Alacrity: Time for a Change

[messiah.1908]

what about revenant alacrity. a trait which hardly needed is nerf now?!also a renagade f skill also nerf now???can we get something else please for revenant. as the boon change will hugly effect the revenant. as we cannot stand more boon on us which will corrupt easilymaybe more cleanse abilities

serene rejuvenation - with alacrity also proc now resistance to allies for 3 sec. or will cleanse 1 condition each sec for 3 secorder from above - with alacrity will also proc resistance to allies for 1.5 sec 4 stacks (or 6 with trait). or cleanse 1 condition each sec for 4 sec (or 6 sec)

[YoRHaArchon.9750]

I've been wanting to suggest to Anet to change the visual effects of Alacrity to be less pink and less visually noisy ever since it was added to Revenant as it didn't fit having a pink mesmer effect come out of a Revenant but now that it's being changed into a boon, this is the perfect time to change the visual effects!

Maybe have like a faint blue clock on their arm (similar to Aegis or Retaliation) or under their feet?

[Feanor.2358]

On paper the changes don't sound too bad. If anything, they might push the Firebrand+Renegade combo toward the limelight, as Chronomancers will have harder time maintaining decent uptimes on both Alacrity and Quickness. Though I don't see the meta shifting fully toward Fb/Ren support - you'd still want at least 1 druid for the spirits and GotL-generated might, and chrono is still the best complement to druid support-wise.

What bothers me mostly is the overall group dps nerf that comes from the reduced potency of Alacrity. 13.6% isn't something to just brush away. For many groups it might be the difference between success and fail (e.g. Gorseval no updraft strat). As a result, these groups would be more or less forced to pick optimal dps professions for the fight, reducing the class diversity in the dps slots of the group.

[Knox.8962]

@Feanor.2358 said:What bothers me mostly is the overall group dps nerf that comes from the reduced potency of Alacrity. 13.6% isn't something to just brush away.

That's roughly a 3% DPS nerf for specs who cared about alacrity before. Unless you play Arcane Weaver or Power Herald. Then you get 2% of that back because alacrity now counts as a boon and should add 2% via traits. (Power PS War and Virtues Guards gain 1% as well).

[Attuned To Love.6579]

@Knox.8962 said:

@Feanor.2358 said:What bothers me mostly is the overall group dps nerf that comes from the reduced potency of Alacrity. 13.6% isn't something to just brush away.

That's roughly a 3% DPS nerf for specs who cared about alacrity before. Unless you play Arcane Weaver or Power Herald. Then you get 2% of that back because alacrity now counts as a boon and should add 2% via traits. (Power PS War and Virtues Guards gain 1% as well).

dps wise it shouldnt matter much ... just gameplay wise

[Akeno.4962]

@"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:1) The movement on surge of the mists is the least inconvenient thing ever. I also doubt that druids have better CC, since a single surge is all that is needed to break bars in fractals.2)You do realize that your argument for not taking a rev instead of a druid is because you're taking a druid? If a druid is not on the team, then capping might is very important. Viper Renegade can do this if the fire fields always line up, but a Harrier Renegade can also do it much more consistently. In fact, I'm not even sure why you're bringing up Vipers. I don't care. I'm talking about the healing build that the renegade has.3)I don't care. The point is that with boon duration applying to alacrity, the support renegade is going to be better at it. There will be a backlog of stacked alacrity bonuses, there will be more leeway for mistakes, there are looser energy demands for stacking alacrity, etc.4)The whole point is that healing renegade competes with healing druid now, so the whole "it makes druid redundant" thing is kind of the focus of the build.

5/6) I don't care.7) There are a crap-ton of encounters scattered all throughout the game where a projectile destruction bubble is useful. Anywhere there is projectiles.8)The power scaling on souclceave is pretty terrible, and Harriers already has good power, so your nonsequitor about viper builds is wrong. There are two important things about Soulcleave: It is a lifesteal that pierces all defenses, and also that it applies per hit. So, if you have capped might (450 per hit), and use Shackling Wave for 10 hits, this is an additional 4500 damage added on to that attack. This bonus has variable effectiveness between classes, but it isn't unreasonable to think that it adds 2k DPS for every member of the team.

Lacking "definition and purpose" are vague and nebulous concepts, and half of your points are nonsequitors. I'm not sure if you're talking about current builds or post-patch builds, either, as you seem to just ramble on about stuff. All I care is that a healing renegade is a strong competitor for healing druid, and that post patch heal renegade is going to be even stronger than before. Right now, the healing classes I am worried about are tempest and guardian, since those are the ones with actual problems atm.

We're talking about completely different stuff. I don't care too much about support renegade in fractals, where people don't expect getting meta comps. I am talking about support renegade in raids, where at least one druid is expected.

Is a renegade a better healer than a druid? Sure. Does anyone care about it in raids? Nope. Druid can do the job good enough since the encounters don't put enough pressure to justify taking a full healing powered equip renegade. What people care are boons, which druid covers more of them, cc, which druid has better or at least on the same level, and general utility to deal with mechanics (entangles, pushes, etc.), which druid has a lot more because it's not held by legends in their utility skills and has more weapons to chose from. I think you undervalue how broken druid is. Frost + Sun spirits are waaaay more powerful than a non permanent 4,5k dps increase, and by having 2 druids you free slots for Glyph of empowerment, Stone Spirit or Search and Rescue.

To sum up my problem with this buff to boon change: now renegade will have to use boon duration gear to provide a decent amount of alacrity, what will make its dps lower than a viper/marshal equipment, what will make me stop having a chance of getting a group, because there'll be no reason to justify its presence compared to a second druid. Would I like for a healing support renegade to be able to really compete with druids? Of course, but that's not the case yet, and it seems it won't ever be.

[Zellk.6308]

@Coronit.9432 said:So... pve balance isn´t greant but ok. PvP and wvw on the other hand are completely kitten. So why waste ressources on something like alacrity?Is that the way you provide content now? Change something like alacrity to force everyone to theorycraft new optimal ressources? consume plasma is completely ok in its current state. quite good in comparison to so many other steal-skill to be said. So why buff THAT?!You, as always, focus on the competely wrong thing.My question is: Why you thought it was necessary to change alacrity? Have there been any complains? If so I am absolutely sure that there have been many more problems in the past where it needed over half a year to change it.Maybe you thought it through to a greater goal but I can´t help me to doubt that. It defintily looks like you want to change something for the sake of changing anything. And balancing everything else was to difficult. If the next balance patch fails I´m done.

The thing Coronit is that they are changing the way the phantasm work in the mesmer class because players had developed ways of playing that doesn't fit with what the developers want! (and maybe they received some complaints idk?)And because they're changing the phantasms, they don't have a choice but to change the alacrity, since it used to rely on phantasms uptime etc.We will see how things evolve since Anet is known to take the time to listen to feedback on immediate changes.

Personally I have yet to try all of these changes in game to see how they feel, but I'm really curious !

[Inneunde.4862]

Arena Net as usual just doing changes to the game that they don't play. Nothing new.

[nia.4725]

I don't think the meta will change, at all. Chrono is not dead and won't be replaced, we're just the best choice for the job we have to do, but we will have to change completely our rotation and we won't have much room for error. The problem here, in my opinion, is that we won't be able to give quickness right at the start so our DPS won't have quickness when they start their burst, resulting on a big dps loss. Unless we run TW, but we really can't run TW everywhere. There are some bosses where certain elite is very necessary, like moa in Matthias or Samarog. The vast majority of groups struggles with CC already and the chrono is the main source of CC, if we can't run moa then... well.

If the purpose of the changes is to kick chronos out of the meta and make room for other tank/boon support choices, you're not going to achieve that with this. At all. Giving alacrity to some random professions isn't helpful, either. That won't get used. The only way to make some professions able to do the job of the chrono is to give them as much "boon potential" as a chrono. You did a good job when you gave quickness to firebrands, since now we can help chronos with that in some niche situations and we can even replace them in very few encounters, but alacrity can't be replaced right now. by anyone.

It just feels like Anet doesn't know a thing about what is chrono in a REAL raid situation or what are the real issues. It started when concentration was nerfed. You said that you wanted us to invest more in concentration gear and so you nerfed our concentration foods, killing all build diversity. The real issue was the sigil of concentration, but you didn't touch that. It was possible to reach 100% boon duration with full ascended concentration gear+foods/utilities, without SoC, but with your changes you made SoC completely necessary unless we a) had a rev in our subgroup b) used chaos traitline. Result? No more investment in concentration gear, just everyone using the same build with the same stupid sigil, and non-SoC offensive chronos completely dead.

This is the same. Arbitrary changes that don't adress the real problem with chronos.

[Feanor.2358]

@Knox.8962 said:

@Feanor.2358 said:What bothers me mostly is the overall group dps nerf that comes from the reduced potency of Alacrity. 13.6% isn't something to just brush away.

That's roughly a 3% DPS nerf for specs who cared about alacrity before. Unless you play Arcane Weaver or Power Herald. Then you get 2% of that back because alacrity now counts as a boon and should add 2% via traits. (Power PS War and Virtues Guards gain 1% as well).

How is it a 3% nerf?

[falchos.8345]

Just a stupid question, for a boss like dhuum who steal boons, alacrity will reduce time limit for mechanics or he will just have alacrity for fun ?

[Nightmare.1234]

@Adriaen.7895 said:What is the condition corresponding to the new alacrity boon?

remember they also doing the rework of the boon/condi convertion tables so we could see it turn to anything at this point

[Remilia Scarlet.3205]

So if I'm not seeing it wrongly, it is totally a big nerf. Reasons:

1. "we decided that in addition to replacing quickness with alacrity on Tides of Time", You send out big news after the word "in addition". You replace quickness rather than just add alacrity. And is there other compensation for the quickness that is replaced? We all know that the chronomancer in raid is not functional only for alacrity upkeep. The quickness upkeep is FAR more important than alacrity. Remove the quickness from shield 5 means NOMORE full upkeep of quickness. In order to compensate that, ppl need to take timewarp, which means less functional, more strickly requirement for positioning. We dont need alacrity in shield 5 Anet. Just give our quickness back;
2. Alacrity down to 25%. Again, a nerf without compensation. I understand u want make alacrity not mandatory in raid. But after the change of fantasm, which may result in DPS decrese for damage dealer mesmer spec, the chronomancer may become the only meta raid spec because it's never a top DD class. If u want to make raid less rely on Chrono, plz at least make fantasms hit harder in PVE. So we can choose other spec to join raid.

[AstralDusk.1670]

I don't know enough about the meta to concern myself with the outcome of these changes, but I am excited to see such a large change in general, when I normally see small tweaks that feel inconsequential to all but meta-nerds.

[Nukkuu.6591]

@Knox.8962 said:Just some numbers for reference since there are a lot of people claiming they always have 100% alacrity uptime already.

Alacrity Uptimes (50th Percentile) - Per GW2Raidar

Balance shouldn't be based around the lowest common denominator, it should be on the 90th percentile.

Also, you might wanna look at that MO and Xera P1 numbers which show that when static on the boss even the lowest 50th percentile has at least 73% uptime. Those other uptimes are artificially skewed low because of split phases on the bosses, boss movement and other mechanics. It's the same reason we don't have golem level DPS on bosses.

So anyone higher than the lowest common denominator already had 90+% alacrity uptime in the moments when it mattered, when you're on the boss and have a solid rotation.

[Xantaria.8726]

@falchos.8345 said:Just a stupid question, for a boss like dhuum who steal boons, alacrity will reduce time limit for mechanics or he will just have alacrity for fun ?

THIS would be interesting to know.

[Nero Wrought.1452]

I don’t understand, because of the changes to phantasm they need to provide a new source for alacrity for that lost from the lack of phantasms. Fine, so they place it on tides of time. But doing so hasn’t solved the problem, it’s just shifted it onto quickness. Where well chronos get their quickness from now?

I like the phantasm changes but nerfing quickness uptime for no reason and buffing alacrity seems like a terrible idea. For this to be a complete solution, they need to provide a similar source of quickness for the chrono. Leaving things as is will needlessly gimp chronos when you are actually trying to improve the profession's core mechanics. Find a new source of quickness so that things don't go all wacky, please.

[Xantaria.8726]

@Xantaria.8726 said:

@falchos.8345 said:Just a stupid question, for a boss like dhuum who steal boons, alacrity will reduce time limit for mechanics or he will just have alacrity for fun ?

THIS would be interesting to know.

@Robert Gee.9246 what will happen once bosses have alac?

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

@trollpatsch.5249 said:could you also rework chronomancer rune like the firebrand rune, just for alac? or do you intend to kill support renegade?

....Killing quickness necro with your suggestion. Trust me when i say, that we necros enjoy quickness of that rune far more then we would any alacrity.

@Rym.1469 said:As always, please be cautious when adding new boons to the table. It often throws the boon-corruption relations out of balance and we have all seen what disaster adding few boons here and there can release with launch of HoT and Season 1 of PvP. That event called for drastic boon corruption availability adjustements, moving boon corruption from main niche utility to main source of damage.

Corruption stopped being niche and started being a desperate need the moment everyone started overspamming boons day one of HoT. Hi warriors, engies, guards, rangers, heralds, elementalists....

Necros and their boon corruption were the only thing keeping this madness in check. Well now we get spellbreakers, but still, I welcome ability to corrupt alacrity, hell it's about time!

Also it's about time alacrity was a subject to concentration stat. On one side we had chronos that could pump it out all day long and not give a flying you-know-what about concentration, on other revs that could only cry not being able to extend it, even when there were ready, willing and able to invest into concentration...

[JanTar.5961]

As a pve mesmer main I really don't mind that my class will go through some changes. My first thoughts on these changes are that I'm looking forward to seeing them implemented in game and trying them out. Since the mirage came with the clone build option I really love the dynamic and involved gameplay that comes with it and the phantasm change should only make it even better.

The change I'm worried about is the removal of quickness from Tides of Time. This skill is at the beginning of every quickness rotation of my chrono in raids, and without the option to immediately receive any quickness the rotation can't fit inside the Continuum Split and the whole thing becomes very clunky. I think that the quickness on this skill particularly is very important and the immediate effect is only replaceable with Time Warp which is not always wanted. The base duration of the quickness received could be lowered to 1s and i wouldn't mind. Or keep the quickness given on the way out and switch to alacrity for the return trip of the wall, but the return trip is not that reliable so it might not be ideal (but still better than removing quickness altogether).

With all that said I will wait till I can see the changes live and then we will see the options available to us.

[Sojourner.4621]

@"messiah.1908" said:what about revenant alacrity. a trait which hardly needed is nerf now?!also a renagade f skill also nerf now???can we get something else please for revenant. as the boon change will hugly effect the revenant. as we cannot stand more boon on us which will corrupt easilymaybe more cleanse abilities

serene rejuvenation - with alacrity also proc now resistance to allies for 3 sec. or will cleanse 1 condition each sec for 3 secorder from above - with alacrity will also proc resistance to allies for 1.5 sec 4 stacks (or 6 with trait). or cleanse 1 condition each sec for 4 sec (or 6 sec)

For PvE this will be a buff to renegade, not a nerf. They will, flat out, be able to EASILY maintain 100% alacrity uptime. Even Herald will now be able to maintain alacrity uptime at or close to 100%, since it will be effected by boon duration. Sure it won't be as powerful as before, but neither will Chronomancer's. The "more effective alacrity" trait will only affect the chrono with it selected, not any of its party members. In fact, this might make Rev a better support choice than chrono for some situations, or at least an equal one.

[StARlORD.2736]

Will that affect core Mesmer and mirage or just chrono? And does alacrity stack some condi damage?

[CptAurellian.9537]

Sounds like an excellent change, at least with regard to general aspects. We'll see how the details function in practice, but the direction is the right one. Did you hire new devs for the balance team during last summer, ANet?

[ZDragon.3046]

Robert for counter play purposes in those few situations that happen what will alacrity convert into now that its a boon? Will it simply become chill which is its obvious opposite effect or will it become something possibly a new condition all together. Will resistance now convert into something new or different? or will we simply have 2 boons that convert to chill?

[Wraith.3504]

What bothers me most about this situation is, they are yet again talking about nerfing the players, but they are not talking about nerfing the aggro zones, and unlimited condi potential of the new enemies that continually out mob even my best builds, some meta some not. It is time that they look at the pure number of enemies on the new maps, especially areas over saturated with veterans. Perfect example of this would be the area around the Djinn HP in Crystal desert, or the Veteran Jacaranda HP in the elon riverlands, but their are many others. Additionally the forged are ridiculous for both their range and condis, and it is hardly possible to survive areas that have Canids or abominations in them as they are mostly vets and their aggro range takes them were ever the hell you want often times other vets and then well yet again Mob death again. I have mentioned in previous posts the issue with Jacaranda pack ping ponging you around until your dead. I mean really soloing a map is painful on the best of day, and this is what they claim they want us to be able to do. The maps are becoming uninhabited quickly except where their are the few meta's on the new maps, but then we have the awakened raiding parties bringing the pain to the old maps as well. Their needs to be a rebalance of these enemies, before they nerf player classes into non existence and then create the same frustration the HOT garbage did.