Guild Wars 2

I think that Wells with both positive and negative effects should always pulse negative effects to enemies and end with a positive effect to allies. We saw how the old Gravity Well didn’t work when it did the opposite, and I feel this is the problem with Well of Recall as well. So with that in mind…

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Well of Recall: Create a well that steals memories from foes, damaging and Chilling them for 2s every pulse. When it expires, it grants the stolen memories to allies, giving them Alacrity for 5s.
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The original end Chill was really weak for the same reason old Gravity Well’s end Float was weak. Sure it was a strong effect, but it is heavily telegraphed and trivial to avoid. The Alacrity given to allies was also negligible considering the CD on the well.

Reversing the Chill and the Alacrity IMO makes it far more workable: you immediately control enemies on cast, and allies who see the Well can enter it before it expires to gain the full effect.

It would also give Mesmers another tool for tagging groups of enemies (with the pulsing damage), which is something Mesmers do need.

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Well of Precognition: Create a well that overwhelms foes with images of the past, damaging and 2x Confusing them for 5s. When it expires, allies in the well can briefly see the future, gaining Blur and Unblockable attacks for 3s.
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So Well of Precog is meant to be a purely beneficial well, but I think it too can benefit from the dualistic approach. For starters Unblockable is a really niche effect, and the delayed Blur was nice but difficult to use. I also think we need a damaging Well geared towards condition builds, given that there is none at the moment.

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Well of Eternity: Create a well that rewinds time, cleansing a condition from allies every pulse. When it expires, the well heals all allies in the area.
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With the (good) change to All’s Well that Ends Well, we no longer have a condition cleansing option in Chronomancy. Not a real problem but I think it’s a shame. Also, Vigour on Well of Eternity seemed a bit weird: a boon that encourages dodging on a skill that wants you to stay in an area. No dualism here, just though I’d throw this in.

No, confusion is horrendous and if anything the blurr should be first and unblockable second.

No mesmer will use well of precognition in pve with your suggestion as condition mesmers are worthless there and confusion in particular is one of the worst damaging conditions, right besides torment.

Any particular reason you believe it should be this way, beyond some desire for symmetry?

Zenith.7301:

No, confusion is horrendous and if anything the blurr should be first and unblockable second.

No mesmer will use well of precognition in pve with your suggestion as condition mesmers are worthless there and confusion in particular is one of the worst damaging conditions, right besides torment.

For direct damage you already have Well of Calamity, Well of Action and with my suggestion, Well of Recall. You’re not going to fit another utility Well in there so might as well leave something for condition builds.

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Any particular reason you believe it should be this way, beyond some desire for symmetry?

Because as we saw with old Gravity Well, pulsing a beneficial effect and ending with a negative one doesn’t work. Allies who are late in moving into the area won’t get the full benefit, and enemies can completely avoid the negative effect simply by not being in it when it ends.

The opposite means that you can always ensure enemies are debilitated, and allies can always get the full benefit by entering the well before it expires.

High vigor uptime is extremely important on Mesmer. Having a good source available anywhere means build viability without the need for dueling and high crit chance. When you actually do the dodging is somewhat beside the point so long as the vigor keeps ticking away.

Ross Biddle.2367:

High vigor uptime is extremely important on Mesmer. Having a good source available anywhere means build viability without the need for dueling and high crit chance. When you actually do the dodging is somewhat beside the point so long as the vigor keeps ticking away.

Sure, but I think having ample condition cleansing that isn’t locked in Inspiration is also pretty important, given that Mesmers who don’t go Inspiration tend to be very, very lacking in this department.

Also remember this is a group effect, not just a self effect.

Embolism.8106:

Ross Biddle.2367:

High vigor uptime is extremely important on Mesmer. Having a good source available anywhere means build viability without the need for dueling and high crit chance. When you actually do the dodging is somewhat beside the point so long as the vigor keeps ticking away.

Sure, but I think having ample condition cleansing that isn’t locked in Inspiration is also pretty important, given that Mesmers who don’t go Inspiration tend to be very, very lacking in this department.

Also remember this is a group effect, not just a self effect.

I might agree with you if this were some other class such as necro who can’t evade and mitigate hits the same. Mesmers can get by without much if any condi cleanse just by adjusting the manner in which they engage fights. Of course you get caught out and you’re in trouble, but that’s how it goes. The fact is, Mesmers have solid avoidance and escape options.

Ross Biddle.2367:

The fact is, Mesmers have solid avoidance and escape options.

Could use this same argument on why Mesmers don’t really need pulsing Vigour on Well of Eternity.

I don’t really see anyone dropping Dueling for Well of Eternity. Way I see it it’s an augment, not a replacement when it comes to Vigour, whereas the situation with condition cleansing can be quite different.

Mesmers need more vigor than most classes to proc DE. Chronomancer offers many ways to boost your illusion count, so I don’t think vigor is so useful there. Condi cleanse on the other hand is a clear weak point.

When you mention that mesmers don’t need condi cleanse because they can kite, this is a very biased idea. Wells favor a playstyle of area denial and less mobility. For this playstyle, kiting is not an option, so condition cleanse is very needed.

Ideally, I would have liked both because I like the idea of running chrono to skip dueling all and all, and because of that, vigor is a good survival tool. But I miss condition cleanse more.

Embolism.8106:

Ross Biddle.2367:

The fact is, Mesmers have solid avoidance and escape options.

Could use this same argument on why Mesmers don’t really need pulsing Vigour on Well of Eternity.

I don’t really see anyone dropping Dueling for Well of Eternity. Way I see it it’s an augment, not a replacement when it comes to Vigour, whereas the situation with condition cleansing can be quite different.

If you’ve ever played a mesmer build without either dueling, or dueling with no crit chance (thus no vigor) you’d understand. Especially if you were working DE into the build. If you’ve played for any length of time, you’d also remember the big difference that the vigor nerf made to mesmer.

Dodge roll is the single most powerful thing in the game :)

Ross Biddle.2367:

Embolism.8106:

Ross Biddle.2367:

The fact is, Mesmers have solid avoidance and escape options.

Could use this same argument on why Mesmers don’t really need pulsing Vigour on Well of Eternity.

I don’t really see anyone dropping Dueling for Well of Eternity. Way I see it it’s an augment, not a replacement when it comes to Vigour, whereas the situation with condition cleansing can be quite different.

If you’ve ever played a mesmer build without either dueling, or dueling with no crit chance (thus no vigor) you’d understand. Especially if you were working DE into the build. If you’ve played for any length of time, you’d also remember the big difference that the vigor nerf made to mesmer.

Dodge roll is the single most powerful thing in the game

In fact my current build (both Chrono and non-Chrono) doesn’t use Dueling. As for how long I’ve played, not sure if you do but I do remember you since the beginning of this forum.

But that is exactly my point. Well of Eternity isn’t a viable alternative to Dueling by itself with Vigour. If it had condition cleansing however, it could (with, for example, Disenchanter and Chronophantasma) be a viable alternative to Inspiration.

Therefore a Well of Eternity that gives condition cleansing would increase build diversity more than one that gives Vigour.

(If you’re wondering how I get by with no Dueling and no Well of Eternity, the answer is blocking. So. Much. Blocking. Oh and it involves Inspiration.)

Embolism.8106:

Zenith.7301:

No, confusion is horrendous and if anything the blurr should be first and unblockable second.

No mesmer will use well of precognition in pve with your suggestion as condition mesmers are worthless there and confusion in particular is one of the worst damaging conditions, right besides torment.

For direct damage you already have Well of Calamity, Well of Action and with my suggestion, Well of Recall. You’re not going to fit another utility Well in there so might as well leave something for condition builds.

I don’t think you get to tell me how much utility I should get to choose from.

There are plenty of mobs where the unblockable upfront will be used over other wells, for example the Volcanic Fractal fire shaman inside his shell will be easily rooted by something besides a signet warrior now that I can lay a well for my party to ignore the shell’s blocks.

Same goes for Captain Arshym in Urban fractal when he opens the fight with a block or the Oooze blocking in the Thaumanova Reactor fractal at 5% hp left when the little oozes are getting near.

So, thanks, but no thanks. Let’s keep the utility universal.

Embolism.8106:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Embolism.8106:

Ross Biddle.2367:

The fact is, Mesmers have solid avoidance and escape options.

Could use this same argument on why Mesmers don’t really need pulsing Vigour on Well of Eternity.

I don’t really see anyone dropping Dueling for Well of Eternity. Way I see it it’s an augment, not a replacement when it comes to Vigour, whereas the situation with condition cleansing can be quite different.

If you’ve ever played a mesmer build without either dueling, or dueling with no crit chance (thus no vigor) you’d understand. Especially if you were working DE into the build. If you’ve played for any length of time, you’d also remember the big difference that the vigor nerf made to mesmer.

Dodge roll is the single most powerful thing in the game

In fact my current build (both Chrono and non-Chrono) doesn’t use Dueling. As for how long I’ve played, not sure if you do but I do remember you since the beginning of this forum.

But that is exactly my point. Well of Eternity isn’t a viable alternative to Dueling by itself with Vigour. If it had condition cleansing however, it could (with, for example, Disenchanter and Chronophantasma) be a viable alternative to Inspiration.

Therefore a Well of Eternity that gives condition cleansing would increase build diversity more than one that gives Vigour.

(If you’re wondering how I get by with no Dueling and no Well of Eternity, the answer is blocking. So. Much. Blocking. Oh and it involves Inspiration.)

Ok. You’ve made your point.

And yes, there’s certainly ways to work around dueling/vigor with a variety of (but not all) builds.

Zenith.7301:

I don’t think you get to tell me how much utility I should get to choose from.

There are plenty of mobs where the unblockable upfront will be used over other wells, for example the Volcanic Fractal fire shaman inside his shell will be easily rooted by something besides a signet warrior now that I can lay a well for my party to ignore the shell’s blocks.

Same goes for Captain Arshym in Urban fractal when he opens the fight with a block or the Oooze blocking in the Thaumanova Reactor fractal at 5% hp left when the little oozes are getting near.

So, thanks, but no thanks. Let’s keep the utility universal.

I expect unblockable skills to be important in raids: they have added a lot of unblockable in elite specializations, there is probably a reason for that!

Zenith.7301:

Embolism.8106:

Zenith.7301:

No, confusion is horrendous and if anything the blurr should be first and unblockable second.

No mesmer will use well of precognition in pve with your suggestion as condition mesmers are worthless there and confusion in particular is one of the worst damaging conditions, right besides torment.

For direct damage you already have Well of Calamity, Well of Action and with my suggestion, Well of Recall. You’re not going to fit another utility Well in there so might as well leave something for condition builds.

I don’t think you get to tell me how much utility I should get to choose from.

There are plenty of mobs where the unblockable upfront will be used over other wells, for example the Volcanic Fractal fire shaman inside his shell will be easily rooted by something besides a signet warrior now that I can lay a well for my party to ignore the shell’s blocks.

Same goes for Captain Arshym in Urban fractal when he opens the fight with a block or the Oooze blocking in the Thaumanova Reactor fractal at 5% hp left when the little oozes are getting near.

So, thanks, but no thanks. Let’s keep the utility universal.

If you’re using Well of Precog for the unblockable, then surely you wouldn’t mind even if it does no damage at all: as with the current iteration. Adding Confusion doesn’t suddenly change it from “universal utility” to “condition-only crap”.

I should clarify that when I said “utility well” I meant a well in the Utility slots, not a well designed for utility. I assumed as you were talking about damage that your concern was not being able to fill your bar with direct damage wells.

Thanks for this feedback OP!!

Embolism.8106:

Well of Recall: Create a well that steals memories from foes, damaging and Chilling them for 2s every pulse. When it expires, it grants the stolen memories to allies, giving them Alacrity for 5s.

I think 1.5s is a better number for the chill considering that you’re getting 3 pulses from it. Our uptime for alacrity has been buffed. 5 seconds is a bit much considering with the trait, you’d get ~8s. 4s is a better number here I think to share with others while also trying to keep it balanced for self-alacrity.
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Well of Precognition: Create a well that overwhelms foes with images of the past, damaging and 2x Confusing them for 5s. When it expires, allies in the well can briefly see the future, gaining Blur and Unblockable attacks for 3s.

I think for something with this type of CD, 3 stacks on each pulse would be a better fit. It would definitely allow for confusion bursts on a point with the addition of shatters. Also, the 3s for Blur/Unblockable would allow for combo-ing much easier. I like that this gives Condition Chronomancers something to play with in terms of wells.

Embolism.8106:

Well of Eternity: Create a well that rewinds time, cleansing a condition from allies every pulse. When it expires, the well heals all allies in the area.
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With Alls Well that Ends Well now not removing conditions, I think this is an excellent compromise. You might need to lower some of the healing though to compensate.

Embolism.8106:

Zenith.7301:

Embolism.8106:

Zenith.7301:

No, confusion is horrendous and if anything the blurr should be first and unblockable second.

No mesmer will use well of precognition in pve with your suggestion as condition mesmers are worthless there and confusion in particular is one of the worst damaging conditions, right besides torment.

For direct damage you already have Well of Calamity, Well of Action and with my suggestion, Well of Recall. You’re not going to fit another utility Well in there so might as well leave something for condition builds.

I don’t think you get to tell me how much utility I should get to choose from.

There are plenty of mobs where the unblockable upfront will be used over other wells, for example the Volcanic Fractal fire shaman inside his shell will be easily rooted by something besides a signet warrior now that I can lay a well for my party to ignore the shell’s blocks.

Same goes for Captain Arshym in Urban fractal when he opens the fight with a block or the Oooze blocking in the Thaumanova Reactor fractal at 5% hp left when the little oozes are getting near.

So, thanks, but no thanks. Let’s keep the utility universal.

If you’re using Well of Precog for the unblockable, then surely you wouldn’t mind even if it does no damage at all: as with the current iteration. Adding Confusion doesn’t suddenly change it from “universal utility” to “condition-only crap”.

I should clarify that when I said “utility well” I meant a well in the Utility slots, not a well designed for utility. I assumed as you were talking about damage that your concern was not being able to fill your bar with direct damage wells.

Your suggestion would push the unblockable to a delayed delivery of 3 seconds, which is way less valuable. The reason why I would swap blurr with unblockable is because the blur first is powerful enough to take that hit in delayed delivery. Confusion, however, is not.

I said I’m a direct damage mesmer because that’s what mesmers will be running in raids, but that doesn’t preclude them from taking wells that don’t directly do damage but instead enable it.

By taking away a portion of the well and replacing it with useless confusion, which will never become a thing in PvE, you’ve made the well not situational for me, but WORTHLESS.

That’s my objection, that the well can be used in certain PvE situations, whereas you suggestion means I’ll never use it. The delayed unblockable means little on Volcanic Shaman or Captain Arshym as their block periods will end around the 3-4 second mark, so the delayed unblockable becomes useless.

True, my suggestion to swap the benefits would give us the less useful delayed unblockable, but I can accept that in exchange for getting Distortion upfront as it makes the well useful in many more circumstances.

Condition specs benefit from unblockable and blur just as equally as power specs do. Why change a well so that it only benefits condition specs.

I think those are very good suggestions and I have been suggesting almost the same things after BWE 1.

Wells of precognition can be simply reversing blur and unblockable application order. It would be pretty good that way. Reliable 3 sec of blur application to your party is going to be very strong.

I also like the condie removal idea to well of eternity. Vigor is certainly nice but ONE option of condie removal should be provided from the chronomancer trait line. And condie removal is way more important to mesmer than vigor.

I already said it elsewhere, but I’m also all for switching Blurr and Unblockable. The delayed Distortion is nearly impossible to be used skillfully on a reliable level. And in those scenarios where it was possible you might as well just dodge. Unblockable can be utilized with a delay. It’s actually much better this way because you can plan your unblockable attack ahead.

For condition removal… phew. I guess I’d trade the Vigor on the Well for condition removal. But I agree that the access to Vigor on Mesmers is way too scarce at is right now. Some ideas:

Temporal Enchanter

• Remove Super Speed
• Add 1s Vigor per pulse

Super Speed on cast for Glamours is… bleh. I want to stay inside the Glamour. What is it supposed to do? Make me run in circles like a chicken even faster? Please make Glamours sexy again, Robert!

Time Catches Up

• Add 1s of Vigor per shattered Illusion
• OR regain 5-10 Endurance per shattered Illusion

I really like the idea of condition cleansing per pulse on Well of Eternity, since the elite specialization doesn’t provide a single condo cleanse. I’d rather like to use another of these amazing wells instead of using the skill slot for Mantra of Resolve or Null Field.
It would also contribute to the utility/support role of the Mesmer.

The real problem with Well of Precognition is that neither effect is very valuable on a 3s delay, and the people who want it one way or another are simply those who prefer one effect over the other.

Going through blocks requires that you know the target is blocking. Given the duration of most blocking effects, you kind of need to know that when the block starts.

Using evades requires that you know when you’re going to be attacked. Evades in general are a “Save me!” button, so having to wait 3s for it is not terribly helpful.

It doesn’t matter which order you put them in, one of the two effects is gonna get the shaft. The only good solution is to either move both effects into the main duration—thus breaking the stated design of the Chrono wells—or divide them between different wells.

Well of Recall:
Agreed, this would indeed be a much better well this way. I also think the chill is useless in any way since everyone has enough time to leave this well before bad things happen. Even though not made for damage, damage is alwasy important.
I’d also like to see the CD lowered since the effect is really barely ok for a 45 sec CD skill…

Well of Precognition:
I have to disagree on this one. One needs the unblockable mode right away, so I think this skill is “ok” the way it is. The blur would also be needed right away but I think this would make it op. So I think why not combine it with the current well of eternity effect to buff it a bit? Yes, give it also vigor on pulse, that’s all this skill needs.

Well of Eternity:
Aaaand I also agree with you on this one. Shift vigor to Precognition and give is condi cleanses will make this skill perfect. But maybe increase the cd to 25 then maybe.

Overall great ideas.

Silverkey.2078:

Mesmers need more vigor than most classes to proc DE. Chronomancer offers many ways to boost your illusion count, so I don’t think vigor is so useful there. Condi cleanse on the other hand is a clear weak point.

When you mention that mesmers don’t need condi cleanse because they can kite, this is a very biased idea. Wells favor a playstyle of area denial and less mobility. For this playstyle, kiting is not an option, so condition cleanse is very needed.

Ideally, I would have liked both because I like the idea of running chrono to skip dueling all and all, and because of that, vigor is a good survival tool. But I miss condition cleanse more.

I don’t like anything that relies on DE. It is unfortunate that this is still a “required” trait for so many builds. We need more solid alternatives to get away from it, not augment it after such a long time the devs should have really figured that out.

Also, DE or no DE, all clones / phantasms, etc. are still completely and utterly useless in WvW fights 10 people or larger where all your clones/phantasms die within 0.000001 seconds of their creation long before your insta shatter even registers with the server regardless if traited for health or not. They only have place in very small stuff, which while I do find OK once in a while, I would also like to get away from and be of use in large scale battles for something other then veil bot / portal bot.

First I’d like to say they are good suggestions overall, but my problem is that I only play WvW, and any well in this environment is never going to do the final effect when I want it. Even time warp was never a very useful elite because people just move around too much.

My suggestion is to just decrease the well’s duration to 2s total (especially the healing well).

Well of precognition needs to be changed, it’s straight up unusable, big cooldown for a mediocre effect.

Well of recall could have the chill split into every tick, no one is gonna stay on top of the well for 3 seconds.

As for the damage, I’m gonna try a full berserker build and see how it performs but I’m not sure they are better then necro wells.

As for #4 shield, the phantasm should proc in the end of the block duration regardless if you blocked or not, feels terrible to sit there in hopes of it proccing.

EDIT: The grandmaster traits of chrono tree are kinda useless in WvW. I’d like lost time to affect up to 5 targets (near my target) other than just one target in total

I definitely in support of adding a damaging condition to one of the wells. I don’t understand why Condie always gets the red headed stepchild treatment, and is completely overlooked in Mantras and Wells.

Both the damaging Mantra and Well should get a Condition damage component. It would be balanced to simply add this on top of current values, as without Condition damage these Confusion/Torment stacks do very little damage and both have innate counters. So adding 3 stacks of 3 second duration Confusion/Torment per tick of the Well will not be OPd in the least. (Same for the Mantra too really.)

Come on Robert, this is a no brainer! With MtD gutted, please give us some more means to apply AE Confusion/Torment via Well of Calamity or Mantra of Pain!

I prefer my take on Well of Precog for thematic reasons, but I can understand why people object on the (more valid) grounds of mechanics.

The reason I didn’t suggest reversing Blur and Unblockable and leave it at that is because I think on-demand group Blur on a kitten CD is too strong, considering that Distortion is on a 50s CD, is self only and while active prevents you from contesting points.

To make my idea more enticing for people who just want the Unblockable/Blur, the duration of both could be extended so it can be pre-cast while retaining a useful window of effect, but that may become too powerful.

The problem I guess is we don’t know how Unblockable (and to some extent Blur) is going to be utilised in HoT content, so it’s hard to judge what is balanced and what isn’t.