You know what really GRINDS MY GEARS?

[Ruufio.1496]

I liked the part where you main mesmer and want engineer gutted because you can't kill it easily.

Remember that time mesmer scepter 3 became a beastly power skill for no reason? I remember.

[mortrialus.3062]

@"Mbelch.9028" said:Holy yikes, batman...

Your post is literally "nerf anything that kills mirage or doesn't let me kill them."

Here's my five things in reaction to your post:

• Condi damage isn't weak. There are still hyper-viable condi builds.

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:mmm. Me thinks kneejerk, forgive me.That aside, If Arenanet would stop putting counterintuitive damage types on condition rotations so things could be counterplayed, I would be more willing to accept this. If Mirage was ONLY confusion or ONLY torment paired with the other jamming conditions and not able to stack both of those together in excess while also boasting the playstyle common to mirages, It would be much easier to counterplay and they wouldn't have to buff all of these stationary builds with cleanses that remove practically every condition in the game at once.

It's literally just scourge and mirage. And scourge is not exactly a ranked friendly build to play and really needs a support to baby sit it to get its maximum potential. I've have been pointing out how condition cleanses are over tuned, power has completely outpaced conditions, and that leaves everything that's not a condition mirage and scourge in a very poor state for months and months now.

• Warriors aren't power crept. They have received no buffs. Last meta, they were nonexistent. You're seeing them a bit more because condi mirage was knocked down a peg or two.

Magebane Tether allowing for warriors to stack 25 might very easily and peak performance absolutely power crept warrior's damage. It's practically the definition of power creep.

• Engineer's turret is fine. If anything, it needs potentially a small shave on its initial heal. That's all.Both Holosmiths and Scrappers have access to too much resustain. Not too many classes can wring almost 9k healing from their heal skill with zero investment in healing power. 2 leaps and exploding the turret which is a free blast 8,980 healing with zero healing power investment and I'm not even counting the regeneration. And 2x leaps, or a leap and another blast are pretty easy to come by for a meta holosmith.

• Overcharged shot has a tell. If you can't see it to dodge it, you need to work on that yourself.Overcharged shot has a projectile, it does not have an anticipation frame. If the engineer is point blank there's 0 travel time and you'll be CC'd pretty much as soon as they keybind registers.

• I agree with you on weaver. Big sad that it is so bad.

Big, big sad.

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:Don't you have mirror cloak stomps and distortion if you absolutely need that stomp?

Does that make automatic pet knock downs any better? Is anyone else really not annoyed by these?

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:Yeah it can crit for close to 3k if you're glass, usually that happens with boosted damage though. Need to see pictures.People cared about imaginary axes -damage?-

If you add up both the physical and condition damage components of Imaginary Axes, maximum potential with a 3x Clone Infinite Horizon on Carrion Amulet with Adventure Runes it adds up to about 4k damage in total split between power and condition. So at this point bounding dodge crits for about 75% of what Imaginary Axes is capable of assuming 3 clones infinite horizon, running damage on torment, and a pretty typical meta stat set up.

[mortrialus.3062]

@coro.3176 said:

@"Snellibee.2761" said:I think condition cleanse needs to be toned down, that will indirectly buff condition damage. Buffing condition damage itself would not be the right approach as classes like Revenant who have close to zero condi cleanse are already getting kitten by condi spitting classes. increasing condi damage would just be one hell of a nerf to non condi cleanse builds.

To be honest I think condi cleanse should just act the way protection acts, instead of clearing all the condi's, just let them have reduced damage.

Condi damage ALREADY was toned down. .. They just forgot to hit the two main offenders at the time - Scourge and Mirage. Way back in .. 2017? I think? there was a great condi nerf patch where practically every high damage condi skill in the game had its duration extended but stacks nerfed, sometimes by as much as half.

Given that there was NO reduction in cleanse at the same time, this resulted in an effective 50% nerf due to the way conditions are cleansed. Cleanse a 10s 2-stack bleed after 5s of damage, and it's done 50% of its potential. Cleanse a 1-stack 20s bleed after 5s of damage and it's done 25% of its potential. At present, playing condi in this game is a frantic scramble to get some damage on an opponent, then follow it up with all kinds of cover conditions without reapplying your damaging condi accidentally.

I somewhat agree with you that condi could stand to be nerfed, BUT it would have to also come with a SEVERE reduction in cleanse. I mean like EVERY class would be at revenant cleanse levels. I mean like remove all cleanse traits and cleanse sigils/runes.

At present, condi is almost all downside with no upside:

• you have to hit opponents usually with closer range skills than power
• opponent can cleanse the damage - some opponents have so much cleanse you can do literally no damage to them even if you land all your skills for a minute straight
• even if the opponent doesn't cleanse the damage, it takes up to 15s for it to fully tick out
• while the damage is ticking, the opponent can attack you back and down or kill you first - if they go down, they lose all condi and win the down fight
• your damage and other condi effects can be entirely negated by resistance
• other players share cleanse with their nearby allies, so much that condi in large fights is near unplayable outside of repeating corrupt fields

For this, you get:

• ability to run tankier stats .. except not really because those stat combos were all removed from PvP, and the small amount of toughness/vitality you do get doesn't make you tanky enough to survive power burst anyway
• higher potential damage (if your opponent doesn't cleanse, but they always cleanse, so effectively less damage than power).

Cleanse needs a heavy, heavy nerf game-wide if you ever want things like: Condi Engi, Condi Revenant, Condi Ranger, etc. to be viable again.

As I mentioned, I suggest ONLY having cleanse on heal skills (which tend to have a ~20-30s cooldown). Maybe 2-4 conditions cleansed per heal. Then fix condi damage values + duration in PvP if needed.

People don't believe me when I point out in a world without cleanses, condition firebrand, ranger, engineer, berserker and revenant all are capable of doing way more damage than condition mirage and scourge's current out put.

But in a world where most of these classes rely very heavily one 1-2 damage dealing conditions and most meta builds can shrug off 5+ multiple times a fight, their effective damage output in this environment is zero. This isn't a remotely new knee jerk opinion from me.

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:14

Dagger Storm

Overall I'm okay with Daggerstorm but there are two aspects I specifically hate; the fact that Improvisation recharges this and the random projectiles that shoot off of it. With Improvisation, you always end up in a fight against that one thief who is running the double steal trait alongside the recharge a skilltype trait and gets Daggerstorm recharged each steal equaling three Daggerstorms spammed back to back and you just can't handle that and die and he says "GG EZ." EVERY time. Also if the counter play is to get away from the thief as they're daggerstorming, I shouldn't have to deal with getting pelted by the random projectiles as well.

I feel like this skill is perfectly in line with what an ultimate should be. Also, considering Improvisation isn't reliable it's hardly a problem. If you get caught by back-to-back dagger storms that's some bad luck on top of not managing your defensive cd's well. With all the blocks, invulns, blinks, and evades other professions have it shouldn't be hard to avoid two dagger storms.

That level of randomness on resetting such a high value skill is indefensible in and of itself really.

[mortrialus.3062]

@"Ruufio.1496" said:I liked the part where you main mesmer and want engineer gutted because you can't kill it easily.

Remember that time mesmer scepter 3 became a beastly power skill for no reason? I remember.

Scepter 3 probably does too much physical damage in the grand scheme of things on a condition build but let's be real, the auto attack chain and ambush attacks for scepter are hot, hot garbage. If you opponent is running away they're going to outpace your projectiles because that's how slow they move. Scepter 3 is your only real kill potential with scepter. Like let's say your running Carrion which a pretty standard choice for a condition damage amulet and Adventure which is pretty normal for condition damage builds.

Your auto attack chain is going to do:

729 damage maximum (355 physical plus 2.25 seconds of torment calculated at moving speed)916 damage maximum (355 physical plus 3.25 seconds of torment calculated at moving speed)

And the final skill on the Auto Attack chain is going to do either:

399 physical damage only

Or

2081 damage maximum (399 physical plus 10 seconds of torment calculated at moving speed) only if you have 3 illusions when you cast this skill which really isn't that likely considering how fast they die.

Like even the extremely restrictive final part of the attack chain designed to be super powerful does only about as much damage as a Holosmith's Rifle 1 attack on a crit. And unlike the Holosmith who can expect to crit extremely regularly crit chance isn't going to be that useful to a condition class as it's not like critical strikes with conditions apply double the duration of the condition itself.

You're never going to kill anyone with the scepter auto attacks. And the ambush skill isn't that much better frankly, you're spending a bar of endurance that best case scenario on this build with 3x clones is going to output about 3k damage on a target.

Scepter got buffed because it was a bad weapon no one ever used and even now the 3 skill is your only real kill potential on the weapon kit.

And before you say "Yeah but clone auto attacks also do condition damage" clones will maintain 3 stacks of torment on a completely stationary target while also doing almost no physical damage.

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

@mortrialus.3062 said:Does that make automatic pet knock downs any better? Is anyone else really not annoyed by these?

I mean.... I understand being randomly knocked down without the ranger having to press a button is obnoxious, but the pets have tells before they do those things.It's just a weird thing to be annoyed by it enough to want it nerfed, imo.

[Vagrant.7206]

@KryTiKaL.3125 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

11

Bulls Charge

As a utility it kind of does everything. It has great movement for both engaging, chasing, disengaging, and roaming across the map. It does excellent damage. Its a 3 second knockdown. It's a combo finisher. It evades. The way Axes of Symmetry and Illusionary Ambush just did too much on too little of a cooldown, Bull's Charge should have to do like 2 of the four things it currently does. Pick them.13

Reckless Dodge

Warriors literally refuse to believe me when I tell them this easily crits for 3k in SPvP, unboosted by might and damage modifies like Peak Performance, even when I post screenshots of exactly that. And it's unblockable. I genuinely can't believe warriors were up in arms over 4k maximum potential Imaginary Axes and Chaos Vortexes when their own dodges do this and unblockable as well. It's not breaking the game, but to me its just funny in like a "WHY????" sort of way.

First off yes a lot of people called for nerfs to Axes of Symmetry. I never saw them as an issue compared to some specific other things. Second...if they removed any of the things that Bull's Charge did then it would go down into the gutter. Remove the Movement? Becomes a second or

worse

Shield 4 due to the longer cast time. Remove the Evade? It becomes a glorified Rush with a CC that you'll just get CC'd during (smart players will CC you during Rush). Remove the CC? It just becomes a Rush with an Evade which is redundant and

you

would still complain about it.

Honestly, my only problem with bull's charge is the evade. It's lacking in a lot of counterplay besides dodge, block, or stability, because it has a very similar tell to rush or shield 4.

But honestly, Bull's Rush is not a big problem for me as it is. Good warriors usually punish me for blowing cooldowns too early with it. My bigger problem is with Rampage being overtuned in terms of damage for how much CC it's packing. The only things I can do about rampage are kite or hope I have a field that continuously blinds available, like mortar kit 4 (Flash Shell).

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

@"Snellibee.2761" said:To be honest I think condi cleanse should just act the way protection acts, instead of clearing all the condi's, just let them have reduced damage.

You are only okay with this because you've never been hit by a condibomb that includes movement hindrances. That is my assertion and I will stand by it.

Condition damage should be an accent to a rotation IMO, not a main event. It's so brittle though that the moment you try to make it more viable, you open the way for people to build in such a way that they put an unreasonable amount of conditions on you at once while still having damage on top of that, or they apply the conditions so frequently that cleansing becomes useless or unreliable.

Conditions don't need a buff or nerf. they need a partial rework that looks at the absolute maximum damage a condition oriented spec can do and balances around that, with consideration given to making sure that condition application has ebbs in its flow that would make cleansing good counterplay, as well as thematic but non-conflicting application, like Revenant's application of torment and chill vs Mirage's application of Torment and Confusion.

Condition oriented specs should at best be able to punish one or two specific battle behaviors that are not independent of each other. Either punish an opponent by actively weakening their defenses if they are kite-y/focused on blocking, or punish them for attacking recklessly. There should be a clear divide between those two punishes on any given spec. You can't punish someone for attacking, then also punish them for running away from you or avoiding you while they wait to be able to attack. Its disingenuous and people will hate it.

As long as conditions can be spammed and jam an opponent to death without any clear response short of "press a button to cleanse", I will never be for just reducing the duration of the conditions, especially since some of them impede movement.

IMO, both cleanses and condis need to be reworked. They do not interact symmetrically, and their damage can be spiked (and cleanse-spiked). I don't believe this was the original design behind conditions, which is supposed to be victory through attrition.

Take for instance skills like Elixir C and Plague Signet. Both skills cleanse many conditions (assuming they don't fail) but have a massive cooldown period Both these skills were introduced in the original game.

Then compare against powercrept condi cleanses, like anticorrosion plating, which replaced alchemical tinctures. The cleansing has crept up to the point where unless a condi build is able to ceaselessly spam their condis, damage won't stick. So both the spamming and the cleansing need to be dropped significantly.

PS: I'm not specifically directing this against engineer. I just happen to be an engi main, so I know what stuff's hot for engis.

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:Does that make automatic pet knock downs any better? Is anyone else really not annoyed by these?

I mean.... I understand being randomly knocked down without the ranger having to press a button is obnoxious, but the pets have tells before they do those things.It's just a weird thing to be annoyed by it enough to want it nerfed, imo.

They're kind of annoying because often the pet ends up behind you as you chase the ranger down, so it's much harder to spot the tells. It's especially annoying when the ranger is downed.

@mortrialus.3062 said:

• Engineer's turret is fine. If anything, it needs potentially a small shave on its initial heal. That's all.Both Holosmiths and Scrappers have access to too much resustain. Not too many classes can wring almost 9k healing from their heal skill with zero investment in healing power. 2 leaps and exploding the turret which is a free blast 8,980 healing with zero healing power investment and I'm not even counting the regeneration. And 2x leaps, or a leap and another blast are pretty easy to come by for a meta holosmith.

The entire cycle for a full Healing Turret heal (HT + Overcharge + Blast (detonate) + Blast/leap + leap) takes around 4 or 5 seconds without quickness. With quickness it's about 2-3 second. That's an extremely long healing rotation, which is wide open to CC, unless the holo has burned their elixir U to save themselves, or wastes a leap or blast for stability from corona burst.

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

@otto.5684 said:

Got it. So I will add bull charge to all the other warrior CC skills and boon rip skills I must dodge. If only I have 50 dodges.. will be an easy fight.

You are playing sPvP. You almost always in range. You fight on tiny circle you know...

What are you talking about? The only skills you have a critical need of dodging are

Breaching StrikeBulls ChargeShield BashEviscerateArcing Slice

four out of 5 of those are also blockable, and all of them are single hits, which means any blind if the warrior is not currently zerker stance is going to make them whiff.Out of all of those skills, only bulls charge and shield bash are available without adrenaline, even if they are used back to back, you will have endurance back before the Warrior is ready to burst you with anything significant.

If a warrior pops Rampage, you should disengage entirely, as it is currently overtuned.

There's no reason to modify one of their defensive CCs, especially with Endure pain being reduced to two seconds. Rampage can be nerfed, but leave bull's alone.

[Snellibee.2761]

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

@"Snellibee.2761" said:To be honest I think condi cleanse should just act the way protection acts, instead of clearing all the condi's, just let them have reduced damage.

You are only okay with this because you've never been hit by a condibomb that includes movement hindrances. That is my assertion and I will stand by it.

Condition damage should be an accent to a rotation IMO, not a main event. It's so brittle though that the moment you try to make it more viable, you open the way for people to build in such a way that they put an unreasonable amount of conditions on you at once while still having damage on top of that, or they apply the conditions so frequently that cleansing becomes useless or unreliable.

Conditions don't need a buff or nerf. they need a partial rework that looks at the absolute maximum damage a condition oriented spec can do and balances around that, with consideration given to making sure that condition application has ebbs in its flow that would make cleansing good counterplay, as well as thematic but non-conflicting application, like Revenant's application of torment and chill vs Mirage's application of Torment and Confusion.

Condition oriented specs should at best be able to punish one or two specific battle behaviors that are not independent of each other. Either punish an opponent by actively weakening their defenses if they are kite-y/focused on blocking, or punish them for attacking recklessly. There should be a clear divide between those two punishes on any given spec. You can't punish someone for attacking, then also punish them for running away from you or avoiding you while they wait to be able to attack. Its disingenuous and people will hate it.

As long as conditions can be spammed and jam an opponent to death without any clear response short of "press a button to cleanse", I will never be for just reducing the duration of the conditions, especially since some of them impede movement.

How are you going to act like I've never been hit by condi? I play revenant, I don't have any condi cleanse. I constantly have condi on me for full duration

[Snellibee.2761]

@coro.3176 said:

@Snellibee.2761 said:I think condition cleanse needs to be toned down, that will indirectly buff condition damage. Buffing condition damage itself would not be the right approach as classes like Revenant who have close to zero condi cleanse are already getting kitten by condi spitting classes. increasing condi damage would just be one hell of a nerf to non condi cleanse builds.

To be honest I think condi cleanse should just act the way protection acts, instead of clearing all the condi's, just let them have reduced damage.

Condi damage ALREADY was toned down. .. They just forgot to hit the two main offenders at the time - Scourge and Mirage. Way back in .. 2017? I think? there was a great condi nerf patch where practically every high damage condi skill in the game had its duration extended but stacks nerfed, sometimes by as much as half.

Given that there was NO reduction in cleanse at the same time, this resulted in an effective 50% nerf due to the way conditions are cleansed. Cleanse a 10s 2-stack bleed after 5s of damage, and it's done 50% of its potential. Cleanse a 1-stack 20s bleed after 5s of damage and it's done 25% of its potential. At present, playing condi in this game is a frantic scramble to get some damage on an opponent, then follow it up with all kinds of cover conditions without reapplying your damaging condi accidentally.

I somewhat agree with you that condi could stand to be nerfed, BUT it would have to also come with a SEVERE reduction in cleanse. I mean like EVERY class would be at revenant cleanse levels. I mean like remove all cleanse traits and cleanse sigils/runes.

At present, condi is almost all downside with no upside:

• you have to hit opponents usually with closer range skills than power
• opponent can cleanse the damage - some opponents have so much cleanse you can do literally no damage to them even if you land all your skills for a minute straight
• even if the opponent doesn't cleanse the damage, it takes up to 15s for it to fully tick out
• while the damage is ticking, the opponent can attack you back and down or kill you first - if they go down, they lose all condi and win the down fight
• your damage and other condi effects can be entirely negated by resistance
• other players share cleanse with their nearby allies, so much that condi in large fights is near unplayable outside of repeating corrupt fields

For this, you get:

• ability to run tankier stats .. except not really because those stat combos were all removed from PvP, and the small amount of toughness/vitality you do get doesn't make you tanky enough to survive power burst anyway
• higher potential damage (if your opponent doesn't cleanse, but they always cleanse, so effectively less damage than power).

Cleanse needs a heavy, heavy nerf game-wide if you ever want things like: Condi Engi, Condi Revenant, Condi Ranger, etc. to be viable again.

As I mentioned, I suggest ONLY having cleanse on heal skills (which tend to have a ~20-30s cooldown). Maybe 2-4 conditions cleansed per heal. Then fix condi damage values + duration in PvP if needed.

bro you didn't even read my comment, I said nerf condi cleanse not condi damage smh learn to read next time so i do'nt get annoyed by these mentions

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

@Snellibee.2761 said:bro you didn't even read my comment, I said nerf condi cleanse not condi damage smh learn to read next time so i do'nt get annoyed by these mentions

@Snellibee.2761 said:I think condition cleanse needs to be toned down, that will indirectly buff condition damage. Buffing condition damage itself would not be the right approach as classes like Revenant who have close to zero condi cleanse are already getting kitten by condi spitting classes. increasing condi damage would just be one hell of a nerf to non condi cleanse builds.

To be honest I think condi cleanse should just act the way protection acts, instead of clearing all the condi's, just let them have reduced damage.

??

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

@Snellibee.2761 said:How are you going to act like I've never been hit by condi? I play revenant, I don't have any condi cleanse. I constantly have condi on me for full duration

Even revenants have condi cleanse. It's just limited. They also have an easy means to remove movement impairment. You're telling me you're fine with being crippled or chilled and hobbling around, unable to cleanse it while a thief bombs you with venoms?What you're asking for is a lot of trouble.

Do you play mallyx by any chance? I'm just finding it really friggin difficult to understand why someone would be fine with being condijammed without having access to something like resistance or condi transfer.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

@Vaeo.4097 said:slow down animation a bit

No. If you cant dodge bulls charge as it stands right now there's a problem and it isn't with the skill. Let's not make warrior evasion worse than it already is. We already struggle to fight the more kitey classes.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:Thiefs dagger storm projectiles are proximity .

Didnt know this. if it only autos you if you are in range, no change to DS is necessary.

Yup. The targeting is slightly random, but it targets the closest enemy and I believe the daggers only bounce once instead of twice.

It also appears to throw more than 8. But only up to 8 actually deals damage, and the bulk of the damage comes from the bounce. So... In an out numbered fight this skill can fuck your shit up.

The whirling thief is unable to deal damage outside of those projectiles. And is still open to some AoE attacks and suffers condi damage still.

[mortrialus.3062]

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:

@Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

@Vaeo.4097 said:slow down animation a bit

No. If you cant dodge bulls charge as it stands right now there's a problem and it isn't with the skill. Let's not make warrior evasion worse than it already is. We already struggle to fight the more kitey classes.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:Thiefs dagger storm projectiles are proximity .

Didnt know this. if it only autos you if you are in range, no change to DS is necessary.

Yup. The targeting is slightly random, but it targets the closest enemy and I believe the daggers only bounce once instead of twice.

It also appears to throw more than 8. But only up to 8 actually deals damage, and the bulk of the damage comes from the bounce. So... In an out numbered fight this skill can kitten your kitten up.

The whirling thief is unable to deal damage outside of those projectiles. And is still open to some AoE attacks and suffers condi damage still.

What AoE attacks in PvP bypass evade?

There's also the Point Blank Area of Effect aspect of the skill, which since it's an evade now you don't need the random dagger projectiles flying from the skill anymore.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@mortrialus.3062 said:What AoE attacks in PvP bypass evade?static cc skills do like guard staff 5 line of warding.

[mortrialus.3062]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:What AoE attacks in PvP bypass evade?static cc skills do like guard staff 5 line of warding.

Oh yeah. I guess shocking aura as well.

[mortrialus.3062]

@"Chaith.8256" said:What's the point of making a balance note if you address the sheer silliness of Unstoppable Union's potential 40% Unblockable uptime, but deliberately make no comment on something like Evasive Mirror's 2s Reflect on a 1.5s cd. What's the potential projectile blocking uptime of that? Yes I'm sure it would be great if Soulbeasts had reduced access to Unblockable but Mirage lowkey kept the Reflect uptime. You're too biased, IMO

Edit: If you say that just because something isn't meta definining, we still need to talk about the silly and unhealthy traits/mechanics, that's fine. We can operate under those parameters if you don't protect your Mirage class because it's not meta defining. Holo isn't meta defining, neither is Longbow SlB, yet that's pretty much the point of your balance note to address.

Why would I need to? There's a million posts about mesmers on the PvP forum already. Whereas no one ever talks about Spellbreakers, Engineers, Rangers. I mean people are talking about scrappers now. But at least 50% of what's so powerful defensively on scrappers is coming from Inventions+Alchemy combo and I think most people who are shocked at all the scrappers running around now aren't aware of that.

There have been tons of threads about the Evasive Mirror. There have been tons of threads about the detargets. There have been tons of threads about Portal. There have been tons of threads about the damage out put. There have been tons of threads about Blurred Inscriptions. I know because I've participated in them and frequently agree or recommend my own personal takes on what should change.

You on the other hand, whenever anyone points out Holosmith has been an excellent build, A Tier in literally all aspects of conquest, since Path of Fire. You go on the defensive, talk about how they aren't winning enough Monthly Tournaments to justify nerfing any aspect of them in any capacity, as if other classes and builds ever get that kind of luxury.

How's that old saying go? When you point a finger at someone you're pointing three fingers back at yourself? Something like that?

[Crystal Paladin.3871]

@Quadox.7834 said:

@KryTiKaL.3125 said:

@Quadox.7834 said:

@Chaith.8256 @Mbelch.9028 @KryTiKaL.3125

Of course it is not objective, the title is "You know what really grinds

my

gears", and the first sentence literally says "but really this is just stuff I hate". Couldn't be more obvious.

True, but they are also suggesting that these are balance issues in the game and need to be addressed. I will admit

some

things are, but not all.Sure.

For instance Ranger Longbow bothers me too, but only

one

skill and its for thematic reasons. Rapid Fire. On a Longbow. That kitten hurts me.

You don't rapid fire longbows

. I know they added it as a skill because of GW1's Preparation skill called Rapid Fire that gave you increased attack speed for a duration, but on the

longbow

? With 1500 (1750) range? Gross. Replace Rapid Fire with a single shot snipe skill and move Rapid Fire onto Shortbow

or

just get rid of it or add a utility/elite skill for it for increased attack speed...I'm sure they can think of something.It is also about the fact that projectile range in general is bugged, giving ranger LB a range of about 1900 instead of 1500.

@Quadox.7834 said:

@KryTiKaL.3125 said:

@Quadox.7834 said:

@Chaith.8256 @Mbelch.9028 @KryTiKaL.3125

Of course it is not objective, the title is "You know what really grinds

my

gears", and the first sentence literally says "but really this is just stuff I hate". Couldn't be more obvious.

True, but they are also suggesting that these are balance issues in the game and need to be addressed. I will admit

some

things are, but not all.Sure.

For instance Ranger Longbow bothers me too, but only

one

skill and its for thematic reasons. Rapid Fire. On a Longbow. That kitten hurts me.

You don't rapid fire longbows

. I know they added it as a skill because of GW1's Preparation skill called Rapid Fire that gave you increased attack speed for a duration, but on the

longbow

? With 1500 (1750) range? Gross. Replace Rapid Fire with a single shot snipe skill and move Rapid Fire onto Shortbow

or

just get rid of it or add a utility/elite skill for it for increased attack speed...I'm sure they can think of something.It is also about the fact that projectile range in general is bugged, giving ranger LB a range of about 1900 instead of 1500.

No... U're wrong absolutely positively... last time I checked, Ranger longbow range is 2400 u should recheck it

[Vagrant.7206]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:What AoE attacks in PvP bypass evade?static cc skills do like guard staff 5 line of warding.

Oh yeah. I guess shocking aura as well.

Static Shield does as well. Useful at disrupting dagger storm. It's particularly hilarious when I have it ready, a thief hits dagger storm, and I immediately disrupt them. They're usually extremely confused for a second or two.

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@Chaith.8256 said:What's the point of making a balance note if you address the sheer silliness of Unstoppable Union's potential 40% Unblockable uptime, but deliberately make no comment on something like Evasive Mirror's 2s Reflect on a 1.5s cd. What's the potential projectile blocking uptime of that? Yes I'm sure it would be great if Soulbeasts had reduced access to Unblockable but Mirage lowkey kept the Reflect uptime. You're too biased, IMO

Edit: If you say that just because something isn't meta definining, we still need to talk about the silly and unhealthy traits/mechanics, that's fine. We can operate under those parameters if you don't protect your Mirage class because it's not meta defining. Holo isn't meta defining, neither is Longbow SlB, yet that's pretty much the point of your balance note to address.

Why would I need to? There's a million posts about mesmers on the PvP forum already. Whereas no one ever talks about Spellbreakers, Engineers, Rangers.

I'm not sure we read the same forums. :smile: People have been knocking those classes too, especially now that condi mirage has been taken down a peg. Scrolling down I see complaints all about scrapper and warrior. Not as many about boonbeast as I did before the nerf.

[Bast.7253]

I feel like ranger longbow 4 should only knockback if they're within a certain range. It's really annoying, especially in wvw, when you get knockbacked and immediately pelted with 2. And they don't have to sacrifice anything for it like taking a trait as dragon hunter which still requires range I think? Or an engi and have to have stab or get knocked down themselves.

[Bast.7253]

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:14

Dagger Storm

Overall I'm okay with Daggerstorm but there are two aspects I specifically hate; the fact that Improvisation recharges this and the random projectiles that shoot off of it. With Improvisation, you always end up in a fight against that one thief who is running the double steal trait alongside the recharge a skilltype trait and gets Daggerstorm recharged each steal equaling three Daggerstorms spammed back to back and you just can't handle that and die and he says "GG EZ." EVERY time. Also if the counter play is to get away from the thief as they're daggerstorming, I shouldn't have to deal with getting pelted by the random projectiles as well.

I feel like this skill is perfectly in line with what an ultimate should be. Also, considering Improvisation isn't reliable it's hardly a problem. If you get caught by back-to-back dagger storms that's some bad luck on top of not managing your defensive cd's well. With all the blocks, invulns, blinks, and evades other professions have it shouldn't be hard to avoid two dagger storms.

It's still a bit strong though. Or maybe other profession's elite skills need a bit more as compensation. I mean, Mesmer has moa, which is pretty strong but a long cast time and a long cooldown. Warrior has rampage, but they still take quite a bit of damage during it. Ele's elites are kind of a joke outside of the tornado, which engi's also get.

I agree that it's what an elite should feel like, but I don't think the other professions have something quite that strong. Guardian invuln that recharges virtues is kind of cool I guess. Necro plague is pretty good but not great enough to run over some of the others. Lich form feels like an elite, but I personally find it kind of hard to use and the targeting system and abilities a little undertuned.

Daggerstorm is definitely one of the better elites out there, all that damage plus an evade? And you're not rooted in place? And it's cooldown can be reduced? Thankfully thief is hard enough to play generally that it kind of evens out.

[mortrialus.3062]

@"cptaylor.2670" said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:14

Dagger Storm

Overall I'm okay with Daggerstorm but there are two aspects I specifically hate; the fact that Improvisation recharges this and the random projectiles that shoot off of it. With Improvisation, you always end up in a fight against that one thief who is running the double steal trait alongside the recharge a skilltype trait and gets Daggerstorm recharged each steal equaling three Daggerstorms spammed back to back and you just can't handle that and die and he says "GG EZ." EVERY time. Also if the counter play is to get away from the thief as they're daggerstorming, I shouldn't have to deal with getting pelted by the random projectiles as well.

I feel like this skill is perfectly in line with what an ultimate should be. Also, considering Improvisation isn't reliable it's hardly a problem. If you get caught by back-to-back dagger storms that's some bad luck on top of not managing your defensive cd's well. With all the blocks, invulns, blinks, and evades other professions have it shouldn't be hard to avoid two dagger storms.

It's still a bit strong though. Or maybe other profession's elite skills need a bit more as compensation. I mean, Mesmer has moa, which is pretty strong but a long cast time and a long cooldown. Warrior has rampage, but they still take quite a bit of damage during it. Ele's elites are kind of a joke outside of the tornado, which engi's also get.

I agree that it's what an elite should feel like, but I don't think the other professions have something quite that strong. Guardian invuln that recharges virtues is kind of cool I guess. Necro plague is pretty good but not great enough to run over some of the others. Lich form feels like an elite, but I personally find it kind of hard to use and the targeting system and abilities a little undertuned.

Daggerstorm is definitely one of the better elites out there, all that damage plus an evade? And you're not rooted in place? And it's cooldown can be reduced? Thankfully thief is hard enough to play generally that it kind of evens out.

I don't mind Dagger Storm on it's own that much. My problem is the randomness Improvisation introduces into the game, potentially giving such a powerful elite skill 2x uses back to back, and potentially 3x uses over the course a 20 second fight. And also now that it's an Evade it doesn't need the projectiles which you can never really count for. It's fine enough on it's own as a Point Blank Area of Effect Evade.

[Quadox.7834]

mfw people unironically defending dagger storm.

[Quadox.7834]

delet this

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@"cptaylor.2670" said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:14

Dagger Storm

Overall I'm okay with Daggerstorm but there are two aspects I specifically hate; the fact that Improvisation recharges this and the random projectiles that shoot off of it. With Improvisation, you always end up in a fight against that one thief who is running the double steal trait alongside the recharge a skilltype trait and gets Daggerstorm recharged each steal equaling three Daggerstorms spammed back to back and you just can't handle that and die and he says "GG EZ." EVERY time. Also if the counter play is to get away from the thief as they're daggerstorming, I shouldn't have to deal with getting pelted by the random projectiles as well.

I feel like this skill is perfectly in line with what an ultimate should be. Also, considering Improvisation isn't reliable it's hardly a problem. If you get caught by back-to-back dagger storms that's some bad luck on top of not managing your defensive cd's well. With all the blocks, invulns, blinks, and evades other professions have it shouldn't be hard to avoid two dagger storms.

It's still a bit strong though. Or maybe other profession's elite skills need a bit more as compensation. I mean, Mesmer has moa, which is pretty strong but a long cast time and a long cooldown. Warrior has rampage, but they still take quite a bit of damage during it. Ele's elites are kind of a joke outside of the tornado, which engi's also get.

I agree that it's what an elite should feel like, but I don't think the other professions have something quite that strong. Guardian invuln that recharges virtues is kind of cool I guess. Necro plague is pretty good but not great enough to run over some of the others. Lich form feels like an elite, but I personally find it kind of hard to use and the targeting system and abilities a little undertuned.

Daggerstorm is definitely one of the better elites out there, all that damage plus an evade? And you're not rooted in place? And it's cooldown can be reduced? Thankfully thief is hard enough to play generally that it kind of evens out.

I don't mind Dagger Storm on it's own that much. My problem is the randomness Improvisation introduces into the game, potentially giving such a powerful elite skill 2x uses back to back, and potentially 3x uses over the course a 20 second fight. And also now that it's an Evade it doesn't need the projectiles which you can never really count for. It's fine enough on it's own as a Point Blank Area of Effect Evade.

No... it needs the projectiles.

Because whats going to happen is that it becomes a regular spin to win move that deals insane damage without the requirement of being outnumbered. And combine it with evades and the whirl finisher, you're going to have even more people crying about thieves than there already is. Where thieves already get nerfed nearly every patch with no meaningful comp.

Remember the stolen skill Whirlaxe thief gets? That skill friggen hurts. Combined with the fact that thief will often try combining it with a whirl finisher like from a spoke field, poison, or what ever. Annnnnd GG.

At least with projectiles, it changes the elites value depending on the situation.

[Zexanima.7851]

@"cptaylor.2670" said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:14

Dagger Storm

Overall I'm okay with Daggerstorm but there are two aspects I specifically hate; the fact that Improvisation recharges this and the random projectiles that shoot off of it. With Improvisation, you always end up in a fight against that one thief who is running the double steal trait alongside the recharge a skilltype trait and gets Daggerstorm recharged each steal equaling three Daggerstorms spammed back to back and you just can't handle that and die and he says "GG EZ." EVERY time. Also if the counter play is to get away from the thief as they're daggerstorming, I shouldn't have to deal with getting pelted by the random projectiles as well.

I feel like this skill is perfectly in line with what an ultimate should be. Also, considering Improvisation isn't reliable it's hardly a problem. If you get caught by back-to-back dagger storms that's some bad luck on top of not managing your defensive cd's well. With all the blocks, invulns, blinks, and evades other professions have it shouldn't be hard to avoid two dagger storms.

It's still a bit strong though. Or maybe other profession's elite skills need a bit more as compensation. I mean, Mesmer has moa, which is pretty strong but a long cast time and a long cooldown. Warrior has rampage, but they still take quite a bit of damage during it. Ele's elites are kind of a joke outside of the tornado, which engi's also get.

I agree that it's what an elite should feel like, but I don't think the other professions have something quite that strong. Guardian invuln that recharges virtues is kind of cool I guess. Necro plague is pretty good but not great enough to run over some of the others. Lich form feels like an elite, but I personally find it kind of hard to use and the targeting system and abilities a little undertuned.

Daggerstorm is definitely one of the better elites out there, all that damage plus an evade? And you're not rooted in place? And it's cooldown can be reduced? Thankfully thief is hard enough to play generally that it kind of evens out.

thief is hard enough to play generally that it kind of evens out.^ This is important to consider which I think people are brushing aside. I could make a list of all the "OP" skills other professions have that thief lacks but I think we all already know it doesn't compare to other professions in the raw power/defense department. Honestly, I think they could completely remove dagger storm and thief's effectiveness wouldn't change much. They would just have to play even safer. I'll reiterate that if you're dying to back to back dagger storms then you should probably work on your kiting and CD management. There is plenty of outplay potential to this skill.

• Blink/Dash away
• Time stun after dagger storm ends
• DS doesn't save them from condi's
• Lighting aura/ring of warding/static field/spectral ring
• Pressure them so they have to use it defensively

It's not easy to deal with but it's not suppose to be, that's why it's an ultimate. When I'm facing a thief I'm more worried about avoiding their steal than dagger storm. When they dagger storm I usually just back off and use it as a chance to recoup some of my CDs.