Suggestion: What to do with Alacrity?

[Mega.5791]

Dual staff is currently the only way to play boon support mirage and it takes away so much from the excitement. So why not change Dune Cloak to give Alacrity on Ambush skills - potentially reducing the duration a bit so boon mirages have to invest into some boon duration?

 

Advantages:

- Mirage can use a second weapon set for more excitement and flexibility.

- Mirage has to choose between DPS (Infinite Horizon) and Alacrity.

 

Disadvantages:

- Some boons (Might) are still staff dependant...

- It might become too strong, but changing Alacrity duration could fix that (by having to invest into boon duration).

 

What do you think? Any other suggestions, adjustments, ideas? I like the new option, but I am just not happy with dual staff. 😞

Edited June 21, 2021 by Megametzler.5729

[Tayga.3192]

What if they removed alacrity from mirage completely? It's chrono's niche. 

Edited June 22, 2021 by Tayga.3192

[Alpha.1308]

43 minutes ago, Megametzler.5729 said:

So why not change Dune Cloak to give Alacrity on Ambush skills - potentially reducing the duration a bit so boon mirages have to invest into some boon duration?

uhm holy broken

 

as much as i'd love that because of how busted my greatsword would be

 

no 

 

i'd rather we remove the time magic from mirage to begin with, and move it onto the freaking c.h.r.o.n.o.-mancer, in a way that isn't on the last tick of some trashy well

and while we're at it, rework the wells so they're actually worth using

 

58 minutes ago, Megametzler.5729 said:

I like the new option

it's a "new option", which is the only thing to like here

 

we need more actual options, not being pigeonholed into rotating in an entire traitline for just a single trait in the entire line to change one thing in a rotation because a few options are too strong to ever pass up, or are the literal only options due to being the least useless 

 

mesmer as a whole is a trainwreck, half our traits are garbage and have no place in this game at all, whether it be pve, pvp, or wvw, and the same goes for half of our utility skills

 

i mean, the same could be said about other classes, but, that doesn't make it okay... i mean..??? that literally makes the entire situation worse 

 

(i still can't believe they added two staff traits competing with each other to the chaos line....)

 

 

 

[Fueki.4753]

Just take Alacrity out of Mirage and give it back to Chronomancer.

Chronomancer was supposed to be the boon support Mesmer, not Mirage.

 

 

Edited June 21, 2021 by Fueki.4753

[Infusion.7149]

I'd like alacrity to be a chronomancer only thing on mesmers, maybe make it mutually exclusive to StM by putting it on Lost Time.  By design, chrono isn't going to be that great  if on condi build anyway.

They can keep the might spam on the mirage.

Edited June 21, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Ardenwolfe.8590]

Seeing a trend here with the Chronomancer answers. Regardless, no thank you. Leave things as they are.

[Alpha.1308]

7 hours ago, Ardenwolfe.8590 said:

Seeing a trend here with the Chronomancer answers.

who'd of guessed the time mage having the easiest access to time magic would be a normal thought process 

 

imagine making something with a clock for the icon, and NOT having it being easy access on the class with another clock icon

 

imagine making a generic boon out of a mechanic that was not a boon to begin with, specifically launched for the one class that it shared the icon with, and then giving MORE access to other classes than the class it was originally on

 

yea, surprising people want things to actually make sense in the game 

 

not to mention from a balance standpoint, the devs even said themselves in their own post on the May 11th update:

 

"Chronomancer has been steeply overperforming in a damage role in all content, leading to an environment in which the best way to tackle almost any challenge is to throw more Chronomancers at it. "

 

so if the class was balanced around being a support????? it's almost like???? woooowieeee it would actually not work like that, and you'd have a chrono for support and actually open builds elsewhere 

 

woWoEiwiEowiweoWIoiWE

Edited June 22, 2021 by Alpha.1308

[Ardenwolfe.8590]

Let me spell it out for you: "No, give alacrity to me!" is the overall response. That's not balance. That's self-centered. Hope that's clear enough for you.

 

The class with the item that buffs everyone with its basic attack is also buffing with alacrity. I know. It's crazy.

Edited June 22, 2021 by Ardenwolfe.8590

[TheAgedGnome.7520]

Mirage alacrity working as intended - no change needed. 

[anbujackson.9564]

Its actually really sad, that chronomancer is the worst option to give alacrity and its on a good way to be the worsed quickness provider in my opinion. You cant really blame anyone who thinks that the whole class idendity of chrono is shattering.

 

Sure chrono was meta for both boons for a long time but why keep adding stuff that is easier and better, making chrono more and more redundant? Pretty sure that people would be fine with mirage if chrono could compete with the simplicity, which is pretty unlikely. It well never be as braindead as renegade alac of course but compared to mirage it could be used on condi and power encounters.

[Mega.5791]

I don't think anyone (well, except at Anet) disagrees that giving alacrity to mirage was a... well, let's say, weird choice. But I doubt they will just back down and delete it saying "oops, well, we had no clue what would happen lol let's go back to start". So I fear people will have to live with it and "just delete it" is not really a realistic suggestion...

 

... well, then again, I doubt any suggestion on the class forums are realistic...

 

(Also lol at the guy thinking mirage with GS would become OP anywhere except in Open World mob farming.)

[Alpha.1308]

35 minutes ago, Megametzler.5729 said:

(Also lol at the guy thinking mirage with GS would become OP anywhere except in Open World mob farming.)

you're right

sorry

my bad

i forgot, that this game

 

called

 

GUILD

 

wars

 

actually does not in fact have a game mode called wvw, where people can get fights of 10v10s and 20v20s or more

 

i forgot this game is only pve, buying skins off the gemstore, then sitting and facetanking bosses with builds they find on the internet

and occasionally baby sitting a point in the only small-scale pvp game mode that even exists in the entire game

 

i forgot they only just recently, after 10 years, they had an update involving Guilds actually fighting other Guilds for once, in the game called Guild Wars, suRpRiSiNGlY tOtaLlY NoT A coIncEdenCE after a streamer had just said a month prior that he was doing a gvg tournament, added to the game, (in a way that's still p garbo)

 

but, you know, having a 1,200 range beam that hits 7 targets (should be 9... for whatever reason that's going on internally that i haven't bothered looking into, it's 7) where almost every other skill has 5 target cap, in a game where damage saturation is a thing due to that fact, is definitely super awful, i know, mesmers don't bring any sort of utility to larger scale fights in the game mode that doesn't exist

 

definitely not the ability to pluck 5 people out of an area, or strip boons in a boon heavy game mode that doesn't exist anyway

 

nobody uses mesmers in the game mode that doesn't exist, of course, what am i thinking 

 

because, you know, even the devs forget that pvp can actually, in fact, involve more than 5 people fighting 5 people 

how could i expect the community to remember what the devs can't 

 

silly me 

[Obtena.7952]

It's odd but not unreasonable that Alacrity is a boon applied by Staff Ambush skill. Still, I would not have been my approach. For me, the staff as a 'chaos' weapon should 'bounce' boons back from the target that are the opposite of the conditions applied. What are those opposites? They are what converting a condition to a boon would result in.

 

So, staff applies Torment, Confusion and Bleeding. Those are converted to Might, Resolution and Vigor respectively ... any of those I would find MUCH more relevant to getting as a Mirage than Alacrity would ever be. Those applications make much more sense to me than random applications of Alacrity.

Edited June 22, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Mega.5791]

1 hour ago, Alpha.1308 said:

you're right

sorry

my bad

i forgot, that this game

 

called

 

GUILD

 

wars

 

actually does not in fact have a game mode called wvw, where people can get fights of 10v10s and 20v20s or more

 

i forgot this game is only pve, buying skins off the gemstore, then sitting and facetanking bosses with builds they find on the internet

and occasionally baby sitting a point in the only small-scale pvp game mode that even exists in the entire game

 

i forgot they only just recently, after 10 years, they had an update involving Guilds actually fighting other Guilds for once, in the game called Guild Wars, suRpRiSiNGlY tOtaLlY NoT A coIncEdenCE after a streamer had just said a month prior that he was doing a gvg tournament, added to the game, (in a way that's still p garbo)

 

but, you know, having a 1,200 range beam that hits 7 targets (should be 9... for whatever reason that's going on internally that i haven't bothered looking into, it's 7) where almost every other skill has 5 target cap, in a game where damage saturation is a thing due to that fact, is definitely super awful, i know, mesmers don't bring any sort of utility to larger scale fights in the game mode that doesn't exist

 

definitely not the ability to pluck 5 people out of an area, or strip boons in a boon heavy game mode that doesn't exist anyway

 

nobody uses mesmers in the game mode that doesn't exist, of course, what am i thinking 

 

because, you know, even the devs forget that pvp can actually, in fact, involve more than 5 people fighting 5 people 

how could i expect the community to remember what the devs can't 

 

silly me 

That is why WvW zergs are crowded with mirages already.

[Alpha.1308]

3 hours ago, Megametzler.5729 said:

That is why WvW zergs are crowded with mirages already.

 

imagine being so complacent with stagnation that you blissfully ignore imbalance

 

game balance is more complex than a 1:0 ratio, you know

 

 

 

not to mention, pvp is more than "hurrr durrr watch my metabattle vs metabattle montage"

 

mirage greatsword can even outdamage heralds killing themselves on reflects, but nobody would or does bother doing that with the other metabattle builds in their groups, because chrono already brings the mesmer utility that mirage can, and the chrono build is designed to bring what the other builds lack, i mean, that is legit how group-based-comps should work

 

that's why in my post about mirage greatsword, i literally even pointed out chrono wells right after it

 

chronos getting different builds mean mirage can get different builds..... presumably..... i mean...assuming smart design decisions, because.......well, current........ design decisions...... ahaahahahahahahaha inspiration grandmaster traits

 

but, yes, if i'm over here out damaging glass cannons on my half soldiers, while also giving TEN of my allies alacrity????.... uhhh no, especially not if they changed more to it due to the rest of my suggestion 

i'm not saying i found some super duper meta breaking most amazingest snowflake build 

 

i'm saying i'd actually like see build diversity in this game

and an already "decent"  ability getting stronger isn't how you balance a game

you fix the trash around it

that's why we're in the mess that we're in already with staff ambush and how many times it's already gotten nerfed 

 

 

 

Edited June 23, 2021 by Alpha.1308

[Stavros.8249]

What to do with alacrity? 

 

Raise it back to 3s like pvp. Give us some rooms for mistakes. Rev hit a button, we must do rotation to have permanent alac. 

[anbujackson.9564]

3 hours ago, Stavros.8249 said:

What to do with alacrity? 

 

Raise it back to 3s like pvp. Give us some rooms for mistakes. Rev hit a button, we must do rotation to have permanent alac. 

Sorry no. At least one renegade alone has to invest in diviner gear, even if its just a single button compared to spam ambush 1. 2 condi renegades doing full uptime is another story (removing internal stacks was a mistake by anet, instead they should have reduced them from 9 to 5/7 for alacrity, then you wouldnt have this problem anymore, now you can just keep spamming).

One staff mirage alone didnt need any investment, neither in gear or food wirh 3s. 2 of them fix the uptime with 2,5s, while not needing to change anything yet again.

[Hirosama Nadasaki.6792]

Remove it and give it back to chrono.

It was dissapointing enough that they added alacrity to other classes despite repeatedly touting that alacrity was chrono's unique mechanic, the fact that chrono isn't even the best alacrity supplier anymore is just poor game design.

[Stavros.8249]

9 hours ago, anbujackson.9564 said:

Sorry no. At least one renegade alone has to invest in diviner gear, even if its just a single button compared to spam ambush 1. 2 condi renegades doing full uptime is another story (removing internal stacks was a mistake by anet, instead they should have reduced them from 9 to 5/7 for alacrity, then you wouldnt have this problem anymore, now you can just keep spamming).

One staff mirage alone didnt need any investment, neither in gear or food wirh 3s. 2 of them fix the uptime with 2,5s, while not needing to change anything yet again.

Yet still Rev with one button and diviners manage to pull 28.5k dps

The staff mesmer with the so called vipers do 26.5k and have difficult uptime for alacrity

They should have lower alacrity so we lose dps from food OR lower the dps. 

They did both and now we are worst than Rev in alacrity and in dps. 

[Curunen.8729]

Dual staff is only a thing because of sigil of energy.

 

I agree encouraging dual anything is kind of silly design when in most games a weapon swap means... swapping to a different weapon.

 

Sigil of energy could be adjusted to give eg 2-3seconds of vigour on weapon swap, so it still has a use but given mirage can already get perma vigour in pve via duelling, false oasis, or even supplement in shatters with the occasional bountiful disillusionment F2, hopefully there could be a situation of encouraging one to build up alacrity in staff and then swap to eg Axe for more damage for a while, then swap back to staff to build alacrity (possibly two mirages doing this alternately or something, to fill the gaps in providing boons - I don't know much about instanced pve strategies, but I imagine this should be a possibility if done right).

 

Although this alacrity on staff ambush is completely out of the blue, and still is a very weird thing that I doubt anyone outside of Anet could have predicted, staff is the "boon weapon" and I think this kind of gameplay should be restricted to using a specific weapon rather than allowing alacrity access on every weapon for mirage - then at least staff damage can be adjusted to balance out its benefits of providing all the boons.

Edited June 23, 2021 by Curunen.8729

[Obtena.7952]

^^ To be fair, you could slap sigil of energy on ANY pair of different weapons and get the advantages of it, so no, dual staff isn't a 'thing' because of sigil of energy. It's a thing because of the perfect storm of clones on dodge, Chaos Vortex and a host of other effects all intertwined with clones and dodging and staff.

 

In otherwords ... no sigil of energy shouldn't be changed because of this. 

Edited June 23, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Curunen.8729]

6 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

^^ To be fair, you could slap sigil of energy on ANY pair of different weapons and get the advantages of it, so no, dual staff isn't a 'thing' because of sigil of energy. It's a thing because of the perfect storm of clones on dodge, Chaos Vortex and a host of other effects all intertwined with clones and dodging and staff.

 

In otherwords ... no sigil of energy shouldn't be changed because of this. 

Where did I say this point only applied to staff?

 

I believe sigil of energy is the only reason dual staff is a thing on mirage, because otherwise there wouldn't be any good reason not to take a different off set with fresh cooldowns, or just stay on one weapon set.

 

Of course there have been dual axe and dual scepter builds among others in the past - equally I dislike these because to me a weapon swap should be swapping to a different weapon - eg melee to ranged or something for different gameplay, not simply for triggering gear effects.

 

Sure you could argue other weapon swapping sigils can be relevant - doom or whatever. But the effects for mirage are marginal compared with a whole dodge every 9 seconds, and all the associated synergies.

 

Given how mirage works, sigil of energy is always going to be mandatory and design limiting, unless they do something weird and made spec exclusive gear choices to prevent certain usage (but then we'd be going down the PvP route of removing everything problematic).

 

Edit - but in general I think changing sigil of energy to X seconds vigour is healthier for the game anyway given the direction they have been going since last Feb patch.

Edited June 24, 2021 by Curunen.8729

[otto.5684]

On 6/21/2021 at 3:02 PM, Tayga.3192 said:

What if they removed alacrity from mirage completely? It's chrono's niche. 

No. There was a good reason it was removed to begin with. No single elite should have access to providing alacrity and quickness at the same time. 

[Infusion.7149]

3 hours ago, otto.5684 said:

No. There was a good reason it was removed to begin with. No single elite should have access to providing alacrity and quickness at the same time. 

If alacrity was on Lost Time it would be mutually exclusive to Seize the Moment making boon duration required far higher. Also it still can provide alacrity right now so that is moot. Power chrono ramp time is about as slow as condi builds.

The game was arguably more balanced with 11K DPS inspi chrono + druid+ BS with full DPS classes than 30K+ support classes. It lacks might , fury, plus actually decent healing right now not to mention not having swiftness is potentially a loss of 10% damage on weaver + BS. All those factors make it unattractive for fractals where you can't use druid, tempest, or herald to give you those boons.

Edited June 24, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Obtena.7952]

10 hours ago, Curunen.8729 said:

I believe sigil of energy is the only reason dual staff is a thing on mirage, because otherwise there wouldn't be any good reason not to take a different off set with fresh cooldowns, or just stay on one weapon set.

Actually, I don't believe that would be true. Any of the 'on kill' sigils becomes a very good option that would maintain equipping two if the same weapon.