Guild Wars 2

In the lore, shapeshifting is supposed to be a VERY important part of a norn’s strength, but the current shapeshift forms leave a lot to be desired. Having access to a full new kit for 30 seconds every 4 minutes, and outside of a very few niche uses (stealthing past enemies with snow leopard and occasionally chasing down foes in pvp with bear) the transformation is not very useful because of a combination of their duration and combat effectiveness.

I feel these transformations would be much more viable without unbalancing by making them function like an engineer’s toolkits, with no duration or skill limit usage. You just transform and you are good to go until you want to transform back. Then once you are back, the 4 minute cooldown comes into effect. Given that while transformed we do not have access to utility skills, it shouldnt unbalance them or make them feel mandatory.

Even in GW1, they were still timed and not permanent. The Norn you fought at the resurrection shrines would channel and become the bear for a short time and then fight as normal after that. Even the GW1 skills such as Ursan Blessing that were granted to humans worked under a timer, but those didn’t transform you.

They don’t actually become the animal, they are so in-tune with the spirit that they channel their host spirit into them and change their outer form.

One thing that worked really well was the Volfen Blessing skill from GW1 in a specific mission:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Volfen_Blessing_
For those uninitiated, you had energy degen when in this form, but for every attack you successfully hit with, you’d gain energy. The form ended when you ran out of energy.
Long story short, you could maintain the Wolf Blessing as long as you kept attacking.

Perhaps if the Norn forms here had certain conditions they had to fulfill in order to be maintained.
Example:
Raven Form currently turns you into a horrendous anthropomorphic raven. Perhaps when you activated it, there would be a 30sec countdown that would decrease so long as you were not moving. Thus, Become the Raven would encourage you to be mobile to stay in the form. Become the Wolf would decrease so long a you weren’t attacking. Become the Snow Leopard would decrease so long as you weren’t moving. Become the Bear would decrease so long as you weren’t being attacked.

It may be clunky, but it would encourage you to act as the animal in order to maintain that form. Hence it would add much-needed flavor to the forms that otherwise aren’t really being used.

I agree with the mechanic of keeping the form under the condition of killing the foes. The transformation will have a gauge which depletes overtime but its filled up every time the character kills a foe. It a simple mechanic that can’t be abused because once the gauge is depleted, the cool-down timer 4 min will start

Ronah.2869:

I agree with the mechanic of keeping the form under the condition of killing the foes. The transformation will have a gauge which depletes overtime but its filled up every time the character kills a foe. It a simple mechanic that can’t be abused because once the gauge is depleted, the cool-down timer 4 min will start

Sort of like what Death Shoud is for Necros.

Though I don’t think it’s 4min cooldown is worth it if it depletes at the same rate as DS. It’s way too quick and would need tweaking or at least the ability to transform out early for a shorter cooldown.
Again that’s already a mechanic in game – Rangers pets, if killed/injured take longer to switch out, compared to if they’re up.

All seems pretty reasonable to me.

As a norn from the start, I really wish the shapeshifting was more attractive. Not some beastly (haha) elite that shredded enemies apart, Racial skills are made to not be as good as profession skills to avoid people from picking them in combination with a profession. However It would be really nice if Norn shapeshifting skills could be used on the move (only snow leapord can. I don’t get the reasoning). Or if each shapeshift form had access to some sort of healing (only Wolf form can heal a good amount. The rest are miniscule) Sure you double your health bar but when you talk about higher levels, that 20-40k goes by quickly if you can’t heal or be mobile.

Avatar of melandur from human is just laughable on all levels….