The easiest way to buff Specialists - free Heart of the -whatever-

[Sibyll]

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I do use Maker's Mark in my rotation and have never said that I don't or that people shouldn't use it so I don't really see how criticizing it makes me a hypocrite. It's easily one of the best openers you can use. However, Flawless Synthesis is a shit skill outside of Maker's Mark just as Brand skills are shit outside of Name. I don't see how using a skill in your rotation means that you are not allowed to criticize it for not actually fixing Flawless Synthesis itself.

They really haven't tried to change anything with the crafting meta. They could've created recipes in the same manner that Ixali dailies were handled, but they didn't. They could've utilized elemental aspected recipes, but they didn't. They could've added more types of conditions that proc in a recipe, but they didn't. Instead we continue to get larger progress bars and quality bars as the only form of variety we see between recipes.

[MN_14]

They really haven't tried to change anything with the crafting meta. They could've created recipes in the same manner that Ixali dailies were handled, but they didn't. They could've utilized elemental aspected recipes, but they didn't. They could've added more types of conditions that proc in a recipe, but they didn't. Instead we continue to get larger progress bars and quality bars as the only form of variety we see between recipes.

I consider this to be the biggest problem myself, aside from the lack of actual new skills other than precise touch and the specialist abilities. It would have been great if they gave us really difficult recipes with debuffs similar to the Ixali dailies from before. Successful completion of these recipes could be a way of getting a larger red scrip bonus or something.

[Sibyll]

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I agree. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to shit all over the crafting system just for the sake of complaining. I think the frame work they have here has some serious potential, but what I'm seeing in the expansion is not promising. I'd be content with garbage i180 gear if crafting was at least satisfying, but at this point it's no different than 2.x. We are still trying to build IQ stacks for Byregot's with most rotation variations aimed at minimizing the reliance of Rapid Synthesis for progression and maximizing the number of touches you can fit in.

The entire design of the new skills really paints a picture for them not wanting to make any effort to change the meta. Like you pointed out, with the exception of precise touch (which in all honesty could've just been a level 53 Trait for Basic Touch), Nymeia's Wheel, and Trained Hand there really aren't any interesting skills. Most of the skills are inferior hybrid skills to reduce cross class dependence (Innovative Touch and Byregot's Brow) or skills added to fix pointless skills (Maker's Mark and Name of X). I mean honestly an entire thread could be made just on how awful Byregot's Brow is.

Even something as class specific traits could be interesting. Something along the lines of how Blood for Blood is cross classed, but Dragoon still gets the best version of it. The crafting system also suffers from skill redundancies, the most obvious being Basic Synthesis and Careful Synthesis I. To an extent Ingenuity I is redundant and Standard/Advanced Touch are pretty useless except for crafting stuff you grossly outlevel/outgear. Those touches sort of had a use if you got a good/excellent condition proc early in a synth, but given the reduced frequency of procs and the addition of Precise Touch you would have a hard time arguing a scenario where using these is non-trivial.

And yea, I realize I've gotten really off topic.

[Nyalia]

Crafting traits would be pretty cool, I have to say.

The point of the brand-name skills and the MaMa/FS combos are that they take two cross class skill slots to cross class instead of one. That was an interesting choice for limiting their usefulness cross-class.

I personally prefer Muscle Memory over MaMa even if MaMa is theoretically better just because I dislike the finicky and RNG nature of MaMa. Muscle Memory is simpler and easier to work into set rotations. I find I make way more mistakes with MaMa, miscounting progress and attempting but failing 80% precise touches and so on. Or, overspending CP because I have a different amount every time due to getting 0-3 Good procs during MaMa.

I feel that Advanced Touch has its place. I use it in low level crafts to quickly HQ them, but I also use it in mid-level crafts. My old level 50 two star or less 80 durability macro rotation ended with SH, GS, Ing2, AT, GS, BB, CS2, CS2. It also had a ST in there earlier because I had the spare CP to replace a BT with an ST, and I could do it under Inno for even more quality. Without that ST/AT, I couldn't HQ on a poor BB. With that ST/AT, it was 100% HQ all the time no matter how many poors I had.