Next Vindicator nerf

[Grinz.4560]

Basics 

Revenant: Revenants manipulate the Mists in the battlefield. Capable of channeling legendary figures in order to have access to different skills, Revenants use a special resource called Energy in order to cast their abilities. They have enough flexibility to play multiple roles during a battle, depending on their Legend of choice. It is only available to players that have purchased either the Heart of Thorns or the Path of Fire expansion.

Thief: Thieves use their initiative to fuel their weapon skills, dishing out quick chains of damage before slipping away into the shadows with stealth. The other part of their specialty is stealing - each enemy has a number of items which provide stolen skills to the thief to turn the fight.

Warrior: Masters of martial combat, warriors have access to a wider selection of weapon types than any other profession, allowing for a multitude of play styles. Warriors' unique resource, Adrenaline, is built through sustained attacking and can be spent to unleash powerful burst attacks during combat.  

 

Traits or Utility that gain Energy / Initative / Adrenaline 

Revenant: Ancient Echo, Charged Mists and of course channeling Legends 

Thief:  Unload, Kneel, Eat Egg,  Signets of Power (Critical Strikes),  Shadow's Rejuvenation (Shadow Arts),  Upper Hand (Acrobatics), Kleptomaniac (Trickery), Quick Pockets (Trickery), Maleficent Seven (Deadeye), 

Warrior: Adrenaline Rush, Counterblow, Riposte, Parry, "To the Limit!", Blood Reckoning, Signet of Fury, Berserker Stance, Outrage, Shattering Blow, Sundering Leap, Wild Blow, Imminent Threat, Signet of Rage, Head Butt, Berserk, Opportunist (Arms), Furious (Arms), Shield Master (Defense), Merciless Hammer (Defense), Cleansing Ire (Defense), Versatile Rage (Discipline), Axe Mastery (Discipline), Burst Mastery (Discipline), Loss Aversion (Spellbreaker)

Revenants only got 3 Traits / Mechanics to gain Energy but need it for allmost every Skill and on top of that we got so high Energy coast on some Skills that we can do nothing else if we use em like Jade Winds! 

As  Revenant i got to keep my Eyes on Cooldowns, Endurance, Energy, Health and some other Game Mechanics in Fight. But and that what this is about, Arena Net did allready mess up Core Mechanics..., Basics..., before messing around with the Elite Spec Vindicator. Its an Elite Spec but Arena treat it like its not. What is the the special thing abot the Vindicator after Arena Net nerfed the Geatsoword and now messing around with the Dodge Traits?  

 

Edited November 28, 2023 by Grinz.4560

[Sarlan.7682]

well time dodges better use more skills idk

[Angesombre.4630]

Frankly, I'm bored with the new features: they're soft and long. I don't see the difference in terms of power with the new power trait. Maybe it's a bug, I don't see the buff, and if it was there, they'll find a way to nerf the dps afterwards.
At least before it was dynamic, now I feel like I can't move like a pebble in a puddle.

The revenant has to use F2 to be useful now, unlike all the other professions that have an ability like the shroud, the guard's F skills, or even engineer, well, I'm not going to make the list. These classes launch it when they need to, but not when they're obliged to.

What's more, with the change in "Contained Temper". It's all very well to want to give back energy if you don't have it to cast the skill, but it's useless. What's more, it's completely useless with ventari.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Angesombre.4630

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

29 minutes ago, Angesombre.4630 said:

What's more, with the change in "Contained Temper". It's all very well to want to give back energy if you don't have it to cast the skill, but it's useless. What's more, it's completely useless with ventari.

I feel like they should have kept with the theme of the old trait and made it restore energy when you cc a target (energy gain once per skill, not per target, that'd be too strong)...or you know, just kept the fury trait in the line all about fury. They could have changed the pulsing fury in devastation to something instead.

[Angesombre.4630]

The problem isn't when you equip the legend herald or alliance. For the fury, the problem comes when you don't equip these legends, renegat has a little less of a problem on this side as it happens at ground level.

[Buran.3796]

  Some preliminary aftermaths of the Nov 28th balance I've noticed testing the waters a bit (only Vindicator) while playing alone:

* We lost vigor, permaregen and permafury while playing a cele build. Those still proc, but aren't consistent. Vigor never procs unless you run Retribution (the dead traitline), and is not the same since it only procs on evades which actively avoids an attack, is not shared amongst allies and the most important thing: last 1 second in PvP, so you'll never have vigor again. A Vindicator with no Vigor access, holly molly!...

* Reaching 25 stacks of might is almost impossible with condi builds unless you run Devastation, most I got without was 20; with Snow Crow's power build is almost impossible to get 5 stacks. Power builds are significatively more affected by the fury/might nerf than hybrid/condi ones, since condi only benefits from crits indirectly.

* Using the middle trait (AT) for F2  means barely gaining a bit more than 1 extra energy unit x second in PvP and a bit less than 1 in PvE/WvW. Absolutely meaningless, and yet better than the other two (but not as good as runniung with the mid tier traits empty and just forgetting the existence of F2).

[Angesombre.4630]

Vindicator has become a group specialization. I don't see any use for solo content like before. If the other intermediate traits weren't used before, it's because they were all bad, except for "Song of Arboreum" before 28. As well as being a pain in the kitten to use, as I said earlier, I have to manage energy, endurance, CDs, switcher and now an F2. Personally, I had more fun before the 28.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Angesombre.4630

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

35 minutes ago, Buran.3796 said:

* We lost vigor, permaregen and permafury while playing a cele build. Those still proc, but aren't consistent. Vigor never procs unless you run Retribution (the dead traitline), and is not the same since it only procs on evades which actively avoids an attack, is not shared amongst allies and the most important thing: last 1 second in PvP, so you'll never have vigor again. A Vindicator with no Vigor access, holly molly!...

 

My Open World cele build still has Perma regen and fury, as well as 25 might. the only thing thats fallen off is vigor. Which isnt perma even while spamming dodges and using Imperial Impacts boon extension, but its close.... like 80%+ uptime. It's still a sad time, but manageable. Like you said the only way to get back to perma vigor is with retribution trait line.....or evasion relic. But Evasion relic suffers from all the same issues you listed with the retribution minor trait above. 

[Angesombre.4630]

I don't think the vindicator population was very high before. Except maybe in WvW for the heal only where he could really use it. I haven't seen a ton of vindicators for their DPS either. 

And replacing a critical trait with a less useful one that can only be used if you manage to cast an anti-stun spell. What's more, heals have a CD of 30s for a hit of 5 energy, so they're not much use, except for alliance, but its anti stun hit is also less, so the trait has zero use and isn't even useful with ventari. And if you're playing with a legend who isn't a herald or alliance, you'll lose fury and build diversity.

[Howluffu.7259]

Vindicator is dead, now dps herald will occupy it's place.

Energy Meld is a bad button and it shouldn't exist. It was useless before, now it is mandatory to get fluid. They don't want to aknowledge that button was stupid and changed it to force the people to use it by deleting Song of Arboreum. Now I will only use vindicator for open world with the sigil of stamina just to not press that crap of a F2 button.

This is a bad dev decision. It's the worst change to this spec so far. Energy Meld needs to get rid off of the freaking game and put something else in return. If I ever take this e-spec to a group content I'm sorry but I'm going to use Sigil of Energy just to not EVER use Energy Meld.

Energy Meld = VERY BAD VIDEOGAME DECISION

[Buran.3796]

10 minutes ago, Howluffu.7259 said:

Vindicator is dead, now dps herald will occupy it's place.

   Dps Herald will never be a thing. And I won't play Herald again (for two years and still strong), and I'll keep ignoring F2. Vindi plays the same in PvP, since Song of Arboreum wasn't working there anyway. The most  damaged builds are the Vindis at WvW; in PvE is still a nerf but that just means that instead of facerolling the keyboard with the two eyes closed now you have to keep one open, just in case. Energy Merde can still be skipped.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

Guess I'll be "that guy" and say that the number of energy gaining methods is irrelevant to their quality.  One of the biggest problems I encounter when playing as renegade is having too much energy, since I need to get below that 10 threshold ASAP to trigger Invoke Torment off cooldown while gaining that 25 bonus form Charged Mists.  Vindicator has a similar deal, where alliance stance has me mashing nearly every button I've got to efficiently deplete all the energy for the swap to shiro.

[Jobber.6348]

8 minutes ago, Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

Guess I'll be "that guy" and say that the number of energy gaining methods is irrelevant to their quality.  One of the biggest problems I encounter when playing as renegade is having too much energy, since I need to get below that 10 threshold ASAP to trigger Invoke Torment off cooldown while gaining that 25 bonus form Charged Mists.  Vindicator has a similar deal, where alliance stance has me mashing nearly every button I've got to efficiently deplete all the energy for the swap to shiro.

That's more of a Charged Mist issue. It never made sense why there needs to be an abrituary condition to gain Energy.

If the trait straight up gave Revenants default 75 Energy out of combat and on swap, it'll be a strong enough GM to compete with the other two.

As of now, it's really only used in Upkeep playstyles where you want to have that Upkeep skill permanently switched on so the drain always puts you 10 and below when the Legend Swap is off cooldown.

[Angesombre.4630]

The problem is that they're more likely to try to improve this vindicator crap than to put it back the way it was...

I'd like to get more feedback from people on what they think of it now.

Edited November 29, 2023 by Angesombre.4630

[Angesombre.4630]

I think that as soon as a dev is forced to use or play in a certain way, they've missed something in the development. As is the case with vindicator's new intermediate traits such as "Song of Arboreum" and "Contained Temper", the benefit is almost useless, because as already said you have to be able to cast the skill to benefit from the energy, so it doesn't change anything. And if by chance there's no need to wait because casting a heal costs 5 in energy, the biggest problem is the CD in this case, I'm not saying it should be lowered, and 10 energy for the alliance that can be cast more often. But it does force you to use a legend, like herald or alliance, to benefit from fury. So already 2 constraints for this profession.
For me, the developers are missing something.

Edited November 29, 2023 by Angesombre.4630

[Jobber.6348]

32 minutes ago, Angesombre.4630 said:

I think that as soon as a dev is forced to use or play in a certain way, they've missed something in the development. As is the case with vindicator's new intermediate traits such as "Song of Arboreum" and "Contained Temper", the benefit is almost useless, because as already said you have to be able to cast the skill to benefit from the energy, so it doesn't change anything. And if by chance there's no need to wait because casting a heal costs 5 in energy, the biggest problem is the CD in this case, I'm not saying it should be lowered, and 10 energy for the alliance that can be cast more often. But it does force you to use a legend, like herald or alliance, to benefit from fury. So already 2 constraints for this profession.
For me, the developers are missing something.

Refunds via Minors are one thing, but Major traits shouldn't really need to layer conditions like that is what I feel.

Between a trait that just goes "if you do x" and another that wants you to somersault like a monkey, it's obvious which is more attractive, no matter the playstyle.

And the thing that ticks me most is that I'm not even sure if I like it or not:

Angsyan's Trust literally becoming Ancient Echo, but without the Legend benefits. I'm just full of Bruh right now. 

On one hand, I can play Vindi exactly like Core and have a nifty dodge and traitline. On the other hand I just feel "what's the point"

Aside from the Hammer changes, I'm just bruh-ing over this patch in general. And yea, Scepter deserves top Bruh. It's just so disappointing that Bruh doesn't cut it.

[Raknar.4735]

I’m just going to switch to the other elite specs after the recent changes.

While I’m not even sure that the trait reworks were strictly nerfs dps wise (Reaver’s curse instead of Song of Arboreum now, might even be a buff), having to weave in Energy Meld (with the 1/2 casttime) all the time to enhance dodges feels awful and unfun.

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

I forgot all about spirit boon as well. So you can technically do perma aoe vigor still...........but you need perma alacrity and 30-40% boon duration; and its very tight timing. It just feels like super bad and lazy redesign. 

For PVE: Why design vigor to only be perma in groups, its just vigor... its not breaking any crazy mechanics. In fact If your group doesnt have any other source of vigor to share to you it almost feels better off using Angsiyans over Arboreum because randomly having vigor up only here and there makes tracking leviathan's strength harder and messes with a rotation on where to dodge to upkeep the bonuses. What's wrong with a espec themed around dodges to have a boon up to help use that mechanic more. Stop balancing in a bubble, not all your content is on a dps golem, and its just VIGOR, theres not even any percentage dps modifiers directly to the boon. I just don't understand.

For PvP: if it was such an issue from vindis dodging all the time, maybe you should try other skills, like the built in evade or the cost of battle dance. Or realize your nerf to the vigor durations out in competitive did nothing when in the same patch you added a relic that gave vigor back to its original duration. 


 

[Jobber.6348]

42 minutes ago, UncreativeGreen.2019 said:

For PvP: if it was such an issue from vindis dodging all the time, maybe you should try other skills, like the built in evade or the cost of battle dance. Or realize your nerf to the vigor durations out in competitive did nothing when in the same patch you added a relic that gave vigor back to its original duration. 

Irony here is despite Vindi being literally designed for that dodge, they are trying so hard to stop Vindi from dodging so much. Vindi is such a mess. 

It's gonna get to a point where they just give Vindi 1 dodge and then forget to revert nerfs to everything else, making Vindi unplayable in competitive. I smell it coming. 

[Aeolus.3615]

8 hours ago, Angesombre.4630 said:

The problem is that they're more likely to try to improve this vindicator crap than to put it back the way it was...

I'd like to get more feedback from people on what they think of it now.

 Anet made rev overall "heavy" on F2 usage even on herald the f2 usage will boost your next tablet heal performance so if u want a bigger heal w/o swaping legends that's a way to do it, and Anet ported that mechanic for vindicator f2.

Anet as kinda been destroying Herald identity offcourse it will affect all other legends as well.

Edited November 29, 2023 by Aeolus.3615

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

18 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

It's gonna get to a point where they just give Vindi 1 dodge and then forget to revert nerfs to everything else, making Vindi unplayable in competitive. I smell it coming. 

I mean they just got rid of our vigor being 25% stronger AND didnt revert the "only when vindi is equipped" restriction to Enduring recovery in retrib.... so yeah, just usual Anet things.  All I gotta say is some Vindi must of touched Roy in his no no spot when he got separated from his "elite fight guild" blob. The disdain in his voice about anything rev on the streams is so disheartening, get him off the rev balancing and design and please move him to a class he's more passionate about.

[arazoth.7290]

3 hours ago, Aeolus.3615 said:

 Anet made rev overall "heavy" on F2 usage even on herald the f2 usage will boost your next tablet heal performance so if u want a bigger heal w/o swaping legends that's a way to do it, and Anet ported that mechanic for vindicator f2.

Anet as kinda been destroying Herald identity offcourse it will affect all other legends as well.

uhm no, entire revenant has good F2 useages => core, herald, renegade and they trying to make vindicator too.

Energymeld for starter needs lower baseline cd though (15seconds all content), some of the new traits can use some buffs too. Reaver's Curse is most underwhelming imo and should give your next 2 dodges a boost (useable in those 5seconds) on the entire grandmaster trait effects. 

Death drop would give more vulnerability and outgoing damage ontop of higher dodge damage. Amount depends on content

Imperial impact would give more might stack, protection duration and higher boon extension duration. Amount depends ln content

Saint's shield would give ontop of current larger heal/barrier from dodge, also higher outgoing healing it already gives. Amount depends on content

Angsiyan's trust Give it ontop of 25 energy, +2 energy pip increase for 5 seconds. Otherwise it is just a lesser +25 energy core version without special effects.

Song of arboreum is now fine since I said earlier, baseline cd should be 15 seconds. Now it gives enough frequent uptime on the vigor boon and increasing instantly endurance to allies and yourself.

 

okay, have fun with the current version all 😂

Edited November 29, 2023 by arazoth.7290

[Carnifex.3275]

All i can say is F CmC and F Energy meld. Thanks for ruining fluid rotation of Vindi and forcing us to use that useless F2 button for no apparent value. Way to go, balance team strikes again.

[zeyeti.8347]

For me the solution is to get rid off the 1/2 cast time of energy meld , it just feel like cutting your rotation in half , and maybe reduce the cd in pve , i can feel the vigor effectiveness missing , before this pacth it was fluid and has no purpose at all alone being fully damage oriented , helping allies by giving more endurance and vigor ... feels much like a pvp change , no use in pve ... I really prefered how it was before the patch, energy meld being only used when an emergency dodge was needed.

[Angesombre.4630]

Just to remind you that it's been a bug for over a year now.