Balance Update: 2 October 2018

[Carighan.6758]

Can we get the patch notes in advance? So we can prepare a bit, get gear ready and all?

[Liewec.2896]

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:balance patch?fire staff ele not bad enough?

Ele's still complaining after being on top for how many years ?Now you guys can be average like every other DPS.

staff has been regarded as fairly bad in pvp, but because some people must have been doing well with it in raids, it is now utterly useless in pvp.what happened to skill splitting? why was my weapon turned from bad to useless because it was good in a totally different part of the game?

I can say the same for several skills and abilities from other classes that got dumpstered due to PvP.

go ahead then? lets see if you can give anything as useless as staff ele is in spvp right now.if it is even USEABLE in pve then it isn't as useless.

[geist.4126]

No nerf to mirage or deadeye in WvW and pvp. Guess Anet think it's fine or doesn't care for the game modes.

[Astralporing.1957]

Well, they just nuked chronosupport from orbit, so i guess they will wait tilll the next balance patch with continuing on with other mesmer builds. It tends to build up anticipation.

[Turkeyspit.3965]

I see a lot of skills changed so that to active the ability they had before, you need to either interact with a combo field or have a specific buff on you. Not quite sure I understand the change. As a Guardian I already have important reasons to want to combo my light field, there was no need to attach the GS heal to it. Kinda baffling.

[crazyhusky.2985]

Thanks nerfing Guardian's best weapons.Mesmar got buffs it didnt need, it was already super strong, you've made it stronger.Buff the strong and Nerf the weak.

Guard's sword didn't a need nerf it, could use a slight buff or tweak instead.Guard's Scepter was fine how it was.Guard's Greatsword you can no longer self heal with it... why? I know is small heal but every point of HP counts when you abysmally low Base HP for little reason, if you going to change the healing to combo fields then allow Guardian to still be able to it when it wants. Only Symbol of Wrath gives a light combo field, so you've effectively nerfed it's healing, limiting it only to that move, No other Greatsword skills have a light combo field.what it SHOULD be changed to "Heal yourself when you use a Combo field with a Greatsword equipped" so this way Guardian can still get this small healing by itself, with and without allies. It's a nerf that was not needed.

[Blocki.4931]

@"crazyhusky.2985" said:Thanks nerfing Guardian's best weapons.Mesmar got buffs it didnt need, it was already super strong, you've made it stronger.Buff the strong and Nerf the weak.

Guard's sword didn't a need nerf it, could use a slight buff or tweak instead.Guard's Scepter was fine how it was.Guard's Greatsword you can no longer self heal with it... why? I know is small heal but every point of HP counts when you abysmally low Base HP for little reason, if you going to change the healing to combo fields then allow Guardian to still be able to it when it wants. Only Symbol of Wrath gives a light combo field, so you've effectively nerfed it's healing, limiting it only to that move, No other Greatsword skills have a light combo field.what it SHOULD be changed to "Heal yourself when you use a Combo field with a Greatsword equipped" so this way Guardian can still get this small healing by itself, with and without allies. It's a nerf that was not needed.

You're ignoring 90% of the mesmer changes to make a claim that would otherwise be disproven in the same sentence. Can you stop?

[Lambent.6375]

Why was the Lead the Wind trait nerfed for PvE?

[crazyhusky.2985]

@Blocki.4931 said:

@"crazyhusky.2985" said:Thanks nerfing Guardian's best weapons.Mesmar got buffs it didnt need, it was already super strong, you've made it stronger.

Buff the strong and Nerf the weak.

Guard's sword didn't a need nerf it, could use a slight buff or tweak instead.Guard's Scepter was fine how it was.Guard's Greatsword you can no longer self heal with it... why? I know is small heal but every point of HP counts when you abysmally low Base HP for little reason, if you going to change the healing to combo fields then allow Guardian to still be able to it when it wants. Only Symbol of Wrath gives a light combo field, so you've effectively nerfed it's healing, limiting it only to that move, No other Greatsword skills have a light combo field.what it

SHOULD

be changed to

"Heal yourself when you use a Combo field with a Greatsword equipped"

so this way Guardian can still get this small healing by itself, with and without allies. It's a nerf that was not needed.

You're ignoring 90% of the mesmer changes to make a claim that would otherwise be disproven in the same sentence. Can you stop?

Can you stop?I wasn't ignoring the changes to mesmar, Blurred Inscriptions was given new unique things to all signets, they no longer remove 1 condition from you. In otherwords a buff.You have a new trait in the offensive Domination traitline "Egotism" that replaced it, it does more damge to foes if you have higher HP than your foe.Considering how mesmars like blink in and surprise people doing damage first, this is going to be a good trait to help them out, as they'll be able to do more damage from the get go.

With Confounding Suggestions, That trait no longer converts dazes into stuns can be seen as a nerf. but then I can agrue that the stuns and dazes durations are now longer which is a buff. The only difference I can see from this "nerf" is now that a target can move on some of the skills that would have stopped it with this trait. However they still can't attack you. This doesn't really change anything. Mesmars can still swarm dazed/stunned people with clones.

The only nerfs i can see are Blurred Inscriptions was moved to a supportive traitline, and replacing Temporal Enchanter. It does mean mesmar's no longer a trait to effect Glamor's. but Temporal Enchanter only made glamor's last 2 seconds longer, to be honest is not too much of a lost.The nerf to Elusive Mind in pvp/wvw was a much needed one to balance out Mirage. Mirage's are too evasive, and have tons of movement options, Allowing people being to able actually keep them in place for a bit, this will help other classes who have to fight them. Because playing a Mirage, you have little to no risks, but all the rewards. See a target, attack it, if it doesn't easily go down, blink away and find another target.

[Curunen.8729]

The additional nerf to Elusive Mind is a total nuke from orbit.

Remember it means even when you dodge while dazed it will proc 6s exhaustion. Why suffer that when even with normal dodge you can do it while dazed?

I will be extremely surprised if anyone runs this anymore, even for the condi cleanse, instead of IH (or the tiny minority who run Dune Cloak).

The only game plan now for anyone stubborn enough to stick with EM and dodges even during a daze is to blink out and run away until the exhaustion wears off because sticking in a fight even with energy sigils/adventurer runes and having maybe one weapon skill evade or something like IA means an inefficient waste of skills to maybe barely sustain through the 6 second exhaustion - after which that waste of cooldowns is going to be costly.

[Substance E.4852]

I'm supposed to be spooked by the Halloween content, not the balance teams attempts at "small adjustments".

[TexZero.7910]

@Liewec.2896 said:

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:balance patch?fire staff ele not bad enough?

Ele's still complaining after being on top for how many years ?Now you guys can be average like every other DPS.

staff has been regarded as fairly bad in pvp, but because some people must have been doing well with it in raids, it is now utterly useless in pvp.what happened to skill splitting? why was my weapon turned from bad to useless because it was good in a totally different part of the game?

I can say the same for several skills and abilities from other classes that got dumpstered due to PvP.

go ahead then? lets see if you can give anything as useless as staff ele is in spvp right now.if it is even USEABLE in pve then it isn't as useless.

Warrior Rifle been nerfed repeatedly, even to the point of reworking it because it was that much of a dumpster fire weapon that no mode used it.That's one very easy example of a weapon.

Lets continue on to skills that have been changed for "PvP reasons". Engineer Turret and Necromancer minions both of which had their damage and health scaled so far back that they then had to be re-adjusted to have -90% damage reduction against AoE skills.

That's probably not good enough for you so let me hit you right in the Ele feels. Ride the Lightning had it's cooldown doubled. It's only recently had changes to revert some of that overkill by shaving 10 seconds off the cooldown.

So there you have some very easy examples of things PvP has caused to neuter skills and weapons for other game modes based on your criteria of them being "useless". There's far more than these those if you'd take your blinders off you'd see it.

[Silmariena.6205]

R.I.P. the only alternative -> guard + rev ....well done

[Astralporing.1957]

@crazyhusky.2985 said:

@Blocki.4931 said:

@crazyhusky.2985 said:Thanks nerfing Guardian's best weapons.Mesmar got buffs it didnt need, it was already super strong, you've made it stronger.

Buff the strong and Nerf the weak.

Guard's sword didn't a need nerf it, could use a slight buff or tweak instead.Guard's Scepter was fine how it was.Guard's Greatsword you can no longer self heal with it... why? I know is small heal but every point of HP counts when you abysmally low Base HP for little reason, if you going to change the healing to combo fields then allow Guardian to still be able to it when it wants. Only Symbol of Wrath gives a light combo field, so you've effectively nerfed it's healing, limiting it only to that move, No other Greatsword skills have a light combo field.what it

SHOULD

be changed to

"Heal yourself when you use a Combo field with a Greatsword equipped"

so this way Guardian can still get this small healing by itself, with and without allies. It's a nerf that was not needed.

You're ignoring 90% of the mesmer changes to make a claim that would otherwise be disproven in the same sentence. Can you stop?

Can you stop?I wasn't ignoring the changes to mesmar, Blurred Inscriptions was given new unique things to all signets, they no longer remove 1 condition from you. In otherwords a buff.You have a new trait in the offensive Domination traitline "Egotism" that replaced it, it does more damge to foes if you have higher HP than your foe.Considering how mesmars like blink in and surprise people doing damage first, this is going to be a good trait to help them out, as they'll be able to do more damage from the get go.

With Confounding Suggestions, That trait no longer converts dazes into stuns can be seen as a nerf. but then I can agrue that the stuns and dazes durations are now longer which is a buff. The only difference I can see from this "nerf" is now that a target can move on some of the skills that would have stopped it with this trait. However they still

can't attack you

. This doesn't really change anything. Mesmars can still swarm dazed/stunned people with clones.

The only nerfs i can see are Blurred Inscriptions was moved to a supportive traitline, and replacing Temporal Enchanter. It does mean mesmar's no longer a trait to effect Glamor's. but Temporal Enchanter only made glamor's last 2 seconds longer, to be honest is not too much of a lost.The nerf to Elusive Mind in pvp/wvw was a much needed one to balance out Mirage. Mirage's are too evasive, and have tons of movement options, Allowing people being to able actually keep them in place for a bit, this will help other classes who have to fight them. Because playing a Mirage, you have

little to no risks, but all the rewards

. See a target, attack it, if it doesn't easily go down, blink away and find another target.

There's a ton of nerfs in those patchnotes. You just don't see them, because you concentrate only on mirage in SPvP. Illusionary Inspiration change (loss of Lesser SoI), for example, was a nuke from orbit for support chrono. Well of Recall nerf wasn't good either. And for Blessed Inscriptions, you probably missed the part where signet cooldown reduction was removed.

[Devilman.1532]

Awww did the MESMERTRAIN finally derail? ;)

[Liewec.2896]

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Liewec.2896 said:balance patch?fire staff ele not bad enough?

Ele's still complaining after being on top for how many years ?Now you guys can be average like every other DPS.

staff has been regarded as fairly bad in pvp, but because some people must have been doing well with it in raids, it is now utterly useless in pvp.what happened to skill splitting? why was my weapon turned from bad to useless because it was good in a totally different part of the game?

I can say the same for several skills and abilities from other classes that got dumpstered due to PvP.

go ahead then? lets see if you can give anything as useless as staff ele is in spvp right now.if it is even USEABLE in pve then it isn't as useless.

Warrior Rifle been nerfed repeatedly, even to the point of reworking it because it was that much of a dumpster fire weapon that no mode used it.That's one very easy example of a weapon.

Lets continue on to skills that have been changed for "PvP reasons". Engineer Turret and Necromancer minions both of which had their damage and health scaled so far back that they then had to be re-adjusted to have -90% damage reduction against AoE skills.

That's probably not good enough for you so let me hit you right in the Ele feels. Ride the Lightning had it's cooldown doubled. It's only recently had changes to revert some of that overkill by shaving 10 seconds off the cooldown.

So there you have some very easy examples of things PvP has caused to neuter skills and weapons for other game modes based on your criteria of them being "useless". There's far more than these those if you'd take your blinders off you'd see it.

warrior rifle, not really, iirc it actually got BUFFS because people were complaining it was a bad confused weapon in pvp,so it later became a powerhouse oneshotting people in wvw, so that was then dialled back (a bit)

turrets and minions,

1. are we going to pretend that turrets were really useful anywhere other than pvp, ever?
2. as a necro pve main who plays 99% of the time with a minion build, not a good example to give me!

ride the lightning, ok sure, how much will you be using that?

now back to fire staff ele who used to be awesome fun for sneaking up on capture points and unleashing hell as a true glass cannon class.the number of hits of meteor shower was nerfed because of large hit box raid bosses, should not have happened to the pvp version.the dmg in pvp is now SEVERELY nerfed, all because of these large hitbox raid bosses.Lava Font has received a FORTY PERCENT dmg nerf , again because of its effectiveness in raids, should not have happened to the pvp version.that is both of the things that made fire staff an awesome glasscannon tool, nerfed to the ground.

a weapon that barely any one was using in pvp because it was regarded as fairly bad, received such a large nerf that it performs half as well as it used to.tell me that is good balancing,tell me the skills shouldn't have been split,or just carry on telling me to not be pissed about such a stupid change.

[Hyper Cutter.9376]

If you're going to whine about things being nerfed across the board because of one mode, ranger pets have been the victims of this more than anything else in the entire game. The smokescale alone has probably been nerfed a dozen times by now...

[TexZero.7910]

@"Liewec.2896" said:a weapon that barely any one was using in pvp because it was regarded as fairly bad, received such a large nerf that it performs half as well as it used to.tell me that is good balancing,tell me the skills shouldn't have been split,or just carry on telling me to not be pissed about such a stupid change.

You mean a utility weapon having it's damage nerfed. Say it aint so ele mains! Say it aint so!The change to staff was perfectly fine, there was no need to split the skill in this case because it wasn't a skill issue. It was a weapon issue in that said "Utility Weapon" was overtunned and outperformed other weapons whose sole design is to put out damage.

So yes i'll tell you to stop being saltier than an ocean. The change was fine and you're overreacting.

[Liewec.2896]

@TexZero.7910 said:

@"Liewec.2896" said:a weapon that barely any one was using in pvp because it was regarded as fairly bad, received such a large nerf that it performs half as well as it used to.tell me that is good balancing,tell me the skills shouldn't have been split,or just carry on telling me to not be pissed about such a stupid change.

You mean a utility weapon having it's damage nerfed. Say it aint so ele mains! Say it aint so!The change to staff was perfectly fine, there was no need to split the skill in this case because it wasn't a skill issue. It was a weapon issue in that said "Utility Weapon" was overtunned and outperformed other weapons whose sole design is to put out damage.

So yes i'll tell you to stop being saltier than an ocean. The change was fine and you're overreacting.

i hope whatever weapon/class combo is your favourite gets nerfed through the floor too,and remember, don't be salty about it.

[maddoctor.2738]

@"TexZero.7910" said:You mean a utility weapon having it's damage nerfed. Say it aint so ele mains! Say it aint so!

Serious question: Elementalist Staff was supposed to be a utility weapon? Because as far as utility is concerned Staff is total garbage compared to every other weapon available to Elementalists. CC on Staff is unreliable, misses too often, it's slow, healing is mediocre and only happens in huge fields (good in WVW I guess, terrible anywhere else), Staff provides little boons/buffs to the party (outside that bit of regeneration and some tiny might) or de-buffs to enemies. So where exactly is this "utility" of the Staff? All Staff had above other weapons is range (it still has) and damage (that it doesn't have anymore) because Staff was never (and still isn't) a utility weapon, if you want utility you use ANY other Elementalist weapon other than Staff.

[Shikigami.4013]

Agreed, to label one weapon a "utility weapon" while the game does not even provide any category like "offense weapon", "defense weapon" or "utility weapon" is just based on a subjective opinion on what the weapon is used for.

Is ranger longbow a "utility weapon" for having hard CC? Or maybe a "defensive weapon" because of providing stealth and a pushback? Or an "offensive weapon" because of rapid fire? No, it's just a twohanded weapon, like ele staff. There is no other category ArenaNet made, nor is there any reason to assume that a weapon with a utility skill automatically has to do less damage than a weapon which does not have a utility skill (if there even is such a weapon, I do not memorize all the skills for all the weapons).

[eldrjth.7384]

@"crazyhusky.2985" said:

what it SHOULD be changed to "Heal yourself when you use a Combo field with a Greatsword equipped" so this way Guardian can still get this small healing by itself, with and without allies. It's a nerf that was not needed.

Not a bad idea. I think the devs wanted to generalise the benefit of the trait so the healing could be provided to different weapon sets rather than be exclusive to GS. What if the trait was: heal yourself whenever you finish a combo (not just light field) and keep the GS dmg and cdr? The healing would still be best with GS because of the number of finishers it has and the main one multi hits too.

[TexZero.7910]

@maddoctor.2738 said:

@"TexZero.7910" said:You mean a utility weapon having it's damage nerfed. Say it aint so ele mains! Say it aint so!

Serious question: Elementalist Staff was supposed to be a utility weapon? Because as far as utility is concerned Staff is total garbage compared to every other weapon available to Elementalists. CC on Staff is unreliable, misses too often, it's slow, healing is mediocre and only happens in huge fields (good in WVW I guess, terrible anywhere else), Staff provides little boons/buffs to the party (outside that bit of regeneration and some tiny might) or de-buffs to enemies. So where exactly is this "utility" of the Staff? All Staff had above other weapons is range (it still has) and damage (that it doesn't have anymore) because Staff was never (and still isn't) a utility weapon, if you want utility you use ANY other Elementalist weapon other than Staff.

So you're going to discount what is has because you're bad at using it ?Fair enough. But that doesn't change the fact that the only pure damage on staff is in Fire. The rest of the weapon has UTILITIY even if you don't/can't/won't use it.

[maddoctor.2738]

@"TexZero.7910" said:So you're going to discount what is has because you're bad at using it ?Fair enough. But that doesn't change the fact that the only pure damage on staff is in Fire. The rest of the weapon has UTILITIY even if you don't/can't/won't use it.

The rest of the weapon is inferior at what it does compared to every other Elementalist weapon, which is why the only good Attunement on Staff was/is Fire. You can find Elementalist weapons that are better than Staff on CC, healing, boon support, which, according to your definition, means all Elementalist weapons are utility weapons. I'm not against nerfing the damage of Staff, but they should've increased the actual utility of the other attunements on Staff to make them compete with every other option in the game because as is, Staff is a really weak "utility" weapon.

[TexZero.7910]

@maddoctor.2738 said:

@"TexZero.7910" said:So you're going to discount what is has because you're bad at using it ?Fair enough. But that doesn't change the fact that the only pure damage on staff is in Fire. The rest of the weapon has UTILITIY even if you don't/can't/won't use it.

The rest of the weapon is inferior at what it does compared to every other Elementalist weapon, which is why the only good Attunement on Staff was/is Fire. You can find Elementalist weapons that are better than Staff on CC, healing, boon support, which, according to your definition, means all Elementalist weapons are utility weapons. I'm not against nerfing the damage of Staff, but they should've increased the actual utility of the other attunements on Staff to make them compete with every other option in the game because as is, Staff is a really weak "utility" weapon.

Nothing saying Anet wont do just that. Although you'll likely dismiss it as still not doing enough until it's overloaded.