Guild Wars 2

NOTE – There is a copy of this post in the Sylvari section of the forums as well. PLEASE do not delete that copy. It’s there for other Sylvari players to discuss. Thank you.

First off I’d like to say that the recent update to the game was pretty good. There were a lot of things that were patched up, added, and polished upon. Overall, it was a very neat update.

There’s one thing that I’d personally like ANet to tweak on a little bit and that would be the Sylvari’s Racial Elite Skill, Summon Druid Spirit.

A few months ago I made a thread about how it needs to be improved because the Druid Spirit itself is lackluster as an Elite Skill. Here’s why I believe it’s lacking:

1) Its only form of attack is its immobilizing AoE chains – The skill itself is powerful as it can hit 5 mobs for around 2k damage simultaneously plus immobilize them for 2 seconds. However, the skill itself is not good on its own because the skill is activated once every 7 seconds. That’s only 8x that the skill is used in the Druid Spirits 60 second duration. Another thing is that the skill can be easily dodged if the target can predict it. Therefore every time the Druid Spirit attacks, it misses. Even though the skill can force targets to dodge and thus waste endurance, the Druid Spirit isn’t doing much good as only an “endurance waster”; especially when in a group fight, the Druid Spirit isn’t a big focus as it should be considering it’s a tier 2 elite skill.

Solution: Add in 2 offensive abilities for the Druid Spirit.

A) Swiping Knock Back – The Druid Spirit sweeps and pushes close ranged enemies back 500 distance from it and deals approximately 900-1200 per hit at lvl 80. Cool down on this skill is 4 seconds. This skill activates whenever an enemy is within 100 range of the Druid Spirit when not under influence of the cool down. This skill fixes the problem of the Druid Spirit not being able to protect itself at close range.

B) Sprout Seed Turrets – The Druid Spirit pounds the earth with both fists and summons 3 seed turrets to attack its enemies. The seed turrets do around 300-500 damage per seed at lvl 80 with bleed damage of 54 damage per 2 seconds that lasts for 2 seconds per seed. Condition stacks intensity. The turrets last for 25 seconds and this skill’s cool down is 40 seconds. This skill triggers randomly. The chance for this skill to proc is 30% when not in cool down. This skill fixes the problem of the Druid Spirit not being able to provide ranged assistance against more agile players/mobs in large quantities. Immobilizing chains is a ranged AoE skill, but with its weaknesses of being able to be dodged easily and its long cool down, seed turrets will help.

2) Update the Druid Spirit’s aesthetics – Sylvari are the most beautiful plant creatures “Nature” has to offer. The Sylvari’s Tier 2 Elite Skill should also represent that beauty as well. Although the Druid Spirit has a nice glow at night and does have a semi-unique look, it doesn’t look as if it represents the beauty and power of Sylvari.

Solution: Add leaves to its branches and/or a trail of pools of water with rose petals gliding along with them. With this update, the Druid Spirit will truly represent nature as it should be.

3) Have the Apply Regeneration and Draw Conditions abilities be able to work properly and effectively – I have been using the Druid Spirit for months and I have only seen it Apply Regeneration 6 times total. The sad thing about that is when it did, it only healed me about 310 HP per second for 10 seconds and I have never seen it draw conditions from me before.

Solution – Make it that Apply Regeneration and Draw Conditions are in one skill. Increase Apply Regeneration’s heal tick to 610 hp per second for 10 seconds. The skill activates when the player’s health reaches 66%. The cool down on the skill is 30 seconds. This fixes the problem that should’ve been fixed a long time ago as it is one of the noted abilities of the Druid Spirit.

The result of all solutions above provided – A fully supportive tier 2 Elite Skill worthy of being used at last. ArenaNet, if you read this, please indulge time into fixing this skill please! There is so much potential for this skill to be on par with other racial elite skills/elite skills in general. As I see it now, any tier 1 elite skill including tier 1 racial elite skills can top the quality of the Druid Spirit. My wish because I did invest 30 skill points into this skill is for it to be what most players like myself expect: A supportive aid to any combat situation.

If anyone has any questions or constructive criticism of my ideas, post them here please! Thanks.

Sorry, but Anet’s philosophy is that racial Elites are supposed to suck. Just look at all the Norn Elites racials.

No they are NOT supposed to suck. I’m not taking that “philosophy”. Tier 2 Elite skills that cost 30 skill points are supposed to be mathematically 3x better than that of their tier 1 10 skill point counterparts regardless of racial or class specifications. Elite skills are supposed to be strong and effective in battle, not a waste of a skill slot! Redo every races racial elite skills and then that’ll make everyone happy.

In beta there were no tiers in skills, thus saying that they should be more powerful is silly.As this would reduce the amount of skill customisation even further. Whether or not it was a good choice isn’t the core of the problem here. A net wanted to avoid creating a game were a certain class has to be a certain race because of the racial skills. They circumvented this problem by making the racial skills sub par to comparable professions skills. The fact that elites are lacklustre in general (in my opinion) is once again a different matter.

Delirious.9278:

No they are NOT supposed to suck. I’m not taking that “philosophy”. Tier 2 Elite skills that cost 30 skill points are supposed to be mathematically 3x better than that of their tier 1 10 skill point counterparts regardless of racial or class specifications. Elite skills are supposed to be strong and effective in battle, not a waste of a skill slot! Redo every races racial elite skills and then that’ll make everyone happy.

complete agreement and they don’t work on pvp so there shouln’t not be balancing problems except maybe wvw but that is warefare problem

Delirious.9278:

No they are NOT supposed to suck. I’m not taking that “philosophy”. Tier 2 Elite skills that cost 30 skill points are supposed to be mathematically 3x better than that of their tier 1 10 skill point counterparts regardless of racial or class specifications. Elite skills are supposed to be strong and effective in battle, not a waste of a skill slot! Redo every races racial elite skills and then that’ll make everyone happy.

Yeah, sorry that you’re not “taking” it, but that’s how it is. Anet have said that racial skills are supposed to only be “fun” and add “flavor” to the races; they are not supposed to be usable because that would upset the balance. They don’t want one race to be “better” than any other at class Y or X because of their racial skills.

Which is why I’m stunned that Hounds of Balthazar still hasn’t been nerfed; you regularly see Human characters picking it over their class Elites. When was the last time you saw a Norn use Become the Bear/Wolf/Raven/Snow Leopard other than to mess about?

a fun note… human mesmers don’t use hound of balthazar^^

Amadan.9451:

a fun note… human mesmers don’t use hound of balthazar^^

I’ve seen some do actually. Especially if roaming in WvW where Time Warp isn’t that useful.

Point still stands that it us frequently used where-as many other races’ Elites are never ever used.

The design of the racial skills, including the elites, is that they are for flavor and are weaker than regular skills.

“Eric Flannum: Each of the five races has unique skills available to them. Our philosophy behind the design of these racial skills is that they are slightly weaker than equivalent skills determined by profession. While they may be less powerful, the racial skills capture the flavor of each race and provide additional options for the player. For example, a human playing a profession that normally doesn’t have a good way of dealing with conditions could take the Prayer to Kormy racial skill, which removes a condition but is a fair bit weaker than comparable skills provided by a profession specializing in condition removal. By doing this, we hope to give the various races access to skills that make them feel unique without making them overpowered when played as a particular profession.”

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/blog/comments/guild_wars_2_interview/

Astral Projections.7320:

The design of the racial skills, including the elites, is that they are for flavor and are weaker than regular skills.

“Eric Flannum: Each of the five races has unique skills available to them. Our philosophy behind the design of these racial skills is that they are slightly weaker than equivalent skills determined by profession. While they may be less powerful, the racial skills capture the flavor of each race and provide additional options for the player. For example, a human playing a profession that normally doesn’t have a good way of dealing with conditions could take the Prayer to Kormy racial skill, which removes a condition but is a fair bit weaker than comparable skills provided by a profession specializing in condition removal. By doing this, we hope to give the various races access to skills that make them feel unique without making them overpowered when played as a particular profession.”

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/blog/comments/guild_wars_2_interview/

This qualifies weaker than profession skills sure… but the issue at hand still stands… the Tier1 racial elites are far superior to the Tier2 racial elites. You spend 3 times as much for a skill 3 times weaker… longer cooldown, same durration, and less useful… they should at least be on par with eachother… a Tier2 elite should never be weaker than the Tier1 elites, they should be either equivalent or greater. Not necessarily in damage output but in overall effectiveness.

Only one thing to say to this. Skills weren’t balanced around tiers. They may or may not be working towards it but it wasn’t originally intended.

Astral Projections.7320:

The design of the racial skills, including the elites, is that they are for flavor and are weaker than regular skills.

“Eric Flannum: Each of the five races has unique skills available to them. Our philosophy behind the design of these racial skills is that they are slightly weaker than equivalent skills determined by profession. While they may be less powerful, the racial skills capture the flavor of each race and provide additional options for the player. For example, a human playing a profession that normally doesn’t have a good way of dealing with conditions could take the Prayer to Kormy racial skill, which removes a condition but is a fair bit weaker than comparable skills provided by a profession specializing in condition removal. By doing this, we hope to give the various races access to skills that make them feel unique without making them overpowered when played as a particular profession.”

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/blog/comments/guild_wars_2_interview/

Hahaha! In your face Panda. Me spouting nonsense indeed! If I were a lesser man I’d demand an apology.

Astral Projections.7320:

The design of the racial skills, including the elites, is that they are for flavor and are weaker than regular skills.

“Eric Flannum: Each of the five races has unique skills available to them. Our philosophy behind the design of these racial skills is that they are slightly weaker than equivalent skills determined by profession. While they may be less powerful, the racial skills capture the flavor of each race and provide additional options for the player. For example, a human playing a profession that normally doesn’t have a good way of dealing with conditions could take the Prayer to Kormy racial skill, which removes a condition but is a fair bit weaker than comparable skills provided by a profession specializing in condition removal. By doing this, we hope to give the various races access to skills that make them feel unique without making them overpowered when played as a particular profession.”

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/blog/comments/guild_wars_2_interview/

The bold part is where the “philosophy” fails. Tier 2 Elite Skills (Racial or not) are “coincidentally” less effective than their Tier 1 counterparts.

I run a Sylvari Ranger. My Tier 2 Elite Skills are Spirit of Nature and Summon Druid Spirit. They are lackluster compared to their Tier 1 counterparts, Take Root, Rampage As One, Entangle, etc. Spirit of Nature is supposed to heal nearby allies, revive, and remove conditions, but the effectiveness of the skill is so mediocre that it’s not worth it to use it at all. The skill itself is a Tier 2 CLASS Elite Skill. If that skill is 20 SP MORE than the Tier 1 skills even though they are both Ranger skills then explain to me why “nobody” uses the skill in WvW or in PvE?

Summon Druid Spirit for Sylvari is also significantly weaker than Tier 1 Elites. For 20 SP more, I should be expecting 3x the effectiveness at least. Logic and Numbers > “Philosophy” The same goes for all racial and Tier 2 skills that have lackluster performance compared to their Tier counterparts.

sallost.6875:

Only one thing to say to this. Skills weren’t balanced around tiers. They may or may not be working towards it but it wasn’t originally intended.

The fact of the matter is: ArenaNet made Elite Skill Tiers. Tier 1 being 10 SP per skill and Tier 2 being 30 SP per skill. The standard is that Tier 2, which requires Tier 1 skills to be purchased and 30 SP compared to 10 SP. Tier 2 basically sets itself apart as the better choice of Elite skills, but in reality it’s not what it is supposed to be.