Exactly what the title says. I’m not much for an elaborate emphasis on my opinion and yes I understand that new weapons are planned, but I’d like to offer a few suggestions over this, and I’ll try to make them as lore-friendly as possible.
First I’d like to thank the developers for the very mobile and flexible weapon skills already present for each of the classes in game at the moment. Even though some weapons still would in my opinion require a little more balancing to be viable, in about 80% of cases they work very well and each blend into character builds very well complementing the class’ spec. I’ve tried all classes in game up to this point at an extended degree, both PvP and PvE, and in my opinion beyond a few quirky weapons (like torch for Guardian and Ranger) they all help the build adapt to its core functionality, either in a group or in a singular situation.
I’m only going to state several in-mind suggestions here, for several classes i enjoy the most. If anyone wishes they can criticize at will, even in a bashful manner, or add their own ideas.
1. Necromancer – Greatsword
I’d suggest beyond its already current condition heavy focus on all weapons (yes, even for bursters, you do stack vulnerability on an axe so still counts) to give the class a few more gap closers. Giving these in the form of skills would either slow down the build from denying it utilities or debalance it further. In my opinion it’d be best to do this by adding a greatsword which, for all classes that can use it minus Mesmer does have a form of a rush attack that tends to be used to minimise distances to targets. It’d be best to add a gap closer on 3 for this, a basic dagger-like attack on 1 which would culminate in a minor form of lifesteal, maybe a mobility skill on 5 and a supportive darkness combo field on 4, and of course either a bleed or a weakness attack on 2 since it is a Necromancer after all.
2. Elementalist – Sword
Even though the class can conjure weapons for a temporary useage, I believe the Elementalist would benefit from the use of a sword as a permanent weapon. Swords to all other classes got slightly lower damage than daggers or greatswords but offer some form of either condition stacking or mobility skill. It is quite difficult to add a weapon for a class that would have 12 weapon skills off of it, but these should stick to a simple warrior/ranger-esque layout for mimicry.
2.1 On fire the sword could have a cleave attack with a wide air-dagger styled arc, a leap attack that would cause burning for a short duration and a thief deadly blossom type evade on 3 with minor damage to target.
2.2 On water the first skill should be a low damage 600 range water projectile single target attack with a fast firing rate with no inherent conditions. On 2 there should be a dagger fire 3 type attack with a long duration chill and on 3 I’d suggest an instant cone of water in front which would grant regeneration and also heal for a small amount on contact.
2.3 On air the sword should have a stab attack with a 3-skill culmination into a higher damage hit but slower, a teleport with blindness and a 600 range aoe with a one second daze for interrupts.
2.4 Earth should utilize an on-target 300 range AoE with slow attack speed and bleed stacking. The second earth skill should throw projectiles at everything in a 600 range that cripple and bleed and the last earth skill should be a 600 range 2 second stun to target.
3. Thief – Shield
The thief at the moment has a wide range of weapon skills which add a supportive effect to compensate for its low hp, but in my opinion this class would also benefit from a purely defensive weapon. I’d suggest adding a shield as a useable Thief weapon with the following skills: the 4th skill should add a 3 second reflect (4 initiative cost) similar to elementalist focus on earth and the 5th should be a defensive teleport with an AoE 2 second daze field (6 initiative cost).
To complement the other thief weapons for pistol the shield should add a backwards evade leap on 3rd skill similar to the heal, on sword a 3 second block which if triggered would blind the target and on dagger a single target pistol-whip similar attack with an evade, without the initial daze.
Those would be my suggestions. Feel free if interested guys to add your own ideas. Sorry if the post was too long. Cheers.