Despite the fact that ArenaNet have now stated that there will be no more balance passes until early 2016, I am compelled to at least share the thoughts of many dedicated WvW players – and try to explain why exactly this is such a big issue.
Since release, there have always been ‘mandatory’ professions/specs. The GWEN meta was established quite early as each profession showed true value and we all more-or-less accepted it; this sort of thing is inevitable in any ‘competitive’ game, as people will always figure out the most effective way to play. Fast forward 3 years and the Revenant class was introduced with the HoT expansion, promising very strong party support through boon sharing and boon extension. It had a rocky journey through the betas, with developers trying to make the class feel good to play, the result being largely well received by all aspects of the GW2 game mode trinity (PvE/sPvP/WvW). It could grab a fair spot in any game mode because it had the tools necessary to be competitive, which was fantastic… until people discovered just how strong it could be in WvW. Despite having some terrain bugs (as many skills currently do, still) people discovered the unparalleled damage pressure of Coalescence of Ruin (hammer skill #2) and how quickly it could turn a fight, especially if stacked. This is not to say that skill becomes irrelevant, it just becomes less relevant. Even at the top levels of GvG, people have accepted that the team with the most Revenants has a very clear advantage (again, not taking skill into account) and have begun stacking them for that very reason.
Let me just stress this point in its own paragraph:
The team with the most Revenants has an advantage due to one single weapon skill. Not a mechanic, but a weapon skill.
CoR is hands-down the most effective damage ability in WvW/GvG. It has 1200~ range, very high base AOE damage and coefficients, intense trait synergy with damage modifiers/perks, and a short enough cast/animation time that it can’t be dodged effectively in large scale (not to mention texture bugs that cause it to not show at all and LOD trimming which makes it nearly impossible to see coming anyway) – all on a 2s cooldown; 2 whole seconds. It also still bugs occasionally, triggering a double-tag hit. On top of all of this it is not static and can not be reflected. Anyone who is investing in organized WvW play will understand just how important these last two points are as they are crucial aspects of counterplay.
So we have a new king in town, what’s the big deal, right? Well here’s the thing… balance is very delicate in large scale combat. One of the main things keeping GvG style combat competitive was that the main sources of damage were ground targeted, static AOE spells. This meant that a good team could make judgments about when to attack and when to retreat. In order to secure kills, you frequently needed to combine these attacks with crowd control in order to land enough damage to down a target. These abilities were also on long CDs (30-60s~), meaning that there were periods of time during which a team could tactically engage in melee combat without fear of constant, massive AOE counter spikes.
So how have things changed? There is no longer a safe time to make tactical plays. CoR can do all of, if not more damage than these previous damage spikes – all upfront and on a 2s CD. Regardless of what you do, you will be bombarded with (occasionally unblock-able, +50% damage) 6-15k CoR crits every 1 or 2s. Depending on how many Revenants are on the field on either side, this is instant death if you are caught by 1, 2 or 3 (depends on your current and total health) at the same time, or in rapid succession. Several classes can not achieve safe EHP values to survive even one of these (without neutering themselves), as the chances of being at 100% health in a fight are very low and short lived. This has resulted in a worst-case scenario… Rally Wars 2. All you have to do is look at any of the top level guild streams, and you will see that people are going down left and right – the winner being crowned because they finished off downed targets the fastest, rallying all of their downed teammates (provided they got a tag on the target). Granted, this has always been a thing but not to the horrendous degree it is now. It doesn’t matter what you do, there is always a risk that every 2s you will die instantly because you happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, which is usually entirely out of your control due to the directional nature of the ability.
It doesn’t take a genius to see why this is so bad for the game mode, and I’m sure everyone has experienced it to varying degrees by now. We know that the hammer doesn’t get any action in PvE and sPvP metas, and it is only in WvW that this is a problem – but it is a huge problem that needs to be addressed. It is worth noting that it has always been the case that certain weapons see more action in specific areas of the game, and right now Hammer is dominating WvW largely due to this ability, but is underused in PvE and sPvP metas. While this is problematic for those who enjoy the hammer and wish to shoe-horn it into other game modes, this is a reality that every class faces. I urge you (devs) to take a very serious look at Coalescence of Ruin during the next three months and consider a solution that will keep the game mode fun and competitive without destroying the weapon set. The Revenant is a fantastic addition to all game modes, and does not need this one over-tuned ability to be viable, especially when it is having such a dramatic effect on a specific part of the community.
In closing, I would like to share with you some of the ideas being thrown around on the related reddit thread (https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3v4x4h/coalescence_of_ruin_is_sending_destructive/). I do not claim personal credit for these suggestions, and would like to thank everyone who chimed in on the discussion and contributed various points of interest. I am not personally advocating any of these as concrete solutions, nor am I claiming that all of these should be implemented in bulk, I am simply providing the more reasonable feedback from the community related specifically to WvW.
- Address the traited damage mods on traits such as Cruel Repercussion and the impact they have on CoR. This specific trait alone is a huge problem when combined with CoR in WvW where blocks are frequent, resulting in (un)lucky potshots or completely unpredictable damage bursts. It is currently very easy to stack multiple high +damage mods.
- Switch the damage pulses so that the higher damage is in close range (where it is less likely to do massive amounts of damage) and the damage tails off on targets farther away. This is not a completely alien concept for ranged weapons in GW2 (e.g. Mesmer GS #2, Mirror Blade). This means that you must take a risk to reap the rewards of such a powerful attack instead of sitting back and casually downing back-line with a huge damage pulse that may more may not have been intentional.
- (BUG) Acknowledge and fix the AOE multi-pulse and double-tagging that has been present since beta.
- Increase the CD or energy cost so there is a bigger gap between its use, or doing massive damage spikes comes at a significant resource cost.
- Make CoR reflectable/stoppable by projectile blockers in the same way that some other ground trail attacks are (e.g. staff Elementalist earth #5, Shock Wave). This alone opens up significant counter-play options.
- Give it a much clearer animation/texture so that it is more visible over spell noise and look into how effect LOD prioritizes spells, as running with it off is not an option for many people due to the immense performance cost.
