Guild Wars 2

I might’ve thought someone’s posted this before, but I didn’t see any with a cursory glance. So if this is a repeat, sorry about that!

Anyway, the Fiery Dragon Sword is really cool. But having it constantly churn with fire, even when ‘sheathed’ (buckled, hung, clasped? I’unno.) is a bit much, in my opinion. It makes the sword crazy busy, whereas if the flames kicked on only when wielded, it’d be pretty dramatic. For an idea of what I’m talking about, you need only reference the Cobalt greatsword.

Another way of looking at it is from an RP perspective. If you had to decide on a weapon to carry, would you choose to carry the one that’s going to burn down the building you walk into if you brush past something? Or catch someone’s clothes on fire if they stray too close? Your other weapon might not be as impressive, or even do as much damage, but at some point people are going to consider you more of a liability to be near or have around.

You get what I’m saying. Anyway, that’s my two cents. Really cool sword, would be cooler if the flaming aspect were more dynamic.

What do you think, Developers?

cyanweapon.7290:

If you had to decide on a weapon to carry, would you choose to carry the one that’s going to burn down the building you walk into if you brush past something? Or catch someone’s clothes on fire if they stray too close?

The sword doesn’t burn anything while drawn, so I assume the flames are just and illusion.

As wiki says:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fiery_Dragon_Sword
As of 6/23/14, this is the only non-legendary weapon skin that has a base damage type of “Fire Damage”. This is unrelated to Burning and has no effect on combat mechanics.
Specifically, its only effect will be changing strike effects of certain skills to those caused by fire-themed skills, and death animations of creatures defeated with this weapon to look as if there were defeated by burning or fire-themed skills.

In other words, the fire damage is only cosmetic and is therefore illusionary. You may use this information when roleplaying to explain why it doesn’t actually burn things.

As to changing how it looks in game, this would annoy the many who like it. Which is most of the people who wield it.

That’s actually the quote I’d use to counter that, I’d just highlight different facts. To wit, every enemy you kill dies on fire, and looking as if they’re burning – and a lot of those deaths are really graphic. Their death to fire is more convincing than when they die on fire from a Guardian’s Virtue of Justice.

Let’s not confuse game balance with logic here. You could make the argument that they’re dying from the illusion of being on fire, but I have a sincerely difficult time buying that. Moreover, the blades of the weapon itself aren’t edged. Pointed, sure, but no edge. It doesn’t kill the potential for damage from the weapon, sans fire, but it does greatly limit it. (Note: even rapiers have edges.)

The implication here is that the damage is largely fire, and that the fire is very real. It just doesn’t cause coded burning damage.

I’m not saying people can’t RP that it’s an illusion. Not at all. I’m just saying I personally don’t buy that. I also don’t buy that most of the people who use the weapon would be upset or annoyed at the weapon skin becoming more dynamic. I, as someone who uses it, would like to see that change.