Ashes of the Just stacks are no longer attributed to the caster

[cat.8975]

The stacks now belong to your allies, giving them the burns (and using their condition damage stats).

This is a pretty hefty nerf, and even if it's intended, I'd rather the skill be reworked entirely at this point. Having a skill whose damage is entirely dependent on what your allies are running heavily restricts where you can run the build.

Is it still viable in power comps? Sure. Are you going to feel like a huge idiot for running it with power comps instead of condi? You bet.

Edit: Keep in mind this is the exact reason they changed thief venoms in 2014 to use the thief's condi stats instead of their allies. Feels like a big step backwards.

Edited August 18, 2021 by cat.8975
its been longer than "a few" at this point

[supporthero.4520]

I completely agree.

Thanks for writing this.

[MrTJpwnz.4710]

I mentioned it a while ago already on the forums, this skill has given so many problems, and keeps having problems. A complete rework of the skill to be something that isn't dependent on allies would be best solution imo..

[Hellmasker.1649]

I don't have anything to add other than my full support and agreement. Firebrand may be / have been overtuned for a little while but a stealth nerf of this magnitude should not be the answer.

[hulmen.8713]

I am surprised this is not more discussed. Earlier patches nerfed FB with finetuning, which is the way to do it. This "stealth nerf" however is a huge change to FBs dps. I don't have any hard numbers, but the dps is drastically lowered in my daily fractals so far (mby 15-25% compared to earlier depending on party). Too big of a change imho. First ashes need to be reworked to something balanced. Then other adjustments ought to be considered to balance the FB-class compared to other classes.

For myself, I will be taking other classes in the condition dmg dps role for now (Sc or Slb).

 

[supporthero.4520]

I agree. I hope they will give Ashes of the Just at least some attention and not leave this change in the game the way it is.

[Trejgon.9367]

I am hoping that since this was not mentioned in the patch notes that it was not intentional stealth nerf but a bug/accidental slip of a change.

 

But I can toss onto the pile of confirming that it is indeed a case now - I've got burning ticks on druid after getting ashes from someone - on druid build that features no burning, so it had to be ashes proc.

Edited August 21, 2021 by Lord Trejgon.2809
typo

[MorpheusDV.8592]

They need to just rework this skill once and for all.

 

How many times have they screwed around with Ashes since its iteration? The skill has been causing issues no matter how much they try and tweak it, and they can't seem to find a good balance in-between. 

 

Knowing how Anet balances things, they'll just screw it up again regardless of how they rework it, if they ever do.

 

EDIT: Apparently after reading more into the fixes... this was a bug fix from the June 8th patch. Either way, why wasn't this mentioned into the balance patch notes?

Edited August 22, 2021 by MorpheusDV.8592

[Hellmasker.1649]

I can't wrap my head around that June 8th note being what is live in the game right now. That change was worded to address "stealing" ashes from other firebrands so taking damage away from the casting firebrand - unless you're stacking them - and giving it to whoever receives the ashes is so unintuitive and backwards. 

I might be in the 'denial' phase of grief but there's no way in my head that this isn't a bug. 

As an aside, it's a little disheartening that ANet's communication has been so great lately and there's nothing at all about this. Come Monday or Tuesday patch time I guess we'll know for sure but this has really ruined my drive to play Guild Wars 2 lately.

[MorpheusDV.8592]

I agree. I only brought up the June 8th patch because I thought maybe it had something to do with it,  but as I keep thinking about it, nothing really just makes sense. For them to leave such a significant change out of the balance patch notes and leave your player-base in the dark is bad. I hope they will at leave give us a follow-up or at least what their true intentions with Ashes is.

[Incurve Giidis.7829]

dog comment unlucky

Edited August 22, 2021 by Incurve Giidis.7829

[Erick Alastor.3917]

While I do believe condi firebrand does need some nerfs, this is not the kind of nerf it requires.
All this change does is promoting stacking condi classes even more, which is already out of hand in fractals.

If they really want to lower our personal dps at least normalize it as a buff to both strike and condi damage to the party:
- for X s  +X% dmg (strike and condi) to 5 people.
Set a pretty low cap on its seconds or make it so that new applications overwrite the older ones or something, just prevent people from wanting to stack as many guardians as possible to keep it up endlessly.

Always talking about fractals, I don't understand why we have to move from it's easier if everyone is zerk to it's easier if everyone is viper. Can't we make them both equally wanted options please?

[supporthero.4520]

Just rework Ashes of the Just. It clearly causes too many issues.

[MorpheusDV.8592]

Heard this was fixed but again wasn't documented I haven't gotten around to test it yet since I am preoccupied with things.

Any confirmation?

[supporthero.4520]

It now works exactly like before the August 17th patch.

They reverted all the changes.

You can still steal ashes etc.

That's still a lot better then what we had the last two weeks imo.

[supporthero.4520]

Apparently it now uses up the most recent stacks up and afterwards any older stacks.

That makes running more then 2 Firebrands in 1 subgroup dangerous because your stacks may expire.

 

Please fix this new bug or just avoid this mess by reworking the skill.

[cat.8975]

They've been "fixed", but are now broken in a new way.

The first player to apply ashes gets ownership of the whole stack until their stacks are consumed, which sounds perfect, but the stacks are being used in reverse order (newest stacks are used up first, so the oldest ones are much more likely to expire before they can be used). If the original stacks expire before they're applied, the second player that applied ashes gets ownership until theirs expire or are consumed.

Research courtesy of Muru in the SC discord:

Quote

Heres the scenarios-
1. FB1 casts ashes, FB2 casts ashes 1s later. ALLY procs ashes 6 times, they all attributed to FB1
2. FB1 casts ashes, FB2 casts ashes 5s later. ALLY hits the boss 3 times in 5 seconds consuming 3 stacks. This consumes all 3 stacks from FB2 and attributes them to FB1, then the 3 stacks from FB1 expire.
3. FB1 casts ashes, FB2 casts ashes 5s later. ALLY hits the boss 2 times in 5 seconds (these, like before, contribute to FB1 but consumes FB2 ashes), there is 5s left of FB2's ashes (1 stacks) and the 3 stacks of FB1 ashes have now expired. ALLY hits 1 more time and now the burning is attributed to FB2.
4. FB1 casts ashes, FB2 casts ashes 5s later. ALLY waits 5 seconds for FB1 ashes to expire. Then ALLY hits the boss 3 times, this burning is now FB2's.

If we imagine a stack, whatever is at the bottom of the stack is who the burning is attributed to. Ashes get consumed from First In Last Out. The ashes at the bottom of the stack can expire, leaving a new 'owner' at the bottom of the stack.