You may be looking forward to Spears, revealed on stream by ArenaNet a few days ago, and available for testing later this week (June 27 9:00 a.m. - June 30 10:00 p.m. Pacific Time UTC-7).
We'll look closer at how these new additions settle into our arsenal, but until then—let's have a look at hot new changes in the most recent balance patch.
An extensive list of changes was revealed quite some time ago on the forums. As usual we're digging into the PvE-oriented changes and want to give you an idea on how they're going to actually affect your gameplay! Now that we have Open World builds in the mix, beware that we won't only be focusing on numbers, numbers, numbers. Just a heads up. We've neatly kept the sections divided per profession, so that you can safely ignore all the things you don't play. Ha.
The devs have made a great effort to go over the Cooldowns of many skills, which often date back to the balance before the competitive split (in the times of yore when PvE, PvP, and WvW all lived in harmony shared cooldowns and damage coefficients). If you ever wondered why some skills had a silly high Cooldown, well, now you know.
Elementalist changes come plentiful; the class as a whole is receiving targeted buffs to Scepter to firmly establish it as a Power-oriented playstyle. Additionally, a lot of defensive skills are having their Cooldowns reduced and weapons like Dagger and Staff are being improved in their supportive capacities. These Scepter skills are receiving increases to strike damage:Power Overwhelming
Power Tempest is a vintage build from early raid history that has rarely seen play since, as other options typically have dominated the metagame. With this patch, deals 33% increased damage and grants Fury to allies, likely bringing the build back into the fold.
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Notably, this skill now deals more damage up-front instead of primarily favoring a long cast. - ,
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Additionally, ( & 3) and are receiving reduced Cooldowns.
Do keep in mind that all of the primary damage skills on the weapon, such as , , and , remain unchanged. Due to this, it isn't quite guaranteed that Scepter will be your new favorite stick to poke raid bosses with, but the weapon will be much more favorable for range and open world gameplay.
Onto some support changes!
and will now help maintain Fury on your allies, and will also grant more stacks of Might for a longer duration.
no longer requires your health to be above 90%, and now shares its Protection with allies.
(Dagger 3) now creates an Ice Field, making it a self-contained Combo for Area Frost Aura and .
(Dagger 2) will now be a Blast Finisher as well.
(Staff 5) and (Staff 4) now deal initial Defiance Break on cast.
is being reworked to remove a condition from yourself and allies when you use a Blast Finisher in any Combo Field.
will now activate on Heal Skill, granting you Frost Aura more proactively.
now grants 300 Vitality, increasing your Health by 3000.
All in all, these are some truly wonderful changes for builds such as Heal Alacrity Tempest that should increase its ease of use and boon uptime significantly.
Lastly, some notable utility skills that are receiving new Cooldowns:
- : 25 seconds
- : 30 seconds
- : 25 seconds
- : 25 seconds
- : 20 seconds
in now has an additional effect that Cleanses Conditions from nearby allies. The Boon Extension is still retained. Renegade is receiving some small, but notable changes: So, can we reasonably expect a Power-based Renegade build to return? These changes amount to a decent increase overall, but nothing that makes the builds stand out—it still lacks the flexibility of most other support builds. However, if burst is your game, Renegade can certainly be right for you. Overall, these changes end up doing little to shake up the specialization's ranking. When it comes to improving the output of Power-based Revenant builds it may be better to look towards the Devastation Trait Line as a whole, instead of incrementally raising each elite specialization separately."Bring the thunder!"
10% damage increase upon casting a skill.
This will feel similar to the current synergy with , but with a slightly longer duration.
Virtuoso is receiving some significant Buffs this time around. Mesmer also had some notable changes to slot skill Cooldowns. As a final note, can no longer be retargeted, in case that's something you fancied.
's duration is increased by 2 seconds, making the timing of Bladesongs less punishing.
increases the damage of Blade attacks by 10%. This change alone is sure to bring Power Virtuoso back to the top. This build has been under the radar ever since End of Dragons, but may now finally find its place as a high burst Power build.
Alchemy gets a significant upgrade with the reintroduction of elixir condition removal on the minor grandmaster trait. This won't affect other allies as it did in its previous iteration, but it will give engineers some much-needed defense against conditions through elixir-skill triggers on the other minor traits and any other elixirs they bring. We've also added a more reliable source of fury, replacing the rarely utilized Emergency Elixir trait to give damage-focused builds more consistent pressure. On the PvE side of things, we've adjusted damage numbers on Grenade Kit, Tool Kit, and some of the holosmith's exceed skills to bring them more in line with each other. Elixir X also gets a fun addition: lich is being added to the pool of potential transformations while on land. We wanted to make the skill a more reliable offensive threat and felt that adding another offense-focused transformation was a more interesting direction than simply adjusting the individual chances of rampage and tornado. HolosmithElixir S: Reduced the cooldown from 60 seconds to 30 seconds in PvE only.Elixir U: Reduced the cooldown from 32 seconds to 20 seconds in PvE only.Utility Goggles: Reduced the cooldown from 24 seconds to 20 seconds in PvE only.Detection Pulse: This skill now also inflicts vulnerability on enemies.Superspeed (Slick Shoes Tool Belt Skill): Reduced the cooldown from 25 seconds to 20 seconds in PvE only.Pry Bar: Increased the power coefficient from 2.0 to 2.5 in PvE only.Throw Wrench: Increased the cooldown from 17 seconds to 20 seconds in PvE only. Increased the power coefficient per hit from 1.0 to 1.5 in PvE only.Magnet: This skill now properly plays its visual effect during the full channel. This skill cannot be retargeted. This skill now applies bonus defiance damage to targets with defiance bars.Freeze Grenade: Increased the power coefficient per hit from 0.5 to 0.75 in PvE only.Poison Grenade: Reduced the cooldown from 25 seconds to 20 seconds in PvE only. Increased the power coefficient per hit from 0.5 to 0.75 in PvE only.Supply Crate: Reduced the cooldown from 120 seconds to 75 seconds in PvE only.Elixir X: This skill now also has a chance to transform the user into a lich.Compounding Chemicals: This trait now also removes a condition from the user when they use an elixir skill.Emergency Elixir: This trait has been reworked and renamed Boiling Point. Gain fury when you gain might at or above the threshold.Launch Wall: Reduced the 100% heat damage bonus from 50% to 35% in PvE only.Laser Disk: Reduced the 100% heat damage bonus from 50% to 35% in PvE only.Particle Accelerator: Reduced the 100% heat damage bonus from 50% to 35% in PvE only.Blade Burst: Reduced the 100% heat damage bonus from 50% to 35%.
Wait, hold the phone. (Short Bow These changes seem quite targeted at Druid and Untamed, who generally find the bow to be subpar compared to other options. We're not expecting this to impact Condition Soulbeast at all. and (Longbow Ranger's slot skill Cooldowns being touched on this patch are as follows: As a final bonus, (Jaguar Bearbow Returns
Ranger updates primarily include changes to Short Bow, Longbow, and utility skill Cooldowns.4) now uses the Ranger's attributes for the inflicted Bleeding. This is a buff to all non-Soulbeast specializations.
(Short Bow 5) Cooldown reduced to 20 seconds.
(Short Bow Ambush) now has increased velocity, and a slight increase to Poison and Torment durations.1 & 2) are receiving increases to their damage.
will now grant its boons when using (Longbow 4), giving it a more predictable synergy.
These changes won't shake up the current raid build offerings. However, if you enjoy this weapon in open world you may have a slightly better time!F2) now grants Stealth to the Ranger too! Keep this in mind for the Spear beta this weekend.
Here are some builds to try in the new patch:
Heal Alacrity Tempest • Condition Daredevil (Raids) • Power Tempest (Open World)
