A Msg To GW2 - Heal Tempest Buffs

[Gabbs.1087]

Hey Everyone, 

I just wanted to post about how Heal Tempest has fallen behind every other healer at the moment in the support role in raids. My hope is maybe the mods will see and it will spark some discussion. (Long Shot Haha) 

 

First off I love and have mained Heal Tempest for years and today it’s still a good healer. It’s just falling behind more and more every patch it seems. 
 

I really hope GW2 in the future buffs HAT so it’s more competitive with Druid, Mech, Etc. 
 

A good start would be letting us pick both Alac and healing auras Vs putting them both on the same trait line. If we could have both it would put us in the right direction at least. 
 

It would also be amazing is GW2 would make scepter water 3 heal allies again Vs just the caster. This would give some more range healing ability which would be great for a heal tempest player. 
 

Also, making our fire overload radius 360 would be a step in the right direction. That way people don’t have to stand right on top of the caster to get our buffs.
 

If you are thinking about picking up HAT please do! It’s still great and seen commonly in the raid scene. I just hope one day we get more love. 
 

-EndOfRant<3

[crosknight.3041]

issues i have with heal tempest is currently. MASSIVE lack of support options outside of water, and alac on overload.

Alac on overload means you are cycling through all your attunements instead of camping water. ok. the issue is that you as a healer are discouraged from overloading water to prevent it from being put on a longer cooldown, which causes your two responsibilities to the group to clash. overloading water is your biggest and most reliable heal, but since you'll be locked out of most of your healing options if you use it to provide alac you do not want to use it in case you do need to go back to it. the alac trait also competes with the aura heal trait which was the heal tempests bread and butter for years and made them one of the most reliable healers in the game, despite not providing quickness or alacrity.

then we got the utility situation. currently we only really got wash pain away, water signet, ice bow auto attack and water elite glyph (mighta missed one). with ele shouts having some boon support, they arent as used as healing options without the aura heal trait. ele needs a massive utility rework to compete with the best healers like firebrand or mechanist.

[Gabbs.1087]

You have amazing points! I hope with enough HAT players raising their voice we can see some positive changes in the future. I always try to remain hopeful because I just love Tempest so much and I will always stand by how good and great it can be. 

Edited September 7, 2023 by GabbyGoesHa.6079

[Chyro.1462]

I really enjoy the flow and decision making tempest has with requiring to swap elements for the alac upkeep. To sometimes decide whether its smarter to stay in water a bit longer or to risk going out even if its gonna be on cooldown for a bit. To overload water in an emergency or not to. Using the utility heals to fill in the gaps when unable to go back in water. Honestly I'm quite satisfied with how Tempest currently plays as healer and wouldn't want it changed. Having more options to support or heal wouldn't be bad, could be nice. But I don't really want its current flow to be changed.

[Chyro.1462]

What's so confusing about my post? Just ask if I was unclear about something. Or is it that odd for someone to be satisfied with the current state of the class? ^^

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

15 minutes ago, Chyro.1462 said:

What's so confusing about my post? Just ask if I was unclear about something. Or is it that odd for someone to be satisfied with the current state of the class? ^^

the problem is that it plays worse than every other healer due to having almost no healing outside of water attunement. even if you cycle over water twice in your rotation, you're still spending the majority of your time doing damage and giving boons rather than healing.

 

compare this to something like firebrand, machinist or even scourge who are doing damage, giving boons, and healing 24/7.

Edited September 7, 2023 by SoftFootpaws.9134

[Gabbs.1087]

 SoftFootPaws makes a very valid point - I love HAT currently as well,  but I’m not blind to the fact it needs more access to healing outside of water. Like I said originally if we could pick Alac and healing auras at once Vs only one that would be a step in the right direction. Not a solid fix but it’s something. 

Edited September 7, 2023 by GabbyGoesHa.6079

[oCynder.5136]

They missed the mark when they first introduced Alac to overloads. In a PVP sense, they would want players to pick one that you either provide alac or you provide heals through shouts. But I believe they can go in the direction moving Elemental Bastion to replace Gale Song. I actually don't see the point of Gale Song trait in majority of the builds when the other two options are superior. I did like the idea before the introduction to alac on overloads, you just heal through shouts. And that was a fun concept but the alacrity trait is what you take now.

The problem with healers though in this game. It's not about the healing. It's just throwing out all the boons. Healers are just boonsbot. It's kind of a misconception that you think of a healer is to heal and keep party members healthy, but it's like almost the opposite in this game. As for healing, it does feel restrictive if you don't have your water up and a long CD if you overload water and you only have your utilities if it not off CD.

But I do agree that the fire overload needs to have the 360 radius rather 180. It is restrictive especially if you want to play it as a DPS support. I also want to have more options for weapon choices rather being stuck to dagger/warhorn (this is just the best combo at the moment for supporting). I missed the scepter when it was viable but it was gutted because of PVP which also translate over to PVE.

Utilities wise though, I want better core utilities that also translate over to Catalyst heal (off-meta healer). Giving access to warhorn on a Cata is great but I still want better utilities. The same goes for weapons. More healing options somehow. Staff is good but it underperforms so much as of right now. And pressing Staff Fire 4 is risky.... that is something I hate.

Edited September 9, 2023 by oCynder.5136
Corrected Fire overload radius

[Joswi.2635]

I love HAT too, I just wish it was as easy to play and heal with as some of the other heal/alac classes. I really dislike alac being tied to overloads but if they are going to keep it on there it would be nice if Lucid Singularity made overloads pulse alac and also reduced the base cooldown of overloads, to like 10sec, the normal attunement recharge. That way you could keep 100% alac uptime within one element. That would also make it not as punishing to leave water after overloading. The other thing would be to make a major overhaul to the conjures to make it so frost bow is a good healing weapon that you can use in any attunement without a timer on it.

[the krytan assassin.9235]

HAT is fine atm. I would love to see Fire overload on 360 range though. Also more access to breakbar dmge would be very helpful. Healing access outside water is more then good enough (regen, soothing mist, wash the pain away, signet of water and elite water ele). Aurashare healing really isn't needed (only real bonus is the extra access to condi cleanse). 

Compared to other healers

Tempest is top tier in terms of access to stabi, aegis, rezzing power, ranged healing, sustain and burst healing

Tempest is mid tier in terms of mobility, breakbar dmge and tanking 

Tempest is bottom tier in terms of condi cleanse, might generation, projectile blocks/reflects and barrier output. 

Condi cleanse is still more then enough, only abit troublesome at encounters such as IBS strikes/TL with alot of chilled/movement restrictive conditions. 

Might generation isnt an issue if the qdps or rest of the group provides decent might uptime. Warhorn & glyph of lesser eles are also usually able to solve the issue. 

Projectile block/reflects and barrier output can be nice in some specific niche situations, but pretty much irrelevant for 95% of the encounters 

Defiance break for d/wh is mediocre at best since the cyclone nerf and defiance break is horrible for staff. Changing Gust to a launch or adding some stun/daze on top of its current effect would be really nice. Most of all tornado deserves to get a proper rework, reduce cd to 40/60 seconds and give it decent defiance break. 

[Gabbs.1087]

On the note above when someone said they wish HAT was easier to play. 
 

Me personally I love that it’s the hardest healer to main. I take pride in mastering the class and knowing when to go in/out of elements. 
 

I hate playing no talent/overly easy classes. 
 

That is just me though haha.

Edited September 8, 2023 by GabbyGoesHa.6079

[oCynder.5136]

9 hours ago, GabbyGoesHa.6079 said:

On the note above when someone said they wish HAT was easier to play. 
 

Me personally I love that it’s the hardest healer to main. I take pride in mastering the class and knowing when to go in/out of elements. 
 

I hate playing no talent/overly easy classes. 
 

That is just me though haha.

HAT is already easy to play but it does take a while to understand what you need to take per encounter. It is complex.

 

But there can be some improvements that Anet can do to make it better like fire overload radius. There should be better core utilities that also help the Catalyst healer (off-meta healer) that also translate over to Tempest. I love having more better options.

 

And yes, I am an ele enjoyer. It is a piano and that's the fun part 😛

 

18 hours ago, the krytan assassin.9235 said:

Compared to other healers

Tempest is top tier in terms of access to stabi, aegis, rezzing power, ranged healing, sustain and burst healing

Tempest is mid tier in terms of mobility, breakbar dmge and tanking 

Tempest is bottom tier in terms of condi cleanse, might generation, projectile blocks/reflects and barrier output.

Your tier list seems out of place for majority of the items you listed.

Bear in mind this is GROUP APPLICATION

Tempest has poor stab application. There is a on-demand shout but it is only one shout. Compared to other alac healers, it is similar. Cannot compete against HB amount of stab. You do have another stab application through earth trait but you have to take that trait and assume you do not go into earth to proc stab.

It has only one (not on demand) aegis application. You must actually wind up animation just to apply aegis. That means no overloads, no in the middle of a skill windup, etc. One aegis application similar to other alac healers. Cannot compete against HB that has more aegis application.

 

Temp has good ressing power assuming you are taking Arcane traitline or the revive signet. It does have good range healing assuming you are taking range healing. Burst healing is actually good but it's similar in power to HB or any other healers.

 

Ever since the nerf to Cyclone being one hit vs multiple hits on a single target, Ele in general don't have really good CC options now. You can take hammer or earth shield, but that will take up a utility slot just for CC only.

 

Ele is okay in tanking assuming you do not have to move out of certain spots or dodge mechanics and ruining your overload. You can time it yes, but there will be points where it will not sync.

 

Temp is literally one of the best might generators assuming your party is stacked on you. It literally is the best and cannot compete with any other healers. It's one of the reasons why you take Mabon relic and crit to give might sigil.

 

It has good Condi Cleanse if you take Fire Traitline and have shouts. You can also give more condi cleanse if you aurashare. You also have 1 condi cleanse from Heal. You have tons of options here.

 

Projectile hate / reflects is not the best but there are other players that can help with that. You don't need to be the only projectile hate / reflect in your party.
 

Barrier output? This is the wrong class to tier list that.

What ele DOES suffer is in a HEAVY ENEMY CC FIGHTS. It is very difficult to pull off overloads without getting CC'd. This is one of the reasons why Anet gave us pulsing alac. At least we get some compensation for giving out alac rather it all be endloaded.

[Gabbs.1087]

Anet did confirm in my ticket that Mabon relic is glitched and should NOT buff might of allies only caster. This will be fixed. 

[oCynder.5136]

Interesting, they should keep it as it does give something unique but if they want to get "rid" of the unintended effect. It's just going to be another dead relic just like many other relics. Kind of sad that we only use a few relics because it just what fits with majority of the builds and many of them seems boring to use with elite skills or some strange effect that nobody ever uses.

But aside from that, I guess we're going to go back to monk relic once Mabon gets fixed sadly. Or maybe something else that seems... interesting.

One thing we do have now as an option, boonstripping. Unreliable boonstrip but it is there.

Edited September 9, 2023 by oCynder.5136

[Gabbs.1087]

I agree - I wish Anet would leave it alone as it would give HAT a little leg up. Dan at SnowCrows will fix his built once the glitch is patched. 
 

I know my buddy at Hardstuck.GG says Monk will be best or if you want a more relaxed gameplay use Flock.

[the krytan assassin.9235]

11 hours ago, oCynder.5136 said:

HAT is already easy to play but it does take a while to understand what you need to take per encounter. It is complex.

 

But there can be some improvements that Anet can do to make it better like fire overload radius. There should be better core utilities that also help the Catalyst healer (off-meta healer) that also translate over to Tempest. I love having more better options.

 

And yes, I am an ele enjoyer. It is a piano and that's the fun part 😛

 

Your tier list seems out of place for majority of the items you listed.

Bear in mind this is GROUP APPLICATION

Tempest has poor stab application. There is a on-demand shout but it is only one shout. Compared to other alac healers, it is similar. Cannot compete against HB amount of stab. You do have another stab application through earth trait but you have to take that trait and assume you do not go into earth to proc stab.

It has only one (not on demand) aegis application. You must actually wind up animation just to apply aegis. That means no overloads, no in the middle of a skill windup, etc. One aegis application similar to other alac healers. Cannot compete against HB that has more aegis application.

 

Temp has good ressing power assuming you are taking Arcane traitline or the revive signet. It does have good range healing assuming you are taking range healing. Burst healing is actually good but it's similar in power to HB or any other healers.

 

Ever since the nerf to Cyclone being one hit vs multiple hits on a single target, Ele in general don't have really good CC options now. You can take hammer or earth shield, but that will take up a utility slot just for CC only.

 

Ele is okay in tanking assuming you do not have to move out of certain spots or dodge mechanics and ruining your overload. You can time it yes, but there will be points where it will not sync.

 

Temp is literally one of the best might generators assuming your party is stacked on you. It literally is the best and cannot compete with any other healers. It's one of the reasons why you take Mabon relic and crit to give might sigil.

 

It has good Condi Cleanse if you take Fire Traitline and have shouts. You can also give more condi cleanse if you aurashare. You also have 1 condi cleanse from Heal. You have tons of options here.

 

Projectile hate / reflects is not the best but there are other players that can help with that. You don't need to be the only projectile hate / reflect in your party.
 

Barrier output? This is the wrong class to tier list that.

What ele DOES suffer is in a HEAVY ENEMY CC FIGHTS. It is very difficult to pull off overloads without getting CC'd. This is one of the reasons why Anet gave us pulsing alac. At least we get some compensation for giving out alac rather it all be endloaded.

Lolol stabi output low? And aegis sucks?  Sure compared to HFB only. Are you going to compare HFB's crappy healouput to HAT aswell?  HAM aegis/stabi/alac combo is fcked, have fun running around the map to pop stabi on necro (or 360 radius aegis), stabi on rev is locked behind weapon swap, dudu has low stabi uptime (and high cost). Meanwhile if you want you can have perma stabi uptime on staff HAT. 

about might application, sure Tempest is one of the better might generators if everyone is stacked up and doesnt get its Boons removed. In that case however there's not a single decent healer+boon dps that will struggle with boon uptime. As soon as (for whatever reason) some1 loses their might or are out of range for your overload there's a high amount of downtime on might on HAT

in terms of condi cleanse, sure you can take fire traitline. However you'll lose out on ~350 hps from soothing mist, lesser cleansing wave, 180 concentration, 15% attunement recharge, alot of rezzing power and boon uptime, . In return you'll only get a single condi cleanse on aura share. I cant imagine a single encounter where you would like to invest so much resources for some mediocre condi cleanse. 

In terms of rezzing power staff has literally the highest rezzing power ingame rn. But even d/wh on arcane w/o rezzing signet easily beats most healers. 

All in all it seems like you're advocating for a suboptimal niche build just in order to disagree with me lol. 

Ele is very similar to HFB in terms of adaptability. They can easily swap their weapons and utilities to accommodate for the given situation. Only big difference is that the HFB players are always swapping their builds and HAT players stick to their standard setup and go to the forums to complain about it. There are barely any situations where a HAT isn't able to adapt to the situation ( can only think of Q1 cm, SH, XJJ being abit awkward)

[oCynder.5136]

I stopped reading after the first word of "Lolol". Really nice argument there. But we can agree on some things. My statement is: You will always need to sacrifice something to adapt to the encounter. There is no one package fits all. Reasons why Anet has went down the route to get away from role compression that healers must bring everything. There's your other boon support for a reason.

We should take this conversation to a new post and express our opinions on how we see things.

 

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

 

Going back on topic to the actual OP post. I do want HAT to get more love and be more competitive than other healers (or just tempest in general). Anet is slowly working on it and it is a good step in the right direction. HAT does get overshadowed a lot because there are better options that can easily spit out boons without getting CC'd. Better on-demand boons are always better than working for it without getting CC'd. This is the issue as it currently stands.

And playing a piano isn't for everyone is another issue. You have to put in a lot of effort to get the same results. I'm fine with this as long I'm not doing 60 APM to get the nearly perfect healer.

But do bear in mind about cTemp, if the range gets increased from 180 to 360, it would make easy tagging on everything to apply condis. This would be nice a nice buff for PvE if they ever do that. Speaking of fire overload, they also should increase earth overload from 240 to 360 to match all overload baseline of 360 radius. They could keep it the same radius on PvP/WvW so it isn't too overpowered. They have done splits and they can do it again. But who knows, we never tested how good it can be with a longer fire/earth overload radius in a PvP sense. I really don't want to go down the route that eles keep getting the nerfbat because of PvP/WvW that also translate over to PvE.

[Emberheart.8426]

I am not sure why all overload cds need to be the same at 20 seconds. Can't it depend on the overload and its effectiveness? Rethinking this could especially help overload water.

[zeyeti.8347]

Put alacrity generator in tier 2 selectable traitline and so we can take bastion of elements in tier 3 and there we go , we can go full aura sharing healing with alacrity as we were doing before alacrity showed up , healing with our shouts and after each overload with the good traits , it will also highly benefit dps/alacrity tempest.

And give ele a reliable source of fury in arcane , who cares about 1 might each time you attune to fire ... , if in your sub you have none fury support you will need to change whole arcane for air just for the sake of fury , i know there are a lot of fury generators now , but other support can cover fury 100% of the time why could'nt ele , feel very bad to take air traitline just for fury , and don't tell me you use rebound for fury ,10 sec fury on a 75 cooldown that garbage... 

33 minutes ago, Emberheart.8426 said:

I am not sure why all overload cds need to be the same at 20 seconds. Can't it depend on the overload and its effectiveness? Rethinking this could especially help overload water.

A little change could be in arcane Elemental Enchantment a bit more effective for overloads like -20% or -25% cd when overload successfully.

Anet said they will remove all negative effects of elite specs anyway , berserker has no more the -300 thougness , druid no more -20% pet stats and vindicator has his two dodge back , so maybe +100% cooldown on an overload is a bit too much (not counting the 5 sec to wait in one attunement then actually overload , who takes up to 4 sec , +-3 with quickness) , also the cast time ... kitten , without quickness it's 4 secs ... so overaloads are base on a 20 sec cd , then on a 5 sec cd after you attune and take 4 sec to be successfull ... and wonder why tempest is one of the lowest tier healers ...

And next problem is the staff who is now obvioulsy the best healing/support weapon , but nobody take it because you need heat sync from warhorn to provide might at a good range , fire overload give might in a 180 wide aoe , all other support have that kind of thing but 360 or 600 wide ... a shame when you see all the changes they made for staff , but very very few use it . Increase the range of the boon (not the damage) from fire and earth overload , also earth overload could give maybe a 1 stack of stab to nearby allies once successfull , we have eye of the storm , but thats 1 stack of stab 10 secs on a 30 sec cd , don't forget firebrand has stand your ground which is 5 stacks of stab 12 sec on a 24 cooldown ... not hard to the math.... even scourge can now give stab 12 secs and it's on a 20 sec dc ...

Edited September 10, 2023 by zeyeti.8347

[Gabbs.1087]

Loving all the feedback! 

[oCynder.5136]

11 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

A little change could be in arcane Elemental Enchantment a bit more effective for overloads like -20% or -25% cd when overload successfully.

This could work as an added bonus and Tempest specific. There should be rewards for overloading successfully without cancelling it or getting CC'd. Rather just being on full CD if you don't get the overload fully off. They can split off to specific elite specs differences. They already have done that specifically for guardian and they can do something similar here.

 

12 hours ago, Emberheart.8426 said:

I am not sure why all overload cds need to be the same at 20 seconds. Can't it depend on the overload and its effectiveness? Rethinking this could especially help overload water.

If they do this, I think they could lower the overload CD for Water only in PvE. It will not only help with giving more cleansing from overload water, but help with going back into water to do healing stuff.

 

11 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

And next problem is the staff who is now obvioulsy the best healing/support weapon , but nobody take it because you need heat sync from warhorn to provide might at a good range , fire overload give might in a 180 wide aoe , all other support have that kind of thing but 360 or 600 wide ... a shame when you see all the changes they made for staff , but very very few use it . Increase the range of the boon (not the damage) from fire and earth overload , also earth overload could give maybe a 1 stack of stab to nearby allies once successfull , we have eye of the storm , but thats 1 stack of stab 10 secs on a 30 sec cd , don't forget firebrand has stand your ground which is 5 stacks of stab 12 sec on a 24 cooldown ... not hard to the math.... even scourge can now give stab 12 secs and it's on a 20 sec dc ...

Like only increasing the range of the boon application while keeping the aoe the same size? I would think in PvE, it could be bumped up to 360 range for the actual overload size than 180 (fire) or 240 (earth) would be better and match with your boon application radius. Having two different application radius will probably be too much to think without a good indicator if players are within your range or not. It has a good visual already to see if players are standing in your overload. Having a bigger overload radius for fire/earth will also help in PvE to better hit enemies. Damage won't change though. PvP can remain the same for radius with what its currently at.

That's the problem with warhorn heat sync as of right now. It is the only reliable way to give your copy of might/fury in a longer range... and what's worse is staff Fire 4 that you dash backwards. That's the worse if you fatfinger that skill. I do want staff to be used but dagger/warhorn just overshadows it and other support options as of right now due to bad designs of boon application.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

Easy tweak :
Lucid Singularity : Recharge rate of current overload +100% under alacrity.

[Sylvyn.4750]

Give us our 10 target effect on overloads back! 😏

[Gabbs.1087]

2 hours ago, Sylvyn.4750 said:

Give us our 10 target effect on overloads back! 😏

Yassssssssss 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

[oCynder.5136]

Give us 10 target effect on everything including shouts