Jade Tech Offensive & Defensive Overcharge Timers Incorrect & Excessive [Merged]

[Deadringers.9047]

Hi,

 

I've been using the Jade Tech Offensive & Defensive Overcharge for a little while and with the new update it states this:

 

• Increased the internal cooldown for jade tech offensive and defensive overcharge application when entering combat from 30 seconds to 90 seconds.

 

That is incorrect, it was never on a 30 second cooldown, I don't believe there was ANY cool down.

Following this video from Masel (below)  - You can see how the tonics instantly apply the buffs. 

I used to do this also and just yesterday was using the "Enchanted Snow Diamond Tonic" to stack up the buffs for longer on myself. 

I don't think going from a 0 second to 90 second internal CD is appropriate for this.

Given this is ONLY used in open-world, and not in any instanced content, I don't think any CD is game-changing or breaking and how it was before was not being abused in any way that impacted the game that I'm aware of. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 17 by Deadringers.9047

[GEAR.6309]

Today's "QOL" change to the Jade Protocol Buff makes them almost useless and pointless to apply now. They only ever worked in open world content, and the few players that used them regularly seemed to be satisfied with where and how they worked. I don't understand why ANET decided to break them. They are not even worth bothering to grab now unless you happen to already be playing on a Cantha map. Might just be another reason for players to forget about the EoD expansion.

[Deadringers.9047]

3 minutes ago, GEAR.6309 said:

Today's "QOL" change to the Jade Protocol Buff makes them almost useless and pointless to apply now. They only ever worked in open world content, and the few players that used them regularly seemed to be satisfied with where and how they worked. I don't understand why ANET decided to break them. They are not even worth bothering to grab now unless you happen to already be playing on a Cantha map. Might just be another reason for players to forget about the EoD expansion.

I'd agree to be honest...

 

It was already pretty kitten easy to stack up 2 hours of the buff, and you could then use it all the time during that 2 hours. 

Now they've made getting the buffs easier, but MASSIVELY reduced the usefullness and utility of this feature. 

You always knew you could use it if you were going to fight a champ mob, but now you might have to wait 1.5 minutes while it counts down...

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

LOL, what a weird "QoL" change.... "Here we fixed that weird wait time on the second interact of each jade bot node, made it even easier to stack up the buffs, and and increased it's total timer to 3 hrs!!!!! ...... And then we made it completely useless because we didn't even know how it was interacting inside our own game. Enjoy your 10s boons every minute and a half out in open world where there no need for extreme balance measures like this"

I don't know what was wrong with the old version, and even why it was vital to fix it. 

[Mike.7983]

0 Cooldown to 90 seconds oof, feels terrible now.

[CosmikVoyager.8654]

Anet: Oh look something that is working well, let's fix it.

Players: Uh......

[Mae.1729]

This is an absolutly terrible change.

First I thought sure, its a nerf, but the protocols are still good. But now after playing with it for a couple of hours I realized how bad this feels. As a veteran who doesn't enjoy repetetive open world mob killing the protocols as they were before were an absolute gamechanger. The game suddenly felt quick and enganging. Even with the trash mobs. Now it's like someone slowed everything down. Like I'm playing at 0,5% speed. It drags. It truly feels horrible.

This feels like a mistake indeed.
Why? Where do the protocols matter? ONLY in open world and only on very short encounters = trash mobs. Whenever there is a longer encounter like a champ or a world boss the protocols do not matter anymore because they are not renewed. But since Anet made boons so accessable you have people around you proving you with boons. In my oppinion this used to be a very smart approach to harmonize the game flow.

This change feels absolutly out of line for Anet since pretty much all the actual  QoL changes show how well the developers understand the game.

Yes, protocols are very stong but not gamebreaking because of their actually limited nature. Please consider changing this back.

[Burntpinz.8293]

Please roll this back. Jadebot Protocols were great prior this patch and now they feel broken and useless...

Update: Logged in this morning in order to do some simple map completion in Ember Bay. I was approaching a mob and fell down a vey small group of rocks prior to engaging. Buffs popped and mobs were still not in aggro range thus negating the buffs for the engagement. Exited game.

Edited April 17 by Burntpinz.8293
Additional Comment/Update

[NukkinFutz.8645]

This change is absolutely horrible.  Please roll this back.

[kilowatts per second.1734]

I would also like to show my support for rolling these changes back. 

I honestly feel that 90 seconds is far too excessive and that this should be re-evaluated . The original cool down helped to greatly ensure that small group play in the open-world was fast , fluid and fun without breaking the game in any way. 

If it must be changed, I would say that 20 seconds seems like a decent compromise here. 

Will definitely check this thread for any possible response or dialogue from a developer. 

-kw/s

Edited April 17 by kilowatts per second.1734

[Mike.7983]

Please roll this back, but keep the faster spam battery's into offence/defence.

[Thayon.2107]

Anet,

Please roll these changes back!

[simple jack.3592]

I knew something was off today. I grab the protocols all the time. Today i was thrilled to see the time upped and fast charge rate. Then I started playing and was thinking ok something isn't right. Not super happy about it. 

[Values.5278]

I just went and grabbed the buffs and thought "Wow, that was so quick and easy to apply!" - I was thrilled at the buff to application. I then saw the timer -- 3 hours?! I was floored! These are AMAZING buffs! Anet's team must be killing it!

... Then I read the patch notes. "90 seconds from 30" - wait, 30? That can't be right... There were some mechanics that pinged you for ~0 damage but didn't pull you into combat properly, and I distinctly remember seeing my little jade bot fly in over my shoulder to give me buffs and then fly out, watching my buffs stack up every time. Did they get a 30s ICD last patch or something that I missed?

Then google led me here. How tragic. This completely kills the jade protocols. This is the exact OPPOSITE direction we should be moving.

Anet, you had something good here with protocols. Let me tell you how to build on them:

1. Revert current nerfs
2. Make reuseable offensive & defensive protocols that only stack up to 30 minutes and cost no batteries
3. Put them as ultra-rare drops in BLC, like the current crafting stations

And that's it. And you know what you'll get out of that?

1. Players will spend money for keys
2. Tons of gold will exit the economy in the form of TP tax cuts
3. Kind veterans will have more to give to the community - positive interactions with newcomers especially that will help them feel engaged
4. New players will get a feel for how awesome buffs are and perhaps start engaging more with competitive builds
5. New players who don't own EoD will get a taste of EoD and may be more inclined to buy it

This would be a win-win-win addition. There is absolutely no reason to take a crap on protocols like this. They only work in noncompetitive open world content. You should be embracing them and giving players more ability to get the buffs, not nerfing them out of existence.

[ThroneOfGWII.7801]

Roll back to 0 seconds.

[Mike.7983]

Funny how anet said min cd was 30 seconds, like it has been maybe 0.5-1 seconds for a whole year +.  Virt open world is horrible to play now without quickness burst, now back to quick herald/vind cause hate not having quick, spoiled apparently.

Edited April 17 by Mike.7983

[GEAR.6309]

Honestly, it seems like the current devs don't play the game the same way that a player would. This "fix" sounds like it was theory crafted without actually playing the game and understanding how the existing mechanic worked in real open world gameplay.

The 30s vs 90s timer discussion makes no sense, because the way the Jade Protocol Buff worked before today's "fix" was that you only got buffed at the beginning of combat, and the buffs would not reapply until the next time you entered combat. The patch notes make it sound like the devs thought that it was applying repeatedly during combat. This was never the case and still is not the case.

Most classes and current builds in the game underperform in solo open world content because they lack the full set of boons that the devs obviously "balanced" the class around. The Jade Bot Protocol buff gave players a way to play for a brief moments with the full set of buffs (like with the training dummy) and only gave an advantage when grinding random trash mobs. The buffs did not last long enough to give a lasting advantage for Champion or Boss fights. As other players already pointed out, the buffs were lost in instanced content, WvW, and PVP.

I always felt like the Jade Protocol was the sort of thing that was intended to motivate Free to Play users to purchase expansions and upgrade their accounts without imbalancing open world play. It worked before, but it's broken now. It's just not worth the hassle of traveling to an EoD map (or Skywatch Archipelago) to apply the buffs, even for the extra Power, Armor, etc.

I've been playing GW2 for 11 years, and EoD felt like a backslide in quality for ANET, and now SotO is starting to feel even worse. I just don't feel enthusiastic about a future expansion with these kinds of changes to the game being rolled out.

The Jade Bot Protocol was a small thing that many of your PAYING customers enjoyed using for open world.

Please acknowledge the mistake and roll it back ANET.

[Values.5278]

6 minutes ago, Mike.7983 said:

Funny how anet said min cd was 30 seconds, like it has been maybe 0.5-1 seconds for a whole year +.  Virt open world is horrible to play now without quickness burst, now back to quick herald/vind cause hate not having quick, spoiled apparently.

Weaver is also particularly trash to play without alac/quick, because alac affects attunement CD and quick affects your ability to get things out in each attunement before swapping. Such is the nature of a class where you need to press 15 buttons to do what a necro can do with shroud4.

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

24 minutes ago, Values.5278 said:

Put them as ultra-rare drops in BLC, like the current crafting stations

I'd be up for a permanent gizmo item in the Gem store. Seems like the kind of QoL the 'Rechargeable Teleport to friend' is. Keep it in you inventory, double click it for both offensive and defensive buffs for 30mins. Refresh the timer at any point, no charges needed.

but locking it behind gambling seems a bit much.

[Values.5278]

1 minute ago, UncreativeGreen.2019 said:

I'd be up for a permanent gizmo item in the Gem store. Seems like the kind of QoL the 'Rechargeable Teleport to friend' is. Keep it in you inventory, double click it for both offensive and defensive buffs for 30mins. Refresh the timer at any point, no charges needed.

but locking it behind gambling seems a bit much.

All of the other contracts are held behind "gambling" and this actually gets Anet something. Don't want to gamble? Pay 10k gold like the rest of us. I'd gladly pay 10k gold to drop these stations down for myself and new players.  

Recharging TP to friend is like a 300g item. Make it cost 30k gems and maybe.

[Aukoor.2530]

Yep! The devs definitely broke the jade tech overcharge functionality & utility. It was never on a 30 second timer. It proc'd every time you entered combat. I'm primarily a solo player and the jade tech overcharge helped in big boss fights and more efficiently keeping up with and working through content. Now the jade tech overcharge has no real functionality or worthwhile usefulness. Please roll it back.

[Nightcore.5621]

Roll this back

[Mae.1729]

OK,  a few more thoughts...

I read a couple of times that people were asking for "compromise" to put it on 20-30s internal cooldown instead. And here I absolutly disagree. The design (how it was before) is great. Besides the permanent boons (which are similar to food) all the protocols give is a short burst of boons when entering combat. Once in intense combat you do not get another burst unless you actively move out. That again costs time and therefore damage. It's not worth it.
So literally all the protocols do is to help you in open world on short fights when you are alone and in group contents where all you have to do is to kill some random adds. Those rather boring events get speed up, so us players can get to the juicy encounters. 😉
Yes, I absolutly have Dragon's End Meta in mind. Once done with all the pre-events you get to fight the huge cinematic encounter. It's a great example how the protocols help you with the mostly boring prevents and barely matter during the huge final fight when you are in perm combat. Absolutly great even after more than 2 years.


Soooo,... I try to come up with logical reasons for breaking the protocols and I can't find any.
1) Were there unfair benefits toward players who didn't bother to grab them? No, they chose not to grab them. They chose not to interact with a great expansion mechanic. It's a bit like not unlocking certain mounts and then complaining they can't catch up with the rest.
2) Were the overcharges unfair towards players who don't own EoD? No, this should an incentive to get EoD and should be a good thing.
3) Even tagging is not an issue. First, providing boons is very much encouraged by ANet, and second.... Every class has ranged Weapons.  I own a PoF only account that I never got to play as much as I wanted to... But I do event stuff and never had issues to get my participation.
4) Do the protocols trivialise open word trash mobs and events? Absolutly. But this is what this game always handled diffrent than other games. GW2 feels like it's respecting people's time, letting them get to juicy content instead of forcing them to endless sluggish killing XX enemies.

Also... as it was stated by other poeople it feels like most of the balance nowadays is a around the boons. Some weapons feel like they are even designed around being affected by quickness. Yes, there are ways around it and there are enough quickness classes. Let's all okay qherald. 😉 

Some people told me that the protocols are still worth it. Yes, true. It's a little food-like boost... but you have to decide if you want to bother with it outside cantha.
Basically it costs you stuff like...
- mental awareness. You can't just travel to any instances content, guild hall, mistlock etc...
- time. You need to move to actually grab the buffs.
- gold. Waypoint costs - since you sometimes cannot use shortcuts like GH or Mistlock to save travel fees.
I guess these were the limitations were the reason that many people just didn't bother grabbing them.


TL;DR:
Don't get me wrong, this is not the end of the world for any of us. Lazy as I am I mostly used protocols on map completion on expansion maps and one or the other open world meta. What bothers me is that this decision goes so much against all the QoL stuff ANet usually does. Usually you feel that some of the devs also play the game themselves and truly undertand its issues. This one feels like it was made by someone who either didn't engage with this mechanic at all or just saw it on the paper.
So yes, I do strongly advocate to revert the nerf.

[Tofu.1865]

Feels terrible using it after they put 90 sec CD on it, maybe 20sec CD is decent because crap just running into something that triggers battle and u waste the jade tech buff and wont proc when u really need it

[hash.8462]

I think there was a bug since the introduction of these boosts when you had both offensive and defensive overloads, in this case there was no cooldown, in fact if only one of the two was active there was a 30 second cooldown.
With this patch it seems they have fixed that bug and further aggravated the cooldown to 90 seconds (I also think it is excessive).
I rarely use them, but if they were to stay that way I would say it would be a good idea to switch the activation from "Entering in combat" to "When in combat".