Guild Wars 2

Way too much condition and cc spamming….Like seriously enough already with that. And did you really have to give thieves more stealth and more burst damage??? Who comes up with these ideas….

Idk if anyone else had this issue, but anytime I had Barrier I kept mistaking it for my health because the numbers are right next to each other. Maybe a good suggestion would be to place the a barrier bar in another place?

Aside from that the new specs seem really interesting, but somewhat clunky especially Weaver which could really use some simplification in a few areas.

Renegade felt really bad. Shortbow is cool but buggy and missing a mobility move.

Leggend utilities are boring and bad for pvp. Also too much energy use. Cant use most skills ever. It crushed my spirits to even try the other specs.

I guess i will be playing power herald in pvp for another year. Really regret pre buying

There also needs to be a preview weekend of the Elite Specs in PvE. I’m fine with those being two separate weekends, but seeing how they each work in raids, for example, is really important.

Also, the actual comments for each individual specialization need to be taken from the individual class forums. One central thread to collect comments for 9 specializations is going to be a jumbled mess.

MOAR CONDI MOAR GOOD!

Renegade is simply unusable in PvP and WvW. I doubt about PvE too (traits and bow may be decent, Kalla is not)

- No condi cleanse (how comes we have just 2 condi cleanses, including 1 from traits, when the current meta has you spammed with 10 conditions in 1 second?)
- Wells can be killed, feared, pulled out and so on…
- Stun break on healing, wtf… And the heal is not even decent
- No heal
- CD on skills with already HUGE energy cost (basically pop one and auto attack until legend swap). Herald was centered around the particular mechanic of the Revenant, with all skills being upkeeps draining Energy, our main resource. Kalla makes no sense for the class.
- No synergy with core Rev
- Worst animations for wells ever
- Nothing works underwater, even if water is low, you can’t target skills in there

Also, bravo, 40+ skills for Weaver, including underwater, and Revenant still has just 2/6 legends that are usable underwater , despite having just 1 ground targeted skill per legend.

And that’s not just my opinion. Check the Revenant forum here or this poll from Reddit: https://strawpoll.com/6k45px96

Basically is common opinion that Renegade is visually and functionally the WORST Elite Spec, including HoT and core classes.

After 2 years of nerfs for the Revenant we expected more.

You noticed that the Firebrand can give Retaliation, Stability, Aegis and Protection with 1 skill, right? Not to mention all the other OP ones with basically no CD because they’re mantras.
And can condi cleanse, again, with almost no CD, AUE and 3 conditions.
I mean, Revenant can maybe cleanse 3 Conditions every 30 seconds, and only if we equip Jalis and the trait from Invocation (so basically only on Power Herald).

Builds range from eh to OP, but spread across classes. With HoT specs and Core, there’s decent variety now. There are also some interesting choices to make.
Traits and utilities could use some tightening up in general (see class feedback threads for specifics).
It would have been nice to play the specs in one exclusively PvE map like Orr or DS or even raid test golem. PvP/WvW requires significantly different builds to be effective.

I really enjoyed the look of the Weaver, but the stances and traits felt underwhelming. Flashy, but with no real exciting gameplay involved.
I’m really disappointed with the Mirage as well. Though the utility skills are very neat they don’t lend themselves well to the kind of combat the axe skills want me to take.
I have heard nothing positive from those who tried Firebrand, and personally I still feel like Guardians are headed in the wrong direction since Dragonhunter. Again, a miscommunication between how utility skills and traits work and how the actual weapon plays seems to be a definite dissonance. Not something I’m excited about as a Guardian main.

Water transitions need work. Rangers were already losing all pet boons when getting into water, now the SB beast form drops and goes on cooldown (not sure why a cooldown is required either since the form is a sidegrade rather than a clear powerup). Beast form should be maintained above and below water, just flipping the beast skills between the equipped land/water pets.

Haven’t played with the other specs, but some of them might also have issues with water transitions.

Weaver air sword 1 is weaker then air dagger 1, it should be the opposite way since sword puts you closer! Additionally, I recommend a nice boost to all air skills in sword. I prefer a power play style over condi, and sword is leaning towards condi/hybrid for max efficiency, which is fine! BUT, make it like dagger in that it is really good if you go full condi, and pretty decent if you go full power! That is what makes ele weapon sets great.

Renegade was great! My favorite aspect is that it is very viable for a pure power spec which is a positive and good design, so great kittening job. So for any changes you might be considering for renegade, keep the power viability there please!

Soulbeast was good too. Major complaint is to please reduce the aura when in beast mode, I would suggest a complete redesign of it if possible. Dagger 3 is too slow to activate, a skill that provides quickness should be quick, it just does not feel good at the speed it’s in! And finally, dagger 1 chain could use a quick power damage boost, by about 15-20% would be a good choice!

Soul beast need some new animation to dagger and make it faster…. idk why the vanilla thief animations also why no new animation at beast mode?

Couldn’t test them in PvE maps against PoF mobs. I spammed elite skills for most professions against target golems, got bored and didn’t go back. I understand the need for feedback for competitive play. Still I didn’t see enough to provide feedback from a mostly PvE player.

Firebrand skills were beautiful but not fun for me at all…way to clunky and complicated for my little brain.

I loved the Soulbeast so I’m going back to my Ranger. It still needs some work though. We need to be able to swap our pets while in beast form for starters. I quit my Ranger because didn’t like pets at all so I’m happy that I can go petless and I plan to stay in that form as much as possible. (I also didn’t like Druid) Soulbeast is an amazing idea that needs some tweaking to be really good.

I tested intensively the scourge:

-barrier decay is too high and comes too fast. should have the same decay like shroud.
-f skills life force costs should decreased a little

-barrier from f5 is good, from heal skill too. other barrier skills should increased. e.g. f3 because most hits break it instantly.

-lifeforce regeneration isnt enough to activate the f skills in a fight more than 2 times. after 2 activations the availability of f skills is too low.

-torch is good
-sand shades need 300 radius because fast moving enemies are hard to hit with its current properties and 10 sec recharge, bcause with the current recharge you can hold a maximum of 2 shades in the fight permanently, but you need all 3 of them.

-skills: dessicate should focus on lf generation, 30% or more on due to lack of life force generation
and serpent siphon need buff to, because no dmg, and really small barrier

trail of anguish would be nicer with 15 sec swiftness to handle your mobility with this skill.

wish you a good day. have fun. see ya in pof.

Edith: would be nice to have some more combo finisher on scourge and blinds (as a second defense mechanic next to barrier)

For weaver, maybe put the attunement global cooldown every other attunement shift? That would allow someone to get a full set of 5 skills to use rather than 1/2, wait 4-5 seconds then the other half. That really blocks a lot of gameplay and skills combos. Maybe increase the cooldown to more than 5 seconds then to balance.

I tested things mostly in WvW, small scale, and the wyverns in northeast DBL. I really had a crush for Mirage, but I tested some others as well.

The fast ones :

• Spellbreaker seems fine :
  • easy to handle and understand ;
  • sustain improvements appreciated ;
  • utilities maybe too situational ?
• Soulbeast seems fine too :
  • nice addition to the pet mechanic ;
  • rich possibilities yet not too hard to apprehend ;
  • dagger may be a little weak ;
  • Dolyak stance bugged (broadly reported) ;
• Scourge :
  • Mobility gain appreciated ;
  • Punishements need a better range lisibility ;
  • Core traits that are realted to shroud need to get a clearer tooltip.
• Weaver :
  • Lots of jumps and spins and explosions, but where is the effectiveness ?
  • Twist of fate needs to remove immobilization too.
• Renegade :
  • Kalla lacks personnality
  • Shortbow seems average/fine
  • Utilities work far better as an offensive support than as self-support.

Mirage :

• Profession concept and mechanics :
  • Really interesting gameplay, with lots of mobility options ;
  • Mirage gameplay is very antagonistic of phantasms and shatters ;
  • Mirror shards lack reliability because they don’t last long enough ;
  • Maybe a trait should allow mirrors to heal or cleanse.
  • Interesting idea was to turn F1-F3 shatters into mirror spawns
• Weapon skills and ambushes :
  • Axe 2 should provide an evade ;
  • Axe 3 has targetting issue, especially on non-flat ground, or against moving targets ;
  • Ambush skills should auto-trigger immediatly when in mirage mode.
• Utilities : targetting issues for Mirage advance and Illusionary ambush like Axe 3. Others seem too weak.

Miscelleanous :

• New elite specs don’t shout “power creep” as much as HoT’s did. Good !
• Overall new interesting gameplays are provided, that seem to get along fine next to core and HoT, for a given profession.
• More talks when using utilities : I liked it
• Nice graphics for the new specs. Special mention to Cardcaptor Sakura Firebrand.
• Default builds had unusual stats, like soldier+ exuberance, apothecary. It’s good to shed some light on them too.
• 100 words for feedback ? Please be serious… Or have a feedback thread in each profession subforum please.

cafard.8953:

Water transitions need work. Rangers were already losing all pet boons when getting into water, now the SB beast form drops and goes on cooldown (not sure why a cooldown is required either since the form is a sidegrade rather than a clear powerup). Beast form should be maintained above and below water, just flipping the beast skills between the equipped land/water pets.

Haven’t played with the other specs, but some of them might also have issues with water transitions.

Well Renegade skills don’t even work if the Renegade is standing in water.
Not to mention we have just 2/6 legends usable underwater for basically no reason. Seriously no time to adapt TWO skills, but 40+ new skills for the Weaver. Nice.

PvP was more tricky, intense, challenging. That is good. Need icons for elites to better plan roles in 60 seconds (had to ask, slow responses). Extra visuals clutter & disorient, somewhat of a headache. Did HP bar show barrier %? I don’t recall it, should be there if missing.

No cones for Firebrand tome autos and mantras please

I know you wanted to make them ‘feel different’ from mesmer mantras, but its just completely awkward in pvp and wvw; especially the elite mantra where you just have to hope to get stunned facing your allies for cast to be effective? And the cones just dont hit stuff 90% of the time on slight slopes. Please change to PBAoe

Weaver – very fun, very undertuned

Renegade:
Shorbow: Cast times too long on most skills, Needs mobility/Evade, buggy, damage is low, #4 spiritcrush needs “line of sight” removed. All skills possibly need 300 extra range. Mace feels like the much better option always with only slightly reduced range over shortbow. Almost no reason to use it as the 2nd set with Mace/Axe because it has no defense and not enough range to compensate.

Kalla Utils: All summons need CC immunity or 5 stacks Stab. Perhaps slightly larger radius. Heal is weak, needs 5 less energy cost, reduced cast, 1000-2000 extra healing bare minimum, breakstun moved elsewhere. Icerazor’s Ire needs chill.

100 words is sort of a tight limit for 9 classes so I’ll limit my impressions to Soulbeast where I think I gathered the most playtime:

dagger main hand was exceptionally weak, slow and unrewarding. It feels like its having an identity crisis much like main hand axe but main hand axe is still superior in every way.

Merging has a lot of potential and feels alright, varies playstyle so that’s a plus. Sadly all it has right now is potential.

Pet swap in merge would be extremely beneficial to the spec

traits, stances and attributes gained in beastmode all felt weak and unrewarding, stances need an increase in duration, a reduction in cool down or both, traits don’t synergize, are poorly placed in the trait line and feel very weak in comparison to other professions.

very little clarity as to what pet boons, shouts that affect pets and pet buffs carry over to ranger, are supposed to carry over to ranger and why. Much of the skill interactions I enjoyed such as sic ’ems 40% damage buff may be a bug or oversight. If that is the case it really hurts soulbeast to the point of almost non viability.

That’s already too long so that will be the end for me. As an aside would it be more beneficial to create an impression/ feedback for each individual spec in the respective professions forums? Feedback in 100 words on 9 professions is double tough.

I played renegade, since my main is revenant. Shortbow skills had interesting animations, but it felt lacking in damage. I ended up using skills 1,2 and 5, since 3rd skill was bugging and even if i managed to hit with all 7 arrows 7 stacks of torment for 3 seconds is not rewarding at all, neither is 4 pulses or 1 sec of burn. Kalla was just impossible in WvW, i couldn’t make it work in either roaming or zerg fights with all the movement, cc and deaths of my utilities and skyhigh energy costs.

Mirage: I really enjoyed the Mirage Cloak dodge and mobility from axe/utilities, especially Jaunt. However, I believe Ambush skills in their current implementation are inherently flawed because they create conflict with shatter skills. Even if clone generation is high enough for both, it feels like they are conflicting because you are choosing between two forms of damage. Phantasms exacerbate this problem. In my opinion, replacing Ambush skills with a second set of shatter skills that replace the normal ones during Mirage Cloak is the best solution. This solves the conflict issue while maintaining burst effects during Mirage Cloak.

Comprissent.3856:

No cones for Firebrand tome autos and mantras please

I know you wanted to make them ‘feel different’ from mesmer mantras, but its just completely awkward in pvp and wvw; especially the elite mantra where you just have to hope to get stunned facing your allies for cast to be effective? And the cones just dont hit stuff 90% of the time on slight slopes. Please change to PBAoe

Weaver – very fun, very undertuned

If anthing they’ve put a lot of work in Firebrand and Weaver. Weaver has more new skills than a core class has in total, and Firebrand animations are AMAZING.

Renegade has crap animations (at least for healing/utility/elite skills), it’s thematically wrong (not only the phantasm summons are strange for a Revenant, that doesn’t summon but CHANNELS, but “Fervor” and “from above” make no sense for Kalla that opposed to religion) and basically unusable in every game mode except PvE (without Kalla and ShortBow, just the traits are somewhat nice, even if they have no synergy with the core class).

Maybe they spent too much time into doing 40 skills for Weaver, including underwater, and had no time to even test the Renegade (given the bugs and the state it is for pvp and wvw) or doing 2 underwater skills for the core Revenant after 2 years of nerfs.

Again, Revenant was already coming from 2 years of nerfs. Seriously guys.
Just do those 2 underwater skills already, it’s a matter of principle. I get that Ventari is kind of impossible for underwater, but there is no excuse for Jalis and Glint.

Renegade is zero fun. High cost utilities and shortbow does very little damage even when specced in vipers. I understand it wont be stronger than mace because it’s ranged but It feels really useless. With renegade you don’t have any survival skills and are a sitting duck unless you spec for bunker, but then damage is even more laughable and bunker would be better on herald. I could see renegade bring some dps support for pve but at what cost? you literally can’t do anything besides sitting in the back using the kalla utility skills and not being able to use other skills, or you can go in with mace/axe and do a bunch of damage but will most likely get killed do to lack of survival skills. There is no flavor to revenant and it’s just bland, and that’s more of a complaint on revenant as a whole, it’s just much easier to see this when glint isn’t there to make every build somewhat viable.

If you, the devs, are reading this, the Revenant needs a rehaul as a class. Please make this class fun and not a pain to play.

https://youtu.be/I1QgvSWinCc

^Scourge POV in WvW Large Scale fights. Personally think the idea and concept behind the class is very good. Just need to tone it down alot. You have way too much access to condi cleanse, boonstrip, barriers, and top tier damage all in once. And yeah this is only from a WvW perspective, so tbh things would probably have to be separated between PVP/WVW/PVE more than ever now

When you’re power you deal no damage what so ever when you take that 1-3 seconds to cleanse the condies off. When you’re condy you still do massive amount of damage as you withdraw for 1-3 seconds to recover. Nice game ARC. This is literally what’s wrong with the condy meta because DOT should have never been made into a main source of damage. The ability to spam these condies even after cleansing is ridiculous.

Then you have Thieves asking for more mobility while with the insane abilities to stealth and deal massive amount of damage in an instant. Dead-eye is supposed to make people sacrifice something for that damage. This was literally what Thieves did during the initiatives regen debate. They screamed and shout for faster regen and less skill costs for more survivability but what you end up seeing it they just use it to get an extra backstab in and still have enough to quickly exit danger.

Dead-eye P/P is way too over-powered and too easy to play, was quite annoying when trying out the new Elite Specialization during beta.

Nerco’s shield needs to decay little slower.

Renegade felt like it is unfinished. Needs more offensive, little higher range etc or better defensive, movement etc. Overall Revenant really needs more condi cleanses.

Numbers definitely needs to be tweaked with these new specs but overall I see potential for them to fill roles the old elite specs and base classes couldn’t before.

Tried basically every class. I’m not a die-hard pvp guy, so I would have liked to test the builds in a PvE map, so that’s my first point of feedback: please organise another preview weekend…where we’re able to test the builds in PvE. Even if it’s just for one evening. It’s great that you made PVP people happy, but GW2 doesn’t revolve around PVP only.

That said, a short breakdown:

- Weaver: Liked the concept. Loved the skills. Loved the animations. Basically…don’t change anything about the system…., but sword needs to be buffed. Like someone else mentioned: using a dagger gives you more dps, which is strange, since using a sword brings you closer into the action. The reward of that should be noticeable in the dps. The elite skill feels odd. I used it multiple times, but I still don’t know what it actually does? The utility skills feel weak, compared to the tempest utility skills. Also, please make sure a power build is given. There’s enough condi in the game.

- Mirage: Loved it. It was one of the most stable classes I’ve tried in PvP. I am not impressed with the ambush skills tho. They need a slight buff. Also, they should trigger automatically. It’s too easy to miss the ambush window.

- Holosmith: Compared to the other classes this is the build that feels the most OP. They have everything and are quite easy to play. Being easy to play is no bad thing, but the way it is right now…skilled people who play with complicated classes like mirage, weaver, etc, are less succesful than beginners who just spam skills on holosmith. Imagine skilled players playing holosmith. So in short: nerf the damage a bit, nerf their surviveability slightly.

- Spellbreaker: Seems nice. Never really played a warrior, but it seems to be quite stable. It was hard to pick good utilities though. There are a lot of traits/utilities that require enemies having boons. Sooooo….what about PvE? Where most minions don’t have boons?

- Firebrand is great! By far my favorite elite spec so far. Numbers feel stable. Don’t change a bit.

- Dead Eye: I tried this one a lot, since I wanted rifle to work. It could work in PvE and it could work for certain skilled thiefs (I suck at it, so), but it feels really clunky. It’s nice to snipe someone down from across the room, but it feels dirty. Too easy. That said, if you get close to them it’s over for them. It sucks that you gave them even more stealth tho. Stealth, snipe, stealth seems a bit OP. The damage is insane. 2-3k with auto attack rifle. 15-17k crits with sniper 4. Compare that with the weaver auto attack of 1k…crits of 2/3k…

Also the condi weakness on Revenant in this weekend was simply too much. The PvP/WvW meta seems to be revolving around huge condi outputs and stuns. Given the spellbreaker and the Scourge, the fact that Revenant has almost 0 cleanses makes no sense.

At the beginning Revenant used to be very strong (still remember the 7 hits on Sword-3?), so the fact that it was “weak to conditions” was somehow justified. After 2 years of nerfs the class doesn’t pop out anymore, but it’s still the weakest to conditions, making it borderline unusable against the new Elite specs in any player vs player format.

And having 2 minutes of cripple in PvE is not funny.

And about the dancing Charr animations, I get you want the “warband” theme around Kalla, but you could have just used the theme of the warband for the names and the effects of the skills. The animations with the dancing charrs make no sense, also because the revenant is supposed to CHANNEL spirits from the Mists, not summon them. We are not Necromancers.

Deadeye: IMO, it feels more effective without the rifle. I tried both rifle and then dagger/dagger and shortbow, and I found the latter to be far more powerful. Especially with SA’s Hidden Thief trait, you can technically get 3x Backstabs in (using Shadow Meld). Even without Hidden Thief, with dagger/dagger, you can use CnD for first stealth, giving you still 3x Backstabs.

I’ve also heard of players using pistol/pistol and shortbow as a very effective combo. The rifle, with the right traits and trait lines, as far as I’ve heard, can be good. But my setup killed the rifle’s usefulness.

I love Shadow Meld, it’s something I’ve wanted for a VERY long time. Being able to cancel Revealed and Stealth? Now that’s what I call an assassin’s Elite Skill.

Weaver: Did not play Weaver as much, but I was disappointed with abilities like Pyro Thrust (Sword; Air + Fire) as for some odd reason, even if I had an enemy targeted, I would miss most of the time. I’m used to my character facing the target and hitting it with the skill.

I do not understand the point of the Utility skill (whose name eludes me) which forces you back into one Attunement when you can just, using Air for example, press F3 again, and you’re attuned only to air.

The Weaver is definitely a Viper’s build, I found that build much more effective than Celestial.

I was very excited for the Sword finally coming to Ele, but it feels lackluster. The abilities are a little weak, and some of Dual Attacks seem bugged (like Pyro Thrust as mentioned above). Lava Font (I think it’s called, Sword; Earth + Fire) is a very useful Dual Attack, and very effective, it’s the others that feel… weak and lacking, and/or bugged.

I didn’t try any of the other elite specs.

Note to Thieves: Stop expecting to have massive mobility as a Deadeye. If you want speed and mobility, go Daredevil. Deadeye sacrifices mobility and speed for massive damage. If you want to be able to kite and run, don’t use rifle.

Firebrand feels clunky in WvW. Spellbreaker will most likely destroy wvw fighting guilds. scourge is brokenly op as well because of its condi clear and barrier spam.

Oh and renegade… straight up useless for wvw. the “skills” die instantly in fights and are useless. The short-bow is clunky and slow.

Renegade needs more bleed duration on the target hit (the splash damage can stay low) because renegade dps is great for HUGE groups but terrible vs single targets.

Would love to see chill in renegade shortbow and legend skills to mesh with corruption line.

Those are the 2 main things for me.

Based on what I’ve seen Firebrand being able to do, along with scourge I’m not really sure peope will be taking Spellbreaker into WvW.

It’s damage is sub par for what it offers and the boon strip mechanic is limited by boons being so frequently applied.

The boon strips really need a type of a “opposite resistance” effect that prevent boons from having any effect for a short period of time.

Mesmer Main Here,

Man Mirage is fun, but it is way to focused on conditions. As someone who mainly plays WvW, and coming from a spec like crono, Mesmer, really didn’t gain any tools to help groups. With all the other boon shread and condi clear the other new classes have, a condi Mesmer with the ability to only keep one’s self alive and have no way to provide support, really felt lost.

It felt lack luster, like it had the ability to jump around and be uncatchable, but any damage I could get off was just cleared away because condi cleanse is becoming more prevalent. Besides this fact, its mostly single target, so it is further lost in the works as WvW is not a HoT raid.

Suggestions: (not all these suggestions go well together, they are just ways to make this spec more suited for something playable)

1. move from conditions to power, this pertains more then just Mesmer but WvW as a whole, the condi meta is killing zerg mentality and forcing people to blob and drop wells (not fun).
2. give Mesmer tools to better move through the battle, right now Mesmer has to choose between stab and utilities like blink. Being a mirage is fun to play and moves through the field well, but it gets locked down way to quickly, and the condis they apply don’t last long enough in group fights to provide anything useful.
3. have a way for the mirage to provide group support, maybe allow them to give the party boons when they mirage cloak, or better yet, allow them to mirage cloak allies with skills like mirage mirror.

just some ideas. But, from what I saw, Mirage, doesn’t have anything on the ability of a Crono

Can I also point out that many of the nerfs on Revenant were made because “it was too strong in PvP” before the PvP-PvE split existed?
Some of them make no sense right now. Not only for PvE of course, but also for PvP, given that most of the new specs are way stronger.

And, again and again, seriously, 40+ skills for Weaver, 20+ skills and AMAZING animations for Firebrand, and still no time for 2 underwater skills for Jalis and Glint. Come on. It seems that you’re making fun of us with the dancing charrs.

Gaile Gray.6029:

We’d like to know your thoughts about the recent PvP and WvW preview weekend that presented the new Path of Fire elite specializations.

Please share your input about the August 18-20 Preview Weekend, preferably in 100 words or fewer

Thanks!

I would advise going to classes respective forms for detailed feedback. Overall, I was a bit disappointed. It seems sPvP will be more condi and CC spam than it is now. None of the elites I played seem to be release ready.

My impression (even mentioned by the devs in interviews) is that the goal was to make the new elites change the classes feel and mechanics. It seems cool in concept, but it misses one key component, most players pick or play a class cuz they are looking for a specific play style. Class mechanics do not change just cuz you added one elite.

That was evident in fire brand tomes. Virtues goal is instant heal and damage mitigation. Tomes failed to do that then make you a melee caster, two words that never go together. In addition, it takes away the appeal of guardian game play; instant no gimmicks functionality.

That was my impression with most of the elites. They tried to do something new, that does not mesh well with the class existing mechanics and functionality. Some where good though, like Dead Eye and Holosmith, they just need more polishing.

Hopefully we get to try the elites in PvE before expansion release.

I could say positive things, but let me limit it to the negative things:

• You forgot to unlock the new ranger pets for WvW.

• Dolyak Stance didn’t work at all the whole weekend.

• Very disappointed Soulbeast doesn’t have access to pet F2. If some were too powerful, you should have given us a different version in beastmode.

• Soulbeast needs to be able to swap pets while in beastmode. This should also trigger pet swap traits.

• Soulbeast master traits all require very specific builds to be good. Make at least one master trait that’s useful by itself.

• In Beastmode F1, F2 and F3 should all trigger “Beast ability” traits (not just F3)

• Soulbeast Live Fast trait does not trigger on pet F2. It should at the very least give the effect to the pet.

From my WvWer perspective. Weaver and Soulbeast had unfortunate bugs that made them nigh unusable for my playstyle in WvW. Those bugs being unravel hexes and leader of the pack. Scourge and Spellbreaker seem to be oppressively exceptional at control in large fights, and shadow arts Deadeye is poised to make anything at all squishy or immobile unplayable outside large groups. I have hope for this new meta, but I have fears too. I just hope the balance guys are on top of their game, they have a tough job ahead.

Scourge

Barriers degeneration must start after a period of time, 5 to 8s. Decrease the degeneration rate by 50%

Torch.
-Harrowing Wave: Additionally, grant 5% LF and 2% LF per target.
-Oppressive Collapse: Unblockable. Hit target behind the caster.

Punishments:
-Sand Flare: 300 radius.
Trail of Anguish: Slick Shoes like. Apply Burning to every one, every time they step into the trail.
-Dessicate: 10% LF, 5-10% per target hit 360radius. (Spectral Grasp potential 100% LF gain!!!)
-Sand Swell: ¼ cast time! 1200 range!
-Serpent Siphon: Target area/5 pulses- damage and poison. Cast barrier to 5 allies and corrupt 1 boon.
-Ghastly Breach: Movable aura around the caster, 220-240 radius(Like old Plague). To similar to Plaguelands as it is.

Shade Skills:
-Manifest Sand Shade: 1/4 cast time. Recharge faster outside of combat!
-Nefarious Favor: Flip skill: Destroy the further away Shade, reduce next shade cd by 33%.
-Sand Cascade: Flip skill: Teleport to closest Shade and gain weak barrier. (ICd 12s)
-Garish Pillar: additionally, all active Shades gain projectile destruction, 180 radius for 5sec.
-Desert Shroud: Flip skill: Destroys all Shades and reduce their cd by 66%

Traits:
-Abrasive Gift: Adds 5sec of Regeneration to barriers.
-Nourishing Rot: Grant 2% LF for every target affected by Torment or Burning (8 ICD per target). PvE doesnt have many boons to corrupt.
-Desert Empowerment: Heal for 20% of the prevented damage.
-Unending Corruption: Also steal the corrupted boon.
-Demonic Lore: split pvp/pve

From when I was able to get on… it was a fail..
I admit that I only dabble in both PvP and Wvw but any of the builds I tested just didn’t feel right with target practice dummies in PvP.
Tried WvW and also could never get a feel for anything cause of massive groups camping outside the starting point and killing anything that came through. Bad draw on my end maybe but after 4 tries over the weekend I gave it up cause it seemed to be same result.

With 30 days until the expansion I seriously doubt they’ll be able to fix the Renegade. The other elite specs still have hopes since they need minor adjustments, but the Renegade, between the thematic errors, the naming errors, the bugs and the complete unusability of Kalla’s skills, basically should be redone from scratch to work.

A quick way around could be to remove the charrs and the hp bars from the skills and to remove some nerfs on core Revenants. Having 1 more undewater legend, Jalis at least, would be nice too.
Also lower energy costs for Kalla and no cooldowns.
Another quick fix would be to double the condi cleanses from traits and Jalis, move the break stun for Kalla to any of the utility skills and add 2000 healing to the healing skill, without having to stand in the circle. I get that we have 2 healing skills so they should be somehow weaker, but come on, weaker should not mean useless.

And given that you nerfed the healing, Shield-5 should not root anymore.

Deadeye:

• Mark doesn’t need and shouldn’t have a cast time
• Steal Strength is underpowered compared to other stolen abilities (one stack of might lol)
• Sniper’s Cover seems to apply a lot of stealth for only 3 initiative. Should be higher and Cursed Bullet should be slightly better to compensate.
• Mark’s stolen abilities shouldn’t expire if the mark expires. You should be able to use it on whatever target or save it for later. Let us save up to 2 stolen skills.

My conclusions are these:
1. Shortbow skills are neat but cost too much and range is a problem with no escapes. It’s hard to sustain the conditions on it in any real form. Mace/Axe is still the superior weapon set I think. Mace 2 is easier to sustain and puts out a lot of burning in a short time compared to SB’s weak Fire Field and Bleeds.
2. Utility and F skills cost WAY too much, it’s hard to have any sort of flow with them when they use up nearly your entire energy bar. Also yet ANOTHER channeling Elite? It needs to be reworked I think, while good we have enough of those already.
3. Playing it like a Standard Condition Revenent with Kalla instead of Jalis may be a better option or really just using Kalla for the Traits and keeping Jalis. Not sure on that though.
Anyway, it’s pretty underwhelming and actually using Kalla’s skills seems to be a drawback than just using her for the traitlines. Also Sevenshot is garbage, I’d rather they nix it and replace it with some kind of escape option on SB. It looks cool but that’s really the extent of it.

In General: Conditions are too powerful and too easily stackable/replaceable (especially burning), cleanses and healing cannot keep up. Nearly every time I died in PvP this weekened some insane burning number was at the top of my list of what killed me. The old argument for powerful conditions was that they had ramp up time, well that’s a complete myth. There is no ramp up time anymore and it’s at a ridiculous level. Please stop this and tone it down a lot before release.

1) Holosmith. I LOVE it. Great DPS, Photon Forge mode is well made (I took a screen and its my wallpaper now). The thing is, it lack Stability (unless traited), stunbreak and the Healing is poor compared to the turret.

2) Firebrand, Soulbeast, Scourge, Renegade, Weaver and Mirage : As soons as i saw they were condies, i didn’t bother to keep playing them.

3) Spellbreaker : I’m curious about this spec, i don’t know if i like/dislike, i want to play more to be sure.

Soulbeast aura looks great, but overdone, distracts from and blocks other visuals while active. Would be better to display when you enter and leave SB mode, but not the whole time. SB is “ok”. Needs more ranged SB options. Something like “Eagle’s Sight” (something I made up, I forget what the birds did offhand in the beta) to assist with longbow attacks, kinda like the ranger becoming one with a pet with exceptional eyesight? Along with the bird theme, a “Swoop” in SB mode when you’re merged with a flying pet would be cool too, to go with the theme and add a mobility option.

As a Revenant main, I think that the Renegade feels somewhat like an after-thought, or an half-finished spec. It clearly didn’t have as much effort put into it as some other specs. I believe the devs have said it was one of the last specs to be finalized/ thought-out? If so, that is quite clear here.

First things first: animations. I think the Shortbow animations (and the bombardment F skill) are -or could be – really good looking, but they lack something that would make them truly satisfying: duration. Especially Shortbow skill #2 and the bombardment F skill. Give them an extra second or so of animation, and they would be far more satisfying. The Ranger’s Rapid Fire and Barrage gives off a bigger impression exactly because of that: because they last long enough to fully appreciate them.

Orange arrows aside, if we look at Kalla’s utilities, then it’s a whole different thing. Their animations are bland. So our ENTIRE utility set is about spawning semi-transparent phantasm charrs? That’s it? I mean, it’s a cool idea when you do it once or twice (like mesmer’s phantasms), but when all our 5 utility skills are tied to it, it’s not. If we’re going to be stuck to non-customisable effects, then diversity is important. When we look at, say, Mallyx, with leaping dark fields, avatar transformations and cone-shapped utility skills, or at Jalis, with roads, chains, stone transformations and flying hammers, having the entire Kalla kit being “invoke phantasms” is a boring concept. And I do enjoy the charr spawns, individually. Just yawn at the idea that there’s nothing else to it.

From a gameplay point of view, I actually enjoy the simplicity and elegance of the design. As a former elementalist, I gave up on that profession because I got bored of playing keyboard piano. The complexity creep only went further with tempest and weaver, and I’m sad that my favourite archetype (offensive spellcaster) is always stuck to a mechanically-demanding profession system. Sadly, this is not something that can be fixed without overhauling the entire profession, so I had to give up on it.

Then HoT was announced, and the revenant promised a more tactical and a less button-mashing approach. Emphasis on energy management over skill mashing. Unfortunately, in PvE, the concept of energy management has been a failure, and the only time it worked as intended was with Glint/ Herald – and that one works differently and is balanced differently. Skill rotations outside of Herald are terribly boring, and the number 1 reason why I don’t log in and enjoy playing the game anymore. And it happens that the Renegade does not seems to fix it at all, at least based on what I saw. It follows the exact same formula of base revenant, which tells me that we’ll have yet another upkeep + AA-spam spec. And I don’t want that. No one wants that.

My suggestions to fix the revenant’s core issues are two (for PvE): either remove energy from weapon skills, so that we can do more interesting rotations, or have our starting energy be at 100 instead of 50, so that we are forced to use energy skills other than the upkeep one before the legend cooldown is over and we can reset it back to 100 again. If 100 was the base value, then our upkeep skills wouldn’t be enough to put it at 0 before legend swapping becomes available again, which means that using MORE skills would actually lead to a DPS boost, instead of a DPS nerf. If you are worried about PvP and WvW balance, then just make this a PvE only change.

The revenant is clearly a very unfinished spec. The energy mechanic has not been working as intended in PvE since ever, the underwater gameplay has been incomplete since ever, and many bugs have run rampant for too long. The renegade is yet another half-complete addition to an half-complete package, I feel.

If I was the game designer behind the Renegade, my thought on it would be this one: “I haven’t done enough”.

Rework Renegade. The utility skills are horrible, “al wells” that can be killed or cc’ed.

Theres no way for someone to even consider Kalla in pvp/wvw. If we could swap these for real utility skills it would be okay but in current state its simply unacceptable. Trait line leaves a lot to desire as well.

Shortbow is clunky (like come on, its not a hammer), lack any sort of defensive move.

mirage: the super speed on gaining mirage cloak feels way too short, it would feel like a lot better trait if the super speed gained was 1.5+ seconds imo, especially since mesmer lost its 25% speed.
Phantasms really should have ambush attacks as well as clones, i feel like it would make the spec a lot more viable.
Infinite horizons really should be baseline, its such an integral part of how the class works that it feels wrong to lock it behind the choice of a grandmaster trait
being rooted by scepter’s ambush attack is extremely detrimental in a fight, would be nice if you could move.
Axe’s power damage felt a little low, and the 2 skill really feels like it needs to be an evade.