Get rid of Quick and Alac Boon

[Kuma.1503]

1 hour ago, Kodama.6453 said:

Well, then how it currently is it is good design, no?

A class shouldn't be able to perform the healer role in a raid comp without any investment into healing power and go for damage stats instead.

Specter Gaming.

(for legal purposes this is a joke pls dont burn me at the stake)

I'm torn here tbh. I think you're right and the three traits are very well balanced... in PvP/WvW. You can make a legitimate argument to run all three. 

Transcendent Tempest for aggressive Tempest builds.

Lucent Singularity for for a mix of offense and defense. You get shorter cooldowns across the board. 

Elemental Bastion for pure defense. The sustain you get from this greater than what you get by reducing your cooldowns by 25%. 

 

In PvE, my biggest issue isn't what you give up. It's the fact that there's no real choice between the two. You take Lucent Singularity for Support. You take Transcendent Tempest for DPS. You take Elemental Bastion for raw heals, but that's not as valuable in PvE. 

In theory, you'd run it if you already have alac covered and need extra heals, but then what usually ends up happening is you get your quickness support to run heal quick instead and take an extra DPS. 

To make pure healers desirable, you need something else like Barrier (which lets you overheal and guarantee better scholar rune uptime). 

Considering Ele is lacking in the utility department compared to other classes (no stealth, no boon rip, very selfish utilities) I think this might be a way to remedy this issue. Perhaps if they changed this to "Auras grant barrier" that would make the choice much less set in stone. 

It would also make more sense visually. These auras look like elemental shields that would block incoming attacks. Traiting so that they grant barrier would make a lot of sense, and you'd have a legitimate choice of when you want to take it In PvE as well as PvP. 

Lucent Singularity for Alac Support

Transcendent Tempest for DPS

Elemental Bastion for Barriers + Heals. Take double geyser rez as well, and do your best scourge roleplay. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 16, 2022 by Kuma.1503

[Yasai.3549]

On 12/11/2022 at 4:25 AM, Nightstorm.8024 said:

 

Disagree. Anet knows that these 2 boons are REQUIRED for any team and they decided to give Vind no alac or swift, so they are effectively deciding it shouldn't be in the meta. 

Wait I thought Vindicator was advertised as a DPS spec and should be geared to dishing out Power Damage, why are you trying to pump out Alac/Quick with it? 

 

Revenants also do have Alac/Quick builds, former being Renegade and latter being Herald. 

[Kodama.6453]

2 hours ago, Yasai.3549 said:

Wait I thought Vindicator was advertised as a DPS spec and should be geared to dishing out Power Damage, why are you trying to pump out Alac/Quick with it? 

 

Revenants also do have Alac/Quick builds, former being Renegade and latter being Herald. 

To be fair, the design of vindicator seems kinda.... confused.

One half of the spec is about (power) damage, but the other half is about healing (Kurzick half of the alliance and having dodges which heal, etc.).

So OP wants to use the healing half of the spec to make a healing build for end game content, but the lack of a high impact boon like alacrity or quickness makes many people not want to take them because of role compression reasons.

It was a more interesting concept when it used the original design of having forced flip overs on the alliance skills. Because this meant you use both, the healing and the damage, with the goal being more of a bruiser spec with some slight support features in the frontline. But since they changed it and you can now camp the healing or damage side, that's the confusing part for people. THe healing aspect of the spec was not supposed to get camped in the original design, it was supposed to be a back and forth between sustain and damage to enable a bruiser playstyle.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Kodama.6453

[Yasai.3549]

2 hours ago, Kodama.6453 said:

To be fair, the design of vindicator seems kinda.... confused.

One half of the spec is about (power) damage, but the other half is about healing (Kurzick half of the alliance and having dodges which heal, etc.).

So OP wants to use the healing half of the spec to make a healing build for end game content, but the lack of a high impact boon like alacrity or quickness makes many people not want to take them because of role compression reasons.

This design has been.... questionable.....
It was a more interesting concept when it used the original design of having forced flip overs on the alliance skills. Because this meant you use both, the healing and the damage, with the goal being more of a bruiser spec with some slight support features in the frontline. But since they changed it and you can now camp the healing or damage side, that's the confusing part for people. THe healing aspect of the spec was not supposed to get camped in the original design, it was supposed to be a back and forth between sustain and damage to enable a bruiser playstyle.

Can't believe we lost Legendary Togo for this mess q.q 

[the krytan assassin.9235]

Meh, both quick and alac are way to embedded into the game to be removed. Even with all quick/alac uptime being cut in half, groups would probably look for a 100% uptime by adding more boonsupport in. 

Completely removing quick/alac uptime wouldn't work either. People are used to playing with quick/alac nowadays and without it it just feels slow. There are even some builds that cant function properly without the buffs (like catalyst and untamed). We're simply to deep in the Rabbit Hole to suddenly take a different path. Gw2 devs have chosen for the boonmeta and quick/alac are simply a part of that. 

[Mungo Zen.9364]

2 hours ago, the krytan assassin.9235 said:

Meh, both quick and alac are way to embedded into the game to be removed. Even with all quick/alac uptime being cut in half, groups would probably look for a 100% uptime by adding more boonsupport in. 

Completely removing quick/alac uptime wouldn't work either. People are used to playing with quick/alac nowadays and without it it just feels slow. There are even some builds that cant function properly without the buffs (like catalyst and untamed). We're simply to deep in the Rabbit Hole to suddenly take a different path. Gw2 devs have chosen for the boonmeta and quick/alac are simply a part of that. 

Not at all.

This is software, and anything can be changed.  The core issue with Alac and Quick is that in most PvE environments you can have near 24/7 uptime of Quick and Alac now.  This was not the case prior to EoD, but with EoD we now have multiple specs presenting Quick and Alac alongside the Jade Protocols.  Jade Protocols actually mean that you can run selfish DPS and still get the (virtually) fulltime Quick and Alac with no-one else around.

People are arguing that Quick and Alac are not needed to clear content, and that is potentially correct, but in PvE, have it up 24/7 and we know that fights will be balanced around having these boons up, so perhaps having it 24/7 will lead to it being required for more content going forward.

When a boon is up 100% of the time it loses its character.  If Quick and Alac stacked like Might, it may feel different, but as they can both be always on when you gain the boon, what are they actually adding to the game?  They added power creep by allowing more groups to always have Quick and Alac with less investment from the players.  There is nothing unique or interesting about these boons now, and I would suggest that if having these boons 24/7 in PvE was the goal, they could have just reduced the CD and cast times of all skills across the game and still ended up in the same place.

So, I guess I agree that yes, Anet have defined this playstyle and meta, have continued to push towards this path, but it is a terrible choice and one I would like to see changed.  The change I would prefer to see is Quick and Alac boons having longer durations, lower base power, but can stack to 3 or 5 times to provide full utility.  This makes it a lot more like Might, where you are working towards having max stacks, but can gain partial benefit with less than full stacks.  This would reduce the effectiveness of Quick and Alac in many parts of PvE but offer support builds the ability to work towards max stacks of Quick or Alac and being effective support for the group, potentially engaging Support focus builds as opposed to DPS builds that are nerfed cause they offer support as well.

 

As to the OP, I think that it is time Anet showed us what they want.  Is it Heal Alac or Heal Quick or both.  Since there are 3 support roles and 2 support slots, and as Anet has shown they want to homogenize the game to 'make it easier for players to figure out' they may as well hard define if Alac or Quick are intended to be Heal primary.  This would help define the Healing roles by basically fitting one of the two primary boons with it.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Mungo Zen.9364

[Zaret.1450]

quickness and alac are the 2 core boons on pve, while in wvw you require more stability power and maybe swiftness, whyle theyre not oblygatory per se these boons have a huge impact in this game modes, of course a healer is a better slot as a boon, because of stat combinations possible, harrier for example, and because they loose the least, a boon dps usually has around 4-5k less in a boon version than a pure dps, while healers still have more than enought healing power with concentration.

Now with that said, heal vindi needs alacrity or something, the whole vindi elite has tons of rought corners and things to balance and smooth out, vicktor is a pure pure healer with literaly no other boon, only green numbers and condi cleanse, if it at least gave resistance (i think it was resistance? the boon that reduces condi dmg, and then maybe alac, or something) it would be more usefull, arche is also kinda.... meh, i mean it was buffed but it still lacks in my opinion, using it is usually kinda rought, it still has the endurance traits wich need some hard rework, etc etc.

If you want to play a heal vindi id advise you to go wvw, there it is a pretty good healer and jalis can help with stabs while ventary bubble is usefull on its own right.

REWORK VINDI ANET,  it needs some hard fine tunning (and both legends have literaly no sinergy at all, either sinergize them right, or in my opinion the best option, separate them completely, noone has a healdps vindi)

[Bunny.9834]

All Healspecs should have access to either Alac or Quickness. Otherwise it will not see regular play. Unlike DPS roles, Heal specs without those meta boons will always be passed for Heal specs that has those boons no matter how strong that healing is. 

 

Doing this will also help steamline LFG. 

The simplest solution really is to give Alacrity to Healers and Quickness to DPS. 

Core classes like Warriors or Rangers should’ve not even gotten these boons. (banners and spirits). It would make more sense for them to go to the e-specs. 

 

 

[Sobx.1758]

14 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

On paper, it's not that big a deal. And realistically, HAT is still a good build even without Elemental bastion. The healing output still trumps HAM especially if you run a staff. 

Heal on aura is a very significant though. It's overkill if you run Harrier/Minstrel stats + rune of monk, but If you're running a cele hybrid, you definitely notice a major difference in healing output with and without Elemental Bastion. If HAT had Elemental Bastion, you could potentially drop healing power entirely and run viper/rit stats and still heal for a ton. 

Keep an eye out if Anet ever does decide to merge the alac trait with Elemtental Bastion. HAT will become insane if they do. Unless they reduce its effectiveness to compensate, which I would be more than okay with. 

So you understand it can either provide enough heal and alac or drop alac to have more heal (for whatever reason) and yet you're saying they're paying a cost here. I'd maybe agree they're "paying cost" if they had some garbage-tier heal whenever they decided they want to provide the boon, but as it is now,... they don't. So they're not really paying anything, they can just choose to do one more thing -provide alac- or do what they're doing anyways -healing- but better.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[Riba.3271]

Well, while I think you are correct about these boons being a problem, I myself find the issue being that these boons are way too strong.  Fury? At most like 12% damage increase. Alac? Twice that. Quickness? So much more.

 

If you compare to other succesful MMORPGs, the buffs in this game are just ridiculously strong with too long of a duration. Which is easily proven by the fact that if you have 25% quickness upkeep instead of 100%, choosing the right moment to use it for optimum damage and get off key abilities during clutch moments requires skill. Whereas 100% is just 100%, not much skill required other than spamming certain skills off cooldown.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Riba.3271

[Gaiawolf.8261]

31 minutes ago, Riba.3271 said:

Well, while I think you are correct about these boons being a problem, I myself find the issue being that these boons are way too strong.  Fury? At most like 12% damage increase. Alac? Twice that. Quickness? So much more.

 

If you compare to other succesful MMORPGs, the buffs in this game are just ridiculously strong with too long of a duration. Which is easily proven by the fact that if you have 25% quickness upkeep instead of 100%, choosing the right moment to use it for optimum damage and get off key abilities during clutch moments requires skill. Whereas 100% is just 100%, not much skill required other than spamming certain skills off cooldown.

I'm of the same mindset. Boons would be so much more fun and dynamic if you couldn't keep them up 100%. Quickness would rock  if it was just available for short durations to quickly burst something down. Time it with your team for max effect. Alacrity could be for when you you really need to fire off a useful skill in quick succession; maybe make it recharge the next skill used 100% faster but only lasts a few seconds at most (oh that gives me 2005 GW vibes!). Other boons could be buffed and given the same treatment, which would make everything so much more dynamic and strategic. Of course, all this would require a major rework to the boon system.

Edited December 17, 2022 by Gaiawolf.8261

[Mungo Zen.9364]

36 minutes ago, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

I'm of the same mindset. Boons would be so much more fun and dynamic if you couldn't keep them up 100%. Quickness would rock  if it was just available for short durations to quickly burst something down. Time it with your team for max effect. Alacrity could be for when you you really need to fire off a useful skill in quick succession; maybe make it recharge the next skill used 100% faster but only lasts a few seconds at most (oh that gives me 2005 GW vibes!). Other boons could be buffed and given the same treatment, which would make everything so much more dynamic and strategic. Of course, all this would require a major rework to the boon system.

and probably the boss encounters as well.  I could see the combination of Breaking Defiance Bar -> Exposed Boss Debuff + Burn Phase where the burn phase we are using those short duration Alac and Quick buffs.  This is along the lines of what WoW did back in the day (not sure if that has changed).  You then adapt the encounters to have defiance bars inline with the proposed Alac and Quickness CDs.

I would also be for this type of approach.  However I wonder if a change like this would have a negative impact on PvP and WvW.

[LadyKitty.6120]

Kitty's kinda greatly disliked how they took that alac away from Vindi when they did Salvation revamp.

However.

There's something people don't seem to realize: the potential of boon extension. By using the "Vassals of the Empire"-trait (Extend boons when you dodge), you can extend the boon uptimes to the point that Boon DPSers can run 0% boon duration and even drop boon skills/traits for DPS ones in some cases. Ofc this means not taking the "Heal on Dodge"-trait but Revenant already has massive amounts of other heals.

And to tell about how effective it can be, just this build allows a Boon DPS with 50% BD to run 0% BD at fights without condi pressure and 80% can run 0% in heavy condi pressure while you'd RP a pogo stick. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmgAYZlZSJsTiilSTMUqiQhsSagl0zd8E-zxIYwoivMyMFquC8dWafzCqA-e

So, a 25k benching Boon DPS could likely bench something like 30-32k if using Heal Vindicator and as such, using Heal Vindi+2 boon DPS instead of typical boon DPS+Boon Healer is about equal overall due to DPS boosts the Boon DPSers get from boon extension. Not to forget that something like staff mirage gets extra benefit due to ability to spam Chaos Vortexes faster at condi pressure bosses (Heal Vindi can convert condis to massive amounts of endurance for allies) and might even be able to run Staff/Axe rota again.

[zeyeti.8347]

35 minutes ago, LadyKitty.6120 said:

Kitty's kinda greatly disliked how they took that alac away from Vindi when they did Salvation revamp.

However.

There's something people don't seem to realize: the potential of boon extension. By using the "Vassals of the Empire"-trait (Extend boons when you dodge), you can extend the boon uptimes to the point that Boon DPSers can run 0% boon duration and even drop boon skills/traits for DPS ones in some cases. Ofc this means not taking the "Heal on Dodge"-trait but Revenant already has massive amounts of other heals.

And to tell about how effective it can be, just this build allows a Boon DPS with 50% BD to run 0% BD at fights without condi pressure and 80% can run 0% in heavy condi pressure while you'd RP a pogo stick. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmgAYZlZSJsTiilSTMUqiQhsSagl0zd8E-zxIYwoivMyMFquC8dWafzCqA-e

So, a 25k benching Boon DPS could likely bench something like 30-32k if using Heal Vindicator and as such, using Heal Vindi+2 boon DPS instead of typical boon DPS+Boon Healer is about equal overall due to DPS boosts the Boon DPSers get from boon extension. Not to forget that something like staff mirage gets extra benefit due to ability to spam Chaos Vortexes faster at condi pressure bosses (Heal Vindi can convert condis to massive amounts of endurance for allies) and might even be able to run Staff/Axe rota again.

Boon extension from herald is still stronger (extension for 10 peeps) and demanding that will need a lot of group adaptation , adaptation a lot of ppl will not do cause only one guy play a fancy build. 

The thing is the Op was maybe one of the few trying vindi alacheal and when revamped herald giving quickness was there , anet had to get ridoff alacrity from core ventari revenant , or else herald could give alacrity + quickness (and would be played as healer , and asked in 90% of the lfg).

Still there is a easy solution to this problem , just add alacrity to one of the trait of vindi (on a dodge , why not) so it could be played as dps/alac and heal/alac.

Op is angry because he surely invested in a stuff for vindi.heal and it did not get nerfed , it was simply wipe out of the meta.

For me it is still a bad design choice to give some core specs access to quickness or alacrity group , means that all actual and future e-specs would be cut out the opposite boon the core spec gives.

Edited December 29, 2022 by zeyeti.8347

[LadyKitty.6120]

2 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

Boon extension from herald is still stronger (extension for 10 peeps) and demanding that will need a lot of group adaptation , adaptation a lot of ppl will not do cause only one guy play a fancy build. 

Boon extension on Herald being better isn't effectively 100% true. Many healers over-cap the effective boon output already without that extra 20% and since Boon DPSers and healers take care of boons, in typical comp there's only 1 other player who truly benefits from that +20% of Herald's: the other Boon DPS. But even then, having specifically QuickHerald to allow the other sub's Boon DPS to run lower BD (and usually can't run 0% even in that case) is even more restricting that running Heal Vindi which does allow the 2 Boon DPSers in its sub to use DPS gears with some boon traits/skills to bring full quick+alac (in other words, pretty much anyone of suitable class can bring the boons so even most DPSers can change to Boon DPS without issues). Heal Vindi doesn't set ANY requirements for the other sub like fully utilizing QuickHeralf would. And considering that people occasionally use Heal Scourge which has only Might to offer, Kitty fails to see why Heal Vindi would be any more issue.

Besides, have people already forgotten about old days of druid+QB+AlacRen combo? Also required healer+QuickDPS+AlacDPS (latter 2 requiring BD gears) and people even wanted such comp most of the time so Kitty fails to see why Heal Vindi would be any harder esp. since it actually makes having Boon DPSers easier.

[Zaret.1450]

On 12/16/2022 at 8:53 PM, Bunny.9834 said:

All Healspecs should have access to either Alac or Quickness. Otherwise it will not see regular play. Unlike DPS roles, Heal specs without those meta boons will always be passed for Heal specs that has those boons no matter how strong that healing is. 

 

Doing this will also help steamline LFG. 

The simplest solution really is to give Alacrity to Healers and Quickness to DPS. 

Core classes like Warriors or Rangers should’ve not even gotten these boons. (banners and spirits). It would make more sense for them to go to the e-specs. 

 

 

The thing about warr and ranger is that both banners and spirits are core class skills, and both have worked on suport purposes since the start, so reworking the core classes, removing the skills and all traits involved, replace them with new things and then do a similar thing to either one or more of the elite specs is the only way it could work, thats a huge amount of work, would involve a monstrous change to the clases themselves, and you cant make sure everyone, or even half of the players, would agree or want the change, meaning it is too problematic to even think about realy doing it, to compare, think about ranger, imagine removing the nature magic trait that gives boons to pet, and adding that effect to a trait in beastmastery or a skill passive like mec has, it is a fairly simple, small change, a couple of traits/skills, but it could mean a substantial change to how the ranger plays as it is a core mecanic, it might be more beneficial and id like that change, but now imagine doing that to nature magic traits, as most are involved in boons/suport/healing, plus all 5 spirits skills, now to add them to druid as hes the healer elite replace druid traits, and then modify glyphs so either they give the boons wich would mean creating whole new skills for core ranger, or changing them so glyphs are going to the core ranger while spirits go to druid, also modifiing glyph sinergy with avatar so spirits have a similar effect, and make glyphs unique enought that noone will misunderstand them for sigils, thatd be almost too much.

yeah thief traps were changed too, and honestly it was a great change, but its traps were pretty... bland, and id say bad overall, just changing the skills for new ones, more of an upgrade than a whole change, while spirits have allwais had a huge impact on ranger overall.

[mizaru.1385]

On 12/17/2022 at 7:33 AM, Riba.3271 said:

Well, while I think you are correct about these boons being a problem, I myself find the issue being that these boons are way too strong.  Fury? At most like 12% damage increase. Alac? Twice that. Quickness? So much more.

 

If you compare to other succesful MMORPGs, the buffs in this game are just ridiculously strong with too long of a duration. Which is easily proven by the fact that if you have 25% quickness upkeep instead of 100%, choosing the right moment to use it for optimum damage and get off key abilities during clutch moments requires skill. Whereas 100% is just 100%, not much skill required other than spamming certain skills off cooldown.

 

This I agree. 

 

Look at other MMOs, their "haste" buff is always controlled and not dished out commonly without any CD. This is the first game I have seen that makes things go speedy mode by stacking in a bunch, then 100% alacrity and 100% quickness and mass blow things down. It becomes so important that without those 2 buffs, performance gets halved........

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

I've said it many times in the past, but quickness becoming a boon was like cat in a bag.  Once it got out, you aren't getting that thing back in there.  This presents two different issues.  

First, it meant that future content started being designed under the assumption that these boons would have either high or permanent uptime.  This creates a problem where the boons don't really exist to give identity or as a means to bolster teammates, insomuch as it is a punishment mechanic for not having them present.  Alacrity isn't too bad, albeit generally powerful, but quickness raising the entire team's damage by 30%-50% by itself is massive.  Where DPS is actually supposed to matter, enemies had to be given health pools and damage-based mechanics where quickness was expected.  Otherwise, the presence of permanent quickness would trivialize the fight.  And no, saying that a bunch of elite raiders managed to beat some boss using masterwork gear or auto attacks isn't disproof of these design choices, for the average player of this game is several times weaker than the elites.  

Second, it meant that there was a fundamental disconnect between how the game felt to play in high end PVE, as compared to everywhere else.  Skills moving 50% faster meant that buttons had to be pressed 50% faster to keep up, which has been hell for me and my unending wrist pain.  This disconnect between game modes meant that performance didn't translate over between game modes, making it difficult for everyone else to do fractals/strikes/raids, and vice versa.  The internal tempo is thrown off, and all the muscle memory amounts to nothing.  Quickness is the main culprit here, but alacrity also throws off the timing for players, too. 

This second problem has been known for awhile, so Anet decided to solve this problem by creating Jade Overcharge Buffs having them function anywhere in overworld Tyria.  Doing this has definitely helped with hurdle when transitioning from game modes.  Of course, this has had the side-effect where all prior overworld content has been power-crept, the ability to manage self-boons on professions is now a nigh worthless consideration while solo, and... future content (Soo-Won, for example) had to be designed assuming that overcharge buffs were present.  The rapid button pressing being everywhere certainly hasn't helped with my wrist pain, either.

 

Removing these boons isn't an option.  Anet themselves said that PVE is based around quickness and alacrity in their balance philosophy, and they've also changed might and fury generation to be automatic in large teams.  The removal of quickness alone would involve adjusting all the fractals, raids, and strikes to compensate for their loss, or it would require the introduction of something new and equally powerful to compensate.  Personally I wouldn't mind a group comp that was x2 healer with x8 DPS, but I'm certain there would be complaints from players that can't play as a buffer now.  We just have to accept that this is the game now.  

[Obtena.7952]

There is a fundamental reason these boons exist and hold the position of importance: they both enable the low to average capability player in instanced content without those players changing how they play.

Anyone that proposes they would get reduced or even removed from the game shows a severe lack of understanding about how this game works and who plays it. 

Edited December 30, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[zeyeti.8347]

On 12/29/2022 at 3:31 PM, LadyKitty.6120 said:

Boon extension on Herald being better isn't effectively 100% true. Many healers over-cap the effective boon output already without that extra 20% and since Boon DPSers and healers take care of boons, in typical comp there's only 1 other player who truly benefits from that +20% of Herald's: the other Boon DPS. But even then, having specifically QuickHerald to allow the other sub's Boon DPS to run lower BD (and usually can't run 0% even in that case) is even more restricting that running Heal Vindi which does allow the 2 Boon DPSers in its sub to use DPS gears with some boon traits/skills to bring full quick+alac (in other words, pretty much anyone of suitable class can bring the boons so even most DPSers can change to Boon DPS without issues). Heal Vindi doesn't set ANY requirements for the other sub like fully utilizing QuickHeralf would. And considering that people occasionally use Heal Scourge which has only Might to offer, Kitty fails to see why Heal Vindi would be any more issue.

Besides, have people already forgotten about old days of druid+QB+AlacRen combo? Also required healer+QuickDPS+AlacDPS (latter 2 requiring BD gears) and people even wanted such comp most of the time so Kitty fails to see why Heal Vindi would be any harder esp. since it actually makes having Boon DPSers easier.

Cause the healers you mention have access to those key boons , only vindi heal has none of those , and for your information the herald is a double boon duration amplifier , +20% duration when passiv is active (on 10 peeps) and a +3 sec when used (on 5 people) .

Also , even if vindi could have access to alacrity , he lacks other boons , he can stack up might and prot. actually , and his dodge who can heal and give barrier has not the boon extension , those end traits are weirdly designed , the only good one is the +15% damage.

Herald has good damage for a support with so many boons , and it is not so far to also become a good healer , cannot be compared to vindi heal , no wonder there is no build listed for it endgame pve .

What you said on the comp. druid +Qfb+ren was only taken cause the spirits were a great addition to a whole squad , people can say +5% damage was nothing (from frost spirit) but +5% damage on an entire squad is huge ! just imagine your 6 dps are benching , let's say... 15k , a +5% , do the math thats worth it , now that druid can give alac , the composition will always be the same in most cases : 2 heals giving alac or quick , 2 dps/support adding the missing boons from the two healers , rest dps . No place for a heal without alacrity or quickness , neither a dps , with some weird boon extension dealing sub damage.

you want vindi heal back ? he needs to put on alacrity , no one in the squad will want to adapt their builds and habits , removing 1 or 2 concentration pieces of armor to add minimal damage change , and have a useless healer ...who extend boon from 1 seconde each time he flyes to the air or have a dps loosing a big chunky +15% damage . Stil , it could get some use to play it dps with boon extension on encounters where boon sharing is hard (like Harvets temple cm), but in 95% of the case , it would be useless , healers and support dish out boons like a machinegun.

Edited January 2, 2023 by zeyeti.8347

[LadyKitty.6120]

On 1/2/2023 at 3:22 PM, zeyeti.8347 said:

Cause the healers you mention have access to those key boons , only vindi heal has none of those , and for your information the herald is a double boon duration amplifier , +20% duration when passiv is active (on 10 peeps) and a +3 sec when used (on 5 people) .

Also , even if vindi could have access to alacrity , he lacks other boons , he can stack up might and prot. actually , and his dodge who can heal and give barrier has not the boon extension , those end traits are weirdly designed , the only good one is the +15% damage.

Herald has good damage for a support with so many boons , and it is not so far to also become a good healer , cannot be compared to vindi heal , no wonder there is no build listed for it endgame pve .

What you said on the comp. druid +Qfb+ren was only taken cause the spirits were a great addition to a whole squad , people can say +5% damage was nothing (from frost spirit) but +5% damage on an entire squad is huge ! just imagine your 6 dps are benching , let's say... 15k , a +5% , do the math thats worth it , now that druid can give alac , the composition will always be the same in most cases : 2 heals giving alac or quick , 2 dps/support adding the missing boons from the two healers , rest dps . No place for a heal without alacrity or quickness , neither a dps , with some weird boon extension dealing sub damage.

you want vindi heal back ? he needs to put on alacrity , no one in the squad will want to adapt their builds and habits , removing 1 or 2 concentration pieces of armor to add minimal damage change , and have a useless healer ...who extend boon from 1 seconde each time he flyes to the air or have a dps loosing a big chunky +15% damage . Stil , it could get some use to play it dps with boon extension on encounters where boon sharing is hard (like Harvets temple cm), but in 95% of the case , it would be useless , healers and support dish out boons like a machinegun.

For starters, Kitty doesn't really need FYIs as she knows the build system quite thoroughly and she usually maths more than she plays (after all, she's done quite a bit of build pioneering). Anyway, guess Kitty needs to elaborate...

Glint F2 is indeed +20% BD that bypasses the normal cap. And it has a +3 when used. But. +20% is only up when you have it active or for 6s after consuming with 16s CD after consuming which means 10s gap without that buff if you ever consume it. As such, there's only a few cases where it's worth it and doing so means not being able to share it reliably. The extension after consuming mainly covers for that a bit but it's nothing more than compensation if it's used for the passive effect. (Using it on QuickHerald is more understandable since it needs to Consume anyway and 3/10>20%.)
But as such, there's not that many cases where it actually adds to boon duration over squad as to get full benefit, Herald's boost needs to 1. be reliable (Can be costly opportunity-wise) and 2. have other booners (as Kitty thinks she mentioned in previous post) for all 10 to adjust their gears for more healing/attack power. Including your and the other sub. For healers, that means swapping stuff to Magi's (Or Marshal's or Zealot's or Minstrel's) which essentially means legendary gears or former "Kitty's bank".

So, compared to pogo stick HealVindi, not very impressive boost. Although HealVindi does have the problem of there having to be existing stacks to extend but that wasn't an issue when Kitty playing HealVindi when it was a thing. But that's why margins exist anyway.

And so, when it comes to spirits, at golem, typical squad would get about 13k DPS boost from Frost Spirit if all (Boon)DPSers were power. Comparing the same numbers to Kitty's earlier calculations, guess what? The lowered boon duration requirement from running HealVindi+2 Boon DPS+2 DPS would also give about 12-14k DPS boost for whole squad. But doesn't even require everyone to be power which is a bonus. So after doing the math, it does seem like there would actually be even more reason to use HealVindi today than there was to use a druid before in Healer+QDPS+ADPS comp (excluding mechanics-reasons but those don't require druid these days or the other sub's healer can be alacdruid to cover those stuffs).
And for clarity: for the math Kitty used Druid/HVindi+QDPS+ADPS+2DPS / Healer+Boon DPS+3DPS comp with DPSers doing 38k, Boon DPSers doing 25k and healers doing 3k each which are what mediocre metabuilds do at golem atm.

And for the last part: please don't even hint at the horror that was Power VoE Vindicator. Kitty played it once as Power Alac Vindi and that's one of the few builds she didn't get to work even decently 'cause it spent too much time in the air without doing enough damage landing and didn't have enough time to hit stuff for DPS.

To be more serious: It's not just "1 or 2 concentration pieces". 50% BD is 750 Concentration. From stat set with 4 stats, minor stats from all gear pieces give 633 Concentration. If you add concentration food on that, that's almost 50% Boon Duration.
In other words: With Heal Vindicator, a boon DPS that would need full Ritualist's and boon duration food could use full Viper's with DPS food. Inversely, a pure Condi FB could be a full quickbrand just by couple trait and utility skill swaps and if you provide them with some sussy consumables that boost Concentration instead of Condi Damage. Power Engi just needs to pull out a hammer and put on Scrapper DPS build with one trait change. You can tell any warrior to just take Banner of Tactics+Banner of Whatever and they can Quick DPS with ease (there's even some room for them to delay the banner if rota requires). So, need to change habits and learn a new rota? Mostly less than in having to adjust rotas during boss fights anyway so shouldn't be a big deal anyway (unless you've literally pressed 1111111 before and on alac mech or Quick Bomberscrapper, even that works with HealVindi).

[Kal Durak.2830]

On 12/11/2022 at 3:52 AM, Nightstorm.8024 said:

Healers are literally getting instantly kicked if you don't bring 1 of these 2 boons. That means that these boons are so mandatory to the meta that healers aren't even wanted. That pretty much means this game fundamentally revolves around 2 overpowered buffs. 

 

Please Anet get rid of them. This is suppose to be a game where everyone and every class is welcome, but when it comes to strikes and raids, you basically HAVE to have them or you get the boot. 

Anets mistake.. You are right.  Oh wait, let's nerf everyone first!

[zeyeti.8347]

1 hour ago, LadyKitty.6120 said:

For starters, Kitty doesn't really need FYIs as she knows the build system quite thoroughly and she usually maths more than she plays (after all, she's done quite a bit of build pioneering). Anyway, guess Kitty needs to elaborate...

Glint F2 is indeed +20% BD that bypasses the normal cap. And it has a +3 when used. But. +20% is only up when you have it active or for 6s after consuming with 16s CD after consuming which means 10s gap without that buff if you ever consume it. As such, there's only a few cases where it's worth it and doing so means not being able to share it reliably. The extension after consuming mainly covers for that a bit but it's nothing more than compensation if it's used for the passive effect. (Using it on QuickHerald is more understandable since it needs to Consume anyway and 3/10>20%.)
But as such, there's not that many cases where it actually adds to boon duration over squad as to get full benefit, Herald's boost needs to 1. be reliable (Can be costly opportunity-wise) and 2. have other booners (as Kitty thinks she mentioned in previous post) for all 10 to adjust their gears for more healing/attack power. Including your and the other sub. For healers, that means swapping stuff to Magi's (Or Marshal's or Zealot's or Minstrel's) which essentially means legendary gears or former "Kitty's bank".

So, compared to pogo stick HealVindi, not very impressive boost. Although HealVindi does have the problem of there having to be existing stacks to extend but that wasn't an issue when Kitty playing HealVindi when it was a thing. But that's why margins exist anyway.

And so, when it comes to spirits, at golem, typical squad would get about 13k DPS boost from Frost Spirit if all (Boon)DPSers were power. Comparing the same numbers to Kitty's earlier calculations, guess what? The lowered boon duration requirement from running HealVindi+2 Boon DPS+2 DPS would also give about 12-14k DPS boost for whole squad. But doesn't even require everyone to be power which is a bonus. So after doing the math, it does seem like there would actually be even more reason to use HealVindi today than there was to use a druid before in Healer+QDPS+ADPS comp (excluding mechanics-reasons but those don't require druid these days or the other sub's healer can be alacdruid to cover those stuffs).
And for clarity: for the math Kitty used Druid/HVindi+QDPS+ADPS+2DPS / Healer+Boon DPS+3DPS comp with DPSers doing 38k, Boon DPSers doing 25k and healers doing 3k each which are what mediocre metabuilds do at golem atm.

And for the last part: please don't even hint at the horror that was Power VoE Vindicator. Kitty played it once as Power Alac Vindi and that's one of the few builds she didn't get to work even decently 'cause it spent too much time in the air without doing enough damage landing and didn't have enough time to hit stuff for DPS.

To be more serious: It's not just "1 or 2 concentration pieces". 50% BD is 750 Concentration. From stat set with 4 stats, minor stats from all gear pieces give 633 Concentration. If you add concentration food on that, that's almost 50% Boon Duration.
In other words: With Heal Vindicator, a boon DPS that would need full Ritualist's and boon duration food could use full Viper's with DPS food. Inversely, a pure Condi FB could be a full quickbrand just by couple trait and utility skill swaps and if you provide them with some sussy consumables that boost Concentration instead of Condi Damage. Power Engi just needs to pull out a hammer and put on Scrapper DPS build with one trait change. You can tell any warrior to just take Banner of Tactics+Banner of Whatever and they can Quick DPS with ease (there's even some room for them to delay the banner if rota requires). So, need to change habits and learn a new rota? Mostly less than in having to adjust rotas during boss fights anyway so shouldn't be a big deal anyway (unless you've literally pressed 1111111 before and on alac mech or Quick Bomberscrapper, even that works with HealVindi).

Oh sorry i forgot about druid sun spirit , giving each squad member a 2 stacks of burn each few sec , point is nobody plays healvindi , and don't tell me that the hardcore players haven't already tried your strategy , but ... no healvindi in the whole game , and just try to come into a squad and say you will heal as vindicator , i bet you know what will follow , an instant kick ... also boon extension from vindi is on a freaking 240 aoe wide , druid was played for a reason and healvindi is not played for a reason , it's not me saying it it's the stats ! https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/popularity i bet that the 1,84% vindi players are playing heal ... no , only solution is to add alacrity to vindi boons . 

And plz stop talking a bout kittens , that make your post awkward 😂

Edited January 3, 2023 by zeyeti.8347

[LadyKitty.6120]

2 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

Oh sorry i forgot about druid sun spirit , giving each squad member a 2 stacks of burn each few sec , point is nobody plays healvindi , and don't tell me that the hardcore players haven't already tried your strategy , but ... no healvindi in the whole game , and just try to come into a squad and say you will heal as vindicator , i bet you know what will follow , an instant kick ... also boon extension from vindi is on a freaking 240 aoe wide , druid was played for a reason and healvindi is not played for a reason , it's not me saying it it's the stats ! https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/popularity i bet that the 1,84% vindi players are playing heal ... no , only solution is to add alacrity to vindi boons . 

And plz stop talking a bout kittens , that make your post awkward 😂

Once again, Kitty already knows and if she remembers correctly, Sun Spirit was about 1.8k DPS to condi-DPSers on metabuilds and that merely compensated for condibuilds not getting most of Frost Spirit's effect. (About 15-25% of condi-DPS's damage is power in most cases.)
And you know, just because something isn't popular doesn't mean it's not effective. Raid community is painfully slow at recognizing and picking up effective builds if they're not on benchmark site. It took longer than a year for Heal Scourge to be recognized as the OP carry build (MTP popularized it but Kitty had already made videos about it soon after PoF arrived). Chaos Chrono was totally unused for a long time 'cause people thought it was horrible but then there were some videos and noise about its insane boon potential and it got demolished in a couple months later 'cause it was too OP (essentially Boon Thief before Boon Thief happened). Boon Thief and Alac Ren was a combo that people didn't even know about until some swifty teef and a Kitty went testing and published a vid about it (and even then it took until a QoL buff 7 months later that AlacRene finally became popular). Even then, it was a super-niche combo despite of being the META. If needed, Kitty can provide more examples of why using popularity is a fallacy in build arguments.

[Ashantara.8731]

On 12/11/2022 at 10:59 PM, Nightstorm.8024 said:

Game is suppose to be about skill

And keeping up certain boons while performing other tasks at the same time, such as playing some of the complex mechanics while tanking or healing and protecting your team, doesn't require any skill?

In that case, I am curious what your definition of "skill" is, frankly.
 

Edited January 4, 2023 by Ashantara.8731