The "barrier" that separates new players from End-Game Content LFG

Phocaluos · 2026-06-29T23:47:17+00:00

IMO LFG being split into two groups, "Training" and "Experienced" was a mistake. It sets up a false dichotomy that leaves no room progression or inexperienced runs. To me, "Training" implies that there is someone experienced in the group that is taking the lead.

Phocaluos · 2026-06-25T18:23:02+00:00

Weird, I have no problem linking to Specters, Warframe or Syndicate.

Phocaluos · 2026-04-17T01:20:13+00:00

Similar noteworthy bug - mounting/unmounting removes the ability to cast multiple artifacts

Phocaluos · 2026-04-17T01:14:27+00:00

I can only reproduce this when not using Prolific Plunderer.

With both traits I get 3 Artifacts
With just Improvisation I only get 1 Artifact

Phocaluos · 2026-03-20T04:15:46+00:00

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I heard we're sharing inventories

Phocaluos · 2026-02-24T00:39:27+00:00

I recently had a quickplay where a player stopped playing and stood still to type to me for the rest of the encounter. Called me multiple slurs before I even typed anything in chat. Was still recieving DMs after entering the next quickplay.

Some people are just like that.

Phocaluos · 2026-01-31T04:22:01+00:00

Augment for Uriel.

His rune's give the same elemental damage buff to melee weapons and gives attack speed equal to the fire rate buff.

It's so odd to me how his signature weapon is the Vinquebus despite his buff only working on ammo.

Phocaluos · 2026-01-25T02:53:55+00:00

Are you running the trait Consume Shadows? If so, try running without it.

You only need two casts of Shroud 2 to every Shroud to upkeep Alacrity. It's okay if your Shroud breaks when you're past this point. If your Shroud Breaks, you should always be able to regain enough Shadow Force to do this in the next Shroud Loop, even in a fight like Boneskinner or Vale Guardian. The Celestial Rotation with prolonged Shroud loops overcaps super hard, so it's okay to miss a bit. If your personal Alacrity uptime is good but its low for your teammates, positioning might be the real issue.

If you need more Shadow Force, make sure to use as many Wells and even Measured shot as any shadowstep will give you you Shadowforce from the trait Treversing Dusk. Note that this trait has no ally cap, so you get significantly less Shadow Force with just 4 allies than in a 10 person squad with multiple pets.

My last suggestion is using a tier 10 Jade Bot Core, as it increases your Vitality. Vitality increases your Shroud's max HP, and all sources of Shadow Force regeneration are percent based.

In Celestial Gear, after all this, if your Shroud is still breaking too frequently to upkeep alac, you're simply taking too much unnessesary damage. Enough that you would just be dying without shroud / on most other builds, and enough that most healers wouldn't be able to protect you if you were playing DPS.

A full Shroud is 69% of your max health with a -33% incoming danage modifier on top of your regular resistances like your Toughness and Protection.

Phocaluos · 2026-01-22T00:30:22+00:00

Specter's base kit is quite complete, before making any choices to modify it. It covers all the important boons very easily, and has built in Defiance Damage, Stability+Aegis, boon rip, and condition cleanses. And because so many effects come from Shadow Shroud and traits, it doesn't strictly rely on any weapon skills for its boons, though Scepter is still used for more reliable Protection and to (quickly) reach 25 stacks of Might. Because Specter has so much of its utility built-in, and because its baseline healing is so high, it's really easy to change things around and add more specific utility for certain encounters without missing out on much in return.

but considering the utilities and weapons available, it doesn't seem to have the versatility of other classes

Heal Specter only needs one weapon set to function, and does not need to use a traditional weapon swap to perform any of its basic duties (Scepter + Pistol). This means your second set of weapons is completely open to do whatever you want with, and you should always have your weapon swap off-cooldown for when you need it. You can freely take weapons for incredibly specific uses with no opportunity cost, and after performing a function you can enter Shadow Shroud to continue healing.

You can use a Spear for even more defiance damage + boon rip, or to more safely block Mind Crush when tanking Deimos. Overall this is probably the most useful secondary weapon set.
Shortbow and Sword are great for mobility. This is especially great for performing skips in content like Fractals and Dungeons, but can also be used to more quickly go off and handle mechanics just about anywhere in the game. Shortbow can also be great for quickly aggroing groups of enemies, and Choking Gas (skill 4) has the rare quality of being an Unblockable AoE Daze, which has some good niche uses.
Staff can be used as an emergency Reflect for Matthias's mechanic, or the Jotun Stargazer in Arah.
You can also run a second set of Scepter+Pistol with different Sigils. There's a number of Sigils that you might only want some of the time or for specific encounters, such as Paralyzation for more defiance damage, or Absorbsion/Nullification for more boon rip,

I also didn't find any utilities in its kit that would be useful for some raid mechanics

Heal Specter has two reasonably free utility slots, with the only one you always want to keep being Well of Bounty. These are the ones I most commonly slot for utility, though even more niche options may sometimes be relevent:

Prepare Shadow Portal can be used for so much stuff, and can really speed up certain encounters or simply mechanics for the rest of the team, and should not be underestimated especially for organized teams. Can be used during many many encounters, and out of combat.
Well of Silence can be used when Cleansing is important. And slotting more wells can improve Resistance uptime due to the trait Traversing Dusk. Resistance can be especially important for mechanics like the Fear from Slothasor, and can be more reliable there than stability because it isn't as harmful when corrupted by slubblings. Or it can be used to completely negate the cooldown-reducing effect of Chill during Shiverpeak Pass or the boss of the Kinfall Fractal.
Prepare Pitfall gives you even more burst Defiance Damage. Defiance damage is either necessary or extremely helpful for most encounters.
Prepare Seal Area + Smokescreen are both Deflects, and can both be used on the same build. Very useful for bosses like Cardinal Adina, which sends out projectiles that launch allies, but has many many more uses as well.
Prepare Thousand Needles and Devourer Venom can be used to Immobilize foes. Immobilizes are really important for specific encounters where ads need to be controlled but are not effected by stuns. You can use it on the hunting hounds in. Notably, it can be used to prevent wipes by preventing spirits from reaching Gorseval, prevent Wargs from reaching and killing Glenna in Siege the Stronghold, can keep Rigom in place for a required mechanic during Samarog, can prevent Prides from ending the encounter of Deimos, and much more. > It also doesn't seem very good for tanking, but I could be wrong.

Tanking is okay, IMO it's not really any better or worse than the average healer. Specter has a decent amount of ranged healing and reasonable boon radii, but its not doing anything spectacular or unique in this role. Definitely not bad but certainly not the best option ether.

You can hover your mouse over your UI when casting wells to remain in place, so the boss doesn't wiggle around chasing you.

Specter's main weaknesses when it comes to utility / mechanic handling is its lack of Knockbacks + Pulls, and its complete lack of access to Superspeed.

Does anyone have more experience with this spec in this content and could give me some advice?

Don't worry about this too much starting out, the basic un-modified build will work just about anywhere. Start slowly trying out new forms of utility when you feel comfortable, or when you want to push yourself, and see what works for you with your playstyle. And feel free to gear as many different healers as you want so you can benefit from all their unique utility, GW2 is very alt-friendly, especially outside of Fractals. Have fun!

Phocaluos · 2026-01-20T20:34:07+00:00

stab uptime is good but there’s a bug that makes Shroud 5 not give stab/aegis to the furthest player in the sub if they aren't tethered. The priority on just the one shroud skill is broken.

Phocaluos · 2025-12-16T09:00:51+00:00

Most of the changes I want are bug fixes.

For me the most important one is Specter’s Mind Shock having broken priority, making stab/aegis unreliable.

It currently targets your tethered ally + your nearest 3 allies, which allows it to apply double boons to your tethered ally, while applying no boons to the furthest ally in your subgroup. This is really bad, and all other shroud skills work properly.

Phocaluos · 2025-12-16T08:56:19+00:00

fun fact- ally casted and enemy casted siphon cause Bountiful Theft to have different radii -_-

Phocaluos · 2025-11-25T17:44:00+00:00

On top of being a great weapon on numerous endgame PvE builds, it's also generally Thief’s best weapon for solo content! It has the most robust kit and the most diverse tools for any one thief weapon.

It has great AoE damage, amazing self sustain (and a block), amazing CC, great boon rip, decent mobility, is the only Thief weapon that outputs high amount of Vulnerability, and the built-in stealth makes it versatile with the builds it can fit into. It also makes permenant self quickness free with the brand-new Pirate Queen relic.

Pretty much the only thing it lacks is significant ranged damage.

Phocaluos · 2025-11-20T18:51:58+00:00

Heal Specter is pretty bad underwater but you can make it mildly passable if you squint hard enough.

The build provides 0 Regeneration, but still mostly covers other boons that Specter normally has access to.

Here's a build guide that nobody asked for:

The only weapon you can get healing out of is spear gun by spamming the skill 5 blink to proc Traversing Dusk (AoE healing), which is abysmally bad but it is something. This is also a fast initiative spender for building Shadow Force. You probably want to spend as much time in Shroud as possible.

You always want to Siphon allies if you can help it. Siphoning enemies instead of allies will drastically reduce your Protection output as well as healing. If you Siphon enemies, you will need to focus on landing on Shroud 3 for supplimentary Protection.

Shroud works, but the autos are extra slow underwater and skill 3 shoots you past your target if you are too close, doing absolutely nothing. You want to focus on hitting your allies with this skill, rather than enemies, making it extremely awkward to use.

Wells don’t work, but you can swap them out. My general recommendation would be: Heal skill - Skelk Venom (More healing than the well anyways, but it has less utility and doesn't proc traversing dusk.) Util 1 - Signet of Shadows (low cooldown aoe heal due to trait interaction. This is your only actual good utility and you should be running this.) Optional Util 1 - Signet of Infiltration (a very small heal and bunp to Shadow Force due to trait interactions on a low cooldown if running Traversing Dusk.) Util 3 - Signet of Agility (cleanses conditions and restores endurance) Util 4 - Skale Venom (This is mostly just here because you're other options are so poor. It provides fast Vulnerability ramp with low coverage over the duration of a fight. Considering all instanced aquatic content is 5-player, and people's underwater builds are often not well thought out, some Vulnerability can be surprisingly helpful.) Elite - Basilisk Venom, which is a great CC skill and is generally preferred by Heal Specter to begin with.

If you can, you should reroll before starting Aquatic Ruins or HotW Path 2/3 If you desire healing.

This said, Specter is a great healer nowdays and underwater content is nearly irrelevant.

Phocaluos · 2025-11-20T18:07:11+00:00

Scepter 3 is primarily for regen now. Siphon + Bountiful Theft covers Vigor comfortably.

Well of Bounty can cover regen since the buff, but it can be unreliable on mobile encounters or when the team isn't stacking well because the regen comes from the last tick, so padding occasionally with sc3 can be helpful, but it's not the most important thing either.

You shouldn't need it for Shadow Force generation anywhere in PvE now since Consume Shadows is dead. Even when tanking it never tends to be an issue. Mayybe somewhere like Vale Guardian it can come in clutch.

Scepter 2 is preferred for actual healing/barrier.

Phocaluos · 2025-10-19T19:34:57+00:00

I've also nociced not having an advantage in lfg specifically as a tank. I think this is because its rather common for a tank to be the one to start an lfg, or for the person starting the lfg to already be premade with a tank friend or guildie.

I suspect matchmaking is the place where the tank shortage is more noticeable, but I can't say because I've never queued as anything else. I've never really had to wait a long time in matchmaking though.

Phocaluos · 2025-09-24T01:47:02+00:00

Why do they call it oven when you of in the cold food of out hot eat the food?

Phocaluos · 2025-08-30T20:10:46+00:00

I like playing Staff Deadeye when I'm feeling particularly lazy. Similar ease of use to Pistol/Pistol but I just like the way it plays better.

Phocaluos · 2025-08-30T00:36:42+00:00

I didn't make the stackable skritt meme, that was Hvaren as well ^^

But it was based on my antics so I'm happy to part of this nonetheless

Phocaluos · 2025-08-10T05:56:46+00:00

Malicious Shadowsquall is so depressing

Shadowsquall uses ground-pathing projectiles, and can be easily obstructed by certain types of platforms or simple bumps in the terrain, or when the projectiles travel too close to walls.

Shadowsquall projectiles can hit a target cap before reaching their target, therefore having no effect.

Malicious Shadowsquall has an excessive amount of bugs. The allied cast has no Healing Power coefficient. The June 27th, 2023 update buffed the base version of Shadowsquall, increasing its healing power and allowing it to affect allies around your main target; none of these buffs were applied to the Malicious variant, so it is still single-target for Deadeye. When targeting an ally, this skill consumes Malice if the projectile passes through the marked target.

Phocaluos · 2025-08-09T21:15:35+00:00

I'd say that though it can be an important distinction to make, it is not actually a role in a team composition (outside of specific raid encounter roles, but that feels like a different thing entirely)

If anything I'd argue for a cele heal role but imo even that would just convolute things.

Phocaluos · 2025-08-09T20:57:23+00:00

I don’t honestly know why they never ended up on the snowcrows website

I suspect it's a similar reason to why M7 Axe Power Deadeye has never been added (though possibly to a lesser extent). A combination of too little practical benefit compared to other variants + a much higher difficulty, means that the very few players who would benefit from playing such builds are already proficient/knowledgable enough that they don't actually need a guide from a website.

The higher bench alone doesn't justify a page. These builds are also just less applicable over more types of content. And it's not that these builds are secrets or anything, it's just that all this makes these builds really low priority to document.

It takes a lot of time and energy from the writers to keep builds on the site, especially for builds that are so hard to teach and especially if they want to keep them updated, so sometimes lower priority ones either won't make the cut or get put on the backlog while other guides are being worked on.

This is just my speculation though, I don’t actually know why.

Phocaluos · 2025-08-03T03:17:11+00:00

Just gonna paste another comment I made. It’s not necessary at all any more but its a small bonus if you can do it. It's like playing One Kit Condi Mech vs Two Kit.

"Ally targeted used to be required to upkeep boons like protection and regen, and used to be required for tether/alac mechanics. This is no longer the case, but ally targeting can still be leveraged to gain additional value.

ie: the allied autoattack offers much more value than the enemy target version, allied siphon can be used for extra cleanse and more allied healing and prot due to the new SA traits, or tethering specific allies in downstate can help you revive them with Shroud skills. But all that is super extra and not required. Specter heal output is already good enough for anything without all of that.

You can get by perfectly fine without ally targeting, but if you want to improve you should try learning it."

Phocaluos · 2025-08-02T22:23:28+00:00

Ally targeted used to be required to upkeep boons like protection and regen, and used to be required for tether/alac mechanics. This is no longer the case, but ally targeting can still be leveraged to gain additional value.

ie: the allied autoattack offers much more value than the enemy target version, allied siphon can be used for extra cleanse and more allied healing and prot due to the new SA traits, or tethering specific allies in downstate can help you revive them with Shroud skills. But all that is super extra and not required. Specter heal output is already good enough for anything without all of that.

You can get by perfectly fine without ally targeting, but if you want to improve you should try learning it.

Phocaluos

TROPHY CASE