Guild Wars 2

Been thinking about something lately. Others have suggested a chance of concurrency of effects on the RNG effects of Elixirs. I got to thinking that maybe we don’t need that, but rather just letting all the buffs happen 100% of the time.

So I’m going to post the “Full Effect” of each Elixir in comparison to a similar skill. Then suggest some alterations if there happens to be something overpowered about the Elixir. Then everyone can discuss.

Elixir H versus Healing Spring (Ranger)
Heal: 5560 vs 4920
Boons: 10 second Regeneration and Swiftness, 5 seconds Protection vs 18 seconds regeneration
Recharge: 25 Seconds, 20 Traited vs 30 Seconds
Condition Removal: 1 Traited vs 1 per 3 seconds
Misc: HGH for 2 stacks of Might vs Water Field (15s) but no traits

Analysis and Balance: Healing Spring is incredible. As a party supporting mechanic, it is superb, thanks to the long-lived water field. Elixir H, even with concurrency, can’t even compare for a single target heal. It’s main advantage is that it has trait support unlike Healing Spring, and is more mobile. That said, full concurrency wouldn’t be too overpowering in any mode, so I’d have to say that the only thing that would need to be reduced is the boon duration.

Concurrency Nerf: 5 Seconds of Regeneration and Swiftness. Protection reduced to 3 seconds. This makes it a spot heal that keeps you from dropping quickly, and likely becomes the go-to PvP heal. (Or remains so.)

TOSS Elixir H versus Healing Cloud (Ranger Pet: Jellyfish)
Heal: 0 vs 0
Boons: 10 second Regeneration and Vigor, 5 seconds Protection vs 10 seconds Regeneration
Recharge: 30 Seconds, up to 21 Traited vs 30 Seconds, 27 Traited
Condition Removal: 1 Traited vs 0
Misc: HGH for 1 stack of Might vs No action required on Ranger’s part

Analysis and Balance: This is one where the toss is better when oncurrent. As it is now, the regen proc is AS GOOD as the ranger pet skill. Traits can make it better though. The similar ability from the Ranger Fern Hound “Regenerate” is actually better, with 5 seconds less on recharge (traitable to 20 second recharge), though it is a F2 skill.

Concurrency Nerf: 5 Seconds of Regeneration and Vigor, 3 Protection. This would be a reliable “Oh snap!” button for your teammates, possibly pulling some rears out of the fire.

Toss Elixir B versus No Comparable Skill (?)
Boons: 30 second Might, 10 seconds Fury, Swiftness, Retaliation vs _?_
Recharge: 20 Seconds, up to 14 Traited vs ???
Condition Removal: 1 Traited vs ???
Misc: HGH for 1 stack of Might vs ???

Analysis and Balance: It’s honestly not bad at all, but the random single buff form is really not reliable for anything. And a single stack of Might is uninspiring. Still, to ask for all 4 buffs on throw, with that cooldown, would be a bit much.

Concurrency Nerf: No Might (because it’s nearly pointless) nor Swiftness. 7 Seconds of Fury and Retaliation. This makes the Toss a quick damage buff for a fairly short period of time. Alternatively, 2 Stacks Might and 7 Seconds Fury, but that’s too similar to “For Great Justice!” to be considered the best alternative.

Toss Elixir U versus Poison Cloud (Ranger Pet: Spiders and others have variations)
Conditions: Possible 1 Second Blind vs 3 seconds Poison per pulse
Recharge: 60 Seconds, 42 Traited vs 20 Seconds, 18 Traited
Condition Removal: 1 Traited vs 0
Misc: HGH for 1 stack of Might, Mid-Duration (7-10s) Combo Field (Etherial, Smoke, or Light) vs Short-Duration (5s?) Poison Field

Analysis and Balance: Okay…Can’t really call concurrency here. The common theme is the combo field. The major difference is the recharge time. Aside from Veil, you’re practically doubling the recharge on the Smoke Screen and Wall of Reflection.

Concurrency Nerf: No concurrency… Reduce recharge to 40 seconds, get rid of Veil. Smoke and Reflection serve similar purposes: Effing up ranged attacks. Mission accomplished, and it’s still “random.” Different fields too. Want a third random spell? Feedback! Sure, it’s a circle, but it’s still a rpojectile messer-upper, has similar duration, replaces the lost etherial field, and has a recharge of… 40 seconds!

Toss Elixir S versus Virtue of Courage (Guardian)
Boons: 4 Second Stability and Stealth vs 4 Second Aegis
Recharge: 60 Seconds, up to 42 Traited vs 90 Seconds, up to 63 Traited
Condition Removal: 1 Traited vs 0
Misc: HGH for 1 stack of Might vs Traitable for Protection (5s), Party-Wide Stun Break(!), Stability (3s), recharge on rally. Also grants Aegis to self every 40 (30 Traited) seconds

Analysis and Balance: Holy buckets, Batman… Traited, Virtue of Courage is beastly compared to Toss Elixir S… Especially when you remember to include range in the above comparison. Virtue of Courage is simply better, so it’s worth the extra recharge. Untraited is good too, since Aegis ever 40 seconds is kind of nice compared to a very situational pair of buffs.

Concurrency Nerf: No nerf needed. Seriously.

Well, that’s all I got. I think I covered them all.

Drinking Elixir H only gives you one of the boons in addition to the spot heal. So you get Regen, Swiftness, OR protection, not all three of them.

This is what many people don’t like about the elixirs. You can’t rely on the RNG of elixirs because they are different from one another.

Protection, Swiftness, and Regen are so different from each other that you can only rely on the elixir as a spot-healing agent and nothing else.

The Full Effect of Elixir H doesn’t compare to a lot of other healing effects. Simply put, ANet is giving us Elixir H as a subpar heal ability because (by some crazy idea) they think we might spam the toss ability along with it. At least that’s the only reason I can come up with.

Elixir H in all ways is a bad ability, and our other heals don’t do that well, either.

Sporadicus.1028:

Drinking Elixir H only gives you one of the boons in addition to the spot heal. So you get Regen, Swiftness, OR protection, not all three of them.

That’s what the thread is covering… What it’d be like IF we got all the associated boons/buffs.

EDIT: Also… Healing Turret is friggin’ amazing… For the most part. If it worked right it’d be fantastic, especially in parties. The regen bug is killing the overall goodness though.

I don’t like the way healing turret works, but we can discuss that in a PM or something.

I do like the recommendation that we get all the buffs together, however I feel that we should get only two of them. I would think that 10s of regen and 5s of protection would be perfect. I could care less about having swiftness when I have utility skills that grant me the same thing.

I think they should remove veil from Toss Elixir U.
They should remove swiftness from Elixir H.
Toss Elixir H get rid of vigor.

You get 10 seconds regen and 5 second protection from toss and drink.

I like your Toss Elixir B suggestion of giving Fury and retaliation. Fury and swiftness work too.

Toss Elixir S suggestion: Having Stability and stealth at the same time is kinda a waste. Not sure what to do with this one. Maybe get rid of stealth and let it give a slightly longer stability boon. I find the idea of drinking making u small and tossing making you big a solid concept.

+1
I really hope someone at Anet takes a look at this thread.
I see nothing wrong with the RNG just being removed and receiving all the boons or at least the ones in the same catagory of atk/def.

I don’t really know why they went with the Random thing on our potions because it just seems to make the RNG effects a secondary thought since you cannot plan for them.

If it has to be different i’d rather it be when something like:
Health > 50% = Boon A
Health < 50% = Boon B

wouldn’t be so bad.

But really we should just get realiable buffs.

definitely not a nerf, vit was already a great trait line now only made better for those liking XI

I’d like it if they figured out some way to make Elixir effects context-sensitive, but that might just be me. Not sure how they’d handle it with some of them.

RNG has no place in a competitive pvp game. If they want this to be an e-sport it, RNG needs to be scrubbed from every possible thing they can find.

Gain all the boons from a single elixier would be OP.
Instead of compare it with other classes ability,we should focus on the RNG factor.
Like already stated by some other user,instead of RNG , elixiers , should work on the % of the HP.
Elixier S for example:toss elixier give stability if the engineer is over 50% hp ,and give stealth if engineer is under 50% hp.
Elixier H should give swiftness if 100% hp , regen if 70% hp , protection if under 50% hp.
Toss elixier U , should give smoke/blind if over 70% hp , reflection if 50% hp and stealth line if under 50% hp.
Etc etc it’s just an example.
The RNG at hight competitive PvP levels,make nearly impossible make a strategy.
But here again,this is my opinion and it’s shared by few engineers.
There are many other ppls that like elixiers exatly like they are now with RNG.
The developers like the RNG because it gives more “fun” …(may be the fun is only for em watching an engineer die , killed by is own RNG skills).
I doubt this RNG will be removed….sadly.

I apologize for my english.
Regards.