Guild Wars 2

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all,

I’m looking into the combat degen resulting in too heavy a gating of Celestial Avatar in PvE situations; from what I saw over the weekend it seemed overly restrictive in open world battles. If this continues it then the degeneration when out of combat is likely to be removed.

Fingers Crossed!

good news TY Irenio

Cheers, and thanks, Irenio!

Thank you, Irenio! That has to be done, now it is just atrocious. And please consider returning shadowscale f2 stealth cause it realy brought tactical mobility to the game and now it is just not fun, considering 50% damage reduction it is double nerf of a useful pet. We don’t have many useful pets so please do not spoil this one.

I’m confused. Continues? Is there someway outside of direct intervention that it could change? Its programmed to degenerate. Shouldn’t it always continue?

Mr Pin.6728:

I’m confused. Continues? Is there someway outside of direct intervention that it could change? Its programmed to degenerate. Shouldn’t it always continue?

If it continues to seem overly restrictive =)

Curious now that I read the post again where Open-World PvE was specifically mentioned. If the decision were made to remove the degeneration of Astral Force, would this be across all modes or strictly PvE?

Just for clarification, if you removed the degen out of combat, is this applying only to PvE situations or across all game modes?

Edit: Lol, Wondrouswall is a faster typer…

AF seems completely useless as is so something needs to change. It takes forever to charge up, then once you take it you can only get a few skills off before it’s gone again.

My Necro loves the Death Shroud and can be in it almost all the time, why is AF so hard to get?

Thanks Rashagar, that makes much more sense. For a bit I thought there was some bug that I was unaware of that was effecting the degeneration rate.

Irenio, we realize healing needs to be gated/controlled but please create a system that is flexible! Defensive mechanics, like healing, need to be flexible enough to counter what its meant to counter; in this case incoming damage. Please do not put healing behind a rigid system like a 10 second cooldown (ala Death Shroud) which is a mechanic not conducive for a healer class which requires access to time-sensitive spells. (I wrote a long-winded post on the benefits of using “soft gate mechanics” to balance AF/CAF instead of hard gates like a 10 second cooldown.)

Thank you for NOT telling us you were going to do this in the first instance, it wasn’t mentioned anywhere. It would have been nice to have ONE post even just stating that it was in fact something that was implemented rather than spending the entire time wondering if it were a bug or not.

While you’re at it could you please revert the changes to the smokescale. (Not the damage, though may have been slightly heavy handed)

Looks like they plan on leaving it as is for WVW and PVP. Sucks to be you guys.

Still, unless they buff AF generation from damage, remove out of combat degen, and remove the 100% full gate to enter AF I’ll never trait Use AF… Not because I wouldn’t want to its just fights will be over before its charged enough to use it…

Doesn’t much matter anyway as Rev is killing it right now.

Its a start but its far from enough. Bring back f2 skill on smokeskale and later when i see that Druid outheals all the other classes and have a genuine place in a group then and only then ill comeback..

For now im of to Elder Scrolls Online

What about PvP? Do you people actually think Druid is good in PvP?

And the way CAF functions now is just plain ugly even without a degen. Is there any plans on making a fun transform?

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all,

I’m looking into the combat degen resulting in too heavy a gating of Celestial Avatar in PvE situations; from what I saw over the weekend it seemed overly restrictive in open world battles. If this continues it then the degeneration when out of combat is likely to be removed.

It’s too heavily gated in PvP as well. When A Druid can’t use CAF more than once or twice over the course of an entire PvP match, something is seriously wrong.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all,

I’m looking into the combat degen resulting in too heavy a gating of Celestial Avatar in PvE situations; from what I saw over the weekend it seemed overly restrictive in open world battles. If this continues it then the degeneration when out of combat is likely to be removed.

Hallelujah!

Thank you, Irenio! I have to say removing degeneration is the right move to bring druids back to a more usable state immediately.

Other tweaks will naturally follow over time.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all,

I’m looking into the combat degen resulting in too heavy a gating of Celestial Avatar in PvE situations; from what I saw over the weekend it seemed overly restrictive in open world battles. If this continues it then the degeneration when out of combat is likely to be removed.

Thanks for at least letting us know this is being looked at.

Now about the other issue… Smokescale F2 needs to be swapped back.. I mean come on… 10/10 would prefer a smoke-field on demand than some pseudo-burst on a pet you do NOT use for it’s damage.

Thanks Irenio! I really love the class concept, and loved it in beta, so I’m definitely crossing my fingers that you’re able to nail the balance on it right, since its current iteration definitely feels a quite lacking.

FYI, the degeneration of AF out of combat makes Druid rather inferior for WvW healing at the moment when compared to Eles. Back in beta, I was able to quickly react to most any combat situation by switching into CA form to heal my team. Right now, the degeneration out of combat has meant I almost always never have enough AF to do so, making Ele on demand, ground targeted water fields far better than what the “heavy healing” class offers. Just some food for thought.

Meh I’m fine either way. I like druid.

Hi Irenio

The out of combat degen for Celestial Avatar isn’t only limited to a pve environment, the whole mechanic of the Astral Force degeneration for all game modes is quite restricting. For example, even changing targets in World Vs World, will result in half your astral force gone as a result of the mechanic.

Cort.

Thanks a lot for this! I really love druid and this combat degen is the only thing i don’t like about it. And yes I agree with other people that it is not only limited to a pve enviroment. It is a problem in pvp and wvw as well. Please fix this.

Thanks for communication Irenio! I guess we are gona write this alot of times down, but this is also a problem in pvp (smallscale) not just pve.

Can I ask why it was made to degenerate in the first place? It literally killed being able to properly heal in 99% of situations and is there any plans to increase the AF gain? Currently it builds far to slow in anything but a large drawn out fight both in PvP and PvE, theres been multiple games during PvP where I only managed to hop into CA once or twice despite healing team mates and being in the thick of group fights. That is completely unacceptable. No other spec has their special ability locked out 99% of the time. CA in it’s current state is a horrid version of adrenaline for Warriors except they can build it with only 1 or 2 abilities in a very short amount of time.

Thank you Irenio for the consideration for all game modes. I do hope this change goes through, it’ll open up the doors for all Druids.

A pve-pvp split on this would be awesome.

The gating in PvE is real. CAF only usable when there is zero downtime between engagements. Large events this is ok but open world doesn’t work at all.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

Imagine if every time a bunker guardian entered a fight in PvP it had to spend 20-60 seconds charging up its shouts before using them, that’s basically the equivalent of Druid currently.

One thing that would fix Druid easily in PvP, and make it viable for builds without staff is if you added Astral Force charging from Regeneration boon. Right now Druid can only charge the form effectively with Staff and Troll Unguent, but if you added Regen charging Astral force, Druid would be able to use:

- Water Spirit (with Regen pulsing boon)
-Traited Shouts for Regen
- Healing Spring in team fights for regen charging
-Traited Warhorn

This would open up an extremely large variety of builds (Shouts, Traps, Spirits, etc). It would be amazing.

infantrydiv.1620:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

Imagine if every time a bunker guardian entered a fight in PvP it had to spend 20-60 seconds charging up its shouts before using them, that’s basically the equivalent of Druid currently.

One thing that would fix Druid easily in PvP, and make it viable for builds without staff is if you added Astral Force charging from Regeneration boon. Right now Druid can only charge the form effectively with Staff and Troll Unguent, but if you added Regen charging Astral force, Druid would be able to use:

- Water Spirit (with Regen pulsing boon)
-Traited Shouts for Regen
- Healing Spring in team fights for regen charging
-Traited Warhorn

This would open up an extremely large variety of builds (Shouts, Traps, Spirits, etc). It would be amazing.

I actually already use a traited shout and WHaO for heals/buffs so this would be huge for me personally.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

Let’s hope that they let us gain energy by healing while we are in the Celestial Form again, simply because once you get in Celestial mode now, you dont have enough time to use enough skills (especially when you have your abilities + some glyphs that you wanna use).

Not sure why this is even in the game, it makes druid 100% useless in almost all situations. There is absolutely no reason to play druid in any situation if you are trying to be competitive. This is the type of stuff that causes people to question ArenaNet’s ability to actually handle ranger, and is a very big insult to the whole ranger community as a whole that we’ve been handled with such neglect after 3 years of very bad management.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

Thanks for the quick response! I do hope you guys strongly reconsider the degen out of combat and remove it. At this point it seems pretty obvious there aren’t any benefits from this change and only a long list of negative points.

I don’t want to be pushy, but is there an estimated time as to when you guys will make a decision on this? Not a specific date, but should we be expecting news in days? Or in a few weeks?

Regen should contribute to AF, so should Signet of the Wild but I’d like to see damaging conditions generate AF too – however at a lower rate as they tick per second, don’t want it bloating up AF too much.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

What about fix AF generation? It’s almost impossible to reach celestial form in PvP.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

Which, unfortunately, right now means you generally don’t even have the ability to throw in any meaningful heals in a large WvW engagement until it’s all too often already been decided (i.e. your team lost). Right now, you often can’t maintain AF for the moments you’d need it, and are required to do very weird stuff to stay in combat to keep it topped off.

Effectively, this has made Druid go from being one of the most amazing experiences I’ve had in 3 years of WvW during BWE3, to quite subpar in its current iteration. I really want to love this class, but the current state of it makes that very hard.

The Warrior Berserker spec has the same problem – thoughts on that?

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all,

I’m looking into the combat degen resulting in too heavy a gating of Celestial Avatar in PvE situations; from what I saw over the weekend it seemed overly restrictive in open world battles. If this continues it then the degeneration when out of combat is likely to be removed.

Yes, please remove the degen.

Also, can we get the Smokescale’s F2 swapped back to the smoke field?

Irenio, I first want to say thanks for the communication. It is a breath of fresh air to have a dev make a post in the Ranger forum, especially after the busy weekend.

Now, for my concerns... Smokescale F2 was changed in the first weekend even though we had it in BW3. Given the weekend I’m sure the dev team had, that’s a knee jerk reaction if I’ve ever seen one. CAF was in a decent spot on BW3 and it gets gated before launch with no communication. Your post means a lot but the mood in this forum is understandably angry due to these unannounced changes and no communication about either. The ranger has been overlooked for so long and this weekend it seemed like the class had a bullseye on it... in a negative way. I hope your contributions to the Ranger put us on par with other classes, which is where we’ve asked to be for 3 years now. Thanks.

Vamp Rook.7835:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

What about fix AF generation? It’s almost impossible to reach celestial form in PvP.

https://youtu.be/aQ6gxY8B6r0

thanks god you are alive irenio!

i can’t tell you how happy i’m about to see this post from you here.
but please also don’t forget to put the smokefield back on smokescale f2.

it was much more fun and sence the old way

Justine.6351:

Vamp Rook.7835:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

What about fix AF generation? It’s almost impossible to reach celestial form in PvP.

https://youtu.be/aQ6gxY8B6r0

Interesting. Few times there you came close to death but I guess that doesn’t matter in the end, right?

Forgot trapper runes are in the game now (sPvP).

Tipper.6973:

The Warrior Berserker spec has the same problem – thoughts on that?

False. Warriors are perfectly capable of charging up and using their burst skill multiple times over the course of a single fight. Druids can’t even do that with CAF over the course of an entire match.

Hey Irenio, thanks a whole bunch for your response; it really puts people at ease to hear that things are being looked into, from the man with the plan.

I sincerely hope you go forward with this change (or reversion) as it drastically improves the fluidity and feel of the druid. I’m sure you are, but please give the same attention to the other outcries here, such as the force gen from damage and the Smokescale F2 change (which has been overwhelming negative in response from the community).

<3

Justine.6351:

Vamp Rook.7835:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

What about fix AF generation? It’s almost impossible to reach celestial form in PvP.

https://youtu.be/aQ6gxY8B6r0

kitten , it pains me to see how long it took to charge up CA. You were in combat, constantly attacking for a whole minute until the bar was full.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

If regen were removed it would be in all modes. I’ve seen that in PvP it is also a pretty heavy gating, but in PvE it is appears worse due to the more frequent travel time between engagements.

What about actual generation or avatar duration? It still takes 60 seconds of dps without popping TU or using staff just to get 5 seconds of avatar time.

Can the other heals be brought up to a comparable generation level with TU? Can damage sources contribute more strongly to avatar gain? What about condition tics? What about regen tics or SotW tics? What about pets?

What about our dreams???!!!

(Couldnt we avoid all this if we just got rid of AF all-together and just worked around having a cooldown on Celestial Avatar?)

Just model it after death shroud. There’s already an internal cool down with the astral skills. There’s zero reasons to gate it more. Healing needs to be an on demand process, unlike attack, so you can’t treat it the same as adrenaline.

Aridia.3042:

Just model it after death shroud. There’s already an internal cool down with the astral skills. There’s zero reasons to gate it more. Healing needs to be an on demand process, unlike attack, so you can’t treat it the same as adrenaline.

But think of all that adrenaline you gain by not knowing if your heal will reach your friend in time before they are dead…