Mechanist is dividing the Community

[Frayze.4620]

Ok, as I said I don’t play ele and I want trying to distort anything. I was saying what I thought was the case so thank you for the corrections.

 On your second point, sure, but the recent “attention” from Anet to mech has been to nerf it in two different ways so I don’t know how that can be construed as positive bias??

i Will take issue with your saying “in all game modes”. I mainly play WvW and certainly there support/cleanse ele is NOT underperforming. It is in an incredibly strong position, helped in no small part to the huge nerfs just given to another engi spec (again, not saying these weren’t mostly justified, they were although i do think they want too far with Sneak gyro). Whilst I don’t play spvp I also believe it has a couple of strong builds there as well?

 Again, don’t exaggerate. it doesn’t help you to build a strong argument at all. It just puts people’s backs up and makes it harder to believe other things you say that ARE true. Yes, ele isn’t in the best place, but you simply can’t say they are terrible at everything everywhere because they just aren’t.

[zeyeti.8347]

6 minutes ago, Frayze.4620 said:

Ok, as I said I don’t play ele and I want trying to distort anything. I was saying what I thought was the case so thank you for the corrections.

 On your second point, sure, but the recent “attention” from Anet to mech has been to nerf it in two different ways so I don’t know how that can be construed as positive bias??

i Will take issue with your saying “in all game modes”. I mainly play WvW and certainly there support/cleanse ele is NOT underperforming. It is in an incredibly strong position, helped in no small part to the huge nerfs just given to another engi spec (again, not saying these weren’t mostly justified, they were although i do think they want too far with Sneak gyro). Whilst I don’t play spvp I also believe it has a couple of strong builds there as well?

 Again, don’t exaggerate. it doesn’t help you to build a strong argument at all. It just puts people’s backs up and makes it harder to believe other things you say that ARE true. Yes, ele isn’t in the best place, but you simply can’t say they are terrible at everything everywhere because they just aren’t.

Thats another debate i dont play neither pvp nor wvw , skills/traits are completely different int those 3 modes , i am specially pointing out endgame pve , where ele is non existent , sure i know that the tempest support alac is pretty strong in  wvw puddle against puddle ... but i am not talking about those modes , if ele had at least one played build in pve endgame , it would be alright but https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/popularity and i can say that the % of what that graph is showing is my feeling , i clear all that content (except ht cm) weekly ... so i can tell. And yes it is terrible at all place , only a few % of the already few % of the people playing it are exceptional with it , like finding a four leaf clover growing on another four leaf clover.

Edited November 1, 2022 by zeyeti.8347

[Frayze.4620]

Ok, you have edited your post but you did say previously in all game modes, hence my reply to you.

 

 And again, If ele is too difficult for the majority of players to actually play, then the problem ISN’T that mech IS possible for them to play. 
 

I can, from personal experience, state that a large percentage of mech players also don’t perform to where the class is capable of performing. Sometimes drastically underperforming. I don’t know whether this is a gear issue or what, but it does indeed happen. Yes, it is easier for a mech player to get good results with less effort. If that speaks to you, that’s great. If you want that type of gameplay, that’s great. Mech also has huge flaws though. I would consider myself a” reasonable “ player. I’m not great, but I’m pretty good when I try. Mech has an incredibly low skill ceiling. Yes, the skill floor is low, but so is the ceiling. Yes, I can mess about with other skills than grenade if I want to try and make things more interesting, but as you say, why would I deliberately hurt my own dps if that is my role in a group setting?

 

[zeyeti.8347]

3 minutes ago, Frayze.4620 said:

Ok, you have edited your post but you did say previously in all game modes, hence my reply to you.

 

 And again, If ele is too difficult for the majority of players to actually play, then the problem ISN’T that mech IS possible for them to play. 
 

I can, from personal experience, state that a large percentage of mech players also don’t perform to where the class is capable of performing. Sometimes drastically underperforming. I don’t know whether this is a gear issue or what, but it does indeed happen. Yes, it is easier for a mech player to get good results with less effort. If that speaks to you, that’s great. If you want that type of gameplay, that’s great. Mech also has huge flaws though. I would consider myself a” reasonable “ player. I’m not great, but I’m pretty good when I try. Mech has an incredibly low skill ceiling. Yes, the skill floor is low, but so is the ceiling. Yes, I can mess about with other skills than grenade if I want to try and make things more interesting, but as you say, why would I deliberately hurt my own dps if that is my role in a group setting?

 

I made my own idea at how ele should be reworked in pve :

- give catalyst a 1 pulse quickness from jade sphere (with the trait and get rid off the -10ù damage dealt)

- rid off the energy , make jade sphere ammunition type skill and blend the cooldown for every attunement 

- just increase elemental empowerment to 100% instead of doing that at 10 stacks

- tie the alac to aura share , or just aura on you , allowing elemental bastion for better consistant healing or transcendent tempest to work while providing alacrity 

- give access to fury on tempest , so we arent locked in air traits just for fury ( water , arcane , tempest !)

 

tempest is not difficult to play as healer , there is just a lot of things missing , cluncky boon apllication , lack of healing avaibilitys , boon range too small (make provide 25 might on a 600 range , ele provide it on a 180 range , can use warhorn 4 fire , but that implement no staff for healing , so less healing , other classes have no such trade offs)

[Frayze.4620]

15 minutes ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

Thats another debate i dont play neither pvp nor wvw , skills/traits are completely different int those 3 modes , i am specially pointing out endgame pve , where ele is non existent , sure i know that the tempest support alac is pretty strong in  wvw puddle against puddle ... but i am not talking about those modes , if ele had at least one played build in pve endgame , it would be alright but https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/popularity and i can say that the % of what that graph is showing is my feeling , i clear all that content (except ht cm) weekly ... so i can tell. And yes it is terrible at all place , only a few % of the already few % of the people playing it are exceptional with it , like finding a four leaf clover growing on another four leaf clover.

Ok, for a moment let’s look outside of the gw2 string and consider its two biggest competitors.

 In WoW they changed the talent tree years and years ago to be much more simplistic. A lot of players decried this at the time stating it hurt build diversity, yet blizzard stuck with it. It is now basically impossible to make a bad build. Yes, some picks will be meta, but none will actually make your build terrible. 
FFXIV don’t even have a talent system. Your class is your class, take it or leave it. You therefore can’t make a bad one.

 Now consider WHY they maybe did these? Are blizzard incapable of continuing to program talents? I doubt it. Was class balance due to talents an issue? Probably yes. Does it make it EASIER for the players. Yes.  Are square enix incapable of making talents? Again, I doubt it. Does it make it easier and simpler for players? Yes.

 There has been a shift in mmo’s for years towards the simpler and easier and more convenient. This is just fact. The mechanist class 100% embodies this type of philosophy. Does the whole player base agree with and support this philosophy? Obviously no as we have continuing threads such as this one. Does the continuing popularity of mechanist, despite nerfs, despite the hatred, shots that this philosophy is popular with the majority of players? One could certainly argue that it does.

[Frayze.4620]

2 minutes ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

I made my own idea at how ele should be reworked in pve :

- give catalyst a 1 pulse quickness from jade sphere (with the trait and get rid off the -10ù damage dealt)

- rid off the energy , make jade sphere ammunition type skill and blend the cooldown for every attunement 

- just increase elemental empowerment to 100% instead of doing that at 10 stacks

- tie the alac to aura share , or just aura on you , allowing elemental bastion for better consistant healing or transcendent tempest to work while providing alacrity 

- give access to fury on tempest , so we arent locked in air traits just for fury ( water , arcane , tempest !)

 

tempest is not difficult to play as healer , there is just a lot of things missing , cluncky boon apllication , lack of healing avaibilitys , boon range too small (make provide 25 might on a 600 range , ele provide it on a 180 range , can use warhorn 4 fire , but that implement no staff for healing , so less healing , other classes have no such trade offs)

Again, why aren’t you posting this in the Ele forums where A-ArenaNet if they ARE looking for ideas for ele will be more likely (I assume) to look for suggestions for ele. 
And B-be more likely to receive feedback from fellow ele players discussing the positive and negative results that such a change might make?

[zeyeti.8347]

When a class is .. wait no ... an e-spec represented a 27% in 2 endgames modes (where there is 3 endgames modes) and another whole class (3-especs) is less than  4% , there is a problem thats all . If anet doesnt care about a spec doing so much with so less effort , why did they nerfed catalyst who was doing uber damage , but with an amazingly difficult rotation ? Thats what we call lowering skill floor. And that kind of mentality ends up as mobile trash "game" with auto leveling to  level 200 in 3 hours by just a  button press , if thats what ppl want , oke , but they are ppl who also want to be rewarded when they play challenge , and actually it's not the case.

[zeyeti.8347]

6 minutes ago, Frayze.4620 said:

Again, why aren’t you posting this in the Ele forums where A-ArenaNet if they ARE looking for ideas for ele will be more likely (I assume) to look for suggestions for ele. 
And B-be more likely to receive feedback from fellow ele players discussing the positive and negative results that such a change might make?

Thats done , many times ... and way before eod came out ... i remind even a post who has fade away cause it was before the forum changes ... but for my own sanity , i think i should take a break , i am off , also i see Obtena writing i dont want to read , "you can play whatever you want , nobody says you had to play how the meta must make you play, ele build still exist (but are irrelevant to me), ... and blabla..." anyway you have fairly good points , and true this a engi forums and 50% of my post are off topic , sorry .

Edited November 1, 2022 by zeyeti.8347

[Obtena.7952]

Totally weird how people think taking things away from one spec gives them the things they want on a different spec, especially things they already have. There is no relationship between what Ele has and doesn't have to what mechanist has or doesn't have. 

Whatever mechanist does, is completely independent of what other specs or classes do. I don't think anyone denies mechanist has some significant balance to be done ... but this continuous rhetoric about how ele is so bad is irrelevant to this discussion. 

 

Edited November 1, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[poop.4183]

6 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Totally weird how people think taking things away from one spec gives them the things they want on a different spec, especially things they already have. There is no relationship between what Ele has and doesn't have to what mechanist has or doesn't have. 

Whatever mechanist does, is completely independent of what other specs or classes do. I don't think anyone denies mechanist has some significant balance to be done ... but this continuous rhetoric about how ele is so bad is irrelevant to this discussion. 

 

And he agreed 😁

[Frayze.4620]

4 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Totally weird how people think taking things away from one spec gives them the things they want and a different spec. There is no relationship between what Ele has and doesn't have to what mechanist has or doesn't have. 

Whatever mechanist does, is completely independent of what other specs or classes do. 

Whilst on a factual level you are correct, I think that in an MMO especially, where one is likely to have invested a significant amount of time, and possibly more, into your character, the emotive level of “This class has all this and my class doesn’t” is something that can’t, and shouldn’t, be discounted.

 Whilst mechanist absolutely shouldn’t be balanced around Ele, when you have so many ele players all stating how unfair and unbalanced it feels to them, then that reaction, that feeling from a large number of players of one particular class, surely should warrant attention. NOT to nerf what they are conspiring themselves to, but to raise them up to similar levels.

[Obtena.7952]

18 minutes ago, Frayze.4620 said:

Whilst on a factual level you are correct, I think that in an MMO especially, where one is likely to have invested a significant amount of time, and possibly more, into your character, the emotive level of “This class has all this and my class doesn’t” is something that can’t, and shouldn’t, be discounted.

 Whilst mechanist absolutely shouldn’t be balanced around Ele, when you have so many ele players all stating how unfair and unbalanced it feels to them, then that reaction, that feeling from a large number of players of one particular class, surely should warrant attention. NOT to nerf what they are conspiring themselves to, but to raise them up to similar levels.

Sure ... but at the same time, anyone playing this game, especially 10 years in, knows the deal here. It's not like all the sudden, we have meta shifts and class changes. We have experienced that since the beginning. What is good can be made trash with one balance patch. Nothing new here. 

I'm not saying that reaction is wrong, but it's something we should ALL expect with how GW2 and in fact all MMO's evolve to some extent as they age and at a MINIMUM reasonable expectation, understand nothing is a constant, nothing is immune to this evolution and that this 'in-balance' is actually standard. Not everything can perform equally. In fact, I would say nothing can without the most exact duplication. 

The thing that's important here: complaints about anything BUT Engi in the Engi subforum ... are not relevant here. They serve no purpose. It's some people attempting to seek comfort in trying to sabotage others because of their own dissatisfaction on non-Engi classes. 

Bottomline: if people are 'invested' in one character, that play choice comes with KNOWN consequences

Edited November 1, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Kuma.1503]

8 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

Yes you can clean condi in fire , but thats the only trait that has a purpose as healer ... the other trait are for dps ... and no barrier playing earth is only for you ... and what you are saying is what i am asking for , the problem i have with the mech is that it seems to take all the attention from anet , like saying : "omg the AA rifle was doing less damage than the skill 1 from grenades , thats not what we intended" , ... or "there is a bug with the AA so we reduced the cast time of it from a 1/4 sec instead of going up 1/4 sec , ..." omg , anet forgot there are non mech players ? 

And sorry to say you that but i was an ele main i know the class traits by heart , i tried every possible way to play the class , and actaully it is underwhelming in any kind of gameplay , efficiency wise ofc. If you dont play the class you can't see the flaws , try your metabattle builds in endgame content , and prepare to cry... it works if you play with amazing good players who dont need healing at all , but try it with  average players , and prepare to read "wtf are you doing healer .. , where are the heals ? "... and blabla..  theory vs reality , and reality hurts !

I post frequently about Ele's flaws and how they can be improved... But this just hasn't been my experience at all. 

 I am not THE best player in the world. I've just spent 99% of my time playing Engi and Ele, so I'm accustomed to the difficulty curve by now. 

I can say from experience that players generally don't care what you play so long as you're pulling your weight. There are a few adjustments you can make to ensure that you and your group are having a better time. 

(These apply to all supports not just ele)

 

1. Consider running Cele/Minstrel stats. The extra bulk lets you focus less on your survivability and more on doing mechanics and keeping your team alive. 
2. Don't be afraid to increase your boon duration. Just because SC or Metabattle is optimizing their BD for perfect play doesn't mean you have to. Give yourself that buffer to make mistakes. It'll be fine. 
3. Don't be afraid to deviate from the Metabattle builds and tweak them to fit your playstyle. Use them as a template not as a rule. 
4. Practice! Whether you're playing HAT or HAM, there are some important skill combos you want to learn until they become muscle memory. Your heals and boons will improve once you learn how to blast your water and fire fields. If you have to stop and think about HOW to accomplish this, you'll want to practice those combos until they are second nature. 

 

I've experimented a lot in order to make day to day experience more comfortable when playing Ele. 

I play HAT with 100% Boon duration. In an experienced group where everyone is playing perfectly, you can afford to drop some, but I prefer to overcap  just in case things go wrong. Running 100% also makes playing with staff easier since I have a bit of wiggle room with when I overload.

I play with extra bulk on my ele. Sometimes you don't want to be the toughness tank in every fight, and for those occasions, I run a mixture of Harrier and Magi. The extra vitality and healing power from the magi stats + jade bot lvl 10 + reninforced armor helps with ele's innate squishiness and lets me focus completely on doing my job.

It's not the SC reccomended build, but when I need a harder carry, I run staff with Water/Arcane. Staff Tempest still boasts the best raw healing in the game. Just remember to blast those water fields like mad. Let your other healing tools like frost bow fill space when you're not in water. If people go down, you have your double geysers to pick them back up. They'll also heal you and nearby allies so they're worth going for. 

 

This is what I run in high pressure encounters/training runs when I'm teaching newbies. 

 

With those adjustments, I've been just fine in raids, T4 fractals/CMs, strikes, heal tempest is also one of the healers I enjoy playin in Strike CMs because it has higher healing output than HAM. If I wipe 99% of the time it's usually due to failing mechanics that have nothing to do with build. I just pick myself back up, analyze what went wrong, and move forward. 

 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

tl;dr: Ele is playable in all content.  Experiment, practice, have fun. Don't blindly follow a guide you read online. Understand WHY they make the choices they do, and adjust to fit your playstyle. 

 

Edited November 1, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[Axelteas.7192]

People is not mad at mech being overpowered in open world. The main complaints are from the PvP WvW playerbase. And it's obvious, a braindead build with a overpowered bot that kills for you is not fair against other players doing its best.

[Frayze.4620]

8 hours ago, Axelteas.7192 said:

People is not mad at mech being overpowered in open world. The main complaints are from the PvP WvW playerbase. And it's obvious, a braindead build with a overpowered bot that kills for you is not fair against other players doing its best.

Nobody who has any experience in WvW is complaining about mech in that game mode at all. They are terrible in a Zerg and mediocre roamers . Use a block/reflect for their first burst and that’s it.

[draxynnic.3719]

On 11/1/2022 at 10:56 PM, Frayze.4620 said:

 

 There has been a shift in mmo’s for years towards the simpler and easier and more convenient. This is just fact. The mechanist class 100% embodies this type of philosophy. Does the whole player base agree with and support this philosophy? Obviously no as we have continuing threads such as this one. Does the continuing popularity of mechanist, despite nerfs, despite the hatred, shots that this philosophy is popular with the majority of players? One could certainly argue that it does.

Depends on how many people were playing it because they enjoy it, and how many were playing it with gritted teeth because they felt they has to in order to be competitive. I've seen a few people saying they were in the latter category.

That's the ultimate problem with something overperforming by too much - people end up playing things not because they actually enjoy them, but because they feel pressure to do so.

[sigmundf.7523]

4 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Depends on how many people were playing it because they enjoy it, and how many were playing it with gritted teeth because they felt they has to in order to be competitive. I've seen a few people saying they were in the latter category.

That's the ultimate problem with something overperforming by too much - people end up playing things not because they actually enjoy them, but because they feel pressure to do so.

This is 100% correct outside of GW2 most PVE contents, or even GW2 as mmo. Its easy to see that if you compare GW2 "endgame" PVE contents with another popular mmo such as WoW endgame PVE contents. The major difference is that in WoW (tl;dr), if you are playing underperformed class / spec, it is more likely for you to be rejected by public groups when trying to progress your character for endgame contents. In GW2 however, most of people won't care which spec you are playing as long as you do your role properly and able to clear the contents. There is no sense of competitiveness for profession or e-spec for general / bite-size PVE contents in GW2, and players can always progress their character's power / gear progression without doing higher difficulty PVE contents (T4 Fractals, strikes, raids) via crafting, open world meta, or achievements. Gear progression is the objective goal here. 

 

Feeling pressured to play an overperforming e-spec / profession to be competitive is not the ultimate problem. They feel pressured, not by the other players, not by the game, but by themselves, at least in general PVE contents. However, when someone choose to do higher difficulty contents (CM modes in T4 fractal, raids, strikes), it is bound to exist a formula / strategy to clear the contents comfortably with certain party composition.

For example, we always meet the undisputed Firebrand in such party, since it can be healer / quickness dps / condi dps, and doing excellent job for those roles. Even as dps, Firebrand able to support the party with powerful defensive boon such as aegis and stability. With such strong profession + e-spec archetype, Firebrand become popular e-spec for instanced PVE contents, especially in fractals. So when a T4 Fractal (CM or not) asking for HFB, a player that enjoy the role of support or healer are forced to play heal firebrand instead of other profession, even if they don't like it or enjoy it. And if another popular healer, Heal Alac Mechanist, already in the party, Quickness DPS Firebrand is the most favored pick. Most of T4 Fractal CM choose quickness firebrand over the other quickness spec, but for general T4 any quickness support is acceptable. And regarding the dps spec, I have not yet meet any group that forbid anything beside mechanist in T4 Frac CM, even back when power dps was doing 37k benchmark dps. There might certainly one or two, but it wasn't the norm. Virtuoso was and still popular pick, even favored for NPNG with Scourge as another alternative. Specter, Soulbeast, Bladesworn, Condi Firebrand, are still solid pick. 

Whether players like it or not, feeling pressured or by choice, they are forced to fulfill those roles with those e-spec, because most pugs demand those e-spec especially in support roles, and those e-spec are already proven to be effective in such party composition. 

It might be the same case with raid or strikes CM mode, where certain profession outshine the other, not only in terms of dps, but also in terms of utility and support that it provides. However I can't say for certain since I don't have much experience on that field.

 

So far, that is the extend of "competitiveness" in GW2 PVE contents. To say that feeling pressured to play overperforming spec to be competitive is the ultimate problem is simply incorrect. The level of competitiveness exists only in higher difficulty contents, where gears aren't the problem as players already expected to use full ascended gears + runes + sigils, have sufficient agony resistance, knowing how to play their profession / e-spec, have enough knowledge about the game or encounter mechanic.

Edited November 5, 2022 by sigmundf.7523

[Frayze.4620]

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Depends on how many people were playing it because they enjoy it, and how many were playing it with gritted teeth because they felt they has to in order to be competitive. I've seen a few people saying they were in the latter category.

That's the ultimate problem with something overperforming by too much - people end up playing things not because they actually enjoy them, but because they feel pressure to do so.

Ok, sure, I can accept that. But, again, with the last nerfs to power mech, where exactly do you feel people are "having to play" mech in order to be competitive? Because I cannot think of a single area, apart from ease of use, where mech shines hugely against anything else?

It is no longer to be-all-and-end-all of dps. Yes, due to movement phases and mech being ranged, it still puts out good to very good dps if you are in an average party. But, in this environment of "average" players, I don't buy the argument that people are willing to switch classes and possibly go through the gearing that that may mean, in order to do a couple k more dps.

Can it do good healing? Yes, but again it is hardly the only class that can do that either. Is it easier on a mech? Possibly, but it also brings its own unique problems with positioning of your mech. The exact same goes for alac support as well. Yes it can do it very well, but not without some issues.

[draxynnic.3719]

15 hours ago, Frayze.4620 said:

Ok, sure, I can accept that. But, again, with the last nerfs to power mech, where exactly do you feel people are "having to play" mech in order to be competitive? Because I cannot think of a single area, apart from ease of use, where mech shines hugely against anything else?

It is no longer to be-all-and-end-all of dps. Yes, due to movement phases and mech being ranged, it still puts out good to very good dps if you are in an average party. But, in this environment of "average" players, I don't buy the argument that people are willing to switch classes and possibly go through the gearing that that may mean, in order to do a couple k more dps.

Can it do good healing? Yes, but again it is hardly the only class that can do that either. Is it easier on a mech? Possibly, but it also brings its own unique problems with positioning of your mech. The exact same goes for alac support as well. Yes it can do it very well, but not without some issues.

Oh, when it comes to rifle mech, I'm inclined to agree. HAM still seems to be pretty dominant in alac roles, though, although it's difficult to say how much of that is because the other alacrity options have problems that need to be fixed before HAM can be properly analysed.

Broadly speaking, though, I feel that this discussion essentially has two strands.

The first is "is mechanist currently overpowered"? My position on this is essentially "I don't currently have enough information".

There is an underlying second strand that comes through in several posts, however, which is implicitly or explicitly asking "and does it really hurt anyone if it is?". That's the strand that most of my posts are responding to - there is a point at which imbalance absolutely does start to hurt people who'd prefer to play something else.

Edited November 6, 2022 by draxynnic.3719
Minor grammar fix

[Kuma.1503]

10 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Oh, when it comes to rifle mech, I'm inclined to agree. HAM still seems to be pretty dominant in alac roles, though, although it's difficult to say how much of that is because the other alacrity options have problems that need to be fixed before HAM can be properly analysed.

For this, I can only comment on tempest, but if it had alac at the start of overload and/or baseline stability on overload, a lot of its flaws would be fixed. 

HAT is very strong, but painful to play in fights where you're getting spammed with CC. One interrupted overload means your boon uptime goes in the dumpster. 

Deimos is a good example. When he does pizza slices, it hits in a huge radius around him. If you're in melee of him you're supposed to dodge to avoid it. But whether you dodge it or not you have to cancel your overload anyway. 

If Tempest had that issue fixed, I think they could be a better healer than HAM. The extra range on their heals, the much higher healing, the rez power, auras, and some extra vuln on the side. Also rebound for niche cases. 

Downside would be a more involved alac rotation, more resource management to worry about when healing (frost bow and ice elemental help with this but don't entirely fix it), and no barrier. 

HAM would have an easier time applying alacrity, barrier, and on demand healing, but lower healing and stubby range. 

10 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Broadly speaking, though, I feel that this discussion essentially has two strands.

The first is "is mechanist currently overpowered"? My position on this is essentially "I don't currently have enough information".

There is an underlying second strand that comes through in several posts, however, which is implicitly or explicitly asking "and does it really hurt anyone if it is?". That's the strand that most of my posts are responding to - there is a point at which imbalance absolutely does start to hurt people who'd prefer to play something else.

Gonna second this. Personally, I think mech is in a spot where it's difficult to tell whether it's still overpowered. It's benchmark is at the very bottom, bordering hybrid support level, but it is easy to play and reliable. It still boasts the highest auto attack dps in the game and is ranged. 

For now, I think the approach should be focused on bringing up underperformers that do not feel rewarding to play at the moment. 

Scrapper needs a rework to how it applies its boons so it can actually make use of its utility.

Holo should probably deal more dps than core. It's very underwhelming right now. 

Reaper and Catalyst both were nerfed way harder than was justified. 

power daredevil should probably be a good bit stronger than it currently is, given it brings very little utility to the table. 

Willbenders have been completely MIA from PvE. Maybe look into that and why no one plays it. 

Power Untamed has the potential to be a very strong build with extreme CC, high durability (they can reset their heal skill with fervent force) long range, built in boon rip and projectile destruction, reliable uptime, and pet that does pretty good dps. The numbers just aren't quite there yet. 

 

Part of the reason for power mech's dominance is that a lot of other builds have glaring flaws that have yet to be addressed or even acknowledged. 

Edited November 6, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[Alcatraznc.3869]

On 11/3/2022 at 4:49 AM, Axelteas.7192 said:

People is not mad at mech being overpowered in open world. The main complaints are from the PvP WvW playerbase. And it's obvious, a braindead build with a overpowered bot that kills for you is not fair against other players doing its best.

 

If you die to mech in WvW then this is a skill issue not the spec being OP.

 

If you want a braindead build you play rifle Deadeye, spam 2 with rifle + sneak attack on rifle. 

[EvilZombie.6801]

People who want to nerf mech is just plain stupid and jealous of lazy build 

I play mech while watch youtube yes i love lazy build in every mmo i play lazy build for the past 20 years 

Lazy build are great in open world farming 

Stop bitching 

If i go pvp or wvw then i use a competitive build 

[draxynnic.3719]

15 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

For this, I can only comment on tempest, but if it had alac at the start of overload and/or baseline stability on overload, a lot of its flaws would be fixed. 

HAT is very strong, but painful to play in fights where you're getting spammed with CC. One interrupted overload means your boon uptime goes in the dumpster. 

Deimos is a good example. When he does pizza slices, it hits in a huge radius around him. If you're in melee of him you're supposed to dodge to avoid it. But whether you dodge it or not you have to cancel your overload anyway. 

If Tempest had that issue fixed, I think they could be a better healer than HAM. The extra range on their heals, the much higher healing, the rez power, auras, and some extra vuln on the side. Also rebound for niche cases. 

Downside would be a more involved alac rotation, more resource management to worry about when healing (frost bow and ice elemental help with this but don't entirely fix it), and no barrier. 

HAM would have an easier time applying alacrity, barrier, and on demand healing, but lower healing and stubby range. 

Yeah, HAT would probably be better if at least some of the alacrity pulsed while you were overloading - make it a bit less all-or-nothing, and let the HAT start providing alacrity from the start of a fight rather than from the end of the first overload.

From my understanding of the others:

The primary issues with druid, chronomancer, and spectre is that they have to devote most of their utilities just to maintaining alacrity, so they have less opportunity to bring other skills to react and adapt to circumstances. Each has other issues, but that's the common thread. 

Renegade, basically, doesn't bring enough to the table apart from alac.

Willbender MUST keep attacking in order to generate alacrity, and is marginal even then.

Mirage is decent as alacdps, but it doesn't have a healing version so it only really works if paired with a heal quickness build like healbrand or healqrapper.

15 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

Gonna second this. Personally, I think mech is in a spot where it's difficult to tell whether it's still overpowered. It's benchmark is at the very bottom, bordering hybrid support level, but it is easy to play and reliable. It still boasts the highest auto attack dps in the game and is ranged. 

For now, I think the approach should be focused on bringing up underperformers that do not feel rewarding to play at the moment. 

Scrapper needs a rework to how it applies its boons so it can actually make use of its utility.

Holo should probably deal more dps than core. It's very underwhelming right now. 

Reaper and Catalyst both were nerfed way harder than was justified. 

power daredevil should probably be a good bit stronger than it currently is, given it brings very little utility to the table. 

Willbenders have been completely MIA from PvE. Maybe look into that and why no one plays it. 

Power Untamed has the potential to be a very strong build with extreme CC, high durability (they can reset their heal skill with fervent force) long range, built in boon rip and projectile destruction, reliable uptime, and pet that does pretty good dps. The numbers just aren't quite there yet. 

 

Part of the reason for power mech's dominance is that a lot of other builds have glaring flaws that have yet to be addressed or even acknowledged. 

Yeah, this is probably where I'd be inclined to focus as well.

[soul.9651]

35 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

 

Renegade, basically, doesn't bring enough to the table apart from alac.

 

It used to bring rly good healing with its elite before they gutted it into pieces and made that skill just dead in pve... I wish they just reverted that absurd nerf because without its elite, alac ren has only good cc and then mediocre boon output with non existend dps in comparison with what other specs are capable of(qfb, herald and prob any other supp spec is just better leaving ren in the last place) and i have in mind power version of renegade for alac. The only place it has is only at fractals just because of the cc and decent burst but other than that in any kind of instanced content power alac ren just doesnt exist.

As for condi alac renegade, its just condi dps with 1 alac button to spam and brings nothing else besides some help with cc for healer and boonstrip.

And also the only reason why renegade got those nerfs back then was just because people were crying how "dominant it was" without realising that there were no other alternatives for alac in instanced content.. and at the current state we have like 5+ other options for alac and they all came with eod and balance patches after that expansion. So looking at how many alternatives we have rn the past renegade nerfs just makes no sence which killed alac build in the majority of instanced content (fractals beeing exception i guess but this game has more instanced content other than  3 cms people are doing there every day...)

Edited November 7, 2022 by soul.9651

[Kuma.1503]

6 hours ago, soul.9651 said:

It used to bring rly good healing with its elite before they gutted it into pieces and made that skill just dead in pve... I wish they just reverted that absurd nerf because without its elite, alac ren has only good cc and then mediocre boon output with non existend dps in comparison with what other specs are capable of(qfb, herald and prob any other supp spec is just better leaving ren in the last place) and i have in mind power version of renegade for alac. The only place it has is only at fractals just because of the cc and decent burst but other than that in any kind of instanced content power alac ren just doesnt exist.

This, i ended up dropping renegade shortly after the soulcleave nerf. It was entirely too harsh and unjustified. They did it because some sweaty comps were using this extra bit of healing so they could drop a healer in favor of more dps, but they ended up making this skill not worth pressing, and killing all of the fun synergies it had with multi-hit attacks. Heal Renegade suffered the most because it leaned heavily on this skill for extra healing while in kalla. 

It's just a boring, underwhelming skill in its current state, hardly worth the energy to upkeep it. You use it to drain energy for Charged Mists. Not much else. They could completely revert all of the nerfs this got and renegade still wouldn't be broken given how much variety we have for alac now. 

Edited November 7, 2022 by Kuma.1503