rely on burst DPS, but somehow you seem to focus on Skorvald, the prime example of a burst boss in addition to a small handful of others, where you arrive just a few steps away from a singularity and can do every trick in the book during a short 33% boss health window.

When did I ever bring up any fractal other than cms? But since you did, again lets address it. You want to balance classes around ALL of fractals? Any encounter that does not rely on burst dps, only makes burst dps better not worse. Literally, take any fractal and analyze cfb under a critical microscope. Siren's Reef, Uncategorized, Volcanic, Swampland, Molten Boss, Twilight Oasis, Deepstone, AQUATIC RUINS for gods sake, all of those fractals in their entirety, before the boss fight and during the boss fight, I would take CFB over anything else. Name me one fractal where you would take Axe/axe, swap x/mace, berserker warrior over cfb because warrior objectively does more cleave or single target average dps over cfb in the same scenario. NAME ONE. 

 

Next, did I say to balance only around skorvald? No. Again, you are not listening. I said to take a solid look at multiple pug groups and see how they fair on all of cms and identify where people are playing only pressing 1 and are being rewarded with top dps. It literally does not matter that skorvald is a few steps away from singularity. I could have chosen Artsariiv. Artsariiv, in a pug setting, I am cleanly top dps over the second person by 10k, AND I AM ONLY AUTO ATTACKING after the first 6 seconds. 

 

Again, conveniently you did not understand what I said. In any game in the history of games if there is any particular class or build rewards you for far less effort and gives a clear advantage over any and all other classes that actually make you try, then unanimously everyone has always agreed that should not exist. 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Not really the best benchmark to balance classes around...

Yes it is. CMs are the best benchmark to balance classes around. Again, you are the only person saying arbitrary random stuff that does not make sense. The reason why CMs are the best benchmark are because they are consistent. For you to do "balancing" you need TONS of CONSISTENT data. You do not balance cfb around the 30 fractals that have a billion adds that allow me to burst 120k dps (before you say some outlandish nonsense, if I have 5 veterans around, or 15 or more small adds, yes I can and do accomplish 120k dps without even trying.) You should balance classes around the 7 fractal CM fights that are all different with varying mechanics and look at the 100 pug groups that run every day and see how many fail, what were the reasons, if they succeeded what were the reasons? are there any specific classes that are clearly going above and beyond making sure that the group does not wipe? Are the people actually caring about the game? Or are they just standing there pressing 1 key doing 30k dps getting hit by everything screaming for the Hb to give stability? You look at 5,000 case studies and look at the average of everything. Then make the balance patch. You will see that something like 70% of all classes played in cm pugs are guardian. Of those classes, 80% of them are firebrand, either healer, cfb, or cqb. You can not look at that data and say "there is no problem here, warrior, SLB, engineer, necromancer, thief, all have proper representation in cms and all have one reason or another to take over Firebrand (OR ANY OTHER CLASS THAT ALLOWS YOU TO STOP CARING ABOUT THE GAME AND CLOSE YOUR EYES DURING THE FIGHT). 

 

Why the hell would you call it endgame content if I can literally close my eyes and succeed? It is supposed to be among the hardest content in the game. It is supposed to mean you are among the best players in the game. Make it actually hard. Do not ever create a build in the first place that can just press 1 button close your eyes and not even care what the boss throws at you because you can literally close your eyes for 10 seconds and the boss will phase.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Who said I am not doing that already? I haven't played cFB (my main) in any other mode besides fractal since god knows when. That doesn't mean though that I also can't protest against proposals that would pretty much remove my last chance to play it competitively...

I was agreeing with your first post.... you do not have to repeat yourself. You said in your first post that we should just prioritize playing certain classes to fulfill certain roles. CFB will never be top dps on sloth. Is that a problem?.... that is just how the fight is. And again, when did I say to make cfb obsolete? I dont care how much damage it does. If it is going to do insane dps, at least force it to have a real rotation. Look at condi weaver. that rotation is insane. Too insane. Dont do that. But also it does insane dps even in cms (in pug groups) and is viable. Obviously in 6s phases it isnt viable. But a condi weaver doesnt only press 1 for 10s after the burst. in pug groups where any boss doesnt phase for 30s+, condi weaver is more than viable, it has the potential to be top dps. I have no problem with that. It should be rewarded for the opener being 15-20s long, then sustain rotation being 10-15s long on repeat. That is crazy. Make cfb best dps class. I dont care if it is top dps IF it has a real rotation where you press more than your 1 skill.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

Also in general I am not entirely sure you know what "nerfing something into the ground" really means, when you also in the same sentence say that doing so would balance and not bury that very subject.

Nerfing something into the ground does not mean make it obsolete. It means take it off of god tier status. It being at god tier status for a 1/5 effort, and able to beat the power renegade in cc, and provide stability with tome 3, for no loss of dps because you already spammed 1 ten times means there is 0 reason to ever play anything else. It literally should not exist. It should not be able to single handedly do everything.

 

BALANCE means that one thing is superior at x, but fails at y, and another class fails at x but is superior at y. That is balance. Alac renegade has the best CC in the game and has easiest access to permanently upkeep alacrity. Great, but it also has mediocre dps. Balance. Imagine power alac renegade also bursting 50k, sustaining 30k. Actually alac renegade is a perfect example. Have you ever seen a video of power ren on cms? No? Well I learned it. Precast darkrazer-icerazor, swap legends, staff 5 the second the bar is up, weapon swap, AP f3, 5,4,2,111111111111111111. If the boss phases after your 2 skill, your burst dps (and average) is 30k. If the boss takes 20 seconds to phase and you auto attack for 15s, your average dps falls to 6k-7k roughly. That is balanced. It is not sustaining 30k dps like cfb does after the burst. That is balanced. 

 

FIREBRAND is not ONLY good at dps (for no skill whatsoever by pressing 1 for 14 seconds). It also can beat renegade cc if they precast sanctuary and the ren staff 5 late....which in pug is always the case. And it does not stop there. It also can nullify all mechanics with tome 3. After the burst it can also full heal the entire group with tome 2, It also provides protection with the heal skill, on skorvald you dont even take renewed focus because the phases on boss are too short, what do you take? Stability mantra. So that all the other players can also just press 1 with you till the boss phases. AND THAT IS CFB. THAT IS NOT EVEN HB. 

 

AGAIN, in a pug setting, why the hell would I ever take warrior, holo, slb, reaper, or any other dps class over cfb? Cfb, single handedly does EVERYTHING those classes do, does them better, and supports for a short duration just as good as a full on Hb.

THAT IS NOT BALANCED. 

I am not cherry picking CFB either, there are many builds that are able to do godly dps auto attacking, they need to not exist. They auto attack and do better than all other dps classes that actually force you to play the game in a pug setting.

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

BTW I can give you a little tip to close this post: If you clearly are unhappy with how high some classes burst, why don't you just drop some stuff to yellow gear and enjoy your harder game while people like me who don't mind the current state at all can just keep enjoying the game? It doesn't affect you how fast I kill my bosses.

Again, I am going to try my best not to insult you. You are clearly not hitting the "theoretical maximum" because I had to spell this out to you. When did I ever say I am unhappy with how high some classes burst? Why do I have to intentionally play worse and put on yellow gear to cater to how you want to just auto attack and close your eyes? I do not care if any class has any amount of burst. LISTEN TO THESE WORDS: THE UNACCEPTABLE PART IS AUTO ATTACKING 30k+ DPS. 

 

YES IT DOES AFFECT ME HOW FAST YOU KILL YOUR BOSSES. Anet believe that 98% of the player base should auto attack and clear the hardest content in the game. I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THAT. Most high end cm fractal players do.  I do not.  IF YOU WANT TO AUTO ATTACK ONLY THAT IS FINE, IT SHOULD BE LESS THAN 20K. It should not AUTO ATTACK sustain 30K+ dps, literally doing BETTER DPS THAN ME - A TIER BELOW DT LEVEL WARRIOR that try hards and actually dodges and cares about mechanics and changes my build to be optimal for every individual fight.

 

11 hours ago, Massimoni.9453 said:

I'd bet there are a few other people around who view things similarily to you so it shouldn't be a problem to get a group going. You can always lower your DPS, but I can't exceed the theoretical maximum.

There was a few people. Guess what? THEY ALL QUIT THE GAME. "Why?" you may ask. Because why the hell should they try hard, not take a healer to make the game harder, optimize their rotation better than snowcrows to be specific for fractals, optimize their builds SPECIFICALLY FOR FRACTALS, optimize cc and do 35k dps? Why would they go through all that effort of hundreds of hours of gameplay optimization only for 98% of the player base to convince anet that their game is too hard and needs build like power mech, where they only have to press 1 LITERALLY CLOSE THEIR EYES CAUSE HB HANDLES EVERYTHING THAT THEY SHOULD KNOW, AND DO THE SAME DPS THAT THE BEST PLAYERS IN THE GAME DO?  

 

YES IT IS HARD TO GET A GROUP GOING BECAUSE NO ONE CARES ABOUT THE GAME ANYMORE. Doing 30k dps means nothing because mech can do it only pressing 1. There is no reason to try, there is no reason to care about the fight, there is no reason to care about raids or fractals, it is all meaningless because the hardest content in the game can be cleared by 4 or 5 insanely broken classes that leaves 0 reason to take anything else in a pug setting.

 

I will never lower my dps because you dont care to learn a rotation. I will hit whatever anet puts as the maximum numbers. I dont care what the numbers are. And why the hell do you think I should lower my dps? lol. How in all of the things I said did you some how get into your brain that me doing big damage was a problem?

 

I said pressing 1 key doing MORE DAMAGE than actual pro players that care and actively learn the mechanics and optimize rotations and builds to be less effective than the person just pressing 1 is unacceptable. You have never hit the theoretical maximum obviously because you have never played classes that make you try. Please, if you actually dont understand anything someone says do not criticize it. So instead of you saying random nonsense, please be productive and actual learn first. Go watch some videos, watch build composition, watch synergy, then look at the 98% of pug cms. Notice how its just a bunch of people thinking they are good by pressing 1? Notice how none of them do mechanics because hb handles it all? Notice how dT people jump the shock wave on islands of skorvald? No, you dont notice that?... you just want every class to do 45k dps auto attacking and kill the game?

 

Lastly, let me give one last thing for you to think about among everything else you never considered before. You know how insulting it is to the creators of the fractals for you to suggest that pressing 1 is okay? Think about the hundreds, if not, thousands of hours all the creators spent designing every fight to be unique and compelling. Think about every mechanic every boss has. Think about all the art and animations, and words across your screen when you get a 1 shot mechanic on you. 

 

You are saying they should have just not wasted those thousands of hours designing every fight because they are just golems anyway. They should not put time and effort into creating their own game because all of it can be cleared with an hb that stops all the mechanics, and classes that just press their 1 key to make the dps checks...............................

 

YIKES. I am done debating this. all of the 98% people that want the "hardcore end game content" easily accessible by just pressing 1 that literally can close their eyes on every single fight will kill this game. It already is killing it when hundreds, if not several thousand of the best players in the game quit to go play other mmos. and the 98% all scream for joy as they dont have to care about a single artists, coder, designer, encounter, gold, meta, raid, or anything else because they have their trusty 1 skill and say "theres a dodge button?" "what does sak mean?" special action key, that you must press on cairn cm or you go flying. No, you want to make anet take that out of cairn cm too cause its too hard? oh okay..... nothing can shock me anymore when trying to "balance" around the 98% that dont want to learn anything about the game.

 

I am not mad at you guys, just disappointed. I just pray anet chooses a path that will actually make the game and endgame content worth caring about and actually mean something when I say I do 30k dps on warrior.

 

Edited August 14, 2022 by black orca.1583

[Kerose.2916]

9 hours ago, Markus.6415 said:

You got your rifle update last patch?

The point is rifle itself is not very strong. The update did not change realistically anything for Holo. The autos are weaker than sword and bombs which a lot of people like to talk about because of  Pmech. Rifle offers an alternative style to sword and changes to the traits allow more customization instead of potentially forcing sword. 

[Yaki.9563]

Re: Engineer & AAR/Big Boomer

Am I to understand that they think that the AAR nerf only affected Mechanists? Wow.

So now they are buffing Big Boomer to buff...Mechanists? Wow x2.

[Yaki.9563]

29 minutes ago, Kerose.2916 said:

The point is rifle itself is not very strong. The update did not change realistically anything for Holo. The autos are weaker than sword and bombs which a lot of people like to talk about because of  Pmech. Rifle offers an alternative style to sword and changes to the traits allow more customization instead of potentially forcing sword. 

People will never understand that it's not Rifle that makes Mechanist do crazy damage, it's the mech. 

[Kolzi.5928]

This seems like a pretty good patch to me. A few things I want to react to positively: the blast gyro change is great, throw mine and harpoon gun buffs for engineer are also well overdue. I hope you are watching elixir gun with this nerf to super elixir, to see that it doesn't fall out of use. Buffs to non-hammer ele damage in general are welcome, as are buffs to a lot of under-used core weapons. The choice to buff power coefficients instead of adding conditions to some of them baffles me a little though, like the necromancer staff + offhand dagger. I think necromancer dagger in both hands, as well as core necromancer offhands in general are still in a very weird state.

 

Buffing mesmer staff for open world is nice, I think it would have been good to adjust phantasmal warlock so it is worth casting for mirages in their rotation as well though. Maybe add some torment in there. Even if your overall goal is to tune alacrity mirage down, you could have found a way to sneak that in there as well, I am sure. Condition alacrity mirage barely uses any boon duration, so you could have toned down the base duration of alacrity a little in order to promote boon duration gearing that would lower their dps a bit.

 

I would have liked to have seen a reversion of the dragonhunter's procession of blades change from EoD. The way that the cooldowns do not line up any more makes it feel significantly less satisfying to play. I don't mind if you want to keep the damage slightly lowered for procession in fact, just make the cooldowns gel properly again please, though I think a complete reversion would be balanced just fine.

 

I would like to talk about ele now. Firstly, I would request that you consider increasing the base cooldown of lava font by 2 seconds and providing a commensurate damage increase. Currently, the cooldown of lava font almost exactly matches the attunement change cooldown for weaver. This makes any attempt at a staff rotation in weaver a clashing nightmare. 8 seconds was the base cooldown for lava font when weaver came out and the rotation flowed really well. This would also give some time for your buffs to staff auto to have an effect on staff tempests, by letting you squeeze in an auto attack or two between meteor shower/overload fire and your next lava font. This would go a -long- way to making staff weaver both effective and fun again, and I am sure you are aware of the clamoring for a decent long-range ele option that has been going on lately.

 

I would also like to talk about the way condis are applied to ele weapons. It seems every elementalist weapon gets bleeding on earth, burning on fire, and that is it. We see this continuing with the move to add burning to staff. To me, this is a slightly frustrating design approach, as it leads to the weapons feeling both unfocused and a bit same-y. I would like to see you step out of your comfort zone on this a little bit. For example, shatterstone and ice shards (water attunement scepter 2 & 1 respectively) could both have bleeding added to them with it fitting the flavour quite well - the shards of ice can bleed enemies just as well as shards of rock in earth attunement can. Scepter has at least some history of being used in condi builds unlike staff, and a condi rotation that allows you to move outside of fire and earth attunement would be novel (apart from a very brief dip into water during weave self for condi weavers). I don't exactly have a problem with having burning on staff fire, it just feels an odd direction to go when there are weapons which already have support for condi, but are lacking, due in part to only two attunements ever being useful for it.

 

edit: Also, as long as we're looking at base weapons and their usability, please consider restoring lightning whip's old range. The range being arbitrarily shorter than the other dagger auto attacks makes it both a lot harder to use, and an anomaly that hurts the learning curve of elementalist.

Edited August 14, 2022 by Kolzi.5928

[bruakumfd.4817]

I admittedly haven't played every MMO since it was either a lot of WoW or some dead MMO, so I'm glad that a company is actually listening to us. Bonus point since a lot of people here give the impression of just loving drama. And in this case, conveniently forgetting how staff skills were already buffed for Eles or how most of the buffs in the June 28th ONLY affected PvP and WvW.

 

That said, I'm very happy to read about the Elementalist changes. Of course, we still need more stability on the Overloads because it's still easy to be interrupted. Otherwise, Lucid Singularity is kind of pointless. 

 

Same thing with the Ranger because I literally got through most of PoF: Act 1, crushed most of the Icebrood Saga, and most of the EoD story before I was practically throwing rubber arrows. It didn't help that my pet wasn't that strong either. I think those Stability changes should be thought out a little more, though. 

[Bunny.9834]

4 hours ago, Jaden.1420 said:

I'm positively surprised by the extend of these patch notes after the mini patch in the beginning of August. I'm sure there is a lot of good stuff in there, but damage coefficent changes are hard to evaluate at first sight so I'll only comment on a few things that I noticed might be problematic.

Thief:
Haven't calculated it, but only buffing staff auto attack could lead to just spamming 1 being the max dps rotation on power DD. The venom nerf was necessary though, the damage distribution between them and weapon skills was way off (as you pointed out correctly) . I hope that after the patch condi DD as a selfish melee build has a higher dps than Specter, a ranged build with integrated group sustain.

Ele:
I miss a mention of condi Weaver. As squishy, melee, really hard to play condi build without group support, it really should be top dps in this game. And yes, dagger is somewhat competitive, but (a) the rush skills are annoying (if not dangerous) in real boss fights and (b) the specialization weapon should imo be a better option, but condi sword Weaver struggles atm. I'm also missing Catalyst, especially the hitbox dependence of the hammer orbs really needs a fix.

Mesmer:
I don't think the Mirage nerfs are necessary. Condi Mirage is definitively a strong build, but also hard to play; it's actually the only build that has a Snow Crows 5 star difficulty rating. Sure, it excels at two or three bosses, but so what? Also worth mentioning that the buffs to Scrapper and Berserker could already negate the buffs to qChrono from last patch.

ALL OF THIS! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

 

[Kolzi.5928]

I will also say that I think a lot of these changes are not enough, for example I suspect the damage increases for power reaper and power daredevil and deadeye will not be sufficient for those builds to feel worthwhile in group content. It is certainly nice to see changes in the right direction, I think you could probably be a little more daring with a lot of them though (at the same time, I understand you don't want the backlash to a nerf in case you over buff them, and evaluating modifier changes can be tricky for us).

[Lydradon.3087]

Thanks for the upfront Patchnotes and showing us that you still intend to find a Balance between Power and Condi Builds.

One Thing i wanna point out, since the Launch of End of Dragons the Vindicator Healingskill "Selfish Spirit" is bugged and only Heals 5x 714 Health wich adds up to a bit over 3k, the Tooltip clearly indicates that its supposed to Heal 714 Health per Target struck wich means 5 Targets x 5 Ticks = 25 Hits wich would add up to 17.850 HP.

It worked properly in the Betas but since Release its bugged and cuts the Survivability of Vindicator in pieces. Not being able to Heal properly in Enemy rich Encounters is a bit of a Problem.

Please have somebody look into that, so Vindicator can Heal himself properly again.

Edited August 14, 2022 by Lydradon.3087

[Kolzi.5928]

On 8/13/2022 at 10:19 AM, Double Tap said:

Quick clarification:

Previously, we included a change to the Dragonhunter skill "True Shot" that would allow you to move at 50% speed while channeling. The True Shot movement change won't be releasing on August 23rd - the release note was included here erroneously and has since been removed.

We've been experimenting with the change to help improve longbow usability in PvE content, but the change could have some negative implications to PvP and WvW, where the skill's current telegraph is very important for counterplay. We're going to keep thinking about how to address the problem and may revisit it down the road.

Apologies for any confusion!

I just noticed this and want to chime in. I actually like that you have to stand still for true shot. I would prefer you not to change that. To me it makes the ability distinct and emphasizes its powerful feel. The mobility tradeoff is also part of what allows (or should allow) it do high damage.

 

However I do think the dragonhunter longbow needs buffs... but simply buffs to damage. I suspect it will need a little more than the autoattack buff listed in this patch, although I do think how bad the longbow is tends to get a little overstated at times.