Upcoming Mechanist Changes

[draxynnic.3719]

On 9/19/2022 at 10:30 PM, Obtena.7952 said:

Not really a concern ... it's not the power rifle that is the majority of mechanist builds in endgame play and DPS isn't the reason mechanist has high representation to begin with.

 

If you assume that metanist has a 100% monopoly on alacrity slots, that would only account for 20% of slots. Metanist is hitting 33% overall. Considering that it can't compete for the quickness role, that means at least one out of five DPS slots is also being filled by one.

[anbujackson.9564]

13 hours ago, Lynx.9058 said:

Except it isn't.

It doesn't even rank in the top 15.  Sure, it's easy to play, and does pretty well for a low intensity build, but it's not beating other specs at benchmarks like everyone is claiming.

News flash:  The vast majority of players are casuals.  The vast majority of players are not particularly skilled.  The vast majority of players cannot maintain a complex rotation.  Give them a class that can keep up with a simpler playstyle, and suddenly the elites are feeling threatened.

 

Everyone complaining about mechanist needs to see some comments from the other side.  These are taken from reddit comments:
 

 

I get the feeling that streamers and posters with an agenda are viewing top-geared mechanist builds as the standard, when that's clearly not the case.  When you have some posters running rampant crying that "Mechanist autoattack is doing 36k DPS!", while the vast majority of actual players aren't even getting half of that while obviously working in more than just AA spam, it creates a false narrative, and these people scream the loudest on the forums in order to get their way, where the devs and reps see this as valid feedback.

"The squeaky wheel gets the grease", as the old saying goes, doesn't really apply when the wheel isn't squeaking nearly as much as the neighbor is claiming.

You are just embarassing yourself when you take such comments as reference.

[Lynx.9058]

1 hour ago, anbujackson.9564 said:

You are just embarassing yourself when you take such comments as reference.

Point is that y'all are drastically overestimating the capabilities of the average player.  Those are definitely low numbers, but that's the point: this isn't just a "dump hero points, afk and win" spec, which is the implication so many people are trying to push.

Even at the numbers that draxynnic posted, an average of 9-10k DPS standing still against a target that doesn't hit back is skewed data, and definitely nowhere in the ballpark of the 36k-41k that gets thrown around in comments whenever someone is pushing to get the spec nerfed.

The entire range of the player base must be taken into account when making balance changes, always.  If you balance entirely around the low end/uber casuals, you'll wind up with overpowered specs in the hands of capable players.  If you balance entirely around the elitists, you'll wind up with a spec that a huge portion of the player base is incapable of doing well on.  A middle ground has to be found, and that should be the goal for EVERY spec.

[RAZOR.7246]

The meta is a complete mess and doesn't look like changing anytime soon. The reason mechanists perform so well everywhere especially in pugs is because you can easily hit a moving target or continue hitting a target if you're forced to move around a lot. This is a power class being able to pull off good damage in situations that are better suited to condition builds simply because of the incredible range of its attacks, on top of being able to operate viably in a power playstyle. If they don't understand this, they're never going to balance kitten. These 2 things are something they've tried  to bring into the games in an attempt to modify their combat system to move away from the static boss playstyle for a while now. Unfortunately they did not update most of their classes in lieu of this, instead focusing on needless drawbacks that go against the playstyle they're trying to implement. 

 

A player of lower skill level, which is like 99% of players are NEVER going to be able to pull off complex rotations and manage skill timings when they're too busy looking at where they need to go and what they need to avoid. The condition playstyle suits these players because they can still do damage while a boss is moving around and therefore, even a power mech suits them because they can still do damage when they wouldn't be able to otherwise on a power class. It was a stupid design in the first place and the way things panned out was so predictable. This is why scourge has been so popular with the average player for so long. 

 

This is nothing new. Average players prefer condition style builds because they can still feel useful while focusing on their survival. A top player wants to finish content as fast as possible which is why they prefer the burst playstyle, generally found on power builds. 

 

 

With the current playstyle and even in open world, you NEED to be able to move around. Restricting mobility like bladesworn or deadeye, static catalyst orbs and a complete inability to do damage if you can't do MELEE damage on willbender just to name a few WILL NOT appeal to the average player because they need to use extra effort just to move around, on top of all the other kitten that they need to put in effort to do. Even if you have good benchmarks on the golem or on a couple pf bosses, a static playstyle on any class is not practicable and balancing based on isolated numbers alone is just bloody lazy.

 

They have made serious mistakes with class design and they need to simplify their balancing first and foremost before they continue to flap around aimlessly and ceaselessly kitten off their player base. I recommend the following changes to begin with. 

 

1. Rework the "confusion" condition and remove the damage on attack function, replacing it with a damage to defiance on attack mechanic instead. This gave them a massive problem with condi mech in particular and is a nightmare to deal with given how it overperforms on certain fights yet is not really significant elsewhere. 

 

2. Add a defiance bar to players. At full defiance, a player can spend the defiance bar to block 1 attack. Otherwise it empties based on control effects. When empty, a player is susceptible to control. 30s recharge on the bar across all classes. Remove Stability and Aegis from the game and do away completely with the need for such dedicated boon supports.

 

3. Remove drawbacks on classes based on mobility. Classes should not be anchored in place when the fights are becoming more mobile. At the same time, players need to be encouraged to do damage at the same time that they're managing mechanics regardless of whether they are on power on condition builds. 

 

4. Standardise baseline damage across classes. Classes need to be at a similar base level of difficulty. If mech is doing 25k with 0 APM then ALL DPS classes should be using that marker as a baseline for LI builds. Once that's established, they can look at balancing the damage on higher APM builds. 

 

I for one have had enough of having to change classes every few weeks while not being able to play the stuff I used to enjoy playing simply because of incompetent balancing. They are not going to be able to fix this in 1 go. 

[xellink.7568]

OMFG. I just got full set of rune of the Golemancer. Why Anet. Why?

[MrForz.1953]

3 hours ago, xellink.7568 said:

OMFG. I just got full set of rune of the Golemancer. Why Anet. Why?

Nothing prevents you from using them.

[anbujackson.9564]

12 hours ago, Lynx.9058 said:

Point is that y'all are drastically overestimating the capabilities of the average player.  Those are definitely low numbers, but that's the point: this isn't just a "dump hero points, afk and win" spec, which is the implication so many people are trying to push.

Even at the numbers that draxynnic posted, an average of 9-10k DPS standing still against a target that doesn't hit back is skewed data, and definitely nowhere in the ballpark of the 36k-41k that gets thrown around in comments whenever someone is pushing to get the spec nerfed.

The entire range of the player base must be taken into account when making balance changes, always.  If you balance entirely around the low end/uber casuals, you'll wind up with overpowered specs in the hands of capable players.  If you balance entirely around the elitists, you'll wind up with a spec that a huge portion of the player base is incapable of doing well on.  A middle ground has to be found, and that should be the goal for EVERY spec.

Keeping mech the way it is would be balancing around the low end skill population. Yet you still disagree with the nerfs. Thats weird.

Also you cant compare dps numbers like you do because you completely ignore the context. Did you ever see a deadeye in squads? When you see one, is his dps higher than a mech? No. Yet it still is top 3 in benchmarks. Literally no one plays this.

Also I dont even know how you could possibly do 10k dps or less on this spec, even in open world. You either have to stop attacking, use healer gear, no runes and sigills or I dont even know what. Engineer has trait options in firearms and explosions to provide himself with perma fury and extra might for yourself and people around you. If people cant adjust their build in open world, they shouldnt cry about their bad performance. If you dont crit as power, you are not dealing damage.

[draxynnic.3719]

13 hours ago, Lynx.9058 said:

Point is that y'all are drastically overestimating the capabilities of the average player.  Those are definitely low numbers, but that's the point: this isn't just a "dump hero points, afk and win" spec, which is the implication so many people are trying to push.

Even at the numbers that draxynnic posted, an average of 9-10k DPS standing still against a target that doesn't hit back is skewed data, and definitely nowhere in the ballpark of the 36k-41k that gets thrown around in comments whenever someone is pushing to get the spec nerfed.

The entire range of the player base must be taken into account when making balance changes, always.  If you balance entirely around the low end/uber casuals, you'll wind up with overpowered specs in the hands of capable players.  If you balance entirely around the elitists, you'll wind up with a spec that a huge portion of the player base is incapable of doing well on.  A middle ground has to be found, and that should be the goal for EVERY spec.

Sure, I'm pretty sure I mentioned myself that actual results when you have to dodge, chase a moving target, and so on will vary. That said, if people are complaining that they can't reach the benchmark because they're not operating under the circumstances the benchmarks are taken, then that's not an indication that the people making the benchmarks are somehow cheating the system. It's that the tests aren't being done under standardised conditions.

The 38k benchmark is when using the full rotation, all boons, optimised gear, and so on so forth. Jo Random Open World Player In Exotic Gear isn't going to get even close to those numbers. But the point I was making is that you can still get pretty good numbers (by open world standards) without using a rotation at all. If there are times where, for whatever reason, you can't attack at all, obviously the number is going to drop. But it's going to drop for other builds as well in those circumstances. Likely by more, since rifle isn't subject to the boss going invulnerable, moving out of a field, or whatever just as you're about to unleash a burst and making you waste it, like some builds (dragonhunter, for instance, which can't even outDPS rifle metanist at the moment even when everything does go right). But what all these observations show is that builds shouldn't be balanced according to their ideal circumstances, but according to what they actually achieve in practice. And the fact is that in practice, power mech outperforms things that have higher benchmarks in most circumstances.

Heck, the mech alone achieves over 4k, and ~3k against a moving target. So if people are getting below that... maybe the target has block/evade/invul frames? More armour? Some other factor? Or maybe the people saying it aren't running DPS gear? It certainly isn't a problem of having a difficult rotation. Certainly, it does seem as if citing those players might be a case of balancing around the low end players that you're saying shouldn't be balanced around. Currently, rifle metanist is currently in a position where it's often the go-to choice even for the top-end players, and it only gets stronger (compared to the competition) when player skill goes down.

The middle ground is, I think, where it's a reliable DPS source that will get players through endgame content when they're busy learning the mechanics and don't want to divert attention into learning a rotation as well, but where more skilled (or physically capable, where that's an issue) players have incentive to move on to something more advanced. While other professions should have builds that offer similar performance at similar complexity.

[AliamRationem.5172]

16 hours ago, RAZOR.7246 said:

The meta is a complete mess and doesn't look like changing anytime soon. The reason mechanists perform so well everywhere especially in pugs is because you can easily hit a moving target or continue hitting a target if you're forced to move around a lot. This is a power class being able to pull off good damage in situations that are better suited to condition builds simply because of the incredible range of its attacks, on top of being able to operate viably in a power playstyle. If they don't understand this, they're never going to balance kitten. These 2 things are something they've tried  to bring into the games in an attempt to modify their combat system to move away from the static boss playstyle for a while now. Unfortunately they did not update most of their classes in lieu of this, instead focusing on needless drawbacks that go against the playstyle they're trying to implement. 

 

A player of lower skill level, which is like 99% of players are NEVER going to be able to pull off complex rotations and manage skill timings when they're too busy looking at where they need to go and what they need to avoid. The condition playstyle suits these players because they can still do damage while a boss is moving around and therefore, even a power mech suits them because they can still do damage when they wouldn't be able to otherwise on a power class. It was a stupid design in the first place and the way things panned out was so predictable. This is why scourge has been so popular with the average player for so long. 

 

This is nothing new. Average players prefer condition style builds because they can still feel useful while focusing on their survival. A top player wants to finish content as fast as possible which is why they prefer the burst playstyle, generally found on power builds. 

 

 

With the current playstyle and even in open world, you NEED to be able to move around. Restricting mobility like bladesworn or deadeye, static catalyst orbs and a complete inability to do damage if you can't do MELEE damage on willbender just to name a few WILL NOT appeal to the average player because they need to use extra effort just to move around, on top of all the other kitten that they need to put in effort to do. Even if you have good benchmarks on the golem or on a couple pf bosses, a static playstyle on any class is not practicable and balancing based on isolated numbers alone is just bloody lazy.

 

They have made serious mistakes with class design and they need to simplify their balancing first and foremost before they continue to flap around aimlessly and ceaselessly kitten off their player base. I recommend the following changes to begin with. 

 

1. Rework the "confusion" condition and remove the damage on attack function, replacing it with a damage to defiance on attack mechanic instead. This gave them a massive problem with condi mech in particular and is a nightmare to deal with given how it overperforms on certain fights yet is not really significant elsewhere. 

 

2. Add a defiance bar to players. At full defiance, a player can spend the defiance bar to block 1 attack. Otherwise it empties based on control effects. When empty, a player is susceptible to control. 30s recharge on the bar across all classes. Remove Stability and Aegis from the game and do away completely with the need for such dedicated boon supports.

 

3. Remove drawbacks on classes based on mobility. Classes should not be anchored in place when the fights are becoming more mobile. At the same time, players need to be encouraged to do damage at the same time that they're managing mechanics regardless of whether they are on power on condition builds. 

 

4. Standardise baseline damage across classes. Classes need to be at a similar base level of difficulty. If mech is doing 25k with 0 APM then ALL DPS classes should be using that marker as a baseline for LI builds. Once that's established, they can look at balancing the damage on higher APM builds. 

 

I for one have had enough of having to change classes every few weeks while not being able to play the stuff I used to enjoy playing simply because of incompetent balancing. They are not going to be able to fix this in 1 go. 

First, let's dispel the tired myth about condition damage having an advantage over power damage because it continues to deal damage while the target is moving.  When you apply 10k condition damage to a target and then stop attacking, it doesn't magically become more than 10k damage.  All things being equal, power damage is a straight advantage over condition damage.

Where you got it right is when you talk about the impact of range.  But your solutions are so outlandish I don't even know what to say.

[draxynnic.3719]

1 hour ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

First, let's dispel the tired myth about condition damage having an advantage over power damage because it continues to deal damage while the target is moving.  When you apply 10k condition damage to a target and then stop attacking, it doesn't magically become more than 10k damage.  All things being equal, power damage is a straight advantage over condition damage.

Where you got it right is when you talk about the impact of range.  But your solutions are so outlandish I don't even know what to say.

This. Condition damage still needs to keep scoring hits to keep its damage up, just like power damage. It's just that the damage from any given hit ticks over X seconds rather than happening immediately.

Let's take a hypothetical. Build A is a power build, while Build B is a burn-based build with each burn application lasting for 5 seconds. Both have a fairly 'flat' rotation with no bursts to speak of, and the same nominal DPS. Both have some event that causes them to have to stop attacking for five seconds before resuming.

For the power build, this causes the attacker's DPS to drop to zero for five seconds, and then it goes right back to what it was before. It's pretty transparent. For the burn build, though, the damage drops off as burn stacks wear off, and when the burner resumes attacking they need to rebuild their stacks from zero. So their DPS drops from full to zero in the first five seconds, during which it's done more damage than the power build, but then it spends the next five seconds doing less damage as the burn stacks need to be built back up.

The same principle applies to longer-duration conditions. If Build C is based around twenty-second burns, for instance, it'll only drop to 75%, but for the next fifteen seconds it will only be replacing bleeds applied before they were forced to stop attacking and it won't be able to build back up until those stacks it didn't get to apply would have expired anyway.

Conditions still rely on scoring hits, there's just a lag between scoring a hit and the full damage being applied. Sure, it might feel nice to watch something die to condis after you're no longer attacking it, but the brutal truth is that if you were hitting it with power that dealt the same DPS, it would have already been dead. Now, sometimes you want that delayed death (Deimos chains, for instance), but generally, dead now is better than dead later.

So why (apart from bosses that are immune to strike damage) take condis at all? Part of it is because some bosses are particularly vulnerable to specific conditions like confusion. Part of it is because conditions can be spread via Epidemic (although this has been nerfed). And part of it is that conditions ignore armour and some encounters have enemies with high armour, so the condi builds will do more damage even if they have the same benchmark.

The flipside, though, is that doing damage now is usually still better than doing damage later, especially if the boss has brief burst windows you need to exploit (such as Keep Construct) or has phases where it wipes any conditions it may be suffering (encounters with a lot of phasing tend to favour power as a result, unless the condis have a really strong advantage otherwise).

[RAZOR.7246]

"First, let's dispel the tired myth about condition damage having an advantage over power damage because it continues to deal damage while the target is moving.  When you apply 10k condition damage to a target and then stop attacking, it doesn't magically become more than 10k damage.  All things being equal, power damage is a straight advantage over condition damage."

 

No. This logic is totally false and does not understand where damage comes from because plain and simple, all things are never equal. Also, if you stack enough conditions to get to 10k, it will continue ticking even if it does not increase from that point.  It does not drop to 0.  If this were true, in the average group, condition damage would not have a distinct advantage over power damage and would not be the preferred source of damage in fights like 100CM or SH. Power is only used in organized groups on such fights because the average player (>99% of the player base) cannot do enough damage quickly enough on such builds to provide an advantage. If you do 10k power damage and stop attacking, your damage drops to 0. When you can't hit you're not doing damage at all. When you stop attacking on condi, you're still ticking condtions. However, when you're playing conditions, you're still ticking damage.  For this reason, WB for example has not been good in the PvE meta. Your conditions do not stay on long enough once you're phased or have to move around and at the same time, your application is not so fast to overcome this drawback.  Better players also play in better groups where you can just stand there and DPS without having to dodge at all because of superior support and organization. So instead of doing mediocre power DPS and then dropping to 0 for the average player on more mobile fights, conditions allow them to do some damage in those phases where they wouldn't otherwise do damage.  At the same time, because of the range on power mech and the actual damage of the ranged skills, they can continue to do damage where other power DPS cannot.  Unless they find a way for average players, which again, account for >99% of the player base to continue doing damage in situations where they otherwise can't, there's no reason for them to play complex power classes that require you to burst within certain windows. 

 

My solutions are not outlandish. Balancing a class based on confusion damage, a situational condition at best, does not make sense when comparing to the entire meta. You make a class weak in a lot of situations just because of a couple of fights. FB is so dominant because of the amount of utilities it has over other classes on top of having superior damage on more DPS oriented support builds. Adding 1 or 2 skills here and there with mediocre application of said utilities on other classes does not do balancing any favors. There is an over reliance on stability and aegis which is the main reason why they can't get FB/HB usage down. Changing the system to a more self-reliant one does away with the need for a dedicated support and encourages other support builds. If you anchor a class in place, you're not going to do well on a mobile fight, end of. That's why you don't see many bladesworns or deadeyes in the average group because they're not good in those situations despite the high benchmarks and again, this is the main reason why rifle mech is so strong. The last thing is the APM issue. If a build can do 28k by only pressing 1 button and nothing else can come close, then it is not balanced at the fundamental level. If you want to encourage players onto other builds and if they need simplicity, which they clearly do, other classes have to provide similar damage for a similar APM for a player to consider using them. Once you've settled the base damage on your AA or auto-casted skills, it is much easier to start looking at other skills to balance around these. Right now there aren't any core skills that they balance around. They just change numbers here and there aimlessly and see what sticks without any regard for the situational usage. 

Edited September 28, 2022 by RAZOR.7246

[draxynnic.3719]

28 minutes ago, RAZOR.7246 said:

"First, let's dispel the tired myth about condition damage having an advantage over power damage because it continues to deal damage while the target is moving.  When you apply 10k condition damage to a target and then stop attacking, it doesn't magically become more than 10k damage.  All things being equal, power damage is a straight advantage over condition damage."

 

No. This logic is totally false and does not understand where damage comes from because plain and simple, all things are never equal. Also, if you stack enough conditions to get to 10k, it will continue ticking even if it does not increase from that point.  It does not drop to 0.  If this were true, in the average group, condition damage would not have a distinct advantage over power damage and would not be the preferred source of damage in fights like 100CM or SH. Power is only used in organized groups on such fights because the average player (>99% of the player base) cannot do enough damage quickly enough on such builds to provide an advantage. If you do 10k power damage and stop attacking, your damage drops to 0. When you can't hit you're not doing damage at all. When you stop attacking on condi, you're still ticking condtions. However, when you're playing conditions, you're still ticking damage.  For this reason, WB for example has not been good in the PvE meta. Your conditions do not stay on long enough once you're phased or have to move around and at the same time, your application is not so fast to overcome this drawback.  Better players also play in better groups where you can just stand there and DPS without having to dodge at all because of superior support and organization. So instead of doing mediocre power DPS and then dropping to 0 for the average player on more mobile fights, conditions allow them to do some damage in those phases where they wouldn't otherwise do damage.  At the same time, because of the range on power mech and the actual damage of the ranged skills, they can continue to do damage where other power DPS cannot.  Unless they find a way for average players, which again, account for >99% of the player base to continue doing damage in situations where they otherwise can't, there's no reason for them to play complex power classes that require you to burst within certain windows. 

If you can't attack for 5 seconds, you still lose 5 seconds of attacks worth of damage application. The only difference is that the power spec loses it entirely during those 5 seconds, while for the condi spec, that loss is spread out over the time it would have taken for the conditions they would have otherwise applied over those five seconds to wear off.

If you have a power build and a condi build doing the same DPS against a given boss, generally speaking it's better to be power, since the power build does their damage as soon as they hit, while for the condi build there's a delay before all the damage has been applied.

[AliamRationem.5172]

3 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

If you can't attack for 5 seconds, you still lose 5 seconds of attacks worth of damage application. The only difference is that the power spec loses it entirely during those 5 seconds, while for the condi spec, that loss is spread out over the time it would have taken for the conditions they would have otherwise applied over those five seconds to wear off.

If you have a power build and a condi build doing the same DPS against a given boss, generally speaking it's better to be power, since the power build does their damage as soon as they hit, while for the condi build there's a delay before all the damage has been applied.

Exactly.  Short windows strongly favor power, not condi.  I think what he's trying to say is that if you apply long duration conditions the damage output relative to the time required to apply them is better.  For example, signet of fire is 2 stacks of burning for 20 seconds.  The DPS on 2 stacks of burning isn't impressive, but the total damage for a 0.5s cast is relatively high.  But to make any meaningful comparison based on this fact would require a level of specificity that can in no way be broadly applied in a comparison between power and condition damage.  The willbender example suggests this is what he's trying to do.

I reject that argument, but I think the point regarding range vs. melee is good.  Higher DPS uptime is a significant factor in the dominance of pmech and is not being accounted for when balancing occurs based upon benchmarks which assume 100% uptime for the sake of comparison.

[Ashen.2907]

On 9/26/2022 at 11:24 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

Not against the golem, anyway. Did the experiment myself. Might be possible against real opponents with higher armour.

 

Furthermore, the claim that it isn't in the top fifteen is 1. inaccurate (it's #14), and 2. misleading because most of what's above it is either only above it by a small amount (while being harder to play in practice) or condition-based. If you compare to other power specs, it's #5. Soulbeast and virtuoso only beat it by a few hundred DPS. Bladesworn and deadeye have noticeably higher DPS, but are also less mobile and more susceptible to being disrupted by mechanics.

I went back and tested (on golem so I know the results are not a perfect representation):

In order to generate damage number in the same range as the lower end of what was claimed I had to unequip all gear (no armor, no weapons, no trinkets, no backpack), have no food, no utility consumable....just use the mech skills, throw mine, and the elite signet.

If the players making those claims are running around naked without even a weapon then their experience with the spec can be generously described as not valid in terms of discussing balance.

 

Edited September 28, 2022 by Ashen.2907

[Atticus.7194]

On 9/19/2022 at 2:39 AM, Mell.4873 said:

Its not in the patch notes but it was mentioned on the livestream as late changes that could make it into the patch.
Here is what they said:

1) Aim assisted rocket will no longer be triggered by Mech, regardless of the trait equipped
This means a nerf to this trait  "Mech Arms: Jade Cannons: Melee attacks become ranged, have an increased chance to critically hit, and apply vulnerability. Unlocks the Mech Command skill Spark Revolver. If you have the Explosives trait Aim-Assisted Rocket, your mech also gains the effect of that trait."

2) No bonus Ferocity on Mech Frames
Basically no ferocity on this trait "Mech Frame: Variable Mass Distributor: Unlocks the Mech Command skill Core Reactor Shot. Your mech gains a greater percentage of your own precision and ferocity stats."

 

This does seem like just the beginning to so more changes (nerfs) of the way

Nice but no where near enough the mech needs much larger nerfs it basically plays the game for you.

[Mell.4873]

On 9/29/2022 at 5:08 PM, Atticus.7194 said:

Nice but no where near enough the mech needs much larger nerfs it basically plays the game for you.

Which I think they want to remove in the next patch but again we shall wait and see since the entire elite is built around making the Mech stronger so if they nerf that to much it might ruin the class.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Mell.4873

[draxynnic.3719]

16 hours ago, RAZOR.7246 said:

My solutions are not outlandish.  

Well, they're certainly extreme...

On 9/28/2022 at 5:18 AM, RAZOR.7246 said:

1. Rework the "confusion" condition and remove the damage on attack function, replacing it with a damage to defiance on attack mechanic instead. This gave them a massive problem with condi mech in particular and is a nightmare to deal with given how it overperforms on certain fights yet is not really significant elsewhere. 

Confusion is an important part of mesmer's identity, and one of the few 'punishment' effects that remains outside of projectile reflection now that Retribution is gone. It's coming up for metanist now because ArenaNet has decided that confusion is the damaging condition associated with electricity, and after scrapper and holosmith were both mostly power-focused, they wanted metanist to have condi damage while also having an electricity theme. Ergo, lots of confusion.

Personally, I think it's fine that confusion is a condition that works better on some bosses than others - it then becomes a factor that encourages using different lineups against different bosses. The problem is that alacrity mechs are already pretty much the default alacrity choice, so confusion bosses just serve to make them even better.

On 9/28/2022 at 5:18 AM, RAZOR.7246 said:

 

2. Add a defiance bar to players. At full defiance, a player can spend the defiance bar to block 1 attack. Otherwise it empties based on control effects. When empty, a player is susceptible to control. 30s recharge on the bar across all classes. Remove Stability and Aegis from the game and do away completely with the need for such dedicated boon supports.

Okay, so everyone now takes several CCs in advance before they actually get CC'd? And can generate at any time as long as they haven't been hit with CC recently? That sounds like the result would basically be an entirely different game, especially in competitive modes.

The approach of removing monopolies is, IMO, a lot better. It really surprises me that with the new quickness and alacrity options introduced in EoD, the only EoD spec with significant stability application was metanist, which already had decent stability options through scrapper.

On 9/28/2022 at 5:18 AM, RAZOR.7246 said:

3. Remove drawbacks on classes based on mobility. Classes should not be anchored in place when the fights are becoming more mobile. At the same time, players need to be encouraged to do damage at the same time that they're managing mechanics regardless of whether they are on power on condition builds. 

I'll admit I raised a mental eyebrow at Bladesworn, but for deadeye, the mechanic whereby they sacrifice mobility for damage (when using rifle) is basically how deadeye gets to be deadeye without being completely oppressive.

The second part I can kinda agree with? It basically translates into having more availability for viable ranged attacks so you can still do reasonable damage while doing mechanics. There are a few professions - power warrior, elementalist, non-renegade revenant - that are really suffering when it comes to decent ranged options at the moment.

On 9/28/2022 at 5:18 AM, RAZOR.7246 said:

 

4. Standardise baseline damage across classes. Classes need to be at a similar base level of difficulty. If mech is doing 25k with 0 APM then ALL DPS classes should be using that marker as a baseline for LI builds. Once that's established, they can look at balancing the damage on higher APM builds. 

This I can agree with (and have been saying similar things).

[Nephalem.8921]

On 9/27/2022 at 6:32 PM, Lynx.9058 said:

Point is that y'all are drastically overestimating the capabilities of the average player.  Those are definitely low numbers, but that's the point: this isn't just a "dump hero points, afk and win" spec, which is the implication so many people are trying to push.

Even at the numbers that draxynnic posted, an average of 9-10k DPS standing still against a target that doesn't hit back is skewed data, and definitely nowhere in the ballpark of the 36k-41k that gets thrown around in comments whenever someone is pushing to get the spec nerfed.

The entire range of the player base must be taken into account when making balance changes, always.  If you balance entirely around the low end/uber casuals, you'll wind up with overpowered specs in the hands of capable players.  If you balance entirely around the elitists, you'll wind up with a spec that a huge portion of the player base is incapable of doing well on.  A middle ground has to be found, and that should be the goal for EVERY spec.

It very much is a "dump hero points, afk and win" spec. I've killed champs completely afk. Cleared some stuff with only mech attacking.

You can not do less than 11k dps with this spec. Thats only possible if the player is running wrong stats or forgets to let the mech attack. That has nothing to do with the build.

Like i wrote earlier, this spec is closer to mmo auto combat than action combat. And if you dare to press a few buttons it reaches top dps numbers. HT cm was cleared with 8 mechanists. 6 of them were rifle mechs. It is broken for every skill level currently.

[samsar.9152]

On 9/27/2022 at 4:51 AM, Lynx.9058 said:

Except it isn't.

It doesn't even rank in the top 15.  Sure, it's easy to play, and does pretty well for a low intensity build, but it's not beating other specs at benchmarks like everyone is claiming.

News flash:  The vast majority of players are casuals.  The vast majority of players are not particularly skilled.  The vast majority of players cannot maintain a complex rotation.  Give them a class that can keep up with a simpler playstyle, and suddenly the elites are feeling threatened.

 

Everyone complaining about mechanist needs to see some comments from the other side.  These are taken from reddit comments:
 

 

I get the feeling that streamers and posters with an agenda are viewing top-geared mechanist builds as the standard, when that's clearly not the case.  When you have some posters running rampant crying that "Mechanist autoattack is doing 36k DPS!", while the vast majority of actual players aren't even getting half of that while obviously working in more than just AA spam, it creates a false narrative, and these people scream the loudest on the forums in order to get their way, where the devs and reps see this as valid feedback.

"The squeaky wheel gets the grease", as the old saying goes, doesn't really apply when the wheel isn't squeaking nearly as much as the neighbor is claiming.

Actually atleast power reaper, sadly, it beats.  Need to be really good with power reaper to reach high numbers. This is tho only my opinion. To be honest, I could transfer that ferocity boost from mech to my power reaper, just to balance both of them in DPS. 

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, samsar.9152 said:

Actually atleast power reaper, sadly, it beats.  Need to be really good with power reaper to reach high numbers. This is tho only my opinion. To be honest, I could transfer that ferocity boost from mech to my power reaper, just to balance both of them in DPS. 

It beats all power builds for guardian, necromancer, elementalist, and revenant.

[EyzKold.8247]

These YouTube videos on the mechanist dps are not realistic.   I do have pmech and a condi build and yes a player can generate low dps numbers.  I’ve seen 4-5k or lower, ave is about 10-11k, and highs ranging from 12k to 19k.  Call it no luck or whatever, but I’ve never seen a sustained dps in the 20 to 30k range.  Burst/crit damage yes, but not sustained.  This is what average joe will see without food and no buffs.

Those higher dps are against a non moving target…buffed.  I would like to see a video on a non buffed, no food, exotic build against a world boss or hot hp which involves dodges.  That would be more realistic for average joe casual player.