Not a fan of the new Final Shielding

[AliamRationem.5172]

First, all but one ele elite skill have dramatically longer cooldowns than final shielding did outside of PvP.  Second, the most useful part of final shielding as a defensive skill was the automatic stunbreak which no longer functions because it requires active skill use.  Finally, all of the elite skills for ele are offensive in nature.  There is zero synergy here.  Am I going to pop tornado to proc an arcane shield?  None of it makes sense.  This was just poorly thought out, another solution to a problem that didn't exist.  Please reconsider.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

With the Glyph of Elementals you can literally spam Arcane Shield now, every single cooldown (16sec). In fact its quite rediculous and makes my Catalyst into a tank.

Edited October 4, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[dascott.6078]

33 minutes ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

With the Glyph of Elementals you can literally spam Arcane Shield now, every single cooldown (16sec). In fact its quite rediculous and makes my Catalyst into a tank.

That'll get fixed quick, I guarantee it.   Unlike the Evasive Arcana bug

[solemn.9670]

Tornado: I can see it working well for core ele air/arcane/water running cantrip traits, arcane shield on 48s CD (WvW) tornado would be pretty cool, definitely gonna try it. I use tornado defensively sometimes and tbh an arcane shield while cc'ing multiple opponents would be nice.

Don't forget that when it detonates it actually does pretty reasonable passive damage to anyone nearby the detonation

&As the above poster said, glyph will prob be patched because it's insanely good 😹

Fire catalyst and fire weaver both get a nice kick out of this change as well, especially catalyst. Better than the boon trait, at least.

I really like this change. No it's not good with FGS or racial elites. People rarely use those for roaming/pvp anyway tho, the rest I think are quite good.. even arcane shield on tempy elite since they're both defensive

Edit: anyone who was using final shielding prior to this patch should also be aware that you were wasting a trait (300s CD for one arcane shield is absolutely useless over time), so if you don't prefer this change it's no worries; you were never benefitting from the old final shielding to begin with, it was awful o__o

Edited October 4, 2022 by solemn.9670

[AliamRationem.5172]

12 minutes ago, solemn.9670 said:

Tornado: I can see it working well for core ele air/arcane/water running cantrip traits, arcane shield on 48s CD (WvW) tornado would be pretty cool, definitely gonna try it. I use tornado defensively sometimes and tbh an arcane shield while cc'ing multiple opponents would be nice.

Don't forget that when it detonates it actually does pretty reasonable passive damage to anyone nearby the detonation

&As the above poster said, glyph will prob be patched because it's insanely good 😹

Fire catalyst and fire weaver both get a nice kick out of this change as well, especially catalyst. Better than the boon trait, at least.

I really like this change. No it's not good with FGS or racial elites. People rarely use those for roaming/pvp anyway tho, the rest I think are quite good.. even arcane shield on tempy elite since they're both defensive

Edit: anyone who was using final shielding prior to this patch should also be aware that you were wasting a trait (300s CD for one arcane shield is absolutely useless over time), so if you don't prefer this change it's no worries; you were never benefitting from the old final shielding to begin with, it was awful o__o

The cooldown is still pretty long for the weaver/catalyst elites, given that it's tacked on to skills you may want to use regardless of whether you need the shield at that moment and the anti-synergy with the tempest elite is comically bad.  But yeah, I guess it's better than a completely useless 300s CD or some random low-impact boons.

[soulknight.9620]

1 hour ago, dascott.6078 said:

That'll get fixed quick, I guarantee it.   Unlike the Evasive Arcana bug

Evasove Arcana is not bugged, its full of "features"! 

[Miannei.5072]

Played a bunch of unranked with the following build:

 

Air: 2-1-3

Water: 2-1-1

Arcane: 3-3-1

 

Sage amulet/ rune of divinity 

 Glyph(heal)/mistform/lesser ele/lightning flash/elit elementals 

 

Either staff or dagger/dagger

 

Was nice survival and support. Lacking a bit of damage but could still win some duels

The elite gives you allot of survival and is really nice to play around

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2022 by Miannei.5072

[BenaSPACE.6028]

My recommended change is to activate it via healing skill, not via elite.

Edited October 5, 2022 by BenaSPACE.6028

[Dimitri Filichkin.3954]

Absolutely 100% for the worse across the board. I'd like to know the logic behind this change, or if it was just random change for the sake of it, because it feels like it's addressing an issue nobody had just so they can say they are making changes. Having yet another thing I need to actively time and juggle the cooldowns for is NOT a good thing when I'm already playing my keyboard like a piano, and the best benefit of Final Shielding for me was often just the sound, since when I heard it proc it meant I was too in the flow and didn't notice my health, and would give me enough time to attune to water and Riptide out of melee.

 

If they feel it's too strong or something I would have preferred it just be nerffed, make it shorter duration or have fewer blocks before it explodes or reduce the explosion, whatever, anything EXCEPT making it yet another cooldown for me to actively and consciously track in the heat of combat. Given my Weaver is built to maximize the benefits of rapidly cycling through elements, I only really use Weave Self when I go on the offensive, while the optimal time for Final Shielding to proc is when I'm trying to fall back and heal. I wouldn't say it breaks the build by any means, but it does render Final Shielding next to useless, and I would legitimately prefer they just slap the PVP cooldown timer on it than this.

 

That said, HOW can anyone legitimately think Final Shielding needed fixing? I thought Elementalist was supposed to get some love finally. Was this meant to be a buff? In what universe is throwing a bowling ball at an already fully loaded juggler a 'buff'? Unless I just remake my build to revolve around Final Shielding (which I won't) I'm never going to get any use out of it ever again, but none of the other perks in that tier are any better, so I'm just stuck with a dead tier in the Arcane specialization now when before it was a perfectly timed, if rarely needed safety net.

[soulknight.9620]

5 hours ago, BenaSPACE.6028 said:

My recommended change is to activate it via healing skill, not via elite.

This is actually a good idea. Cause well if anet intended for it to function the way it does (i mean its interaction with GoE skill activation) then its the only elite that actually works fine due to its cd. But if thats unintended and it will get nerfed/fixed then we will get shield once every 90-180 sec based on the cd of elites, which is kinda meh. 

[the krytan assassin.9235]

Gale song and final shielding didn't need any changes to begin with imo. They were perfectly fine at ~30 sec and 50 sec cd. 

Earth's embrace wasn't overpowered either, but could use a few tweaks since it saw rarely play anyways. 

 

I simply don't understand why its not okay to have lesser arcane shield on 40 sec cd, but it is completely fine to have it on 20/16 sec cd aslong as you're using your elemental elite. 

[ilthelia.8501]

the idea of having traits than passive skills shoved in traits is a good idea . The execution is incorrect in a true Arena Net way

-Final shielding could give aegis when health drop to a threshold. that makes  reactive game play a better meaning
-Earth's embrace barrier is weird, since it's casted only on self  on a support trait line (?)
i guess gale song prot is ok since it synergize well with hardy conduit , It's a reactive gameplay to have prot on demand

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

Clearly they "designed" this trait in a hurry while, with Arcane Restoration too, they could have  buff a little Arcane skills.
For all the reasons you gave : Elites with long CD, no synergy, the lost of the BS, ...

 

Arcane Restoration : arcane skills (or charges of effect) heal you for ~400.
Arcane Shielding : swapping attunement gives you one charge of Arcane Power, or using an healing skill gives you Arcane shield (icd 40) ; Breaking stun gives you Arcane Shield (icd 40)  etc, but not on elite skill.
Arcane skills and traits deserve some love and tweaks on numbers or effects.

Edited October 5, 2022 by Zhaid Zhem.6508

[AliamRationem.5172]

5 hours ago, Zhaid Zhem.6508 said:

Clearly they "designed" this trait in a hurry while, with Arcane Restoration too, they could have  buff a little Arcane skills.
For all the reasons you gave : Elites with long CD, no synergy, the lost of the BS, ...

 

Arcane Restoration : arcane skills (or charges of effect) heal you for ~400.
Arcane Shielding : swapping attunement gives you one charge of Arcane Power, or using an healing skill gives you Arcane shield (icd 40) ; Breaking stun gives you Arcane Shield (icd 40)  etc, but not on elite skill.
Arcane skills and traits deserve some love and tweaks on numbers or effects.

I think it's one way in which the intentionally limited UI comes back to bite them.  They're forever tacking effects on to other effects because they can't add skills.  I get that they want to move away from passive saves, but it makes a lot more sense on a skill like final shielding than simply tacking it onto another skill.

[soulknight.9620]

Anet: Good news guys, we decided to remove the 300s traits. Now Final shielding will proc every 20 sec on elite use. 

Players: But our elites have cds that vary from 60 to 180 secs, its not fair!

Anet: We hear you. To address the issue we decided to adjust the cd of all of ur elites to a new standart - 180s. And we also decided to buff Final shielding skill and lower the cd from 20 secs to 1 secs which is insane isnt it?

Players: But that makes it even worse, make it proc of heal skills instead please.

Anet: We hear you. We decided that Final Shielding will now proc of heal skill use with a cd of 1 sec. To balance things out we decided to increase the cd of heal skills to 180s.  

*300s cd traits gone, everyone happy*

Edited October 6, 2022 by soulknight.9620

[AliamRationem.5172]

1 hour ago, soulknight.9620 said:

Anet: Good news guys, we decided to remove the 300s traits. Now Final shielding will proc every 20 sec on elite use. 

Players: But our elites have cds that vary from 60 to 180 secs, its not fair!

Anet: We hear you. To address the issue we decided to adjust the cd of all of ur elites to a new standart - 180s. And we also decided to buff Final shielding skill and lower the cd from 20 secs to 1 secs which is insane isnt it?

Players: But that makes it even worse, make it proc of heal skills instead please.

Anet: We hear you. We decided that Final Shielding will now proc of heal skill use with a cd of 1 sec. To balance things out we decided to increase the cd of heal skills to 180s.  

*300s cd traits gone, everyone happy*

Maybe tacking an effect like this on to other skills isn't the best way to handle it?  Just a thought.

[Kodama.6453]

22 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

Maybe tacking an effect like this on to other skills isn't the best way to handle it?  Just a thought.

This is another case of Anet suddenly deciding that a mechanic of the game is no longer tolerable, so they rework this mechanic for everyone into complete nonsense.

Elementalist is not the only one here.

• Thief got their auto stunbreak + endurance refill changed to 8 endurance gain on shadowstep
• Engineer has the auto stunbreak changed to activate on healing skill use, giving you a boon and a single condi clean additionally when the trait was only used because of the stunbreak

Unfortunately, I don't see these traits changing in the near future. The goal was not to give a good trait choice here. The entire point was to just remove auto stunbreaks. They most likely don't care much if the replacements make sense.

Edited October 7, 2022 by Kodama.6453

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

18 minutes ago, Kodama.6453 said:

This is another case of Anet suddenly deciding that a mechanic of the game is no longer tolerable, so they rework this mechanic for everyone into complete nonsense.

Elementalist is not the only one here.

• Thief got their auto stunbreak + endurance refill changed to 8 endurance gain on shadowstep
• Engineer has the auto stunbreak changed to activate on healing skill use, giving you a boon and a single condi clean additionally when the trait was only used because of the stunbreak

Unfortunately, I don't see these traits changing in the near future. The goal was not to give a good trait choice here. The entire point was to just remove auto stunbreaks. They most likely don't care much if the replacements make sense.

Exactly, they were trying to make CC stronger in this patch, for the most part. They didn't even try to hide it on changes like adding damage back to Holosmith's elite.

 

Having auto-stunbreaks was counter-intuitive to that process.

Edited October 7, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[AliamRationem.5172]

40 minutes ago, Kodama.6453 said:

This is another case of Anet suddenly deciding that a mechanic of the game is no longer tolerable, so they rework this mechanic for everyone into complete nonsense.

Elementalist is not the only one here.

• Thief got their auto stunbreak + endurance refill changed to 8 endurance gain on shadowstep
• Engineer has the auto stunbreak changed to activate on healing skill use, giving you a boon and a single condi clean additionally when the trait was only used because of the stunbreak

Unfortunately, I don't see these traits changing in the near future. The goal was not to give a good trait choice here. The entire point was to just remove auto stunbreaks. They most likely don't care much if the replacements make sense.

Isn't that how we ended up in this situation in the first place?  Wasn't it CMC, in fact, who gave us 300s placeholders?  Now he strikes again with lazy changes to the same traits?  Seems very uncreative.

[AliamRationem.5172]

26 minutes ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

Exactly, they were trying to make CC stronger in this patch, for the most part. They didn't even try to hide it on changes like adding damage back to Holosmith's elite.

 

Having auto-stunbreaks was counter-intuitive to that process.

That makes sense.  So redesign the trait into something else?  Tacking arcane shield onto another skill just seems like an odd choice.

[Dimitri Filichkin.3954]

Honestly I would be fine with just about any kind of nerf to the auto-cantrips except removing their auto-cast. I'd be fine with a 300 second cooldown for Final Shielding in PVE even, or hell, make it refresh only after combat has ended, so it's a once per combat kind of thing, I'd be fine with that, I've always considered Final Shielding to be sorta like an airbag in that respect. It's a nice safty net that hopefully won't be used. That use has been totally gutted with this patch though.

[fuzzyp.6295]

I've been testing it out with my hammer cata roaming build. It's been more helpful than I originally thought, really useful to use with a double Crashing Font combo.  The block helps reduce the risk of stuns and blinds that would prevent the move from hitting and healing, giving you a nearly guaranteed 3k heal. This doubles for other longer channel moves that might get interrupted like Ground Pound or Molten End. Also its good to use it while running away, gives even more anti range to the build. Not to mention it's great at dealing a nice chunk of damage vs melee builds when it pops. (reapers, warrior, etc)

Honesty all three of the arcane master traits are meh, but it's not really to bad.

Edited October 14, 2022 by fuzzyp.6295