Guild Wars 2

This trait was, obviously, designed with an alacrity rate of 66% in mind (unless, for some odd reason, the devs intentionally released alacrity knowing they would nerf it to 33% within a few months, which I doubt), and I feel that its somewhat lacking now. Especially compared to Illusionary Reversion. I think that Improved Alacrity should be changed to

• Alacrity applied to you will be 50% more effective

In 95% of situations in the game, this won’t have any effect whatsoever. As an example, lets look at untraited WoR. It gives you 5 seconds of alacrity for standing in it on the third pulse.

• Untraited, that is 5 * 1.33 = 6.65 seconds of CD received in 5 seconds
• Under the current Improved Alacrity, you would get 7.5 seconds of Alacrity, for a total of 7.5 * 1.33 = 9.975 seconds of CD received in 7.5 seconds
  * Under my proposal for Improved Alacrity, you would receive 5 * 1.495 = 7.475 seconds of CD in 5 seconds. But over the same period of 7.5 seconds, you would receive a total of 9.975 seconds of CD in 7.5 seconds

What this change does is frontload the effects of Alacrity if you are running Improved Alacrity. It doesn’t buff the net effect of what you receive from any source of alacrity compared to the current version of this trait. However, when you have a good rotation and have high alacrity uptime, this change would benefit you, as you would get slightly more CD reduction out of it. Now, this change would only affect the chronomancer, so all it would really do is give them a bit more wiggle room for their rotations if they have a high enough alacrity uptime. It wouldn’t increase raid group DPS at all (since chrono tanks contribute so little to it in the first place), this change wouldn’t bring back the bunker chronos from PvP leagues season 1, it wouldn’t affect other players. All it would do is give chrono tanks a bit more wiggle room in general.

The only other situation in which this would change gameplay is when a chrono has a skill with only 1-2 seconds of CD left and they shatter for alacrity. But that change would be so small I don’t think it would have any significant impact on gameplay in any environment.

I think that this change to the skill is enough to reward good rotations with that little extra bit of wiggle room without actually buffing chronos at all. Again, net result is the same as with the current version of the trait, this change just frontloads the effects of alacrity to reward good rotations that have high alacrity uptime, and it only benefits the chrono.

It would certainly make room for less boon duration and thus, Scholar Runes again, wich would be straight up a buff for the Chrono.

However, while I agree the “Leadership for minmax” is currently a horrible meta for Chronos (dps and beginner wise), I think that this change would make IA too strong compared to the alternatives.

Right now you can swap between DT and IA depending on the encounter, if you care about those 8% dmg. After your suggested IA changes, DT is immediately dead. It would be a buff, but an unhealthy one. Mixed feelings here.

Memsers are fine where they are. No need to buff something that could be overly used. That is why Boons were nerfed on mesmers. I mean groups having 2 minutes of resistance, etc.? that was ridiculous.

What they need do is nerf confusion.

@Dusty Moon – The only situation where you see any benefit from this change is when you have high alacrity uptimes, which just happens in raids. All it does is make the chrono tanks rotations more forgiving for the player. Also what does this have to do with resistance or confusion?

@Xyonon – I see what you are saying, but I don’t think it would be much of a problem. If you are already good enough in your rotations that you wouldn’t need the extra wiggle room from IA that this change would give you, you could still take DT for that extra damage. The intention of this proposed change is merely to make it easier for newer/less skilled chronos to keep their rotations up. And if we are talking specifically about those players, I think its more important that they have good rotations than get an extra bit of damage out of a chrono tank.

The thing is I wouldn’t pick DT, I’d almost be forced to go IA and throw away Leadership for Scholar. It’s like when HoT has been released, the Alacrity was so strong a single Chrono had no problems granting perma Quickness to everyone (back then you could even swap subgroups in mid fight). Stronger Alacrity equals more Wells, Signets, Tides of Times. It would easily outdamage DT by higher skill uptime already.

Overall I’d welcome the buff, since it would be nothing but a buff. The question I asked myself was rather – is it healthy. But I wouldn’t mind hurr durr :o

I see. I don’t raid so I didn’t think the effect this change had would be so profound. I would still like to see IA reworked somehow though.

Yea it would be an interesting change.

To be honest I’d rather they buffed the trait as is. There’s not many reasons to pick it over illusionary reversion unless you’re doing 3 clone shatters every single time and thus don’t need the extra clone or absolutely only 1 clone.

For example say you shatter a phantasm and a clone you get 3s alacrity.
With is this gives kitten for just under a 1s CD reduction
With iReversion you get 3s however your next shatter gets +1s alacrity if that clone lives.

So say you shatter again that phantasm you get 2s alacrity
3s with improved alacrity
3s with iReversion as you shatter a clone too.

Additionally because you had 2 clones you get 1 back so if you then summon another clone and do a shatter.
IA gives you 3s alacrity
IReversion gives you 3s alacrity

Generally speaking having an extra clone also gives you additional benefits, extra interrupt on diversion, 1s extra distortion, more damage from MW or CoF. So outside of that first shatter you get the same amount of alacrity. There is always the risk of the clone dying.

Personally I’d like it if IA was 75% increase in alacrity duration as it would not impact PvE builds at all or make it any more in demand currently but would help with power PvP/WvW builds have another choice than IR. Heck the only reason I don’t run it is because it gives warriors a clone to proc adrenal healing off.

I was trying to not directly buff chronomancer, as we don’t need yet another reason to not run core mesmer imo, but at the same time I don’t think it would be that bad to buff IA like you suggest apharma. Even at 75% increased duration, it would still be weaker than it was when alacrity was 66%, so I don’t think such an increase would be over powered.

OriOri.8724:

I was trying to not directly buff chronomancer, as we don’t need yet another reason to not run core mesmer imo, but at the same time I don’t think it would be that bad to buff IA like you suggest apharma. Even at 75% increased duration, it would still be weaker than it was when alacrity was 66%, so I don’t think such an increase would be over powered.

I agree chrono doesn’t need more of a reason to be picked but to me iReversion is just better in nearly every way tbh. Also gels well with illusions line for might stacking or condi.

apharma.3741:

OriOri.8724:

I was trying to not directly buff chronomancer, as we don’t need yet another reason to not run core mesmer imo, but at the same time I don’t think it would be that bad to buff IA like you suggest apharma. Even at 75% increased duration, it would still be weaker than it was when alacrity was 66%, so I don’t think such an increase would be over powered.

I agree chrono doesn’t need more of a reason to be picked but to me iReversion is just better in nearly every way tbh. Also gels well with illusions line for might stacking or condi.

Why is IR so much better though? I mean, I know its obvious. But I really wish Anet would redesign core mesmer. IR is so much better because as a class we rely so heavily on our F mechanic, yet unlike every other class, we can’t even use it consistently since on top of having 4(5) shatters, the effects of each shatter scale directly with how many illusions we have out, yet each shatter destroys our illusions.

Our mechanic really needs to be redesigned. And until that happens I don’t think there is any change that could be made to IA that would make it competitive with IR for self utility unless it became much too powerful.

I think it’s a good idea. I always felt alacrity should have remained 66% for the caster and 33% when sharing to others.