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The original was posted on /r/guildwars2 by /u/Phocaluos on 2024-11-17 08:41:32+00:00.

• This thread comes with an optional Google Doc which goes over all the same things except has much more detail in every area and includes lots of examples, a proper table of contents and some bonus material. If you are invested in Specter or the Healer meta, or if you simply prefer that format, I suggest reading that document instead of this thread.

1. Introduction ===============

Hi, I'm Phoca. I’m a Thief (mostly Specter) enthusiast. I’ve previously written a post on Thief's Spear shortly after its release. I'm not the best thief player out there by any means, but I like to research and to keep myself as informed as possible. I play all types of content on all Thief builds, and I do my best to shape my views based on those of a variety of many much more experienced players, as well as newer players.

I apologize ahead of time for this writeup being SO long. It's just that Heal Specter has that many problems, and I want to actually offer constructive feedback instead of just listing issues and leaving it at that. 

We have a balance update coming in January, so hopefully we get some good changes!

2. Overview ===========

This document is mostly going to be about the flaws that plague Heal Specter as a build in PvE, and the sorts of changes that are needed to improve its playability and put it in a good position. I’ll be focusing primarily on Heal Specter, but many of my observations hold true for Alacrity DPS Specter as well, especially the ones pertaining to Shroud and Boon access. This is primarily aimed at instanced content, but everything here is relevant for Open World as well.

Most people seem to have picked up on the general sentiment that Heal Specter isn’t a very competitive pick, but there’s not a good understanding of why this is. Ally targeting is something that is quickly pointed to, and while it is an issue, there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface that most people don’t realize. And because allied targeting and general playability has been so bad, and because Heal Specter is really complex and difficult to pick up, the build hasn’t had the chance for a big community to build up around it to facilitate the transfer of knowledge.

Heal Specter isn't bad because it's undertuned. I don't even think it is that undertuned, really. It's bad because of flawed design and fundamentals issues. While the buff to Shadow Sap in October was a very strong buff which made Specter a lot more powerful, it barely scraped the iceberg of the underlying issues which hurt the build’s usability. Heal Specter needs fixes and redesigns– not buffs.

3. Good Things about Heal Specter =================================

• Heal Specter has good sustained and burst healing and Barrier Output
• Has great ranged healing and is able to spend time away from the group
• Has generally good Boon potential. It’s the methods with which these boons are applied and the lack of Aegis that is the issue. Its Vigor and Resistance uptimes are especially good when compared to other Healers and its Stability application is effective.
• Great Defiance Damage capabilities regardless of your specific setup
• Good single-target Boonrip
• Has access to projectile hate through Smoke Screen and Seal Area
• Has a Portal skill
• Has great mobility for encounter mechanics.
• Has access to lots of Immobilize application, which is highly valuable especially in certain Raid and Strike encounters
• It has good allied Stealth access, and extreme self Stealth access. Has mobility, a portal, and Barrier for skips, as well as Blind fields for ads, all of which are useful for Dungeon type content
• The secondary health bar from your Shadow Shroud can add to your survivability
• It is more desirable than Heal Deadeye

4. Heal (and Alacrity) Specter’s Fundamental Flaws + Solutions ==============================================================

I want to start off by mentioning that all of these issues I’m going to list have workarounds. This is the reason why myself and a handful of other players are still playing the build – But these issues are also the reason many more players aren’t. Even though there are workarounds, all these workarounds all come at some sort of a cost. Importantly, these costs and trade-offs are things which other healers which Specter is competing with do not have to deal with. These costs range from re-tethering allies instead of Siphoning enemies, having to beg a different team member to bring Aegis, or simply choosing to not Stealth your allies at all, leaving a large part of your toolkit unused. The more difficult and complicated encounters get, the more obtrusive Specter’s flaws become, and they become harder and harder to work around.

For the most part, the issues with Heal Specter aren’t the actual output of its support. The issues are the ways it outputs its support. If these issues don’t get addressed, Heal Specter will remain in a poor position and be impossible to recommend regardless of how many buffs it receives through modified numbers, reworked/additional Utility Skills or Traits, or reworked/additional Weapons.

4.1 | Stealth

Stealth is a large part of Thief’s identity, and so it's fitting that Specter has special and interesting interactions tied to this mechanic.

Large pieces of Specter’s supportive toolkit are tied to allied Stealth, but this is very problematic for several reasons. Some encounters will apply permanent or temporary Revealed to certain allies, causing them to be fully immune to parts of Specter’s supportive kit, and any ally which Stealths and/or Reveals themselves can effectively ‘dodge’ the Specter’s support. Revealed as a permanent encounter mechanic is one that cannot be worked around in any other way than simply not interacting with Stealth at all. No other healers have to worry about Revealed affecting them in any way.

Where things get really toxic is when other Thieves are brought into the mix. Heal Specters and other Thieves are both competing over Stealth usage in a very negative way. Stealthing an allied Thief can cause them to use Stealth attacks at unintended times, and can cause them to be revealed when they need to Stealth themselves. For non-Thieves, Stealth is still an issue, just to a lesser extent, as it cancels anyone’s auto-attack chain and disable autoattacks or targeted auto-cast abilities.

There are two primary approaches that can be taken to address Specter’s ally Stealthing issues. 

The first approach would be to take a closer look into Stealth itself, and fixing its issues at a global level. If the balance team wants to keep Specter’s support tied directly to stealth, several changes would need to happen to Stealth itself:

• When players are Stealthed by allies, auto attacks and auto-cast abilities should not be interrupted.
• The way Stealth Attacks work on Thieves would need to change. They could borrow from Ranger’s Spear and Hunter’s Prowess. All skills and combo finishers which apply Stealth to themselves could apply a special buff which enables their Sneak Attack whether they are revealed or not. This effect would need to be for PvE only.

Hunter’s Prowess was added to Ranger Spear due to problems which Arenanet communicated with us. 

“Additionally, due to the popularity of traps and other pulsing damage skills, it was hard to weave in and out of stealth and complete your attack before you were revealed. To remedy this, Panther’s Prowl will now grant Hunter’s Prowess for a short duration. Hunter’s Prowess will allow you to use your next stealth skill even if you were revealed.” - Sharp Lessons: Spear Beta Feedback Update | by The Guild Wars 2 Team on August 07, 2024

It’s also hard to weave in and out of stealth and complete your attack before you are revealed when a Heal Specter is Stealthing and Revealing you at random intervals. And Thief  builds also like to weave Stealth Attacks between pulsing fields, including Thousand Needles, Pitfall, Well of Sorrows, and Well of Tears.

The second approach is to remove Specter's need to Stealth allies at all. Simply change all supportive traits which trigger upon stealthing allies to trigger under a different condition instead. These conditions could be changed to anything, from on Shadowstep, On Stealth Attack, or whatever else the team can come up with. But I have a personal favorite way that these traits could be changed. Hear me out.

The best way to fix Stealth related issues, is to make it so all traits which apply their effect to allies on Stealth, ALSO do so on Dark Aura application, and to add a unique passive to Specter which causes allied Stealth Application to become Dark Aura application instead, but only when in combat. This effect could be attached to the Minor Trait Specter, and could replace the part of the trait which removes max...

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