Guild Wars 2

Good evening

With BWE3 we have no more big reveals concerning healing and healing power in Guild wars 2.

The Problem is that you could buy DPS or Tank oriented gear and you would feel a big difference in the game play while Healing Power oriented gear does not have the impact it deserves as a stat.

I personally played a druid in BWE3 with clerics stats and while the specialization and the heal is nice, the cleric stats did not do much difference. I looked up some Healing Power scaling and i was truly shocked at the low numbers. In the best case scenario you can go up to ~1800 healing power, but that requires you to use Healing Power as your mayor stat which means you give up on a lot of DPS or Defenses.

The main problem with scaling is that the developers has been to cautious with healing power. The best scaling ingame is 1.0, which is only owned by high casting time / high cooldown skills like Empower (Guardian Staff 4) or Cleansing Wave (Ele Dagger water 5). In the case of Empower you will heal 3300 instead of 1500 with top Healing Power gear, which may be noticeable but simply not worth it.

Most skills have a much worse scaling though. Elixir Shell (Engineer mortar kit 5) will scale with 0.2 which means you will heal 1480 without healing power or 1840 with maximum healing power. I could give you other examples, but everyone who tried out Healing Power should know how bad it scales.

I really hope the developer don’t scare away from high scalings like 2.0 or even 3.0 . Especially high CD or high casttime skills should have a much higher scaling.
In the example of Empower you would heal 5100 with a 2.0 scaling or 6900 with a 3.0 scaling. I think that this sounds much more reasonable than the current scaling. The average Healing Power scaling is ranging between 0.75 and 0.06. Regeneration has a scaling of 0.125, which means a Healing Power character would heal 355 instead of 130. Although the difference is high, it is not high enough to be worth the stat line. The scaling of regeneration should be around 0.2 – 0.3 ish!

Another problem is the usage of water field blasts. While the mechanic is nice, Healing Power does not scale with water fields. This leads to more frustration using Healing power. The solution here is easy: make Water fields scale with healing power. And here the scaling should be higher than 1.0, too!

One problem of increasing the Scaling is the Celestial stat. But the solution here is easy, too. Either decrease the Healing Power amount on celestial gear or increase the Healing Power gain as Mayor and minor stats.

Summary / TL;DR:
-Healing Power stats have barely an impact ingame
-Healing power scaling is awful (minimum 0.06, maximum 1.0) -> should be a much higher amout (maximum of 2.0 or even 3.0 on high Cd & high casting time skills)
-Creating water fields doesn’t scale with Healing Power
-Regeneration scaling should be tuned by a little

Simply, the game is not designed for healing coefficients that high

The point is that dodging and active defense is still necessary. Do you really want to see a Guild Wars where it becomes bad to dodge because it’s a DPS loss and healers are chucking out spammable 2k-3k health heals and healing the party to full anytime the boss does a real attack (not to mention insane regen ticks).

Still funny how people think we have healers in this game, the goal for guild wars was active damage mitigation not standby healer support clearing up everyone elses hiccups

He has a point. Heals scale better with Toughness then they do from Healing Power (in terms of EHP restored). I think Anet is worried what will happen when both are combined.

I’ve long suggested that healing power needs a rework or simple removal.

I’d like to see Healing Power removed all together and combined with Vitality.

Kill.3458:

Still funny how people think we have healers in this game, the goal for guild wars was active damage mitigation not standby healer support clearing up everyone elses hiccups

Druid seems to suggest they are at least trying to change that, going by the sheer amount of team healing ablities they’ve slapped onto it.

“He has a point. Heals scale better with Toughness then they do from Healing Power (in terms of EHP restored). I think Anet is worried what will happen when both are combined”

Nomad gear

Mouse.7382:

“He has a point. Heals scale better with Toughness then they do from Healing Power (in terms of EHP restored). I think Anet is worried what will happen when both are combined”

Nomad gear

AKA the war of attrition prefix

Balance is orientated around PvP mostly. That, I suspect is the reason healing will never be worth two hoots in PvE.

In general, healing power has scaled poorly for a long time now. I think something has to be done to the stat to make it a more viable option over other stats. Before the game launched, I had planned out my character to be a defensive support type character with some healing capabilities. I was under the assumption that since we were given the option to play this way, that the build would have some kind of value in pve, but according to the current meta that doesn’t seem to be the case.

I understand that the trinity is not supposed to exist in this game, and is not supposed to be required to clear content, but I don’t believe giving healing power a buff is suddenly going to change this. If the stat is going to exist, it needs to be one worth using.

The trinity was avoided so that that content requiring parties would not be so restrictive, but with the state that the game is currently in, this only restricts players more because other builds besides primary dps/dps hybrids do not hold much value in a large portion of the game’s content.

Amber.2637:

In general, healing power has scaled poorly for a long time now. I think something has to be done to the stat to make it a more viable option over other stats. Before the game launched, I had planned out my character to be a defensive support type character with some healing capabilities. I was under the assumption that since we were given the option to play this way, that the build would have some kind of value in pve, but according to the current meta that doesn’t seem to be the case.

I understand that the trinity is not supposed to exist in this game, and is not supposed to be required to clear content, but I don’t believe giving healing power a buff is suddenly going to change this. If the stat is going to exist, it needs to be one worth using.

The trinity was avoided so that that content requiring parties would not be so restrictive, but with the state that the game is currently in, this only restricts players more because other builds besides primary dps/dps hybrids do not hold much value in a large portion of the game’s content.

This is exactly the problem in the current meta. We were supposed to be able to play to play our character the way we wanted to, but even the developer understand now that a full DPS team will always have the best results, simply because other stat lines are worse. While vitality and toughness has a impact ingame, Healing Power does not.
How many suggested already, another solution is to remove Healing Power or merge it with vitality. But i personally would really like to be able to play a support oriented Character in guild wars 2 and it is a shame that you should still go for berserk stats.

I remember doing grenth temple on my warrior.

I slap in a set of cleric set, use a rifle, auto attack, and go watch tv.

I dont’ think healing need more buff. It is too overpowered already.

If there is a problem. The problem is people heal too much even in berserker gear. And monster die too fast, players never need to heal.

Healing power should give you the chance to re-gain a little margin from your mystakes (a missed dodge, or an invuln ability used too late).
People now can just burst 20k-25k dmg in few instant in WvW, only because you weren’t able to dodge once! If you choose to go full healing, and since you won’t be able to kill almost anyone most of the time, you should AT LEAST be able to support your team with some burst heals (5K-6K HP).
Or add alternative mechanics to healing power, such as merging it with boon duration.

Kill.3458:

Still funny how people think we have healers in this game, the goal for guild wars was active damage mitigation not standby healer support clearing up everyone elses hiccups

Then why have healing power at all? There is no reason to take it over another Stat because of the scaling, but there it is.

depending on the class you can go up to 2250 healing… give or take 30-40 points

The fact it scales bad already ha drawn a lot of attention.

All attention from posters then was healing is bad, leave it people need to wear zerk. Ik had some nice iscussions about why healing should and could be better.

these discussions mostly revolve around

• To high base heals
• Useless healing scaling
• boon duration nerfed away with june 23rd patch
• a lot of healing nerfed away with june 23rd patch

Possible solutions

• 1st: boon duration could be made dependent on healing as a stat make every 100 healing give 2% boon duration and be done with a part.
• 2nd: healing base could be nerfed by as much as 33-50% BUT only if:
  heal scaling would be buffed A LOT 200-350% (MINIMUM !)

And then STILL healing would be below par…

PaxTheGreatOne.9472:

depending on the class you can go up to 2250 healing… give or take 30-40 points

The fact it scales bad already ha drawn a lot of attention.

All attention from posters then was healing is bad, leave it people need to wear zerk. Ik had some nice iscussions about why healing should and could be better.

these discussions mostly revolve around

• To high base heals
• Useless healing scaling
• boon duration nerfed away with june 23rd patch
• a lot of healing nerfed away with june 23rd patch

Possible solutions

• 1st: boon duration could be made dependent on healing as a stat make every 100 healing give 2% boon duration and be done with a part.
• 2nd: healing base could be nerfed by as much as 33-50% BUT only if:
  heal scaling would be buffed A LOT 200-350% (MINIMUM !)

And then STILL healing would be below par…

I think I like those solutions. I’ve thought it would be good to reduce the base healing for some skills but making it so it they scale much more with healing power so that those who spec into it heal pretty well while those who don’t get pretty low heals.

The only place I found healing power to be useful was when I stacked my guardian with it and toughness. Frankly the healing power and toughness was great to keep myself alive, but healing others was marginal at best.

It probably isn’t viable at all except in a PVE zerg. (which is what I primarily use it for)

I get your point OP. Things appear to be changing though. The devs have shown that they are willing to make huge changes in game mechanics. Perhaps this may be one of them? We’ll have to wait and see. Right now DPS is king.

As it stands, Anything non zerk will cause you to give away more than you can make up for in another category. This is true of healing power and condition damage as well. When you really need to lay down the most damage (boss fights) condition damage will cap out.

What you need to do is combine Healing power with Outgoing effectiveness using Monk runes and sigil of benevolence. This would equal an additional 22.5% healing which is combined with the healing power and base heal of the skills you use. It would be outrageous to want more healing than that since anymore would be almost instant full heal in most cases. Just roll your druid and spec for it. Its already super op, so stop complaining about not having enough damage. Obviously when you roll heals, youre sacrificing damage.

Yes condition dmg will cap out at 1500 stacks nowadays, which is way better then it was a year ago. And though I do agree it isn’t DPS in burst, the continious damage can be very nice, also the enemy is kept in combat for as long as condition tick (necro’s still have a bleed of 30+ secs base (Blood is power)) Also conditions will function with tanky enemies , and do so often better then zerk.

Conditions do have 1 major probelm : the horror of objects…

I also have a thing I forgot…:

• VAMPIRIC TRAITS (AND LIFE SIPHON/TRANSFUSION) SHOULD SCALE WITH HEALING in a fashion -better then 0.004 (at least for the old vampiric traits it was 0.004…

Yes: every 250 healing gives 1 pt added life siphon with the vampiric trait IF IT’S STILL APPLICABLE, which is -non verified-
This would mean a fully cleric invested necro with 1500 power life siphons which are 6 points higher then the actual 39….. yes… 6 points. per hit. Who’s afraid of the vampire now?

Now with vampiric aura this trait could actually help necro to help support.

Monk, benevolence, traited, and rice balls. which would raise it to a max of 1.1*.1.125*1.1*1.2= 63.35% added healing on allies, whcih is nice

e.g. 300 on self would become 500 on allies. And it would only work on the celestial form #6 in which case it would give ~10k heal, with a 2k bonus. Same for most other big burst heals as far as they havn’t been nerfed. Water fields & blast will never go above 4k heals

Novamatrix.2569:

What you need to do is combine Healing power with Outgoing effectiveness using Monk runes and sigil of benevolence. This would equal an additional 22.5% healing which is combined with the healing power and base heal of the skills you use. It would be outrageous to want more healing than that since anymore would be almost instant full heal in most cases. Just roll your druid and spec for it. Its already super op, so stop complaining about not having enough damage. Obviously when you roll heals, youre sacrificing damage.

Those sigils and runes are probably good for giving healing a boost, but I don’t think it would be fair to use them as an excuse for the poor scaling of healing power. They are good for specs and builds that are more healing orientated, like the druid, but not for builds that focus on other things besides healing. Players shouldn’t have to rely on those runes and sigils to make healing power worth using. If they end up being too powerful with buffed healing power, they would probably just have to be adjusted.

Amber.2637:

Novamatrix.2569:

What you need to do is combine Healing power with Outgoing effectiveness using Monk runes and sigil of benevolence. This would equal an additional 22.5% healing which is combined with the healing power and base heal of the skills you use. It would be outrageous to want more healing than that since anymore would be almost instant full heal in most cases. Just roll your druid and spec for it. Its already super op, so stop complaining about not having enough damage. Obviously when you roll heals, youre sacrificing damage.

Those sigils and runes are probably good for giving healing a boost, but I don’t think it would be fair to use them as an excuse for the poor scaling of healing power. They are good for specs and builds that are more healing orientated, like the druid, but not for builds that focus on other things besides healing. Players shouldn’t have to rely on those runes and sigils to make healing power worth using. If they end up being too powerful with buffed healing power, they would probably just have to be adjusted.

How you already said, the arguments in this thread are good, but the discussion here lies on Healing Power as a stat. A buff would be my dream solution, but a removal would be a good step ,too. The only purpose on Healing Power equipment is a huge loss on DPS / Defenses for a minimal amount of extra healing.

I would like it if Healing Power also increased damage reduction, so Cleric gear can be like Clerics from DnD as Tank/Healer hybrids. because Toughness on its own, is pretty weak as well.

Healing Power adds damage reduction to conditions.

well it seems like Anet tried healing build aka druid. its broken.
15 guys with 6 melee tanking 22 blob and 1 druid perma healing that melee…

Toughness is the problem here. If they would increase its effectiveness and start giving resistance as a stat combination then things would be fine. Basically zerker is still ‘king’ because toughness does not do enough, not because heal scaling is broken.

Some skills definitely need more contribution. Less than .5 scaling on abilities with long cd’s is a thing that should not be in game. 3.0 seems kind of high especially on empower since guards have so much other healing, but overall its a good idea, especially for classes like necro/thief/mesmer who get almost 0 gain out of healing power currently.

Regen however I dont think should change. Its already a good boon, if anything let it stack intensity instead of duration like conditions all do now.

Gotejjeken.1267:

Toughness is the problem here. If they would increase its effectiveness and start giving resistance as a stat combination then things would be fine. Basically zerker is still ‘king’ because toughness does not do enough, not because heal scaling is broken.

I know that the effectiveness of toughness goes down the more armor you have, but I still like to build it on my characters. I think it has done a pretty good job at keeping me alive. :P I wouldn’t be against a toughness rework if it really is a problem though, but with whatever problems toughness has, certain skills still need to scale better with healing power. Some seem the scale kind of decently while others are just too low.

This is a topic we’re going to see more often, now that Druid is a thing and other roles/gearing will be expected for raids.

The consensus is pretty clear that Healing Power needs something to make it work taking up attribute space that could otherwise be used for damage. Out of the several threads I’ve seen, two ideas come up pretty consistently:

1. Abolish Healing Power and roll recovery bonuses into Vitality.
If Healing Power is going to scale for garbage anyway, buff Vitality (the second weakest stat) by basing healing strength on Vitality. Remove Healing Power as a stat.
It’s a solution that would hurt to implement, considering the implications on gear (Cleric, Nomad, even Giver to a degree). Healing Power would have to be filled by another attribute, but with the current other sets, replacing it with another defensive stat overlaps (Cleric -> Soldier) or is just impossible (Nomad).
Bunker play in PvP would hit a peak in some corner cases, as the Toughness/Vitality gear would suddenly gain unexpected offensive power to fill in the gaps.

2. Change Healing Power to modify incoming and outgoing healing.
Right now, Healing Power modifies outgoing healing. A way to make healing power significantly more powerful is to have it improve outgoing healing as well. Self heals scale more sharply. A character rated for sucking up damage can gain benefit from his allies’ heals as well as his own.
Execution: Get rid of differential scaling in this approach. +1% per 100 HealPow. That means self-heals yield +2% per 100. Simple.
Obvious implications in PvP, still, but actual base heals can be tweaked based on cooldown rates.

3. Add Boon Duration to Healing Power.
This is a way to give Healing Power potency via lateral growth. Even 1% per 100 would do wonders to restore some of the boon durations that were cleaved entirely in some classes (…warrior) and potentially gives Healing Power a helpful offensive component by extending Might and Fury for allies.

Rauderi.8706:

This is a topic we’re going to see more often, now that Druid is a thing and other roles/gearing will be expected for raids.

The consensus is pretty clear that Healing Power needs something to make it work taking up attribute space that could otherwise be used for damage. Out of the several threads I’ve seen, two ideas come up pretty consistently:

1. Abolish Healing Power and roll recovery bonuses into Vitality.
If Healing Power is going to scale for garbage anyway, buff Vitality (the second weakest stat) by basing healing strength on Vitality. Remove Healing Power as a stat.
It’s a solution that would hurt to implement, considering the implications on gear (Cleric, Nomad, even Giver to a degree). Healing Power would have to be filled by another attribute, but with the current other sets, replacing it with another defensive stat overlaps (Cleric -> Soldier) or is just impossible (Nomad).
Bunker play in PvP would hit a peak in some corner cases, as the Toughness/Vitality gear would suddenly gain unexpected offensive power to fill in the gaps.

2. Change Healing Power to modify incoming and outgoing healing.
Right now, Healing Power modifies outgoing healing. A way to make healing power significantly more powerful is to have it improve outgoing healing as well. Self heals scale more sharply. A character rated for sucking up damage can gain benefit from his allies’ heals as well as his own.
Execution: Get rid of differential scaling in this approach. +1% per 100 HealPow. That means self-heals yield +2% per 100. Simple.
Obvious implications in PvP, still, but actual base heals can be tweaked based on cooldown rates.

3. Add Boon Duration to Healing Power.
This is a way to give Healing Power potency via lateral growth. Even 1% per 100 would do wonders to restore some of the boon durations that were cleaved entirely in some classes (…warrior) and potentially gives Healing Power a helpful offensive component by extending Might and Fury for allies.

i really like all 3 suggestions. The reason i opened this thread is because i was worried that Arenanet is not aware of the current build dilemma. They want to end the berserk meta, but doing this by adding more ways to heal should only be the beginning. Healing has more problems than only healing power. But i feel like changing the berserk meta would be achievable by changing the equipment.

Amber.2637:

Gotejjeken.1267:

Toughness is the problem here. If they would increase its effectiveness and start giving resistance as a stat combination then things would be fine. Basically zerker is still ‘king’ because toughness does not do enough, not because heal scaling is broken.

I know that the effectiveness of toughness goes down the more armor you have, but I still like to build it on my characters. I think it has done a pretty good job at keeping me alive. :P I wouldn’t be against a toughness rework if it really is a problem though, but with whatever problems toughness has, certain skills still need to scale better with healing power. Some seem the scale kind of decently while others are just too low.

actually, i’m not so sure it does diminish. if you have 2000 base armor and increase your toughness by 1000, you’d see a 33% decrease in damage taken, which works out at a 50% increase in EHP. 500 toughness will only decrease damage by 20%, but that still works out as a 25% EHP increase, which is a linear progression.

Celestial Avatar Form: Skills that heal have had their base heals reduced by 15-25% and increased their healing coefficients from 100-145%. This should leave base heals solid while really rewarding players who elect to use healing power stats.

this change now happened on the druid.
Does that mean that they will fix the scaling on other professions, too? I hope so