"Nerf Holosmith!"

[frareanselm.1925]

as far as i know, grenade and bomb kits recieved nerfs in the past

[wasss.1208]

@frareanselm.1925 said:as far as i know, grenade and bomb kits recieved nerfs in the past

Not really. In the past three years the major changes were: pre PoF patch buffed 'nade Barrage and Shrapnel Grenade (20% and 12%). Barrage got nerfed twice since (coef. from 0.6-0.5, now from 0.5 to 0.4), Shrapnel just got nerfed (reduced coef and nerfed cd). Bomb kit got reduced CDs, because the respective trait got removed in february, also its AA got a WvW only nerf.

I find it quite impressive how little numerical changes had happened to these kits since their release. Also, 'nade kit didn't see any proper use in the past 5 years, so it shouldn't be that surprising.

[Poledra Val.1490]

@wasss.1208 said:

@frareanselm.1925 said:as far as i know, grenade and bomb kits recieved nerfs in the past

Not really. In the past three years the major changes were: pre PoF patch buffed 'nade Barrage and Shrapnel Grenade (20% and 12%). Barrage got nerfed twice since (coef. from 0.6-0.5, now from 0.5 to 0.4), Shrapnel just got nerfed (reduced coef and nerfed cd). Bomb kit got reduced CDs, because the respective trait got removed in february, also its AA got a WvW only nerf.

I find it quite impressive how little numerical changes had happened to these kits since their release. Also, 'nade kit didn't see any proper use in the past 5 years, so it shouldn't be that surprising.

The problem is the might up time on nade holo its crazy high and until they nerf it to more a reasonable number you will see nades holos consistnently.

[mortrialus.3062]

@wevh.2903 said:

@Shiyo.3578 said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

[UNOwen.7132]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@Shiyo.3578 said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its very far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

[Twigifire.8379]

The issue with holo I don't believe is the access to photon forge so altering cooldowns or the like isn't going to be very significant except for reducing mobility. The main issue I think is to do with the perks of having high heat. Any good holo juggles their heat as high as possible, not for the PF skills (they're all 'good' but nothing OP). Having perma 20+ might, 3 condi converts every ~8ish seconds, 200-400 healing per second, and essentially perma-superspeed from a single traitline is definitely what I believe should be adjusted. The might generation and healing from losing heat being the main issues where it makes Holo able to heal from basically 0-100 whilst still having lots of escape options (also ticks down during elixir s) and heaps of power damage. The high damage of photon forge skills is mostly from the damage increases from the last minor trait and might (to do with high heat) than the actual skills themselves. I'm sure if we gave 30%+ damage to most power weapons then their damage would seem equally (or more) as ridiculous.In short: Look at the perks of having high heat, not the photon forge skills themselves.

[mortrialus.3062]

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith doesn't have access to quickness, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage!

[NotFound.7813]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith

doesn't have access to quickness

, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage

Nice to know pvp is about hittig a golem xďddd , reaper shround one shot ppl , do big dps in long time doenst mean nothing , this is not fucking pve , scourge does far more dmg than reaper but the thing is reaper has big dmg in small time , and holo access to quickness in photom forge is so fucking small , elixir is ur only breakstun u can use it freely to do dmg while holo mains doenst use sword 3 with photon forge , sword 3 is used with morter or granade kit after leaving photon forge with dmg boost but u dont even know cuz ur just bringing stupid pve logic to a complex scenarios ,

[mortrialus.3062]

@wevh.2903 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith

doesn't have access to quickness

, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage

Nice to know pvp is about hittig a golem xďddd , reaper shround one shot ppl , do big dps in long time doenst mean nothing , this is not kitten pve , scourge does far more dmg than reaper but the thing is kitten has big dmg in small time , and holo access to kickness in photom forge is so kitten small , elixir is ur only breakstun u can use it freely to do dmg while holo mains doenst use sword 3 with photon forge , sword 3 is used with morter or granade kit after leaving photon forge with dmg boost but u dont even knos cuz ur just bringing stupid pve logic to a complex scenarios

It's still a numbers game. The damage numbers the meta builds are putting out is relevant, just like their healing per second is relevant, just like their block+invuln+evade uptime is relevant. You really think how much more damage Holosmith is putting out compared to Warrior is has absolutely zero bearing on balance?

[UNOwen.7132]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

Hypothetically it would be, yes. Practically due to how much it increases heat for the little payback, and how jank the skill is, its usually a DPS loss.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

When you say "when you compare the two without quickness", you are aware youre also ignoring 300 ferocity as well, which is a pretty big damage boost too, right? And beyond that, whats your setup, how much heat? Are you just waiting in the 100-150 heat range just for the sake of trying to push damage as high as possible.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith doesn't have access to quickness, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

Having temporary access to quickness is a very far cry from having perma-quickness. Especially if Holo has to burn a stunbreak for the quickness.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

As established above, in an actual use case photon blitz is awful and as such is never used. So you have to compare Corona Burst to Soul Spiral. More damage in the long period, but a lot less in the short erm.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

Except it is. You made 3 errors. You ignored the trait that makes reaper shroud actually broken (while I imagine you at the same time didnt ignore enhanced heat capacity storage unit), you assumed a skill so janky its never used is used, and you ignored the entire aspect of heat. You also assume DPS in the long term, despite the fact that you dont actually stay in Photon Forge or Reaper shroud for very long. Theyre burst forms. And when it comes to burst? Yeah it aint even close, Reaper shroud blows photon forge completely out of the park. Even if you assume the Holo uses quickness.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage!

Lemme guess. You tested it on golems and as such had confusion not do any damage and torment do half damage. Gee I wonder why your results ended up the way they are.

[Khalisto.5780]

If i had to pick one thing to be nerfed pn holo it'd be the perma swiftness, nerfing it's overall map presence and kill potential

[mortrialus.3062]

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

Hypothetically

it would be, yes. Practically due to how much it increases heat for the little payback, and how jank the skill is, its usually a DPS

loss

.As established above, in an actual use case photon blitz is awful and as such is

never

used. So you have to compare Corona Burst to Soul Spiral. More damage in the long period, but a lot less in the short erm.

A quick hop over to Angeel's stream shows him using it pretty regularly, because it's a ranged DPS boost that also allows you to attack targets if they get out of range while in Photon Forge.

I don't know where this "jank" complaint comes from. It isn't any different than any other ranged channel like Confusing Images, Unload, Repeater, Ghastly Clawed, Barrage, Plasma Beam. Don't 360 while you're using, don't do it around easy line of site and it's fine.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

When you say "when you compare the two without quickness", you are aware youre also ignoring 300 ferocity as well, which is a pretty big damage boost too, right? And beyond that, whats your setup, how much heat? Are you just waiting in the 100-150 heat range just for the sake of trying to push damage as high as possible.

Meta builds ripped straight from Gods of PvP aside from swapping off reaper's onslaught just to see what the numbers are looking like it without it. I did 0 starting heat tests as well as high heat tests on Holosmith, and gave you the 0 starting heat tests, and 100% Life Force on Reaper not that it matters.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith

doesn't have access to quickness

, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

Having temporary access to quickness is a

very

far cry from having perma-quickness. Especially if Holo has to burn a stunbreak for the quickness.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

Except it is. You made 3 errors. You ignored the trait that makes reaper shroud actually broken (while I imagine you at the same time

didnt

ignore enhanced heat capacity storage unit), you assumed a skill so janky its never used is used, and you ignored the entire aspect of heat. You also assume DPS in the long term, despite the fact that you dont actually stay in Photon Forge

or

Reaper shroud for very long. Theyre burst forms. And when it comes to burst? Yeah it aint even close, Reaper shroud blows photon forge

completely

out of the park. Even if you assume the Holo uses quickness.

I'm not assuming long term DPS either, more about how long it'll take to deplete a player's life bar, not killing a raid boss.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage!

Lemme guess. You tested it on golems and as such had confusion not do any damage and torment do half damage. Gee I wonder why your results ended up the way they are.

While all my tests involve me using a mix of golems and players, condition mirage exclusively uses player volunteers for that reason to spam skills while under the effects of confusion. Cry of Frustration puts out 3 seconds of confusion, so you can only get about 3 skills max outside of the victim using multiple instant cast skills on top of it.

Photon Forge is still excellent damage. You just aren't getting ridiculous 4-6k crits from the auto attacks like you used too and it also probably looks wimpy compared to some of the Grenade Barrage crits people are getting. This talk about Reaper Shroud in general feels like people trying to deflect from Nade Holo being one of if not the best builds in the game right now.

[UNOwen.7132]

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@mortrialus.3062 said:

@wevh.2903 said:

@"Shiyo.3578" said:Yeah, first you'd need Reaper to keep base necro shroud skills 1-4 and only lose the skill 5 ability for comparing reaper shroud to photon forge. What a silly person.

Imagine thinking photom deals same damage as reaper shround

You say that like Forge has bad damage or something. Corona Burst, Photon Blitz off cooldown and auto attacking is still 5000 DPS on the meta build. I tested it this morning.

Its not bad, but its not good either. Its a mediocre kit. Its

very

far from Reaper Shroud. Also why are you using Photon Blitz, its a useless skill.

Photon Blitz is a DPS boost over autoattacking. Corona Burst is the biggest damage dealer, but Photon Blitz is a mathmatical boost over just auto attacking.

Hypothetically

it would be, yes. Practically due to how much it increases heat for the little payback, and how jank the skill is, its usually a DPS

loss

.As established above, in an actual use case photon blitz is awful and as such is

never

used. So you have to compare Corona Burst to Soul Spiral. More damage in the long period, but a lot less in the short erm.

A quick hop over to Angeel's stream shows him using it pretty regularly, because it's a ranged DPS boost that also allows you to attack targets if they get out of range while in Photon Forge.

Yeah you use it when out of range, sometimes. Its ok when finishing off a running target, but even then you almost always have better options.

I don't know where this "jank" complaint comes from. It isn't any different than any other ranged channel like Confusing Images, Unload, Repeater, Ghastly Clawed, Barrage, Plasma Beam. Don't 360 while you're using, don't do it around easy line of site and it's fine.

As someone who has used all of those before, its different. I dont know how, or why, exactly, but shots have a tendency to just fail. Plenty of weird "obstructed" errors too. Not something you get with any of the other ones. Except maybe repeater, Ive not played that one in a while.

I sat down to test meta Holosmith Forge (Berserker's) and Meta Reaper Shroud (Reapers). Forge is consistently higher DPS when you compare the two without quickness and when you compare the two with quickness.

When you say "when you compare the two without quickness", you are aware youre also ignoring 300 ferocity as well, which is a pretty big damage boost too, right? And beyond that, whats your setup, how much heat? Are you just waiting in the 100-150 heat range just for the sake of trying to push damage as high as possible.

Meta builds ripped straight from Gods of PvP aside from swapping off reaper's onslaught just to see what the numbers are looking like it without it. I did 0 starting heat tests as well as high heat tests on Holosmith, and gave you the 0 starting heat tests, and 100% Life Force on Reaper not that it matters.

Reaper's Onslaught gives 300 ferocity. Which is, what, 20% crit damage? Thats a lot youre missing. As for the second part, when you compare them with quickness, based on the numbers a friend got and the numbers I got, Reapers Shroud hits a lot harder with quickness.

You can argue "Reaper's Shroud has permanent quickness!" and yeah, that's true. But let's not pretend like meta holosmith

doesn't have access to quickness

, or even off meta but still viable Holosmith.

Having temporary access to quickness is a

very

far cry from having perma-quickness. Especially if Holo has to burn a stunbreak for the quickness.

If you want the breakdown reaper auto attacks ARE stronger than Photon Forge, but Corona Burst and Photon Blitz are significantly more spammable than Soul Spiral allowing Forge's overall DPS to overcome Reaper's on the two meta builds when using quickness from Elixir U, and it's only 800 DPS behind Quickness Marauder Shroud without quickness.

The idea that Photon Forge damage is SO MUCH worse than Reaper's Shroud isn't played out by the actual math. Photon Forge will still pick apart a target in seconds even without Quickness.

Except it is. You made 3 errors. You ignored the trait that makes reaper shroud actually broken (while I imagine you at the same time

didnt

ignore enhanced heat capacity storage unit), you assumed a skill so janky its never used is used, and you ignored the entire aspect of heat. You also assume DPS in the long term, despite the fact that you dont actually stay in Photon Forge

or

Reaper shroud for very long. Theyre burst forms. And when it comes to burst? Yeah it aint even close, Reaper shroud blows photon forge

completely

out of the park. Even if you assume the Holo uses quickness.

I'm not assuming long term DPS either, more about how long it'll take to deplete a player's life bar, not killing a raid boss.

Thats long-term DPS. You dont stay in Photon Forge to kill someone. You do in Reapers Shroud, sometimes, because its actually way burstier, but even that is rare.

You want to see bad? God of PvP's condition mirage build is hitting 1,600 DPS . Your 3,600-5,600 DPS meta build doesn't look so bad now, does it? And that doesn't even include Grenade Barrage!

Lemme guess. You tested it on golems and as such had confusion not do any damage and torment do half damage. Gee I wonder why your results ended up the way they are.

While all my tests involve me using a mix of golems and players, condition mirage exclusively uses player volunteers for that reason to spam skills while under the effects of confusion. Cry of Frustration puts out 3 seconds of confusion, so you can only get about 3 skills max outside of the victim using multiple instant cast skills on top of it.

Yeah Im gonna call bollocks here. 1600 DPS if theyre spamming under confusion and while torment, when confusion alone does a lot more than 1600 damage in a second? Not a chance.

Photon Forge is still excellent damage. You just aren't getting ridiculous 4-6k crits from the auto attacks like you used too and it also probably looks wimpy compared to some of the Grenade Barrage crits people are getting. This talk about Reaper Shroud in general feels like people trying to deflect from Nade Holo being one of if not the best builds in the game right now.

Its not "excellent damage". Its outclassed by sword (as in, Engineers regular sword) in the most common heat thresholds. Its outclassed by grenade kit (mind you, a kit that wasnt even playable until recently) at all of them. Photon Forge is effectively a mediocre kit. Its main purpose is to enable the traits to let you use the good weapon skills.

And the talk about Reaper Shroud is because people want to treat photon forge like reaper shroud (i.e. remove holos access to all utility skills in it, increase the duration you have to stay in it, remove toolbelt skills, etc.). Ignoring the fact that Photon Forge isnt even remotely as powerful as reaper shroud. All of these suggestions would just mean that Holo gets Chronod, and core engineer is the only engineer people will play.

[wasss.1208]

@Poledra Val.1490 said:

The problem is the might up time on nade holo its crazy high and until they nerf it to more a reasonable number you will see nades holos consistnently.

That is right, and it is mentioned in every holo nerf thread (this one starts with several takes on how to tone down holo damage), as well as in the engi subforum.

[N A T E.3108]

Well, they lowered grenade kit damage in the last patch for all engi specs. Not the best decision because holo, with all of it's damage modifiers and sustain, is still somewhat oppressive with it... BUT, they did buff core and scrapper a bit so I can't complain too bad. It's a step in the right direction at least. Let's hope they make good decisions moving forward.

[wasss.1208]

@N A T E.3108 said:Well, they lowered grenade kit damage in the last patch for all engi specs. Not the best decision because holo, with all of it's damage modifiers and sustain, is still somewhat oppressive with it... BUT, they did buff core and scrapper a bit so I can't complain too bad. It's a step in the right direction at least. Let's hope they make good decisions moving forward.

CMC said that they'll keep an eye on it. I hope that means core buffs, after the holo nerfs.

[mixxed.5862]

There are a couple of aspects about holo that aren't well designed:

1. Obviously grenade kit has too much front-loaded damage. A plain nerf to the damage coefficients is needed. Furthermore grenade barrage should get a unique, distinguishable animation.
2. Holo stacks might too readily. Enhanced capacity storage unit is the biggest offender.
3. The reworked explosives trait line is a little problematic. The damage coefficient on explosive entrance is overtuned, it shouldn't proc on any attack but only on the first explosion skill you use - so that skill + explosive entrance can be dodged. The blind duration on flash bang should be 1 second.

[xWiroo.3841]

Seriously guys, leave this game, arenanet doesnt give a fuck since pvp gives them no money. Theres not even new raids or fractal content, just empty promises.

[N A T E.3108]

@"mixxed.5862" said:There are a couple of aspects about holo that aren't well designed:

1. Obviously grenade kit has too much front-loaded damage. A plain nerf to the damage coefficients is needed. Furthermore grenade barrage should get a unique, distinguishable animation.
2. Holo stacks might too readily. Enhanced capacity storage unit is the biggest offender.
3. The reworked explosives trait line is a little problematic. The damage coefficient on explosive entrance is overtuned, it shouldn't proc on any attack but only on the first explosion skill you use - so that skill + explosive entrance can be dodged. The blind duration on flash bang should be 1 second.

Please read the OP... The point of this whole discussion was to point out that core and scrapper do not over-perform like Holo with the same traits. Nerfs to core skills and traits nerf all Engi specs, not just Holo; therefore, nerfs like that need to be done with the balance of the non-Holo specs in mind as well. So a universal "NERF EXPLOSIVE ENTRANCE" or "NERF GRENADE KIT" shouldn't be a part of the discussion unless core and scrapper are over-performing with those as well (which they are not).

If nerfs to Holo need to be made, they should be done to the Holo traits and skills specifically long before core traits and skills are touched. So, in light of this, here is a brief analysis of your proposed changes:

1: this is not a good idea. This nerfs all of Engi even though Holosmith is the only over-performing Engi spec.

2: If Holo needs a nerf to damage (which I don't necessarily think it does) this is a fair option. As many have mentioned throughout this post, Holo benefits from a lot of damage modifiers that make its skills hit a lot harder- effectively making skills OP that otherwise are not when used by scrapper or core.

3: Again, the damage from Explosive Entrance is relative to the spec playing it. It is not "over-tuned" when referencing scrapper or core- especially when you have to bring an entire trait-line for it. Making it hit only once would be a bad choice- why would anyone take an entire trait-line for one chance on an opening strike? Regarding Flashbang in particular, we can debate about it. Personally, I don't see it over-performing that strongly. It is a good skill, but again, ask yourself, is it oppressive on core or scrapper when considering the rest of the meta? If it is, I haven't seen it.

Long story short, play Holo, play scrapper, play core, and then make up your opinion on what is op. Universally OP skills are, of course, fine to nerf (i.e. rampage) but that is not the case here. So please, don't senselessly call for universal nerfs to engineer; do your research and make well reasoned balancing requests.

[N A T E.3108]

@xWiroo.3841 said:Seriously guys, leave this game, arenanet doesnt give a kitten since pvp gives them no money. Theres not even new raids or fractal content, just empty promises.

Thanks for the valuable input.

[Kuma.1503]

@N A T E.3108 said:

@"mixxed.5862" said:There are a couple of aspects about holo that aren't well designed:

1. Obviously grenade kit has too much front-loaded damage. A plain nerf to the damage coefficients is needed. Furthermore grenade barrage should get a unique, distinguishable animation.
2. Holo stacks might too readily. Enhanced capacity storage unit is the biggest offender.
3. The reworked explosives trait line is a little problematic. The damage coefficient on explosive entrance is overtuned, it shouldn't proc on any attack but
   only on the first explosion skill
   you use - so that skill + explosive entrance can be dodged. The blind duration on flash bang should be 1 second.

Please read the OP... The point of this whole discussion was to point out that core and scrapper do not over-perform like Holo with the same traits. Nerfs to core skills and traits nerf all Engi specs, not just Holo; therefore, nerfs like that need to be done with the balance of the non-Holo specs in mind as well. So a universal "NERF EXPLOSIVE ENTRANCE" or "NERF GRENADE KIT" shouldn't be a part of the discussion unless core and scrapper are over-performing with those as well (which they are not).

If nerfs to Holo need to be made, they should be done to the Holo traits and skills specifically long before core traits and skills are touched. So, in light of this, here is a brief analysis of your proposed changes:

1: this is not a good idea. This nerfs all of Engi even though Holosmith is the only over-performing Engi spec.

2: If Holo needs a nerf to damage (which I don't necessarily think it does) this is a fair option. As many have mentioned throughout this post, Holo benefits from a lot of damage modifiers that make its skills hit a lot harder- effectively making skills OP that otherwise are not when used by scrapper or core.

3: Again, the damage from Explosive Entrance is relative to the spec playing it. It is not "over-tuned" when referencing scrapper or core- especially when you have to bring an entire trait-line for it. Making it hit only once would be a bad choice- why would anyone take an entire trait-line for one chance on an opening strike? Regarding Flashbang in particular, we can debate about it. Personally, I don't see it over-performing that strongly. It is a good skill, but again, ask yourself, is it oppressive on core or scrapper when considering the rest of the meta? If it is, I haven't seen it.

Long story short, play Holo, play scrapper, play core, and then make up your opinion on what is op. Universally OP skills are, of course, fine to nerf (i.e. rampage) but that is not the case here. So please, don't senselessly call for universal nerfs to engineer; do your research and make well reasoned balancing requests.

This is core Engi's fate. Constantly nerfed for the sake of bringing down Holo.

[Curennos.9307]

Why does heat therapy still exist

[mortrialus.3062]

I'd rather see a hard 25%-33% reduced healing as a draw back for taking Holosmith.

I've personally never minded the damage on holosmith. Holosmith should have augmented engineer into a high risk, high reward damage spec. The problem arrises from Holosmith's utility, traits, and access to the very high sustain inherent to Engineer means that not only is it a damage dealing monster it's also absurdly difficult to counter pressure and kill in relation to how high damage its damage it.

This also has the double problem of meaning there's no practical reason to run core engineer over holosmith because it's such an extreme case of augmenting everything beyond what a core engineer can do with no draw backs. And while Scrapper is still generally more defensive than Holosmith, holo boasts significantly higher damage while having at least comparable sustain to the point where outside of a few months after the initial Gyro rework were Scrappers were just absurdly power crept defensively, Holosmith also generally just steps on Scrapper's toes and crowds it out of the meta.

A lot of this comes from it's utilities and traits. Why is Holosmith's trait line providing condition conversion, passive healing, as well as it's utilities providing high access to block and protection? It's one of the worst designed elite specs from a perspective of just augmenting literally everything the core class does.

Running holosmith should force the player into a high risk high damage spec that needs to play very correctly because it's capacity to resustain and recover after a serious mistake is significantly less than core engineer and especially scrapper. Also overtime the sustain and defense orientated traits and utilities in holosmith should be phased out.

Explosive Entrance should still 100% see a nerf. The minor trait does more damage than all of the Mirage damage orientated ambushes on a Wizard Amulet with Infinite Horizon and 3 clones. And it blinds. What is effectively blind on dodge is ridiculous. it's just on it's face too high value for what isn't even a grandmaster trait.

[Curennos.9307]

@mortrialus.3062 said:I'd rather see a hard 25%-33% reduced healing as a draw back for taking Holosmith.

I've personally never minded the damage on holosmith. Holosmith should have augmented engineer into a high risk, high reward damage spec. The problem arrises from Holosmith's utility, traits, and access to the very high sustain inherent to Engineer means that not only is it a damage dealing monster it's also absurdly difficult to counter pressure and kill in relation to how high damage its damage it.

This also has the double problem of meaning there's no practical reason to run core engineer over holosmith because it's such an extreme case of augmenting everything beyond what a core engineer can do with no draw backs. And while Scrapper is still generally more defensive than Holosmith, holo boasts significantly higher damage while having at least comparable sustain to the point where outside of a few months after the initial Gyro rework were Scrappers were just absurdly power crept defensively, Holosmith also generally just steps on Scrapper's toes and crowds it out of the meta.

A lot of this comes from it's utilities and traits. Why is Holosmith's trait line providing condition conversion, passive healing, as well as it's utilities providing high access to block and protection? It's one of the worst designed elite specs from a perspective of just augmenting literally everything the core class does.

Running holosmith should force the player into a high risk high damage spec that needs to play very correctly because it's capacity to resustain and recover after a serious mistake is significantly less than core engineer and especially scrapper. Also overtime the sustain and defense orientated traits and utilities in holosmith should be phased out.

Explosive Entrance should still 100% see a nerf. The minor trait does more damage than all of the Mirage damage orientated ambushes on a Wizard Amulet with Infinite Horizon and 3 clones. And it blinds. What is effectively blind on dodge is ridiculous. it's just on it's face too high value for what isn't even a grandmaster trait.

Note that the blind on explosive entrance is a GM trait.

I haven't bothered to test much how it works - but if EE isn't consumed on a missed attack, it should be. Most ppl compare it to other on-dodge effects, but it has the key difference of only applying on an attack after a dodge, which provides a certain amount of leeway not present in things like Reckless Dodge, which basically made the dodge itself into an attack you had to mitigate. While I still do think EE should get some nerfs, I don't think it needs them to the extent other on-dodge effects did.

Also, there's no need for a net -healing% on holo. Just remove the sustain inherent to the traitline - aka heat therapy. I also hate how forge#2 can give perma-superspeed if used off cooldown (wasn't superspeed supposed to be scrapper's thing?), but that may be my grumpy bias showing through.

[Shiyo.3578]

Blind on explosive could require you to take 3 trait lines for a single trait and it'd still be obscenely overpowered. I am perpetually blinded against holosmiths and aboslutely SICK of it.

Holosmith needs to have the same sustain as thief, aka zero. They are essentially a roamer RANGED burst class that for some reason is also a bruiser with tons of sustain ?????