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Specters: can we talk about Initiative now?


Parasite.5389

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With the introduction of Weaponsmaster Training to the game, we are beginning to see more variations to buildcraft across all classes and elite specs with many popular Condition and Power build swapping roles thanks to the access of other E.spec weapons skills; The Specter however seems to be struggling to shake off it's role as a Condition/support class due, in part, to it's reduced Initiative pool.

The original design philosophy behind the Specters penalty was to slow the application of conditions and prevent stacks from building faster than other Condition classes and stop them being too over powered.
Power/Staff Specter feels sluggish, and Rifle is barely useable, being able to fire 2 three round bursts in PvE, and 1 in Competetive before completely exhusting their initiative; conversely Daredevil and Deadeye see an increase in Condition damage output via Scepter thanks to their larger initiative pool.

I Believe it's now time to reconsider the Specters initiative penalty and instead rebalance the initiative cost of Scepter skills, making power/Specter builds much more viable and preventing another potential nerf to condition Thief in general by rebalancing the scepter skills damage numbers.

Edited by Parasite.5389
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Currently Scepter feels better on the other two specs over Specter just cuz you got more Ini with it. Daredevil actually heals better with it than Specter because of it imo.

And it's not only sad that there's no power-based traits for Specter but it doesn't help that both Specter's minor traits are weapon-specific; requiring Scepter and Stealth. They're just dead nodes with everything else.

 

 

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I still don't understand the logic in reducing specters initiative. Was there any issues with the speed of condi application on dagger, sword, pistol, or shot bow? Or was it just scepter?

If it's just scepter why not increase the cost of weapon skills?

Obviously this isn't an issue with the rest of specter (shroud & utilities don't take initiative)...

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9 minutes ago, Flobings.7251 said:

I still don't understand the logic in reducing specters initiative. Was there any issues with the speed of condi application on dagger, sword, pistol, or shot bow? Or was it just scepter?

If it's just scepter why not increase the cost of weapon skills?

Obviously this isn't an issue with the rest of specter (shroud & utilities don't take initiative)...

I get why it could have been a developer concern, but playing the spec could have answered that for them. None of the Scepter skills are very fast to begin with and most of the stacking damage conditions are on auto attacks. They might have considered it fair given the access to Shadow Shroud to stagger between Initiative and Shroud, but then Shroud can barely take a hit and even if Specter had full Initiative, Shadow Force still takes the same amount of time to fill depending on your traits. 

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What I like about Specter is that it isn't just spamming one weapon skill over and over again. Yes it does spam skill 3 but then it goes into Shroud and has to balance the cooldown skills.

 

Then after I'm done in Shroud I can go back to the real world and use the Thief mechanic again.

 

What the lower Initiative does is shorten the time before you have a full bar. The trait gives the same amount of Initiative on Weapon Swap. So it will let you use a full skill when triggered but if the initiative was higher then it wouldn't.

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3 hours ago, Flobings.7251 said:

I still don't understand the logic in reducing specters initiative. Was there any issues with the speed of condi application on dagger, sword, pistol, or shot bow? Or was it just scepter?

If it's just scepter why not increase the cost of weapon skills?

Obviously this isn't an issue with the rest of specter (shroud & utilities don't take initiative)...

Specter was pretty cracked in early EoD, so they nerfed the fk out of it. It's always had less initiative though, that's the trade off for a third weapon/2nd health bar. Specter is still really strong in PvP, it's the best thief spec ATM. 

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19 hours ago, Flobings.7251 said:

I still don't understand the logic in reducing specters initiative. Was there any issues with the speed of condi application on dagger, sword, pistol, or shot bow? Or was it just scepter?

If it's just scepter why not increase the cost of weapon skills?

Obviously this isn't an issue with the rest of specter (shroud & utilities don't take initiative)...

Specter was made in the period where ArenaNet believed that every elite spec needed to have some form of tradeoff (beyond, you know, the inherent tradeoff of not taking a third core traitline). Specter's was reduced initiative. And, to be fair, when EoD launched, this worked - you made up for lower initiative by going into shroud and letting your initiative recover. As @WhoWantsAHug.3186 pointed out, though, specter on launch proved pretty strong, especially in sPvP, which led to stiff nerfs.

The balance team has floated giving specter more initiative, but hasn't taken the plunge.

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 8/30/2023 at 2:00 AM, Parasite.5389 said:

With the introduction of Weaponsmaster Training to the game, we are beginning to see more variations to buildcraft across all classes and elite specs with many popular Condition and Power build swapping roles thanks to the access of other E.spec weapons skills; The Specter however seems to be struggling to shake off it's role as a Condition/support class due, in part, to it's reduced Initiative pool.

The original design philosophy behind the Specters penalty was to slow the application of conditions and prevent stacks from building faster than other Condition classes and stop them being too over powered.
Power/Staff Specter feels sluggish, and Rifle is barely useable, being able to fire 2 three round bursts in PvE, and 1 in Competetive before completely exhusting their initiative; conversely Daredevil and Deadeye see an increase in Condition damage output via Scepter thanks to their larger initiative pool.

I Believe it's now time to reconsider the Specters initiative penalty and instead rebalance the initiative cost of Scepter skills, making power/Specter builds much more viable and preventing another potential nerf to condition Thief in general by rebalancing the scepter skills damage numbers.

oh look... they rebalanced the damage numbers ¬_¬

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On 8/29/2023 at 7:00 PM, Parasite.5389 said:

With the introduction of Weaponsmaster Training to the game, we are beginning to see more variations to buildcraft across all classes and elite specs with many popular Condition and Power build swapping roles thanks to the access of other E.spec weapons skills; The Specter however seems to be struggling to shake off it's role as a Condition/support class due, in part, to it's reduced Initiative pool.

The original design philosophy behind the Specters penalty was to slow the application of conditions and prevent stacks from building faster than other Condition classes and stop them being too over powered.
Power/Staff Specter feels sluggish, and Rifle is barely useable, being able to fire 2 three round bursts in PvE, and 1 in Competetive before completely exhusting their initiative; conversely Daredevil and Deadeye see an increase in Condition damage output via Scepter thanks to their larger initiative pool.

I Believe it's now time to reconsider the Specters initiative penalty and instead rebalance the initiative cost of Scepter skills, making power/Specter builds much more viable and preventing another potential nerf to condition Thief in general by rebalancing the scepter skills damage numbers.

So true it hurts.

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ANet Balance Team 🤡: we decided to remove trade-off since it doesn't feel good and doesn't make sense.

ANet Balance Team 🤡 for the next year and a half: trade-offs are fine for thief.

ANet Balance Team 🤡: Acrobatics is fine. Sword is fine in PvE. Pistol MH is fine. 2 off-hands only is fine. Trickery is a fine. Preparedness is fine. Sleight of Hand is fine. Initiative costs in PvP is fine. Thief is fine - it's a class made to run away and make the average person FEEL like they lost, when they ACTUALLY won, considering the Thief was forced to run. 🤡

Edited by Asra.8746
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