March 19 Balance Update Preview

[TheWeaponX.3127]

"Yeah let's buff Berserker"...  The only spec as Warrior being played in WvW while Bladesworn & Spellbreaker are complete ghosts in WvW... FIX IT!

If you compare Bladesworn & Spellbreaker with the other 2 heavy classes = Guardian & Rev "specs" then Bladesworn & Spellbreaker are not even close... completely useless in WvW. 

The Balance update is March 19 so you got time to fix them before that update goes live.

[Crowfang.8529]

9 hours ago, TheWeaponX.3127 said:

"Yeah let's buff Berserker"...  The only spec as Warrior being played in WvW while Bladesworn & Spellbreaker are complete ghosts in WvW... FIX IT!

If you compare Bladesworn & Spellbreaker with the other 2 heavy classes = Guardian & Rev "specs" then Bladesworn & Spellbreaker are not even close... completely useless in WvW. 

The Balance update is March 19 so you got time to fix them before that update goes live.

I dunnow for SB in WvW but it's currently very good in sPvP.

As for bladesworn. Yeah, I haven't seen one in a while in all kind of game mode. 

[Morgoth Bauglyr.9726]

Not shure if the scourge nerf is going to have the desired effect. There are already guilds testing scrapper as a replacement barrier provider.
Funny thing is that before the jan transfusion nerf, we would run scourge as the sole healer in some subgroups. Now every scourge always needs another dedicated healer which makes every group even more tanky. Once the scourges get replaced by scrappers there are effectively 2 full healers in each subgroup.

If too much barrier is really the problem here, why not reduce the maximum barrier to 33% or even 25% of max HP?

[ShadowKatt.6740]

16 hours ago, Crowfang.8529 said:

As you said core mesmer is actually one of the worst class. Rev core might be worse?

But I play core mesmer!

and actually I play core rev more than any spec as well...

[PrinceValentine.9320]

16 hours ago, Crowfang.8529 said:

As you said core mesmer is actually one of the worst class. Rev core might be worse?

Dune Cloak: we will see. I also thought that an increased radius would make the trait more viable than the change they made.

For the rest nerfing a class in WvW which provided an alternative to boons spam is a joke imo. WvW raids will be even worse than they are now.

This guy is a troll: "I dont know about you guys but I think the devs are doing great with the balancing tasks."

They're buffing a class that is currently at the top like they did with ele last year. We all saw what it brought us. Tournaments in sPvP where winning teams were composed of 5 eles.

 

Meanwhile devs still trolling:

Sword of Decimation

Notes[edit]

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/thumb/e/e9/Game_bug.png/18px-Game_bug.png Bug:

Although the patch notes of June 27, 2023 game update state the cooldown of this skill is reduced from 25 seconds to 18 seconds, this is not actually the case. The cooldown is still 25 seconds.

Version history[edit]

For a detailed skill history, see here.

Patch	[hide]Changes
June 27, 2023	Reduced cooldown from 25 seconds to 18 seconds.

Chrono needs a massive nerf and everyone knows that. You being a power creep doesnt warrant you calling people here a troll. 

[SpaceMarine.1836]

So even Zealot's Defense finally gets movement during casting but warrior's Kill Shot burst skill which actually consumes professional mechanic resource still gets locked in place cast with its half a year cast time?!

It appears there is no systematic process of polishing outdated skills but rather a dice roll which randomly picks a few legacy skills to fix.

[Loke.1429]

I hate the arcane wave change with a passion. This was my favorite skill, because it was quick and could be used at range. Why do you have to shorten the range of everything ele? Please dont fk up this skill like this. I dont want to play melee. See you next time.

[Crowfang.8529]

5 hours ago, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

Chrono needs a massive nerf and everyone knows that. You being a power creep doesnt warrant you calling people here a troll. 

Boon givers need a massive nerf and everyone knows that. Guardians being first.

[Reig.8173]

Hello.

I was seeing that:

Rust Frenzy (Sword 3 Earth of Elementalist) Players can now move while casting this skill.

and

Zealot's Defense (Sword 3 Guardian) You can now move while using this skill.

 

Can Hundred Blades (Greatsword 2 Warrior) have free-movement when casting this skill too please?

Thank you.

Edited February 24 by Reig.8173

[ShadowKatt.6740]

16 hours ago, Crowfang.8529 said:

Boon givers need a massive nerf and everyone knows that. Guardians being first.

Here's the thing I see about this. Whether it's OW where you'll have so many people you're almost guaranteed to be running 25 vul on whatever you're fighting plus a smattering of almost every boon in the game, PvE where you have a boon support to guaranteed you 10 might + fury + alac/quick + whatever else, or it's WvW which like OW you have so many people giving boons that it's basically impossible not to have them or even SPvP where you can have a dedicated boon support, the way I see it this is now baseline. Doesn't matter what you're doing, you will ALWAYS have this because either it's incidental or because it's literally required to be accepted into the content.

So you talk about a massive nerf being needed. I don't think so. I think that the boons system should just be ripped out with all of its hanging wires and code dangling in all its sparking and oil-dripping gore. Just recode the skills to automatically assume that the boons are being provided, and then players can get back to actual skill rather than trying to function as perfect number generators.

[ZephidelGRS.9520]

22 hours ago, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

Chrono needs a massive nerf and everyone knows that. You being a power creep doesnt warrant you calling people here a troll. 

The spec dominating most content for years talking about powercreep........... oh the irony.

*Guardian* needs a massive nerf and everyone knows that.

[Dadnir.5038]

On 2/23/2024 at 5:14 PM, Morgoth Bauglyr.9726 said:

Not shure if the scourge nerf is going to have the desired effect.

The desired effect is most likely to reshuffle the WvW raid comps. Scourge as the "best" boon ripper will specialize in boon ripping and people will continue to complain that there are to many of them.

[Angesombre.4630]

I'm more and more disappointed by this game with random updates and no idea in what direction they're going. Constant nerfs to try and highlight new content or just random nerfs to remove all fun. Anet just listens to a crying minority or developers who don't like a certain class and do anything with it.

[Delrago.2098]

no cele change is the best thing to happen to wvw 🙏 i love cele making e v e r y o t h e r  s t a t  s e t  t r a s h  i n  a n y t h i n g  l e s s than 15v15

[Keefe.3821]

Ah great. Anet screwing us over again with changes no one asked for. 

How about fixing the small kitten you continue to ignore like lance on warclaw or the jade slivers recycler. 

Ah but you really don't give a kitten about the miner stuff.

[Althean.5976]

I'm very confused as to why, in the Renegade overhaul, they chose to have Darkrazor's Daring grant protection instead of stability. Specifically, because the trait All For One's whole thing is "Using  Legendary Renegade abilities grants protection to allies near the summoned warband member". This change now is a straight downgrade for the trait choice, when it's already competing against two other solid options

 

I totally getting wanting to reduce the access everyone has to stability, but wouldn't resolution have been the better option rather than a boon that's already covered? 

[Shagie.7612]

5 hours ago, Althean.5976 said:

I'm very confused as to why, in the Renegade overhaul, they chose to have Darkrazor's Daring grant protection instead of stability.

It still gives 1s of stability on cast, just like it does now. It just gives the protection in addition to that.

However considering the trait it's still a weird one over Resolution, Resistance (which is what it gives when enhanced), a condition removal, or like, anything else

[Fifth.8169]

Critical Chance Issue: 

Can Power Guardian build please have access to critical chance? 35% of critical chance  is locked in to the radiance trait line;  its difficult to fully access. The first 10% crit - target must be burning. ok. However for  the second 25% you will need to have 100% uptime of resolution, which is technically possible but hampers gameplay forcing Radiance to always be paired with Virtues and taking Greatsword for symbol of resolution, while requiring you to press Healer's Resolution (from Radiance) off CD. This trait is not affected by alacrity, so technically when you guys lowered the CD for litany of Wrath from 25 to 20 seconds, Guardians no longer get this proc because 20 sec from trait and 16 sec from litany dont match up anymore.  

Weapon Issue

So from above, to have critical chance via  we must take resolution. To access the resolution power builds are forced to single weapon. That is Greatsword for skill number 4, Symbol of Resolution.  To make matters worse into being locked into great sword, in the Zeal trait line, power builds take the trait Zealous Blade. This trait adds 120 power, but yea you guessed it, you only get the 120 power by wielding Greatsword.  

Willbender Issue

In the Virtues trait line, the trait "inspiring virtue" has a duration of 6 seconds. This is too short and not sufficient for being able to maintain 100% uptime. Really this should  just be a flat permanent 10% boost without the extra fluff.  Next, in the willbender trait line, for the first set of selectable traits, Searing Pact, Power for Power, and Conceited Courage. All of them should have +180 vitality and the third choice should receive +120 healing power or Concentration.  Next, for the Virtue skills, the F1  is ok, it has some sloppy movement, but  its functional. However the F2 skill and F3 are very bad.  The F2 skill should not  dash me completely through my target at a fixed ranged. I should be able to select the distance. Currently, its unusable and if its goign to stay this way with the fixed distance. Then I suggest that the dps from this skill should be diverted back into the F1 skill.  However if your going to fix the F2 skill, I also want to say that the distance  traveled of 450 is too short. Greatsword 3, has a leap distance of 600. 

While this isnt a full list of my issues with guardian, fixing the above mentioned will at least make the class "playable" at least for me. For now, keeping it on the shelf. 

Looking over the proposed patch notes for Guardian, it is important to pay attention to how the skills come together as a build. The proposed changes are all junk, they don't really do anything to fix any of the broken issues I reference above. For now it’s just one disappointment after another. 

Edited February 28 by Fifth.8169
Typo

[Assassine.1958]

Quote

Guardian

The guardian changes for this update are focused on improving some underutilized skills and traits for both core guardian and willbender.

• Zealot's Defense: You can now move while using this skill. Adjusted the projectile behavior to interact better with gaps in terrain.
• "Feel My Wrath!": This skill now grants superspeed in addition to its other effects.
• Vigorous Precision: This trait now triggers when dodging instead of when critically striking and no longer has an internal cooldown. Reduced the vigor duration from 5 seconds to 3 seconds.
• Focus Mastery: Protection from this trait will now apply when Shield of Wrath expires instead of when it activates.
• Redemption: Increased the duration of Lesser Litany of Wrath from 3 seconds to 4 seconds.
• Glacial Heart: This trait no longer chills and damages enemies that you disable and instead heals the user when disabling, immobilizing, or chilling an enemy.

Willbender

• Flash Combo: You now gain access to Repose as long as you complete the skill, even if you do not land all 5 hits.
• Repose: This skill is no longer an attack. This skill now heals and removes conditions from you after shadowstepping back to your original position.
• Roiling Light: Reduced the roll duration from 0.75 seconds to 0.5 seconds. The roll distance is unchanged.
• Heaven's Palm: This skill now evades attacks and finishes your targeted foe if they are downed and no other enemies are nearby.
• Deathless Courage: This trait no longer removes aegis from Courage, reduces the duration of Courage, or causes enemy deaths to increase the duration of Courage. This trait now grants the guardian strike damage and condition damage reduction while Courage is active.

How about some changes to axe in pvp ? 12secs on #2 on axe in pvp is just weak and useless!

How about changes on mantra of solace? first 2 charges are literally nothing for selfheal +199 (in pvp / wvw). In PvP firebrand is still weak in its damage role because of non existing good counterpressure. people only complaining about " oh so much boons" or "oh so disgusting this daze on axefield, i cant dodge a 1sec obvious cast with blue light" ... mimimimi ... willbender feels so easy to play and firebrand is just the worst in pvp as healer and much worse as damage.

How about overwork some old traits for example "Indomitable Courage" in Virtues traitline .. this 30 sec aegis regeneration does not doing anything on willbender (only the stunbreak + stab)

In my opinion you have to rework a lot on guardian. there are so much useless/unused traits in several traitlines and the sad thing about it, they sound useful but in practice they are not really useful.

and yes im a little bit frustrated about it, because firebrand as a supporter was really good in the first days of PoF (maybe a bit to good - to be fair) - but since the last nerfs its just garbage - but hey now chapter3 on f2 also heals for a small amount (finally)

[Yumesaki.7082]

Lucid Singularity: This trait now applies might instead of alacrity in PvP and WvW.

Grace of the Land: This trait now applies might instead of alacrity in WvW and PvP.

Desert Empowerment: This trait now grants vigor instead of alacrity in PvP and WvW.

Removing alacrity from wvw is probably a good thing. Keep in mind that Willbenders with Phoenix Protocol and Renegades with Orders from Above can still provide alacrity.

The trade off for taking the alacrity grandmaster traits won’t be very fair.

Instead of giving might these traits could provide a more impactful boon like fury or vigor, this would make these traits more in line with the power of other grandmaster traits.

 

Healing Spring: Reduced the duration from 10 seconds to 5 seconds and reduced the pulse interval from 2 seconds to 1 second. Reduced the number of conditions cleansed per pulse from 2 to 1 in WvW and PvP.

This skill now acts like other similar skills that are condition cleanse fields which is easier to understand, great change.

 

Glpyh of the Stars: Increased the cooldown of this skill from 48 seconds to 60 seconds in WvW and PvP. Reduced the number of conditions cleansed per pulse from 2 to 1 in WvW and PvP. Reduced the revival percentage from 12% to 8% in WvW only.

Adding cleanses to the Celestial Avatar version of Glyph of the Stars and moving the Regen and Vigor to the Non-Celestial Avatar version of Glyph of the Stars would help reduce the skill gap between new druids and veteran ones.

 

Serpent Siphon: Increased the cooldown from 20 seconds to 30 seconds in WvW only.

Sandstorm Shroud:Increased the cooldown from 30 seconds to 35 seconds in WvW only.

Sand Cascade: Increased the cooldown from 12 seconds to 18 seconds in WvW only.

If you are planning on reducing access to permanent barrier up time keep an eye on Relic of the Flock. Overall good changes to barrier Scourge, it hopefully makes different group comps more viable.

 

Glacial Heart: This trait no longer chills and damages enemies that you disable and instead heals the user when disabling, immobilizing, or chilling an enemy.

Be careful because frost aura exists and could trigger this trait more than once per second. If it can also heal allies that might be too strong of an interaction. It might also be nice to trigger the effect when you apply weakness as well.

Vigorous Precision: This trait now triggers when dodging instead of when critically striking and no longer has an internal cooldown. Reduced the vigor duration from 5 seconds to 3 seconds.

This is a nice change since the line has evolved into a healing / support line.

 

Chaotic Transference: Reduced the shared chaos aura duration from 4 seconds to 2 seconds in WvW only.

This change does not address the root of the problem. If you blast finish an ethereal field (3 sec Chaos Aura) will this trait overwrite the Aura on your allies?

The problem is Chaos Aura itself.

Chaos Aura allows you to apply 3 different boons constantly and makes it harder to have your important boons stripped (stability / resistance) decreasing the effectiveness of boon removal overall.

One of Boons you can apply with Chaos Aura is protection which can significantly increases a players tankiness and prolong a fight.

Chaos Aura allows you to apply 3 different conditions on enemies that are attacking you and these conditions are continuously reapplied which negates the effectiveness of pulsing condition cleanses as well as cleansing dangerous conditions becomes extremely hard.

The conditions that Chaos Aura can apply include weakness which can reduce a dps player's damage output from 500% down to 100% or less.

The constant application and removal of boons and conditions when groups with Chaos Aura clash in wvw, surely this must have a negative impact on the servers.
I think reducing the number of conditions applied when struck down to only one type and reducing the number of boons applied when struck down to only one type, this would bring Chaos Aura more in line with other Aura’s.

Instead of : give yourself random boons and your foe random conditions whenever you are struck.

It Would be: give yourself Protection and your foe Confusion whenever you are struck.
 

Null Field: Reduced the field duration from 5 seconds to 2 seconds in WvW only. Reduced the number of pulses from 6 to 3 in WvW only.

If Null Field is doing too much you can move the boon removal aspect to another mesmer skill and then null field will only be a pulsing condition cleanse field.

I would move the boon removal aspect to Well of Senility, so that it removes a boon on every pulse instead of only on the final pulse.
Mimic could be what is making Null Field a problem, a simple fix is instead of recharging the next utility skill 100% you could reduce the recharge amount to only 50%.

 

Mantra of Concentration: Increased the cooldown from 15 seconds to 25 seconds in WvW only.

 Power Break: Reduced the stability duration from 5 seconds to 3 seconds in WvW only.

I think removing the stability from the Mantra of Concentration Cast and replacing it with Protection / Resolution would be more impactful than reducing the duration of stability on power break.

 

Imperial Impact: This skill no longer extends boons on allies. Increased the protection duration from 4 seconds to 5 seconds in PvE and from 0.5 seconds to 2 seconds in PvP and WvW. Increased the might duration from 9 seconds to 10 seconds in PvE and from 5 seconds to 8 seconds in PvP and WvW. Increased the might stacks from 2 to 3 in PvP and WvW.

In Pve you could possibly open up new boon support roles by adding alacrity or quickness to Imperial Impact (damage / boon dodge) or Saint's Shield (healing/barrier dodge) on Vindicator.

[WingSwipe.3084]

For the love of Grenth do not let this buff to willbenders go through.

Willbender already have a dominant position in the pvp meta and giving them more tools is going to disincentive playing anything else.

Guardian in general already has more tools in its belt then the engineers have in every kit combined and playing against it is getting old really fast for everyone else who isn’t playing Guardian.

Giving Willbenders these tools will make them even worse side node monsters then Bladesworns at the highest point of their brokenness. You are essentially giving Willbenders a free banner execute on a 20 sec cooldown.

This is going to scare more of the already dwindling pvp population away from the game mode entirely.

I strongly urge to reconsider this and lay your focus on other professions that need the attention and updates. Guardians and Rangers are in a really good seat already, please give the other professions that kind of love and QOL updates, thank you.

Edited February 26 by WingSwipe.3084

[Batalix.2873]

I love how even remotely unique traits like Glacial Heart are becoming more and more flavorless.

This game is a mess. Every six months I step away, it gets more and more homogenized. This dev team has no interest in making distinct job fantasy experiences. Everything is just procedurally checking off role obligation boxes and flattening the fun contours.

Someday, when GW3 has implemented these "modernizations" better from the ground up, I hope they go back and reset GW2 to be more in line with HoT/PoF sensibilities (as impossible as that sounds given how totally tone-deaf and ambitionless the current dev team is). As it stands, I haven't played for a year and still have no desire to pick this up again, because no jobs feel like they specialize anymore. If I ever do play again, I will probably just pick up Mechanist (my nemesis), because if I'm going to be bored out of my mind I might as well let a bot auto-grind for me while I do other things.

Edited February 28 by Batalix.2873

[Titan.7853]

20 hours ago, WingSwipe.3084 said:

For the love of Grenth do not let this buff to willbenders go through.

Willbender already have a dominant position in the pvp meta and giving them more tools is going to disincentive playing anything else.

Guardian in general already has more tools in its belt then the engineers have in every kit combined and playing against it is getting old really fast for everyone else who isn’t playing Guardian.

Giving Willbenders these tools will make them even worse side node monsters then Bladesworns at the highest point of their brokenness. You are essentially giving Willbenders a free banner execute on a 20 sec cooldown.

This is going to scare more of the already dwindling pvp population away from the game mode entirely.

I strongly urge to reconsider this and lay your focus on other professions that need the attention and updates. Guardians and Rangers are in a really good seat already, please give the other professions that kind of love and QOL updates, thank you.

Wrong.  Since when is Willbender a side node monster?  That's almost laughable.  Willbender is a highly mobile glass cannon roamer, it's not even a particularly great duelist.  In order to be decent as a duelist, you'd need take Valor instead of Virtues (at the cost of a lot of damage).  Willbender is dominating the meta right now?  Really?  In fact, both Core Shout Support and Dragon Hunter are better than Willbender right now.  Do you know what will make Willbender even more of a glass cannon?  Taking Heaven's Palm over Renewed Focus.

I have a better idea, if you are actually worried about a side node monster with a finisher,  "omg ANet please nerf Warrior, and remove their Battle Standard.  They are a side node monster with a fast finisher.  They are dominating the meta right now, and we can't let this continue."  To be clear, I am not in favor of it, but at least this statement would be more accurate.

Or how about we let ANet improve unused traits and skills, like this popular petition just requested, and see how it goes:

 

Edited February 27 by Titan.7853

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Popular eh? /blush.

[Antycypator.9874]

On 2/16/2024 at 7:34 PM, Butterfly Kingdom.8349 said:

• Double Tap: This skill now pierces.
• Three Round Burst: This skill now pierces.

So, now when we (finally) have pierce for Rifle #3 skill... what about Skirmisher/Spotter's Shot? It was in use because of pierce, now it's value is diminished. I would like to see some rework — no need to touch damage, just make it little different.

Edited February 27 by Antycypator.9874