As a long time veteran who played Techter on JP servers for years I cannot stress enough how much this class needs getting overhauled. Techter was always a stepchild of PSO2 and the class we ended up today seems to have been created by accident with how many basic features are relegated to Active Skills (which never expire) or Skill Rings, which really shouldn't be rings in the first place.
Wand Focus
- Intended function: Attacking enemies with charged up Techniques (not charging them up by itself like with Bouncer) increases the Focus Meter. Once it's decently filled up only then do normal attacks inflict Photonic Furies.
- Reality: Wand Focus as a game mechanic basically doesn't exist. Thanks the all these "buffs" Wand Lovers got over the years the Focus meter is always maxed out, Wand attacks always deal 40% more damage and Step attack is always active.
- Overhaul Suggestion: Make the current system of Wand Lovers the default wand gameplay (there is really no reason why you'd use Blind Escape with a Wand and why an always active skill should clutter our Hotbars) instead make the Focus build up over time and at Max you could perhaps use a Weapon Action as a Follow up to Techniques to create a massive explosion of the same Element as the last casted Technique.
Wand Lovers
- Intended function (back in the day): Temporarily makes Wand attacks super good.
- Reality: It's skill that's active 24/7 since there is no reason to have it disabled and it wastes a slot on the hotbar for no reason, also activating it at the start of every quest (if you entered the lobby) is annoying.
- Overhaul Suggestion: Make it a temporary buff again. For example you could make it that during 45s Wand gear builds up faster or when equipped with a Wand you can't be knocked back by enemy attacks and you take reduced damage.
Wand Gear Element
- Intended function: Photonic Furies apply Status Ailments of the corresponding Element.
- Reality: Similarly as Wand Lovers, this is a 24/7 skill that is annoying to turn on and off between quests since there is no real reason why it should be off. Photonic Furies applying Status Ailments should be a basic feature of Wand Focus and not something you need to opt into first.
- Overhaul Suggestion: Make the current effect a function of Wand Focus and make this skill a switch for the A Wand E Change ring. While at the same time removing the Rings from the game. Being able to switch Wand Elements is a important feature of Techter but there are situations where we actually don't want to be flipping our elements each time we cast a Technique. This skill taking that Role would be perfect.
Reverser Field
- Intended function: Revives players for 15s, duh.
- Reality: Due to the long cooldown, short duration and small area of effect as well as 5sp in Tech. Power Up 1 prerequisite there is really no way a Techter can justify using it over just throwing a Moon Atomizer. The Cooldown reduction ring doesn't fix the issue enough and if i had to waste a Ring to make this skill good I'd still rather use it on Atomizer Lovers so that i can just do that better instead. It also doesn't help that the players start with like no health if you only put 1 SP into it.
- Overhaul suggestion: The cooldown for this skill should be 120 or 90 seconds. More is too much. The skill should only require 3 SP in Tech. Power Up 1 and should only require 5 SP to max out. The Healing should start at 50% and end at 100% by when you put 5 SP into it. Duration should be 15s by default. Secondly change the Reverser Field related ring to increase the range of the field instead of reducing cooldown.
Poison Detonation
- Intended function: Detonates Poisoned enemies around the player and inflicts poison to other enemies nearby.
- Reality: Applying Poison before regular enemies die is incredibly unlikely and many Boss monsters who this mechanic would be useful against have a Poison resistance. The range is also subpar, you basically need to stand within the enemy for it to actually work and the increased range from Territory Burst doesn't help either.
- Overhaul Suggestion: Make it a 1 SP skill that temporarily increases Poison application chance by 300% and increase Poison damage by 100%. On Bosses it reduces Poison resistance unless the boss is fully resistant.
- Alt. Suggestion (credits to T R A S H): Turn Poison Detonation into a chain-like skill that detonates upon reaching 100 hit count. Each party member can contribute to the hitcount, The Techter who casted the Detonation counts x4 in solo quests.
Blind/Panic/Poison Boost
- Intended function: Increases Blind/Panic/Poison infliction rate by 10%
- Reality: This is actually a multiplier and not a flat % increase. For example: Megid applies Poison with a chance of 22%. If I put 10 SP into Poison boost I only get a boost of 2,2% for a total of 24,2%. This is laughable for a 10 SP investment.
- Overhaul Suggestion: Reduce the total SP to a 1.
Wind Techniques
I don't know why but Wind, outside of Nazan 0 and Fused Techniques, has basically no Techniques that deal good damage, which is already bad enough because the game barely has any enemies that weak to wind exclusively. As a Result 1/3rd of Techters Technique arsenal feels pointless.
Heavy Hammer
While not out in PSO2GL yet, it's way too slow in the JP version and has very small range. Last week a new class came out which supercharges the Gunblade Damage, making it a viable weapon to use. It also has a Heavy Hammer-like Photon Art except its better since its a long range shot, deals more damage and charges up faster. There is no real reason why the short range equivalent should be worse in almost every aspect.
Subpallete Clutter
Techter is notorious for having way too many things it needs on the hotbar, so much so that playing with 2 of them is basically required. This is partially because Fused techniques eat up way too much hotbar space (3 slots) even tho they could be easily using just 1 slot.
For example you could hold down the Fused Tech Button on your Hotbar and then decide which one with the 3 Attack buttons (X, Y and RB on the controller).
Either that or make hotbar switching easier. Pressing Down/Up then Left/Right and then Up/Down on the D-Pad to actually start cycling through them is clunky and takes way too many button presses to perform such simple task. I'm aware of the Chat Commands solution, in fact I use them in conjunction with Steam-Input to create a control scheme that works far better than what the game provides. My point is that I shouldn't need to jump through so many hoops to play this class.
Tech Charge Parry Ring
This ring was great when it came out but nowadays its unfortunately too unreliable and the Scion Class Phantom comes with a similar ability that works 360° and is longer. It's already bad enough that Force and Techter need to waste a Skill Ring for that but Tech Charge Parry should absolutely be buffed to be on par with Phantom.
New Skills that I can't believe Techter still doesn't have after 8 years this game been active:
Talis PP Charge Revival
- Recover PP while charging Techniques with a Talis
- Why: Techter is supposed to be a more supporting Fo equivalent but Tech gameplay is constantly hindered by Techter not having basic features like this. For almost 7 years Techter had no reason to seriously use Talis for anything outside of Extreme Quest Weapon resistances and a Skill like this would be a heavy incentive.
Talis Element Conversion
- 25% of the Talis Element in converted into a Tech Damage multiplier if the Element matches enemy weakness. (60 element would mean 15% damage buff to Techniques)
- Why: Currently, unless you're a Force or a Hero, there is no reason for Talis to have Element as that game mechanic is irrelevant for Technique damage. This is why Force got the Element Conversion skill and its mind-numbing why Techter doesn't have one for itself.
- Why just Talis: Wand can already freely switch between elements and players are already incentivized to match elements to Enemy weaknesses. Having a skill like that on Wand would be ridiculously OP and would disincentivize Talis gameplay.
But yeah that's basically everything about this class that needs fixing imho and honestly wouldn't break this class's gameplay, instead would enrich it with more playstyles.
