Guild Wars 2

Hello everyone, I had an Idea to about the role and the use of Elite skills and since the suggestions forum was put into the archive I’ll just post it here.

First of all I’d like to explain why I think such a rework is needed:

It’s pretty simple. Most of the classes have at least one elite skill that is not worth taking.

For example the mortar on engeneers or the rampage skill of the warrior. (yes I picked the worst)

The first change that needs to be done would be to give every utility (nonheal) 2 forms. One elite and one utility form. For example on the Warrior:

Signet of Rage (Elite):
Passive: Grants Adrenalin
Active: Grants Fury, 5x Might and Swiftness (30s)

Signet of Rage (Utility):
Passive: Grants Adrenaline (less than the elite form)
Active: Grants Fury, 3x Might and Swiftness (15s)

With my system you could equip every skill as your utility which provides a few advantages.

An example for an Utility Skill equiped as elite could be this:

“For Great Justice!” (Elite)
Shout. Grants Fury (15s), 5x Might (30s) and Retaliation (30s)

Or for Guardians:

“Save yourselves!” (Elite)
Grants all the Boons for 20s and removes all conditions on your allies (5 targets) instead of redirecting them.

What do you guys think about this idea? Sure it would be a lot of work for anet but I want to know if you like it, not if you think that it’s possible or not.

Now I’ll add some more skill Ideas

Necromancer:

Blood is Power: now also buffes 5 allies next to you.

Every Minion Elite has more HP and is stronger. (worm will switch places and won’t be destroyed)

Guardian:

All the Weapon summons would just be more powerful and do not die on attack but get a cooldown just like the necromancer minions. (they still last a specific time long and can be killed)

Hallowed Ground: Increase the number of Targets by 5 and make it last longer / also make the stability last longer

Mesmer:

Blink: Same Skill with reduced cooddown or extended range.

Arcane Thivery: Now exchanges all boons and conditions

Illusion of Life: Doesn’t down the people after helping them up.

Mimic: this skill will be reworked anyways

Portal: increase range from 5000 to 7500 and increase the number of uses to 40

Feedback: Also confuses up to 5 targets inside the circle on cast.

Nullfield: now removes 2 boons/conditions per tick and steals hp per boon

Veil: is now a circle like shadow refugee that lasts 5s.

Mirror Images: Spawns 2 pistol phantasms

Decoy: Increase the Stealth duration by ~2s and add another clone

Illusionary Defender: Increases health of the defender a lot (like +200%)

Illusionary Disenchanter: Casts an aoe field similar to nullfield but smaller

Mantra of Pain: Now is AE and has increased dmg

Mantra of Distraction: Now is AE and stuns instead

Mantra of Resolve: Heals for every condition removed

Mantra of Concentration: Gains 1 additional charge and +100% stability duration

Signet of Inspiration:
Passive: Grants 3 random boons per 10s
Active: Copys all boons from nearby allies to you

Signet of Domination
Passive: Further increased Conditiondamage
Active: now also inflicts chill and cripple (5s) if the stun was broken/overwritten

Signet of Midnight:
Passive: Also blinds nearby enemys every 10s
Active: Also stealthes you for 4s (similar the the prestige)

Signet of Illusions:
Passive: Increases Illusion HP by 150%
Active: Resets cooldowns of your clone summoning skills and shatter skills

Thief:

Scorpion Wire: Deals a lot of singletarget damage, has increased range

Shadowstep: reduce the cooldown

Shadown Refugee: Increase duration. Now you don’t reveal if you move out of the circle (may be too strong?)

Warrior:

Banners: Increase the Buff and add specific boons (Tactics: Regeneration, Disciplin: Fury, Strengh: Might, Defense: Protection)

Endure Pain: Last longer but also longer cd

Berserker Stance: also reduces “normal” damage by 33-50%

Frenzy: Cooldowns are 50% faster too.

“Fear Me!”: also applies cripple/chill and torment

Elementalist:

pmnt.4067:

Cleansing Fire (Elite): is also a stunbreaker.

Arcane Power: Also Grants 10x Might (10s)

Arcane Wave: Now is a field that deals damage over 3-4s and always blasts a combo

also saved =) =) =)

Elementalist: Cleansing Fire (Elite): is also a stunbreaker.

I like this system. It is way better than just turn it into another utility slot.

Interesting idea, but a ton of work.

Bhawb.7408:

Interesting idea, but a ton of work.

I’m sure that it is. The Idea behind this is that we could have a ton of skill diversity with this change without adding new skills that maybe could be useless.

Also the balancing wouldn’t be too hard because we can compare them to the already existing elite skills (like i did with “For Great Justice!” and Signet of Rage

The most work would be to find out what cooldowns would be matching the “new elites”.

Most of the skills are easily to power up. You can:

• increase the range
• reduce the cd
• make the effect stronger (buffing boon or confition duration/ stacks)
• make it AE
• increase number of targets

Oh I think it could be a very cool thing if it was implemented, and in fact as you pointed out it wouldn’t necessarily be difficult to implement. The only thing would be tuning as you said a few various things that don’t really influence how it works, its just a buffed version of the skill, and making sure that it was obvious that this was the new elite skill. So if someone summons Flesh Wurm, you should be able to immediately tell “oh this is the new viagra-enhanced Flesh Wurm elite skill”, and that could take a little bit of work in some cases, but not many (summons could just be bigger, a la how most of them work already, or have added more impactful looking effects).

So besides the bit of work, which wouldn’t kill anyone, the only “big” issue I see is the few (only 1-2 I can think of) skills that basically do this already, such as the Elementalist summon, and I doubt they would complain too much if they got a brand new skill to compensate, and had those two rolled into one.

Would be interesting but very difficult to do the legwork.

Also would be interesting for the builds which don’t have a legendary to support them (and arguably aren’t viable because of it). A signet ele could have all the signets for example, same with a signet necro.

atm rampage is a skill for new players, whos like to be big… but the skills are bad. i think we should keep our skills and modify the duration to 30 sec and add a 10% kd (or stun or daze) to every auto attack

It sound good on paper but in practice, Trahearne said “This won’t end well.”

I was just thinking of this.

I don’t know details, but I think elite forms of Engineer kits should let them drop a second kit for teammates to pick up and enjoy themselves like conjured weapons. Like once every 60 seconds?

For more specific thoughts…
Thieves Guild (Utility)
You summon a single dagger/pistol thief for 30 seconds. 180 second cooldown.

All thief traps plus caltrops: (Elite versions)
Can now be affected by active venoms (consumes a charge). Like when a foe walks into an elite caltrop trap while devourer venom was active, they’ll find themselves briefly immobilized, or trip wire while skale venom applied vulnerability and torment. (this might be horribly overpowered.)

All thief venom Elite forms:
Add one additional charge.

All necro minion skills (elite form):
Summons an additional minion (two additional in the case of bone minions). Let the necrozergrushes return!

This is a great idea, and honestly I’d be happy if i could just take another normal utility skill instead of my elite skill. I don’t even need buffed up versions, just let me take whatever I want in that fourth slot.

I guess this is probably a balance issue though, probably some kind of crazy builds possible or something. I still think they should do it though.