Can we buff combo finishers?

[Kuya.6495]

I personally feel that combo finishers haven't really kept up with all the power creep the game has suffered through the years. Some combo fields are practically ignored while some still have a use (water fields, fire fields, etc). For example blast finishers on light fields only cleanse 1 condition when they could cleanse 2 instead to be more useful and I don't consider that to be an over powered change. Dark fields and poison field blast finishers might have use in pvp but in pve they aren't very useful. 

Would it be too much to ask to make dark field blast finishers be aoe life leech or dark aura for allies and for poison fields to be aoe poison in pve? I think that change would instantly make these fields way more useful. 

What other fields/finishers do you guys think need buffs?

Edited December 6, 2023 by Kuya.6495

[jason.1083]

Thing is with Combos, they're kind of supposed to be a group effort, and from my understanding, most people ignore their experience or literally never understood the mechanic. 

Does cleansing 1 condition to 5 people sound weak? Yes.

Can those 5 people use a finisher or 2 of their own to boost that effect for themselves and their allies? Also yes.

Meaning that 1 Light field can theoretically be used to cleanse 100 conditions given the right finishers are used. Same goes for all the fields in the game.

It's a fine balance where a coordinated group with a specified field provider can get tremendous use out of them, while for a random zerg of people they might as well not exist at all. You have to look at both sides to determine if it's worth buffing them.

[Kuya.6495]

23 minutes ago, jason.1083 said:

Thing is with Combos, they're kind of supposed to be a group effort, and from my understanding, most people ignore their experience or literally never understood the mechanic. 

Does cleansing 1 condition to 5 people sound weak? Yes.

Can those 5 people use a finisher or 2 of their own to boost that effect for themselves and their allies? Also yes.

Meaning that 1 Light field can theoretically be used to cleanse 100 conditions given the right finishers are used. Same goes for all the fields in the game.

It's a fine balance where a coordinated group with a specified field provider can get tremendous use out of them, while for a random zerg of people they might as well not exist at all. You have to look at both sides to determine if it's worth buffing them.

In my experience most people outside of boon blobs don't bother coordinating blasting fields. In pve, since your dps or boon rotation might include dropping a field, you may not bother coordinating user somebody else's field. So for example of a guardian drops a light field, but you dropped fire because it's part of your rotation, you can't blast their field until yours is gone (because the game now prioritizes your own fields over others). 

If there is a concern for buffing fields and it becoming an issue in wvw or pvp, I think the best solution is simply a skill split. If light fields will now do 2 condi cleanse in pve, it should still do only 1 cleanse in wvw or pvp for balance purposes, if necessary. 

Edited December 6, 2023 by Kuya.6495

[Voyant.1327]

I just want Combo Finishers that provide Quickness/Alacrity.

Personally I'd put Alac on Chaos Combo Fields, Quickness on Dark and/or Light. 

In general if they just became reliable sources of the boons people actually desire in addition to current effects it'd be a welcome change.

Might, Fury, Alac, Quickness seem to be the only ones really universally desired so just throw 5s procs on the field finishers and call it a day.

Doesn't make anything more OP bc no change to damage/abilities, just helps boon uptime, & rewards skill play with little issues in terms of balance. 

[jason.1083]

8 hours ago, Kuya.6495 said:

In my experience most people outside of boon blobs don't bother coordinating blasting fields. In pve, since your dps or boon rotation might include dropping a field, you may not bother coordinating user somebody else's field. So for example of a guardian drops a light field, but you dropped fire because it's part of your rotation, you can't blast their field until yours is gone (because the game now prioritizes your own fields over others). 

If there is a concern for buffing fields and it becoming an issue in wvw or pvp, I think the best solution is simply a skill split. If light fields will now do 2 condi cleanse in pve, it should still do only 1 cleanse in wvw or pvp for balance purposes, if necessary. 

Well yes, the issue is mainly in competitive, buffing combos will somewhat shift the fighting style of squads to be more combo centric.

I know the game prioritizes peoples own fields, that's why I mentioned a predetermined field provider, like a Scrapper, since that's basically their job, to provide moving fields. 

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

I'm definitely up for a buff.  Mostly because buffing the effects of combo finishers would be an indirect buff to all of the professions that put them down.  It is a shame how little it is understood, but one of Ele's assets is that it is constantly putting down fire fields, adding excess burns and might for groups.  It gets ignored, largely because of how little impact a projectile or whirl finisher actually has, even through a fire finisher.  

Edited December 7, 2023 by Blood Red Arachnid.2493

[PseudoNewb.5468]

If the servers can handle the load, I think that each finisher should be able to proc effects for one of each unique type of field that the finisher passes through. Maybe only allow the field to generate 5 of each different finisher effects during it's lifetime too.

This makes it much easier to coordinate and prevent the issues of combo fields fighting each other. If they where any more useful without this quality of life, then people will just complain about different fields nullifying or taking finisher effects from each other. The moment someone has to think, can I put down my field, or will it overwrite someone else's field, is the moment fields become useless in a group situation.

Even without buffing the effects, this alone could create a substantial amount of power creep, especially for condition builds, if you can stack all the fields and finishers that apply damaging conditions. But this game has gone through phases of power creep, and it could survive finishers applying the effects from multiple fields.

The fact that overlapping fields negatively affect each other just makes them bad to use. Just like how conditions stacks used to cancel each other due to stack limits.

Edited December 7, 2023 by PseudoNewb.5468

[DanAlcedo.3281]

7 hours ago, Voyant.1327 said:

I just want Combo Finishers that provide Quickness/Alacrity.

Personally I'd put Alac on Chaos Combo Fields, Quickness on Dark and/or Light. 

In general if they just became reliable sources of the boons people actually desire in addition to current effects it'd be a welcome change.

Might, Fury, Alac, Quickness seem to be the only ones really universally desired so just throw 5s procs on the field finishers and call it a day.

Doesn't make anything more OP bc no change to damage/abilities, just helps boon uptime, & rewards skill play with little issues in terms of balance. 

Yeah!

Completely free Perma quickness and alac for everyone! 

Who needs dedicated Boon support? Not us anymore. 

WvW zergs with Perma quickness and alac also sounds lovely. 

I bet Raid/Fractal/Strike groups will love setting new speed records for themself too. Not needing Boon Duration and all. 

Ohhh the PvP players will LOVE that change for sure! TTK into the ground! 

I approve! 

Let the chaos begin! Let millions of tears rain upon the forums! 

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by DanAlcedo.3281

[Woof.8246]

We could offer a new types of weapons that offers  rewards (Kryptic Essences?), that  cut down the effectiveness of the Boons on you  and when you do an combo , you increase it by a small percentage and you get the "bonus elemental damage" on your attacks .

Enemies could be durable for the first 6 sec if attacked by those new weapons , needing to do Elemental attacks (Undead vs Water effects)  but afterwords they behave like normal mobs , so there's no need to force people to play the punishing way .

If you are solo your aoe fields are divided in 4 areas (smaller combos areas) ,where out of combat you can choose which fields you want .

In the zerg scenario , Commanders can choose how nearby combos behave  , nvm

 

And in order to avoid forcing people to do the boring Hearts in order to learn to use this mechanic , we instead create on OW scenario  where:

a) You do combos in OW events you are eligible to participate into the "final 3-weeks" Costumed battle Tournament/20% scalling PvP ,  that will happen in LA

b) When the events ends , the sytem Ask you to choose from these 4 options and guides you to do a single event  (keeps the maps alive) in either:

              1) the east side , and will give you a more advanced Costume , and repeating in the east side of other maps to advance your Costume (rather than sword he can get a wand)

               2) North side , it will reduce the "final 3-weeks" Costumed battle Tournament , by 12 hours and you get small loot

                3) South side will increase the final loot from anyone and you get rewards regardless of the result 

                 4) west side , puts more random environments  in LA (small bush) and anyones standing near it get some "ranged cover" , or HoT teleport tunnels ?

                  5) choose a different one after two times in a row for some bonus rewards

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by Woof.8246

[Passerbye.6291]

1 hour ago, Woof.8246 said:

We could offer a new types of weapons that offers  rewards (Kryptic Essences?), that  cut down the effectiveness of the Boons on you  and when you do an combo , you increase it by a small percentage and you get the "bonus elemental damage" on your attacks .

Enemies could be durable for the first 6 sec if attacked by those new weapons , needing to do Elemental attacks (Undead vs Water effects)  but afterwords they behave like normal mobs , so there's no need to force people to play the punishing way .

If you are solo your aoe fields are divided in 4 areas (smaller combos areas) ,where out of combat you can choose which fields you want .

In the zerg scenario , Commanders can choose how nearby combos behave  , nvm

 

And in order to avoid forcing people to do the boring Hearts in order to learn to use this mechanic , we instead create on OW scenario  where:

a) You do combos in OW events you are eligible to participate into the "final 3-weeks" Costumed battle Tournament/20% scalling PvP ,  that will happen in LA

b) When the events ends , the sytem Ask you to choose from these 4 options and guides you to do a single event  (keeps the maps alive) in either:

              1) the east side , and will give you a more advanced Costume , and repeating in the east side of other maps to advance your Costume (rather than sword he can get a wand)

               2) North side , it will reduce the "final 3-weeks" Costumed battle Tournament , by 12 hours and you get small loot

                3) South side will increase the final loot from anyone and you get rewards regardless of the result 

                 4) west side , puts more random environments  in LA (small bush) and anyones standing near it get some "ranged cover" , or HoT teleport tunnels ?

                  5) choose a different one after two times in a row for some bonus rewards

Yeah, we could add new conditions to the game called corrosive, viral, slash. Corrosive would reduce armor, viral would increase damage taken like vulnerability and slash would do unmitigated dot damage. We'd then add stances to melee weapons so they can do forced slash procs, which would be further boosted by the viral condition. Oh wait, this isn't Warframe.

Can we please not suggest things that would entirely overhaul multiple in game mechanics like they are nothing?

While there is a lack of balance between certain combo fields and finishers, they remain a really impactful aspect of the game, more so than people give them credit for. I'd be interested in seeing some of the underutilized fields/combos brought up, but that would also require yet another balance pass across all classes as herald mace can blast a field 2/3 times depending on the size of the field, meanwhile scourge is limited to very few blast finishers for instance. I don't think buffing light field cleanse amount is a good call though, as it is already one of the best fields in the game with just 1 cleanse, can't even imagine how overtuned it would be with 2.

Edited December 7, 2023 by Passerbye.6291

[IAmNotMatthew.1058]

15 minutes ago, Passerbye.6291 said:

Yeah, we could add new conditions to the game called corrosive, viral, slash. Corrosive would reduce armor, viral would increase damage taken like vulnerability and slash would do unmitigated dot damage. We'd then add stances to melee weapons so they can do forced slash procs, which would be further boosted by the viral condition. Oh wait, this isn't Warframe.

Can we please not suggest things that would entirely overhaul multiple in game mechanics like they are nothing?

T E N N O

<Insert Corrupted Vor Copy Pasta>

[Jski.6180]

I would love to see more relics that make an type of combo stronger and or give an added effect much like we have blast combos always heal we need leap combos always soft cc and projectiles / whirls always condi dmg or something like that.

[ShadowKatt.6740]

Combos are a thing? Huh, I'd forgotten that was a thing.

Look, I'm hardly a noob here. I've been here since Beta, and I don't think I've ever once had a reason to care about combos. We have combo fields and combo finishers and they're all basically...nothing. Give you an example. I'm a mesmer, and Chaos Storm is a combo field. I use it ALL the time, it's my bread and butter. On the same staff Phase Retreat is a Leap Finisher. And you know what it does? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.

"BUT!" I hear you yelling already, "You're teleporting out of it! Of course you don't see the benefit!", and that's fair! But my fiance plays a longbow ranger and 3 of the 5 abilities on Ranger Longbow are finishers. And I still don't see any difference.

Perhaps that's the point of this thread, because they need to be buffed. Then again, I'm not sure if they actually do anything at all to be buffed in the first place. I'm not convinced that the whole combo system isn't broken. Sure, I know it triggers because I can hear characters shouting out their combos, but as for any actual effect, I don't think there is any.

[Kuya.6495]

33 minutes ago, Jski.6180 said:

I would love to see more relics that make an type of combo stronger and or give an added effect much like we have blast combos always heal we need leap combos always soft cc and projectiles / whirls always condi dmg or something like that.

I would love to see more relics like karakosa that add value to combo finishers. 

[Sobx.1758]

18 hours ago, Voyant.1327 said:

Doesn't make anything more OP bc no change to damage/abilities, just helps boon uptime, & rewards skill play with little issues in terms of balance. 

Not sure that's true at all. It means you don't choose between boonsupport vs dps traits but instead make sure there's a field and people can spam themselves with finishers to full boons.

Overally sounds like a bad idea. I don't think combo finishers need to be buffed.

1 hour ago, Jski.6180 said:

I would love to see more relics that make an type of combo stronger and or give an added effect much like we have blast combos always heal we need leap combos always soft cc and projectiles / whirls always condi dmg or something like that.

Ok, this looks like a better idea because at least it includes some form of exchange. Still depends on the actual effect and numbers.

Edited December 7, 2023 by Sobx.1758

[Phyb.6704]

On 12/6/2023 at 7:52 AM, Kuya.6495 said:

I personally feel that combo finishers haven't really kept up with all the power creep the game has suffered through the years. Some combo fields are practically ignored while some still have a use (water fields, fire fields, etc). For example blast finishers on light fields only cleanse 1 condition when they could cleanse 2 instead to be more useful and I don't consider that to be an over powered change. Dark fields and poison field blast finishers might have use in pvp but in pve they aren't very useful. 

Would it be too much to ask to make dark field blast finishers be aoe life leech or dark aura for allies and for poison fields to be aoe poison in pve? I think that change would instantly make these fields way more useful. 

What other fields/finishers do you guys think need buffs?

Light does not need a buff except for the leap finisher being kinda meh. An example is..... If a rev puts ventari dome skills light field down and spams staff 1 its just a mass of clensing bolts. Then some warriors spin to win** and spam clensing bolts too. It can actually become quite overpowered. 

What we need is those benefits like the -10% incoming dmg replaced.... Is someone really going to coordinate a finisher with another persons field for 10% for 5 seconds? Probably not worth it.
Many are just not very useful. That is why most do not bother. Rev ventari dome skill is very useful with staffs wirl finisher however thats the problem. The effects are either.... spam clensing bolts and clear any and negate all condi or.... -10%. That is a big dif in what you are getting. Negate all condi vs -10%.

We also need something to tell us we are in a kitten combo field. They are not always very easy to see in some enviroments. Lets see fire in a volcanic area for example. Maybe just have the character itself yell.... dark combo field down! So we can hear that in our ear. Because lets be honest....... most of the time you probably do not even notice there is a combo field unless its a really really visual one like rev ventari dome. Rev hammer also now has a dark field. But how many even know what that dark field skills animation looks like?

Edit: I noticed the characters do talk when you combo field but if you look at the wiki. WHAT in the actual hell. Who thought that up? ITs not "Dark field down!" something clear. 
Norn female is...

The spirits should be impressed!
I'm amazing!
Do you see? I did that.

Every race is dif and every sex is too. Who the hell thought that was be useful. The hell I am going to think... hey thats a combo field. Are you kidding?

Edited December 8, 2023 by ohericoseo.4316