Guild Wars 2

Edit: Did some testing with skill, its a hit-or-miss change. IMO it is one for the better; not only does this improve our team utility for any build using Staff, but the fix on blind makes even our sword clones more dangerous. (Chaos Storm + Illusionary Leap). The sacrifice of a reliable 5 seconds of Protection every half minute is worth it for the benefits we get, including a higher potential for more overall Protection.

Chaos Armor used to give random Regeneration and Swiftness on hit.. But honestly the only reason anyone batted an eye at this skill was because either:

A) It was a major part of Staff’s defense, being the most reliable defensive skill largely due to Protection. (Chaos Storm gives random procs and leaves you praying for multiple reapplications of Aegis)

B) As a combo field, you’re rewarded with an obnoxiously good-looking purple bubble that actually was truly only good because of the debilitation the enemy took while hitting you. 3 secs of Regen and Swiftness, aren’t worth taking multiple rapid hits for.

Chaos Armor wasn’t necessarily nerfed as hard as people think. As a combo field, it was actually buffed. As a staff skill, its now more similar to Elementalist’s Auras. Honestly, that second fact kind of sucks because of how awesome it was before.. But remember:

• We procced Chaos Armor moreso from Combo Fields than from one skill with a 28-35 second cooldown. With the Staff, we not only get Chaos Armor as a skill, but can combo any leap (Phase Retreat) with Chaos Storm to get Chaos Armor.

• Even though Protection now only last the same amount of time as the other buffs (3 seconds), Regen will still proc Illusionary Membrane (Chaos 15) every 15 secs, giving us a 2/3 chance for Protection in most cases.

• Other classes who gained Chaos Armor from combo fields now have a chance of gaining protection from it. So can iSwordsman.. for what that’s worth.

Its not quite a nerf as much as an awkward change. 3 seconds may not seem like much, but if you’re 30 Chaos, and pop a Chocolate Omnomberry Cream (Or have some other way of getting 45-50% boon duration) that 3 seconds becomes nearer to 5, and 5 secs of potential protection can really start to add up with the right amount of luck.

I’m not angry about the change, but I can’t help but ask… why?

Because it’s a bug fix. It used to not do what it claimed to do. For pvp, I would prefer to blind my attackers 1/3 the time than 0% chance of blind that it used to have. Then protection also now happens 1/3 the time instead of never for all other chaos armors.
My post from a different thread:

The bug. I agree that this is a nerf to staff 4 BUT it is a buff to every other chaos armor if it actually works. Blind also used to NEVER work. Now it should work for ALL chaos armors. This means that the confuse on blind trait now works. This is also amazing defense for WvW. Being able to blind multiple foes now is BETTER IN EVERY WAY. Its like multiple aegis’s that stack.

@ Chaos Archangel

Didn’t you get the memo? Anet wanted to make a condition thief #2 and for us to take PU

confusion on blind works with chaos armor now you say? hrmrmrmrm…. I shall belay further kittening until I can try it.

It’s a hit in WvW when in fighting multiple foes. It’s also a hit when fighting a single foe with very fast attacks.

It essentially normalizes the condition/boon application to one per second each.

Will you feel it in PvE — doubtful because mobs don’t attack that oftent.
Will you feel it in PvP/WvW — absolutely

Blinding Befuddlement always worked with Chaos Armour, that’s one of the reasons the trait got nerfed into the ground.

They should remove Swiftness from the random procs so it is just between Protection and Regeneration, like how Chaos Armour used to be before they made Protection an on-cast effect.

Embolism.8106:

Blinding Befuddlement always worked with Chaos Armour, that’s one of the reasons the trait got nerfed into the ground.

They should remove Swiftness from the random procs so it is just between Protection and Regeneration, like how Chaos Armour used to be before they made Protection an on-cast effect.

How can the trait work if blind never happened.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Because it’s a bug fix. It used to not do what it claimed to do. For pvp, I would prefer to blind my attackers 1/3 the time than 0% chance of blind that it used to have. Then protection also now happens 1/3 the time instead of never for all other chaos armors.
My post from a different thread:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_zUWZIyOL4

The bug. I agree that this is a nerf to staff 4 BUT it is a buff to every other chaos armor if it actually works. Blind also used to NEVER work. Now it should work for ALL chaos armors. This means that the confuse on blind trait now works. This is also amazing defense for WvW. Being able to blind multiple foes now is BETTER IN EVERY WAY. Its like multiple aegis’s that stack.

That’s probably the best reasoning I can think of – a bug fix. Honestly have you seen anyone qq’ing about how much protection mesmers have (no not everyone takes PU in their builds)?

In another post I was wondering about protection stacking from all these additional potential procs which were non-existent before. If it does indeed stack and you are spec’d for high boon duration, it could be interesting for protection uptime, without the need to use PU:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Another-patch-another-mesmer-nerf/page/2#post2377757

This would be more in the PvP realm since as a mesmer you’re not going to get hit nearly enough for reliable protection uptime in dungeons and PvE (unless mabye solo-ing). I haven’t been in game to test myself yet but will try to later.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

How can the trait work if blind never happened.

If you take Blinding Befuddlement back then you would see that even though the Blind does not appear the Confusion does. Plus you get about double the amount of Confusion than you would without the trait.

Really, doesn’t anyone test things themselves these days?

Embolism.8106:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

How can the trait work if blind never happened.

If you take Blinding Befuddlement back then you would see that even though the Blind does not appear the Confusion does. Plus you get about double the amount of Confusion than you would without the trait.

Really, doesn’t anyone test things themselves these days?

As evidence with a recent thread of mine, I test things like crazy. However I never ran condition builds and I cant test EVERYTHING, so I rely on others to also test. I could honestly care less about the bonus confusion working or not and it was a minor thing I added. However, I watched his video and the enemy never missed an attack so I feel confident in agreeing with him that the blind itself never procced. Since peopling are moaning so much about the doomsday of mesmers and the staff, my focus is on the blind now supposedly working.

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg. Edit: Protection
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg. Edit: BLIND (Then more on protection below)

At first appearance, these are mathematically similar until you think about it more. This can also negate important attacks like cloak and dagger and screw up a theif combo. THEN ALL CHAOS ARMORS now also have a 33% chance of 33% less dmg as well.
Edit: Also can be 66% chance of 33% less dmg if you have the chaos 15.

This seems like a bug fix and major buff to our defense while also being a buff to our party support since we can now give our group a chance at protection and blind.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg.
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg.

How do you get “33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg” ?

Shouldn’t it be “33% chance of a 33% reduction of dmg” ?

juno.1840:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg.
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg.

How do you get “33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg” ?

Shouldn’t it be “33% chance of a 33% reduction of dmg” ?

33% chance to proc Blind, which 100% negates your opponent’s next attack if it hits?

juno.1840:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg.
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg.

How do you get “33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg” ?

Shouldn’t it be “33% chance of a 33% reduction of dmg” ?

Well spotted. I think he may have mixed up reduction of damage with duration of damage reduction (protection).

Embolism.8106:

juno.1840:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg.
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg.

How do you get “33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg” ?

Shouldn’t it be “33% chance of a 33% reduction of dmg” ?

33% chance to proc Blind, which 100% negates your opponent’s next attack if it hits?

Yeah but you must get hit at least once to get your 33% chance. Then you must get hit a second time to negate the damage. So this is not a good representation of the new state of chaos armor.

juno.1840:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg.
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg.

How do you get “33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg” ?

Shouldn’t it be “33% chance of a 33% reduction of dmg” ?

this.
it’s a nerf to staff 4 anyway you slice it.

you had 5 seconds of prot on demand

you now have 0 seconds of prot if no one hits you during its duration (so no effect at all)
you now have a 33% chance to get 3 seconds of prot if you get hit 3 times during CA duration (will not happen very often).

useless skill at current cooldown.

The 33% chance of 100% negation is a 33% chance of blind. However, this 33% chance of blind is for all enemies attacking you on individual 1 second cds. As I said before, this is a nerf to staff 4 but an overall buff for mesmers and party support.

“Mesmer:
Chaos Armor: This skill no longer automatically applies protection when activated. This buff now provides an equal chance to trigger regeneration, swiftness, or protection on hit with a 1-second internal recharge. The random condition applied now has a 1-second internal recharge per target. These changes apply to the Chaos Armor provided through combo finishers as well.”

juno.1840:

Yeah but you must get hit at least once to get your 33% chance. Then you must get hit a second time to negate the damage. So this is not a good representation of the new state of chaos armor.

So what if you need to get hit at least once. If you are using chaos armor, its because you expect to get hit. Otherwise you should be dodging/distorting/blurring/blinking/invis…. not chaos armoring.

Relshdan.6854:

you now have 0 seconds of prot if no one hits you during its duration (so no effect at all)
you now have a 33% chance to get 3 seconds of prot if you get hit 3 times during CA duration (will not happen very often).

useless skill at current cooldown.

If you don’t get hit, you didn’t need chaos armor to begin with. You were just spamming a skill and wasting a cd.

Edit: In case you guys missed it again, the blind didn’t work before. Prot is also still there.
Edit 2: Nerf to staff 4 but buff to staff # 5 then #2

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

juno.1840:

Yeah but you must get hit at least once to get your 33% chance. Then you must get hit a second time to negate the damage. So this is not a good representation of the new state of chaos armor.

So what if you need to get hit at least once. If you are using chaos armor, its because you expect to get hit. Otherwise you should be dodging/distorting/blurring/blinking/invis…. not chaos armoring.

Even so, it’s not 100% reduction. You got hit twice, negated once. All damage being equal you got 50% (but all damage is not equal so you may have negated 99% or 1% total over the two hits).

In addition, the chaos armor boon application is capped. So that in itself is a nerf. Your party is now capped at five boon applications MAX. That in itself is a nerf — and not made up for by the new possibility of a blind.

You can sugar coat it all you want — the change hurts.

There are no pros to the change. It’s all cons. This skill is trash now, especially with the internal cooldown. Thanks ArenaNet. I won’t be using staff anymore on my mesmer.

There is definitely a pro, and that is combo Chaos Armour can proc Protection now too. That’s great for Glamour Support Mesmers.

Yeah but it’s a pretty weak pro compared to the new cons.

This is why I don’t even try for a Legendary. With this profession, I can’t rely on having a “main” weapon because each patch makes another more / less desirable.

That’s great for Glamour Support Mesmers.

Sounds very overwhelming…are we supposed to only play support and portal-kittenes now? (/edit: That “kitten” is actually a female dog)

juno.1840:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

juno.1840:

Yeah but you must get hit at least once to get your 33% chance. Then you must get hit a second time to negate the damage. So this is not a good representation of the new state of chaos armor.

So what if you need to get hit at least once. If you are using chaos armor, its because you expect to get hit. Otherwise you should be dodging/distorting/blurring/blinking/invis…. not chaos armoring.

Even so, it’s not 100% reduction. You got hit twice, negated once. All damage being equal you got 50% (but all damage is not equal so you may have negated 99% or 1% total over the two hits).

In addition, the chaos armor boon application is capped. So that in itself is a nerf. Your party is now capped at five boon applications MAX. That in itself is a nerf — and not made up for by the new possibility of a blind.

You can sugar coat it all you want — the change hurts.

Your talking about the party? I used to NEVER give your party protection or blind your enemies.

Old staff 4: You get hit twice with protection so you take an average of 66%.
Old chaos armor (not staff 4) everyone takes 100% dmg every single hit.

With the new one, you have a 33% chance to proc protection and a 33% chance to proc blind.
So 3/9 the time, you take 100% then 0% dmg or an average of 50%.
If protection procs when blind doesn’t (2/9 the time) you take 100% then 66% or an average of 83%.
If neither proc, you take 100% (4/9 the time)

So on average the new chaos armor is (3/9) x 0.5 (2/9) x 0.83+(4/9) x 1 = 0.167 + 0.184 + 0.44= 79.5% reduction for ALL chaos armors.

Again, nerf to staff 4, buff to staff #5 then 2. Buff to leaps/blasts in ethereal fields.

Edit: Lets just compare the two chaos armors you get from staff.
Old staff: Average of 66 &100 = 83%
New staff: 79.5%

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

So lets look at what it should be doing now and what it used to do.

Old: 100% chance of 33% reduction of dmg. Edit: Protection
Now: 33% chance of a 100% reduction of dmg. Edit: BLIND (Then more on protection below)

At first appearance, these are mathematically similar until you think about it more. This can also negate important attacks like cloak and dagger and screw up a theif combo. THEN ALL CHAOS ARMORS now also have a 33% chance of 33% less dmg as well.
Edit: Also can be 66% chance of 33% less dmg if you have the chaos 15.

This seems like a bug fix and major buff to our defense while also being a buff to our party support since we can now give our group a chance at protection and blind.

I’ve always used staff, but in power builds. Trying it now in condition builds and you are absolutely right. The new “fixed” staff is hell for melee. Thieves especially.

I do miss the on demand prot, esp for eating dps while rezzing or taking a treb hit or something. Otoh, overall prot uptime in combat is good. Chaos armor is now as much or more about the condition application as it is a defensive tool.

They should replace the random swiftness with stability though

Before the confusion nerf and when Chaos Armor was still in it’s original form I ran a perma Chaos Armor build that rocked really really really hard. This is a step in the right direction to make the most fun build I have ever made viable again. Now they just need to change Blinding Befuddlement and I might try running it again. ^^

Hexxen.7216:

Before the confusion nerf and when Chaos Armor was still in it’s original form I ran a perma Chaos Armor build that rocked really really really hard. This is a step in the right direction to make the most fun build I have ever made viable again. Now they just need to change Blinding Befuddlement and I might try running it again. ^^

Go for it! It’s only a 5 second cool down …
:-)

Okay lets put it this way…. Guaranteed protection from staff #4 gone. HOWEVER in combat overall protection uptime got INCREASED. Protection is the baby of my build and I tested this. Overall protection uptime through fields and staff 4 is UP…. Not a nerf a bug fix. Let us stop whining now.

jportell.2197:

Okay lets put it this way…. Guaranteed protection from staff #4 gone. HOWEVER in combat overall protection uptime got INCREASED. Protection is the baby of my build and I tested this. Overall protection uptime through fields and staff 4 is UP…. Not a nerf a bug fix. Let us stop whining now.

That’s the spirit. I’ve been wondering how much protection uptime can be obtained without using PU, maybe playing something like Hexxen’s bubble build. I’m might try that out later in PvP with full boon duration runes to see.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Relshdan.6854:

you now have 0 seconds of prot if no one hits you during its duration (so no effect at all)
you now have a 33% chance to get 3 seconds of prot if you get hit 3 times during CA duration (will not happen very often).

useless skill at current cooldown.

If you don’t get hit, you didn’t need chaos armor to begin with. You were just spamming a skill and wasting a cd.

Edit: In case you guys missed it again, the blind didn’t work before. Prot is also still there.
Edit 2: Nerf to staff 4 but buff to staff # 5 then #2

if i’m taking on a couple people, i’m going to use those dodges/evades regardless………and when they are on cooldown, i then had a guaranteed protection as backup. now i don’t………….i must rely on random chance.

again…i understand the buff to combo chaos armors…..but the nerf to staff 4 with its current cooldown is large.

you can try to minimize the nerf by saying that you’ll get a blind with a prot, and you might………but you can’t guarantee that……….you might not get either, and thus you truly wasted a cooldown.

that said……its par for the mesmer course now. we get nerfs and nothing else (some big and some small). i’m not even that mad now….its expected.

skcamow.3527:

jportell.2197:

Okay lets put it this way…. Guaranteed protection from staff #4 gone. HOWEVER in combat overall protection uptime got INCREASED. Protection is the baby of my build and I tested this. Overall protection uptime through fields and staff 4 is UP…. Not a nerf a bug fix. Let us stop whining now.

That’s the spirit. I’ve been wondering how much protection uptime can be obtained without using PU, maybe playing something like Hexxen’s bubble build. I’m might try that out later in PvP with full boon duration runes to see.

I am currently reworking the Bubble Build a bit to add in PU as well. ^^ I LOVE this “nerf” ahahahahaha

Iavra.8510:

That’s great for Glamour Support Mesmers.

Sounds very overwhelming…are we supposed to only play support and portal-kittenes now? (/edit: That “kitten” is actually a female dog)

Actually, this also gives even Berserker builds a bit more team utility. This fix only makes Mesmers of all kinds more welcome in groups.

And for us? Staff gives you atleast 2 ways to obtain Chaos Armor, and if you have a 1h sword in your offset then thats even more armor. Not to mention from Glamour fields. We can maintain chaos armor for a pretty long time, and this change allows us MORE opportunities to get protection more often than 5 seconds from one skill on a half minute cooldown. If it procs even twice in the potential 15 seconds of Chaos Armor you can have, its more worth it than it was before, albiet less reliable.

… Hey do Chaos Armor boons/conditions proc off retal damage?

Chaos Archangel.5071:

… Hey do Chaos Armor boons/conditions proc off retal damage?

before the patch yeah, it does for each reta damage i get a random buff, but now i tried it and am only getting 1 buff per sec out of 20 peeps with retal while they’re under confuse and my total life goes from full to almost dead… which is sad, instead of players learn how to remove conditions in a zerg they encourage to attack while under the influence of them and hope that heal spells will save them.

after player for a few hours (shatter build w/ no boon duration), i can say chaos armor is way closer to perma-swiftness, than perma-protection……………..guess skill RNG works both ways.

maybe it works better in a +boon duration build………….does prot stack in duration if it procs again in time (i’ve never seen it proc twice in a single chaos armor).

if it does, at least i can see some use for the skill on a boon duration build

Chaos armor was buffed unless you were using it on a squishy mes that was using it for on demand protection. In that case then yes it was a nerf… so overall it was more of just a change in the skill balance wise.

What I don’t understand though is the ICD applying to this but not retaliation. In the last state of the game he said that an ICD on retaliation would cause it to be confusing as to where the effect is coming from… but it’s ok on chaos armor? o.O Double standard.

This isn’t trying to say “retal OP nerf nerf nerf” (although I find it to be an unbalanced buff in certain situations) just pointing out the faulty logic.

@Aberrant: The 1sec cooldown is to put it in line with the other auras. Fire aurabhasba 1s ICD and lightning aura can only stun the same person for one second every two seconds. On the bright side, we can proc Chaos Armor far more often than most auras.

just a weird change if it ain’t broke don’t fix it applies here.
imo reliable transformed into rng =nerf as far as i concerned.
for all i care even if they made it to have 33% to oneshot ppl i still would call it a nerf.
but i dont mind it much i can live with this.
and i`ll add its silly to have this long cd now they need to lower it,the skill as of now doesn’t deserve it.

cottage.3274:

just a weird change if it ain’t broke don’t fix it applies here.
imo reliable transformed into rng =nerf as far as i concerned.
for all i care even if they made it to have 33% to oneshot ppl i still would call it a nerf.
but i dont mind it much i can live with this.
and i`ll add its silly to have this long cd now they need to lower it,the skill as of now doesn’t deserve it.

You now have a change to get protection from even combo finisher versions of Chaos Armor. This is in no way a nerf at all as it has upped our collective protection time.

Hexxen.7216:

You now have a change to get protection from even combo finisher versions of Chaos Armor. This is in no way a nerf at all as it has upped our collective protection time.

reliable transformed into rng =nerf as far as i concerned.

they could have made it for finishers only and leave out our staff skill but they didn`t.
rng lowers the skill cap and i don`t like it that`s it.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

@Aberrant: The 1sec cooldown is to put it in line with the other auras. Fire aurabhasba 1s ICD and lightning aura can only stun the same person for one second every two seconds. On the bright side, we can proc Chaos Armor far more often than most auras.

And that’s fine… but why not apply this to all defensive buffs then? It would help even things out in other areas as well.