Guild Wars 2

Virtue of courage -> 50 sec cd
Traps need stun breaker on activation plus some condi removal ( or give some trait that gives stability on activation of traps, 2 sec at least)
Decrease traps cd’s, too long now, nobody will use it. (I know I won’t so far)

Everything is fine. Even sound of LB is okish now.

Fix those suggestions up and you got good worth elite spec.

Keep up the good work!

Dragonhunter just felt meh in pvp. Longbow feels clunky, JI nerf ruined hambow (T.T) and the virtues are still just not worth giving up over the standard ones.
I just feel like dragonhunter will always just be a polished poop compared to the original guard , fluctuating between op and useless :/

All in all still feels too gimmicky, synergy of the longbow compared to the other ranged options is still low. Scepter/Focus or Staff are just superior for PvP, PvE? Well I’d still go Scepter/Focus for blind/regen and blocks, I’ll keep staff also for on-demand might, swiftness and CC.

I still refuse to use traps as to me they are a failed concept in something like GW2 considering they are shruggable compared to other utilities like say any guard shout (even rangers/thieves don’t take em). feel free to just ignore that as you clearly aren’t gonna remove them but it had to be said

The traits still feel like they don’t do much. e.g. Monk’s Focus, Pure of Voice, Altruistic Healing, Shattered Aegis, Amplified Wrath…. those all feel like dynamic changers, Big Game Hunter? meh, Hunter’s Fortification? meh, Heavy Light? RNG knockback that will either be pointless or op depending on which patch.

All in all not that impressed at all.

Obviously don’t take the above personally, you asked for feedback :P

- I really like the longbow now. Velocity is good. I feel like the cast time of Hunter’s Ward is still too long, though. Maybe shorten it to be like the ranger’s Barrage?

- Unfortunately I do not like traps in general so I’ll just leave this here: It would be nice to have a stun break on one of those traps.

- Wings of resolve is a lot better to use than before! Looks cool too.

Other than that, good job Karl.

Traps and longbow result in clunky game play. Longbow trait explicitly require you to be rather away from front line for good damage, and unless you intended that traps are meant for back line…. .. then it’s quite abit of exercise for the DH. Solution: change the name “trap” to something else so that you are more inclined to make it range. After all, if you demanded logic (i.e. how one can set a trap from far away), then I get to ask you what/where are the materials for these light-based mechanisms.

Things look way better for dragonhunter from what i tested so far. These are my thoughts:

1) Bow is way more responsive and the damage is good! I still belive that True Shot (2) should be like the Greatsword (2) Enable us to move while casting it but slower.

2) Purification needs to be activated remotly when we need it otherwise noone is going to use it. That or make it to radiate blindness for a short while.

3) For traps we need to be able to cast them at range. They feel way too restrictive now and i feel the only way enemies are going to activate them is when they come to my face and as a Dragonhunter i dont realy want that.

4) Maybe make Procession of Blades a swirl finisher.

5) I would make Test of faith to push enemies back inside the first time they touch the swords

6) Fragments of Faith needs an extra support buff like healing of protection cause right now i dont see a use for it.

7) Light’s Judgment i can only see myself using this in pvp and even then iam not too sure about. (havent test it though)

Thats all for now, after i play a bit more i might add more. Also it a shame that Spirit Weapons didnt get the rework they need. I realy belive that if they were made viable they would fit Dragonhunter like a glove and give birth to many interesting builds. Thank you for your hard work.

Karl the Dragonhunter is way better than before. I would love to see 1 Little change how about an adept trait which knocks down enemies which get hit by “smite condition” when a condition is removed? You could call it “dragons stomp” and it would benefit the control character of the dragonhunter

the recent Judges Intervention change puts a real hamper on some combos like Mighty Blow (Hammer) + JI and Soaring Devastation DH leap + JI.

the DH still suffers from a serious lack of “fun” and game changing traits.

traits like Radiant Fire that change the way we use certain weapons. flat damage reduction or damage modifier traits have no business being GM traits

So from my experience, you did quite a good work on fixing some issues, i liked it playing with the longbow! But, did i liked it to be a Dragon Hunter? That is a “No” from me. Let me explain why

Positive things about the Dragonhunter :
1) The longbow itself feels ok in terms of strengh
2) The new Virtues are really good
3) Spear of Justice also criples on passive

Negative things about the Dragon Hunter
1) Symbol of Energy feels weird
2) Purification isnt as nearly as good as the already existing healing skills
3) Traps are really, really bad compared to every other skill the Guardian has until now, even Ghost Weapons are superior
4) The New Elite Skill is really, really bad
5) The actual Synergy between the Longbow and every other thing what a Guardian can do and has to offer is almost non existent
6) The traits also offer very little Synergy with the rest of the Guardians abilitys
7) Pure Sight is really, really bad for a Minor Grandmaster trait
8) The Major Grandmaster traits are all pretty bad, especially the Big Game Hunter
9) My Damage overall feels pretty low compared to other professions
10 ) The worst part is that we / I have to sacrifice a traitline for beeing a Dragonhunter (for getting the new virtues to be exact) which are all offering much better synergy, power, feeling and that makes the Dragonhunter traitline like a redundant one if i summarize it. Like it is now, Guardians are simply much better without beeing a Dragon Hunter.

Suggestions :
1) Remove the Traps and Elite skills and make new ones
2) Rework the Major Grandmaster traitline of the Dragonhunter
3) Change Pure Sight to a 25% passive movement speed
4) Change the weapon Swap cooldown when beeing a Dragonhunter / carryig a Longbow down to 5sec
5) Reduce virtue of courage cd down to 50sec
6) Increase Sword Damage overall Weapon Damage and lower Symbol Damage
7) Change Sword skill 2 to beeing able to use when having to target

I dont think that Guardians will die out, because Guardians are freaking awesome super nice <3<3<3<3 (…), but it is nearly a promise, that NOONE will use the Dragonhunter for any serious measures. The thing is also, while Dragonhunter feels OK in pve and really bad in PvP, other “new” professions like reaper, druid and every other feel like WOAH HOLY THATS AWESOME.

First impressions:

Longbow is much, much better. Mechanically, I’m pretty satisfied with where it’s at.

1) Puncture Shot – I think this could still use a bit of a tune up – either firing more quickly or hitting slightly harder. I’d prefer firing more quickly.

2) True Shot – Overall feeling pretty good now. I’d still prefer this be a skillshot like Deflecting Shot (this would make lining up pierces a lot more fun and engaging than it is now), but I don’t expect that to happen (and would definitely present some difficulty with the cast time).

3) Deflecting Shot – Slowed projectile speed on this is great. Feels really good now.

4) Symbol of Energy – Really like the changes to this as well.

5) Hunter’s Ward – I think this skill could use a bit of a damage boost, as well as having the barriers activate earlier. The low damage makes this feel a lot less rewarding than a 45 second cooldown merits.

In general, I feel like Dragonhunters can feel justified in using the Longbow in terms of power. In terms of gameplay, I feel like it’s not as engaging or as fun to play as other weapons, but I’m not entirely sure I can vocalize why. Greatsword does a good job of making you feel satisfied after lining up combo fields (say, Purging Flames, Symbol of Wrath, Leap of Faith, Whirling Wrath), while Longbow just feels more like you’re plunking away and hitting things as they come off of cooldown (with the exception of Deflecting Shot). Unfortunately, I think that’s just going to have to be how it is with the weapon.

Traps are still awful.


The traits are better. Zealot’s Aggression alone has done a lot to really make the Dragonhunter line feel worth taking, and has really good synergy with Dulled Senses and Heavy Light (as well as the Virtues line, which is great). That said, basically every trait feels like a mistake in comparison to what these give. This has made the Dragonhunter line worth using, I think, but the others need to be brought up to par so we have some choices. Pure of Sight is still an unamazing trait – the 10% damage increase should be given to Longbow abilities baseline, and replaced with something else.

I tried the DH now (after I refused to last beta) and I just have one question:

“In which game-mode should I use DH over something else?”

- PvP: 3 skills of bow are ground targetet, 2 skills immobalize you, even with berserker gear the dmg is meh; if we ignore damage and look at support it is meh too. Traits I see no synergy that is better than having one of the old traitlines.

- WvW: Looking at damage and/or support I don’t see any reason to switch from support/tanky frontliner to a dragon-hunter. I don’t do as much damage as any other backliner and I don’t bring more support than I would do otherwise.

- PvE: I don’t have much insight in the speedclear, high-end-dungeon farming but I see nothing that a DH brings to the party.

Soo.. in the end even IF I would like to play a dragonhunter (which I don’t because bow and traps are not good), there would be no need for me in any game mode.

PS: If I’m horribly wrong somewhere please correct me. It is actualy a serious question.. “where would a DH be prefered over a regular guard”

please address…
Judges intervention, why the change?
any talk of making virtue effects passive ?

The traits need a rework. I understood from the last post ‘there were no current trap changes since they were working on them’. Now I see ‘no major changes’.

The damage boost with no conditions is silly from the traits. So a damage boost that will never be seen. Make it 20% since it will only be active damage 1/4 or less of the time in combat.
The knock back is random and weak, any enemy is back on you in half a second and you knock them out of your own traps symbols etc. Make it a knockback and knockdown.
The damage increase on f1 bind is ok, maybe make it also up the burn stack by 1.

Spear of justice – it works…baad. Lots of enemies seems resistant to it. Or it just randomly doesn’t tether to target

Wings of resolve – could we get it to 1200 range? Or 900 at least. Making it leap finisher wouldn’t hurt either. or a blast one with trait

Shield of courage – ¼ is better but still..could we get instant cast? Also, it shows radius, but not boons application range.

Puncture shot – I think it should be ½ second cast?
True shot – seems ok. Unrooting while casting would make us happy for sure, but that would require increasing cooldown also as it would be too good.
Deflecting shot – still too fast
Symbol of energy – vigor is really good, but I think burning should be a bit stronger. If not apply with pulses, at least those initial stacks could last a bit longer
Hunters ward – I still don’t see it working. Almost 3second channel..its hard to catch mobs into the barrier. Forget locking players. make the animation faster.

Purification – who cares about it, very few healing skills in whole game can compete with shelter
Procession of blades – guard got too many good utility skills to pick sth that…does nothing. Damage is laughably low, and its too easy to get away from it. Maybe make it a whirl finisher? Or apply some condis / additional effect. Or at least straight damage boost.
Fragments of faith – this ones seems the best of all traps for me, and can be considered taking into bar at all. Fragments could probably last a little longer on the ground, and disappear faster when picked up.
Test of faith – I don’t like it at all and got no idea how and where it could be even remotely useful.
Lights judgement – may be useful in wvw, maybe spvp. Useless in pve. There are classes that are better at generating vuln, and as mentioned earlier, guard got more important utilities to pick.
Dragons maw – soo I planted it…smokescale triggered it and shadosteped, not being stopped for even a second. Tried few times…I think necro elite shout does the job better. And Mesmer got timewarp for slow. Also theres quickness or invuln+virtues reset to pick here. Which are better.

Overall traps: lets us throw them. Or change a trait to allow us do that. As they are now…taking even 1 on bar means sacrifice of either stability/reflect/condi cleanse/block/? Which makes them reaaally situational. Like pewpew111 wyvern from range. Maybe add boon removal to one of them?

Traits: as mentioned earlier they aren’t bad, just… boring. zealots aggression is a welcome dmg boost, hunters fortification seems nice for aegis/block build (but not sure if it should be a grandmaster). Big game hunter seems super bad. Does it mean 10% dmg more from spear or tethered target takes 10% more dmg from everything? Bulwark could take a few seconds from f3 cooldown. Soaring devastation seems out of place, it should either be super high dmg (and knockdown maybe?), add blast finsher to landing or be a supporty modifier – now its just weak. Not to mention traits are all about bow/traps and don’t synergize that good with other weapons/utilities.
Overall dh: I still don’t like guard with bow and traps, but just 90% of guardians disliking it wont change the whole elite spec and we’ll have to live with that, waiting for better 2nd elite spec. but lets try to make it as good as it possibly can get.

oh and…whoever did shield makeover, thank you!! its not a garbage now!

I am using Medi DragonHunter right now.

Its is in a good state. If buffs are needed. It could use some more disengage.

Just played a bit of it in PvP and had a few suggestions in my head.

-Traps should be able to be thrown or cast on a area. This will truly help it out in every mode if the user is using Long bow.

Honestly that was my only idea, i don’t play competitively so i cant give any ideas for how to make it competitive.

Otherwise, i feel as though long bow dmg is pretty nice (When running marauders).

So far
Autoattack is feeling good which was my biggest bother when I first tested.

But Karl I wish we could really address the traits for DH. As I go through it I find myself having nothing I even find that useful. I am at the point where the DH traitline most useful trait = being able to actually use the bow. That’s about it.

I really appreciate that you kept burning on the symbol. Everything is starting to feel a lot better playing-wise. I do wish that our LB 5 would get a bit more damage though.

WHAT?!!! is this the same class as bw2? :P , but seriously now, it’s really good, the block from Virtue of Courage is really good!, Longbow is nice now!, traits too but but….

Traps!
As i said in BW2 feedback:

Test of faith needs something more i feel, as i hinted last time it lacks something we can chain from other specs.

Maybe put a symbol inside of it that pulses some boon, maybe protection so we have a reason to stay inside of it and also synergizes well with other specializations,

the same kind of synergie exist with Fragments of faith with honor spec. for example.

Procession of Blades needs some love too, but it’s very low cd so i don’t know about that, it can be used as good burst damage so it’s a hate/love situation here.

In general, some traps are awsome, and some needs something more to make them special and unique.

but In the end, it’s a good direction Karl!

The lb5 ward rings almost never make contact, -lay down the rings on the first hit. There’s no point to doing a kitten combo and then locking them with the ward AFTER THE FACT.

Longbow 5:

Make each pulse create the fence which lasts like 1s or 0.5s to allow counterplay for opponents to escape between pulses.

Currently, it never hits because the ward hits at the end.

Longbow 3:
Please remove ground targeting…

Wings of Resolve:
Lower the aftercast. Sometimes immobilize doesnt work.

I testet DH in PvP and it Works.(without the LB)
BUT i think its not better then the original Guard.
Longbow is just too slow in PvP and dmg is so freakin low.
Traps…… I wont talk about it.
And the Virtues are ok, the only reason for me to play the dragonhunter but its not better then the original
I will test DH more at this we

DH feels much better now but it’s not top quality yet. I wonder what could improve traps, perhaps if they could also activate on downed enemies ?
And could we get heavy light to be merged with deflecting shot, it even has the same cooldown. It is really a bummer to have random knockbacks so we can’t plan on doing timed gaps between us and our opponent.
It is quite sad that some of us who run meditation trait and that wish to go with DH spec too for better melee swap will have to sacrifice either Zeal or Virtues (GS trait or lower virtue cooldowns). Well it is possible to play without certain weapon traits but it feels dull and a little bit more challenging. So if we run DH and want to use meditations to do some hard melee dps with traits, then ranged/melee damaging hybrid might not work out. This makes me sad T^T, but I do get that we can’t have all that so we gotta do what we have to do.

I’ve been playing DH all day and i have the following feedback:

Longbow:

1) Puncture shot: Great Damage and Projectile speed compare to previous weekend events.

2)True Shot: The root is still a problem, request removing the root and doubling the recharge.

3)Deflecting shot: Love the slower speed and wider area, however i am not a fan of the ground targeting, request the removal of ground targeting.

4) Symbol of energy: Damage is a bit low, and the burning is applied only on impact, request increasing the damage of symbol pulses and1 stack of burning for 3 seconds on each pulse of the symbol. Tn addition, it would be great if the Radius was 240 instead of 180.

5) Hunters Ward: Request Increasing the Damage slightly , and Applying a hard CC (stun, or knockdown) upon the final impact, and adding a 2 stack of burn on final impact.

Traps

All Traps: Great improvements since last beta, however the recharges are too long and the inability to use traps at range place DH at a disadvantage. request that trap cooldowns be reduced, and allow DH to use traps at range similar to Necro Marks.

1)Test of Faith: Good Trap and decent damage, however it feels lackluster. Request adding a 1 sec Stun once enemies leave the ring so it behaves similar to a static field.

2)Fragments of Faith: Great Trap, no complaints. request Condition clear upon activation or a stun break.

3)Procession of Blades: Trap has a lot of potential, however it is not quite there yet, request a moderate damage increase, radius increase, and 1 second of immobilize.

4)Lights Judgement: Great Trap, the reveal is very great however, request a moderate damage increase. pulsing for 100 damage is very lackluster, can compensate by reducing vulnerability stacks.

I have looked into all other professions forum now and there are minor to no complainments and if, it is very factual. It pretty much reflects what i experienced so far, the Dragon Hunter is sadly, so far, a failure. I already explained why.

Is this a final Problem? No not at all, but it will be a problem, if you, dear Arenanet Team, refuse to admit, that implementing a already failed game mechanic (traps) as a new feature to a class which already has a completely failed game mechanic (ghost weapons), was a good Idea, because its not. I know people arent always impartial when it comes to things they like, but neither are people dumb or all whiny kids and it is no shame to admit, that some peole actually know better than you sometimes do. It is just a shame to not change obviously bad things.

Longbow
The LB skills are much better now and a lot of the reworked skills feel just right, trueshot is in a good place in terms of damage now and the velocity is way better feeling.

Utilities
The traps still seem to be lacking even with taking the 20% reduced cooldown, I dont know if they’re lacking utility but overall effectiveness but something is missing to give them the WOW effect, I would suggest perhaps adding a skill effect to synergies of other utilities "Meditations, Signets, Shouts, consecrations, aegis* Even though one of the traps already gives you aegis, its just a example.

Traits
The Grandmasters I feel like are in a good place but the other 2 tiers still seem to be lacking synergy with the rest of the guardian traitlines.

Purification could use some native condition clear.
Procession of Blades could use a whirl finisher, maybe native bleeding.
Heavy Light isn’t the best it could be.

After testing in wvw.

2#True shot could use slight buff.
5# is too long to cast all, need slight faster mechanism.

Virtue of resolve could use 900-1200 range
Virtue of courage could use slight cd reduction – to at least 50sec

Nothing else to complain. Except hm traps.

Please Please Please fix the interaction between judge’s intervention and mighty blow. Hammer was already underwhelming with the glacial heart move, this change pushes it either further towards sub optimal. Leap of Faith also is also interacting poorly, but it’s no where near crippling as mighty blow/judge’s intervention.

Hunter’s Fortification trait is seriously assbackwards, it needs to be less damage when there are conditions on you, not less damage with ZERO conditions. Its a virtually useless trait in spvp

I played PvP for several hours now, and Dragonhunter has defintely evolved compared to BWE2.

But there are 3 major things I am really missing, if they will be part of the release everything would be fine for me:

- in Karl’s post for BWE3 the following was posted: “Zealot’s Aggression: This trait now allows Justice’s passive effect to cripple, in addition to dealing extra damage to crippled enemies.” If this would come true DH will be WOW!!!!
- Shield of courage can be traited as a stun breaker, so please let it break stuns before the casting time for the shield will start. That means instant stun breaking and afterwards 1/4 sec for the shield (as with Wings of resolve trigger remove Immobility before doing the jump)
- Wings of resolve range should be really 1200. 800 is better then 600, but 1200 will provide new use cases for the skill and Guardian strategy.

What is still in a bad shape are the traps. But honestly I do not know how to improve them. Rune of the Trapper in PvP could help, but I think this might lead to some imbalances. Also Spear of Justice feels really bad. I do not know what to do with this skill during combat. It is the only virtue that is always still passive when I use Renewed Focus I think it should do something like cripple or more dmg, it is a skill with a 20 sec reload.

Compared to the other elite specs in PvP it feels, hmm, ok. Anyhow, playing against even a mediocre Berserker or Chronomancer player is nearly impossible to win, or at least it takes a very long time. This feels very imbalanced at the moment.

Anyhow, if my 3 main issues will be considered for the release, I would be happy

Succinct Feedback:
Bow is good. The damage and feel of the skills is great. Only issue may still be the #5 skill but the changes to Courage help mitigate the helplessness during the cast time.

Traps: Sorry, I primarily PvP and will not be testing traps at all. I’ve said before: due to the mobile and hopefully intelligent behavior of other players, the active effects or zone control of traps would have to be ridiculously powerful to warrant taking them over a hybrid utility (shouts, medi)
*Throwing traps may be an option here though in making sure the current effect does have a better chance of landing.

Traits: Overall are fine, from a design standpoint heavy light needs more control and counterplay for both players. (imo)

Make Heavy Light only affect True Shot. Give it a 100% chance to knockback on the same CD. Make it so you build a “charge” when the CD is done (the charge would pop up next to your boons, condis, etc.)

Make True Shot just slow you like GS #2 rather than root.

Decrease cast time of hunters ward by 1/2 second.

Make elite trap target more than one person.

Make test of faith deal some initial damage too, maybe nerf the damage of crossing over by a little if necessary.

After playing around with Dragon Hunter, there were two things that really stood out for me.

The Virtues feel solid. The cooldown on Shield of Courage could be reduced somewhat, but the other two (even without traits) feel like solid choices between the active effects and passive effects. What bugs me the most about this is how good these Virtues feel to use over the core Virtues. Core Virtues require many traits to be worth losing the passive effects.

• Virtue of Justice can apply up to 5 stacks of Burning for 5 seconds with traits. This is the same as one stack lasting 25 seconds. During the cooldown period of 21.75s, a Guardian would have to hit 39 times to reach the same amount of burning with the same traits. As an example, the Greatsword auto-attack hits approximately once per second. With one enemy, this isn’t enough to match. With two enemies, the Guardian already surpasses the active. With one enemy and other skills (Whirling Wrath and Symbol of Wrath), the Guardian still surpasses the active. In fact, the Permeating Wrath trait nullifies the usefulness of the active effect except when also actively using Renewed Justice.

• With the Healing Power available during the Beta, Virtue of Resolve with Inspired Virtue and Absolute Resolution heals for approximately 4,000 on activation. Its passive, however, heals for approximately 8500 over the cooldown period. Compare that to Wings of Resolve with no traits and the same Healing Power for 5400 health and 4770 over the cooldown period. If one were to take both Virtues and Dragon Hunter, Wings of Resolve would heal for a massive 6,800 on activation and 5150 over the cooldown period.

• Virtue of Courage can apply Aegis on up to five allies (yourself plus four allies). When traited, the Guardian can gain 2.175 stacks of Aegis over the cooldown period. This is only case where the active is better than the passive. However, the cooldown on the active is a harsh 75 seconds base. Shield of Courage greatly surpasses its effects when used co-operatively. In addition, the latest Shield rebalance has Shield of Judgment apply Aegis on the same number of allies on a cooldown as little as 16 seconds. Retreat can also apply Aegis in the same manner as Virtue of Courage at a minimum interval of 32 seconds. Compared to those, the cooldown of Virtue of Courage hardly justifies itself.

The other thing that really stands out is Symbol of Energy. Here’s a quick overview of Symbols:

• Symbol of Judgment is linked to an auto-attack, and is cast at the target’s feet. 1s of Protection is applied per tick, and ticks 3 times.
• Symbol of Faith is cast at the Guardian’s feet, and the Guardian can move while casting it. 1s of Regeneration is applied per tick, and ticks 5 times.
• Symbol of Wrath is cast at the Guardian’s feet, and the Guardian is locked during its animation. 1s of Retaliation is applied per tick, and ticks 5 times.
• Symbol of Swiftness is ground-targeted, and has no addition effects. 3.5s of Swiftness is applied per tick, and ticks 5 times.
• Symbol of Energy is ground-targeted, and applies 2 stacks of Burning on contact in addition to its effects. 3.5s of Vigor is applied per tick, and ticks 5 times.

I’m curious as to what uniformity Symbols should have at this point as no two Symbol is identical to each other. It was originally stated that Symbol of Energy would lose its Burning, but instead was doubled. I don’t hate the change. I like the idea of giving Symbols a sort of burst at the beginning of the Symbol to help in PvP, but no other Symbol has it.

Additionally, the Vigor gained on Symbol of Energy is 3.5s per tick. Its cooldown is identical to Symbol of Swiftness which has 4s of Swiftness per tick. Symbol of Wrath has a 5 second longer cooldown, but only applies 1s of Retaliation per tick. Oddly enough, Zealot’s Speed has the same Symbol with 2s of Retaliation per tick.

things i love about Dragonhunter:

1) a reason to use the active effect of Justice. having that immob and pull is really nice. before i would just keep the passive damage ticking over every three strikes since in the long run its more damage than waiting for the 20s cooldown on Justice for the stronger burn.

2) Wings of Resolve. its an 800 range, group target leap. i almost cried tears of joy when i realised it didn’t use AI path checking. its what i always wanted Shadowstepping to be like. the visual effect looks really impressive too.

i took it to Morgans Spiral in Caledon Forest and jumped around from rock to rock for a good few minutes, then while trying AC, i leapt across the platforms during the master Ranger Nente fight to heal allies without needing to run down and up and around. its worth taking Dragonhunter just to use this Virtue imo.

3) Shield of Courage, i haven’t had much use with this yet since i havent played much, but it sounds very useful for leading zergs in WvW. i did a run of Arah and it was quite useful as a second Wall of Reflection when dealing with the Orrian Turrets.

4) the traps are all great. there isnt a single one i don’t like.

i really like Test of Faith, its like a cage-fight trap and the visuals when it triggers are really good-looking. The unblockable cripple when crossing the trap sounds incredible in WvW/PvP to stop shield warriors making dashes for gate portals while blocking with stability. i’m a big fan of this trap.

Lights Intervention has a very impressive effect (think of the Skyhammer laser from PvP) and i like that it keeps Mesmers and Thieves revealed. i havent used this one much since i havent played WvW with Dragonhunter yet, but i can see it having great utility.

Procession of Blades, this is my staple PvE trap. it seems to do a significant amount of damage, making up for the poor DPS of my clerics gear. i like the visual effect, although i think the blades should spin (visually) faster than they currently do.

Fragments of Faith: haven’t used this trap much due to having a shield for Aegis application. seems like another trap that has strong uses in WvW and PvP for dropping mid-fight or to catch an opponent trying to run.

as for the Longbow skills, i’m happy with how they are, and i like that they both look and sound different to the ranger projectiles. the #4 skill (Symbol of Energy) is very useful. its good that #3 (Deflecting Shot) has a blinding attack like the rest of the Guardian weapons.

5) Traits: im not going to go into detail about traits, but from first glance they are impressive. lots of synergy with existing traits as well as great new ones. i can see the traits based on adding additional effects to your virtues (eg immob attack with Wings of Resolve and Justice passive) being very popular in WvW and PvP.

Things i don’t like about the Dragonhunter:

i have no idea what the Longbow #5 does exactly (Hunters Ward), it says it makes barriers, but is that to block projectiles? to hurt or stun enemies? i’m not quite sure on the mechanics of this skill from the tooltip. the 45 second cooldown feels high, but since im not sure what the attack does, ill save my judgement until i have more facts.

some traits are a bit unclear, the second minor trait (Defender’s Dogma) is worded strangely. i think by ‘maximum charge’ it means the resets the cooldown but im not sure. also, its not said what effect the tethering from Spear of Justice does, there is a visual effect but im not sure what that effect means other than ‘tethering’.

Traps are placed at your feet and not ground targeted. i don’t like this aspect of the traps since you have to be somewhere to lay them so it limits their flexibility. you cant lay a trap at range, have it trigger then leap in for a combo finisher, or trap a fleeing enemy.

ranged traps might be a balance issue, but maybe keeping it short range, maybe 600, would make it have more synergy with Wings of Resolve, Leap of Faith, etc. a bit more QoL on top of the QoL Dragonhunter has already.

that said, i’m really impressed by Dragonhunter and i did not expect to be. last beta weekend i played a few minutes and didn’t really get into it, but today i spent the first hour grinning like an idiot and trying all of the skills and utilities in AC, jumping puzzles and Arah.

Now i just have to finish levelling my second Guardian before HoT comes out so i can have two Dragonhunters. i was only going to have the one but if it stays this fun, ill have to have two.

Karl McLain.5604:

We’ll also continue to review and update, as necessary, after launch as well.

Cheers,
-Karl

Good luck

Greetings, friends!

Long time Guardian here.
I’ll make this concise and constructive, and must point out that this is all personal preference and taste. This isn’t to refute any complaints others have mentioned.

With that out of the way, I really enjoyed playing with Dragon Hunter today. I did a mixture of Meditations and Traps, using Valor/Virtues/DH in traits. I did 10 PvP matches and won 8 of them. I beat everyone I went up against in a 1v1 save for a single Grenade Engineer.

It felt good having the flexibility to jump in with Sword/Shield and put some pressure on. The Virtue activation and velocity changes made them 100% usable in melee combat, and found people taking quite a bit of damage from the F2 landing, F1, Sword 3 flurry combo. All the while locking them up with Test of Faith.

My only functionality gripe is the lack of condition clearing. It seems that the 2k heal+Fury+Condition clearing of a full meditation build is still a ‘little’ more viable, but mixing and matching is definitely possible. I used it to great success.

Thoughts on Everything:
TRAPS and BOW
- Bow skills felt good, and the damage was fair. I don’t feel like much needs to be improved here. Minor aesthetic on the auto attack would be nice, like a light blue trail of light along the arrows path being more pronounced.
- Test of Faith is great area denial and really punishes people who can be baited running over the ring repeatedly.
- Procession of Blades needs to be buffed, or have some extra effect. Right now it isn’t very good.
- Fragments of Faith doesn’t feel like it’s worth a utility slot. There are other ways to grant Aegis to allies via traits and weapon skills. I’d up the damage a bit OR toss in a condition removal in the area when it goes off.
- Light’s Judgement does its job. The damage is garbage but in solo-defending a point and having a Mesmer jump on you, this just ruins their day.
- Dragon’s Maw is pretty good. I’d up it’s damage a little, or have it strip boons, but otherwise it does it’s job. It’s a group lockdown skill.

VIRTUES:
- Spear of Justice was Fine. It was fast enough, the damage was good, and with the 10% trait you could get some nice spikes out.
However, PLEASE make the spear bigger. Right now it looks like I’m throwing an arrow. Think Lightning Spear from Dark Souls.
- Wings of Resolve was Good. The damage from the trait felt just right, and I used it fairly often to chase down targets or to get out of hairy situations.
- Shield of Courage I didn’t use much. However when facing an Ele or Ranger I found myself really thankful for it existing. Took a bit of practice to get facing right but eventually it helped quite a bit.

Overall, I think it’s fine! Needs some aesthetic/sound tweaks but otherwise I loved it! Thanks A-net.

Hi Karl, I will post a quick edit of my last post from the bwe2 thread because I feel it is super important, I hope to convince you that there is a really problem with utilities for the dragon hunter and it is making the spec feel very poor to play.

Let me tackle the utilities we currently have each with 2 considerations:
1. Do they work at range equally as melee.
2. Are they a competitive slot for a dps or team support perspective.

Spirit Weapons:
1. They are minions that have very little health and a limited lifespan in time. If we cast them at 600-1200 range it will take (no calculations) 6 out of 30 seconds for travel time.
Hence dps is reduced by 20%, or even more likely they get focus fired without even arriving, whereas in melee at least they will get some attacks in on summon.
2. Spirit weapons are grossly undertuned with no representation in DPS specs. That is why some have called for their buff as our ranged utilities, perhaps summon at target.

Shouts:
1. Shouts have a 600 range so of course they are worse at range, in this game there always has to be someone at melee, so at minimum you are losing him as a target, at worst you are alone and then why have it as a shout at all.
2. 3 out of 4 shouts are utilities only used in dungeons for swift and stability. Save Yourselves has never been any use in DPS Builds because it does nearly nothing.

Signets:
1. Granted this probably the Only category that holds some truth because our god awful signets are just stats, however our elite signets is only 300 range on healing, and the buff signet is only 600 range, so if you run a “signet dragon hunter” you still won’t be able to “support from the back line”……
2. Need I say anything here, we have probably the worst stated signets and nearly no trait interactions that I am aware of. God awful…

Consecrations:
1. Finally the category that holds the one skill that is truely equal at range, Purging flames but the rest are utility skills, reflects, and stabilities which you now can’t target your whole team because you are far away.
2. Consecrations are actually pretty competitive and purging flames and wall will probably be the only useful skills on the dragon hunter bar.

Meditiations:
1. Intervention is of course out because it puts you into melee, and while Purity is equal it is neither dps nor support, and Smite Condition’s damage is only melee range.
2. Since JI is out this set has no dps utilities from this distance and while is useful in PvP settings it is not really a dps skill.

Conclusion:
Karl you really need to sit down and write a reply to this topic because:
For 3 years guardians have been Actively discouraged to move outside of 600 range and now creating an elite that asks you to stay outside 600 and then gives you no tools to do that is ridiculous!

Devs asked for well written explainations of problems (please ignore my outbursts) and suggested solutions:
1. Remove the 600+ trait and accept that longbow is just an Option to hit from range but will never be good from there. (Guardian and all its elite specs should Never leave 600 range, most would riot in my honest opinion)
2. Buff at least a few more skills to work Equally and Well from range. Eg. Spirit weapons summoned at range/survivability, signets actives(need massive overhaul buff), 1200 range shouts. (Maybe each of these suggestions could have a trait in the elite line)
3. Give our Dragon Hunter more tools to be at range. So what if they are similar to marks or grenades or other things, let us deploy traps to 900 range is still best solution.
Neither of those play styles is one that the guardians have ever gotten to experience. My suggestion being a trait that reads “when wielding a longbow traps have 900 range” and just copy the longbow 4 animation.

I believe this post contains all the conclusions people have made in the bwe2 thread, I think every suggestion there really does fall into one of the three above categories, but I of course understand that I do not speak for everyone.

PS. I think the longbow is already balanced since much more will make it competitive with melee weapons even discounting the 10% range buff.

TL;DR: Longbow just feels boring to play with no utilities, that is my main concern.
Every Dragon Hunter is still a Guardian and Guardians have to stay within 600 range not due to weapon design but due to utility design. So since Dragon Hunter specific utility is still melee range, Dragon Hunters are left with NO utilities.

Dragonhunter Feedback

Longbow feels good, polishing up into a very nice weapon, so well done there.

Traps are, well, traps need to be fixed at the conceptual level probably. If you tweak how they fundamentally work in game atm then the dragonhunter ones will be fine. (as an added bonus this gives thief and ranger more possible builds too)

Virtues are getting good too, the core idea of encouraging their more active use is evident and they are pretty fun to use. WoR really should get at least 900 range though.

Traits are… Inconsistent is the best word I can come up with. There doesn’t seem to be a consistent theme or logic to their arrangement and naming, just haphazard buffing of the various new class elements. Some of them are brilliant (Zealots Aggression), others are very questionable (Heavy Light – does a single RNG knockback every 10 seconds really deserve to be grandmaster?)

But the one I personally hate the most, with a passion, is Pure of Sight. There are so many ways this is a terrible trait –
1. Its boring – provides only a %damage increase with no other effects and is always taken (as a minor trait). Meaning you could have just built it into the base damage of the weapon or the class.
2. It limits builds – only benefits specific ranged builds (no close range kiting) but is a minor and cannot be avoided if you wish to play DH any other way.
3. It has framing problems – while I am sure you conceived of it as a bonus to reward players who keep their distance the overwhelming impression it gives is of a penalty to being in melee. Especially considering another traitline has to be given up for this one.
4. Its underpowered – for a grandmaster trait, even a minor one. The effect could easily go into Heavy Light and that trait still wouldn’t be very good.

Honestly, I think the traits still need a lot of work. But if you are going to do only small changes from now on then please, please, let Pure of Sight be one of them.

Core Guardian Feedback

Shield changes are brilliant, thank you so much! Could do with an adjustment to the shield trait, but otherwise thats all really good.

Sword attack 3 continues to have usefulness issues.

Spirit weapons continue to be almost useless, they need a rethink of the core mechanics involved.

After testing in wvw.

2#True shot could use slight buff.
5# is too long to cast all, need slight faster mechanism.

Virtue of resolve could use 900-1200 range
Virtue of courage could use slight cd reduction – to at least 50sec

Nothing else to complain. Except hm traps.

in PVE:

1. PURIFICATION swap initial heal and trap heal: intial heal 5500 + trap heal 2500 (heal 2 condition on trap heal)
2. Lights Judgement – make it’s every 4th pulse remove 2 conditions
3. Procession of blades – dmg too low…decrease its cd to 16sec traited or increase dmg to at least 12-14 hits (10 now)
4. Dragon’s maw – decrease its cd to 36 sec traited
-edit- found a bug- DRAGON’s MAW dont last for 5 mins, it disappears after 1 min.
-Purification also same thing, disappears after 1 min.

The reduced damage on Hunter’s Fortification is kinda butt, but the condi clear is awesome. I can actually use Glacial Heart.

Bow feels good now. No complaints really besides #2 root. Much prefer a longer cd with being able to move. Otherwise the damage needs to be slightly higher I feel. Root is a big, big problem. The amount of damage you’ll take while rooted is probably going to outweight the damage it does making the skill a no no except in certain situations.

Spear of justice lacks “umph”.

Wings of Resolve needs a blast finisher at the end imho.

Shield of courage cd is ridonkulous.

Traps feel ok, but meh. Seeing people asking for stun breaker…I think what it needs is Stability. Add on to the trap trait a small amount of Stability granted to yourself when an enemy activates a trap. 2 seconds of Stability I think would be perfect. I know, 10 seconds of stability if all 5 traps are activated at once seems like a lot, but if this is the new set of skills we need a real reason to use them, especially if there is no stun break.

(p.s. I don’t see how a stun break on a trap would even work, which is why i suggest stab)

Bow: Is better now. The only 2 complaints from me or people I know is that number 5 takes so long to cast that only ppl who are afk will get stuck in it & number 2 just doesn’t warrant being stuck in 1 spot.

(A suggestion many of my friends have made would be to make it shoot out a narrow cone that cripples all enemies and tethers them for 5 seconds, which can be activated again within those 5s to pull enemies to you and immobilize them for 1 second.
This would also work well with traps.
It would also be great if number 2 was either mobile or had an additional effect)

Light’s Judgment: Is decent, but other classes have reveal on a much shorter CD and can stack vulnerability better then guardians can.
(Maybe up the damage to compensate for this)

Test of Faith: Is alright if you can force an enemy to pass through the radius, useless if you cannot.
(Maybe it would be better if it did something inside its radius like pulse damage, pulse might stacks etc… Just something)

Fragments of Faith: The best trap by far, no objections.

Dragons Maw: Has a small radius and only effects one target
(Make it 300 radius & 3 target limit and it would be great)

Procession of Blades: The straight up damage is alright now, but if all we wanted was damage then there are other things that do almost as much but also bring utility effects.
(make it apply a 4s bleed on hit and count as multiple whirl finishers and it would be very good)

Purification: Very bad design due to the fact that reliance on an enemy for your heal is going to get you killed most of the time. It also doesn’t purify anything.
(it needs to do the following
1: Have a larger initial heal
2: have the heal when triggered be AOE regeneration
3: Be triggered by wounded allies moving over it
4: Remove some conditions in AOE when triggered
After that it would be welcomed in the guardian kitten nal)

As for traits

Piercing Light: The daze is barely noticed and does nothing to keep enemies in trap radius.
(really needs to immobilize or stun)

*Dulled Senses": Really requires other traits be taken to be of any use.
(perhaps combine its functionality with zealots aggression or heavy light)

Defenders Dogma: Really discourages the active use of justice.
(redesign it from the ground up as something useful. There have been a ton of suggestions on what it could be)

Zealot’s Aggression: Discourages the active use of justice as well.
(combine it with big game hunter and it would be nice no matter what your doing)

Pure of Sight: Is really only useful with a couple of weapon sets which like the zeal line makes it feel like your being forced to use them. This is not something a minor should do because we cant swap out minors like we do majors.
(Would be great if you would combine it with heavy light and put something else that is useful here)

Heavy Light: The knock back is kind of random & there is no way to know when the CD is ready.
(Simply make it cause deflecting shot to knock back enemies & true shot to grant stability then it would be perfect. It could also stand to be combined with pure of sight as an all around ranged trait)

Big Game Hunter: Does nothing for the passive use of justice.
(Combine it with Zealot’s aggression and it would be fine.)

Wings of Resolve: is fairly easy to counter & very high risk high reward. It could stand to be a blast finisher or a leap finisher.

Shield of Courage: The CD is rather long.
(this would be more tolerable if so many of the on block traits didn’t have internal cool downs)

Lastly I will add that guardians who were looking forward to using + condition gear feel somewhat slighted. For a while during earlier beta’s they at least had some hope. Now however it seems like it’s just never going to be worth it.
If my & the communities concerns are taken to heart and the traits are changed/merged perhaps you could make a trait that gives + condition damage stat some real use.

It’s late here so I’ll just take my space here and write something very little.

Longbow feels okay, but #4 and #5 needs some improvement. They feel clunky with what they do and how long it takes to cast it.

Traits are rather uninteresting and got no synergy whatsoever with anything else that the guardian got, that’s really sad.

With the removal of traps being throwable at range I see no real future for these. Sure “place and wait for your prey to come” sounds cool and all but it’s horrible in practice and extremely clunky. Especially with a specialization that was announced as a back line support, and traps makes us go frontline…

The only thing you really can do to pass them off as symbols… that would give use the synergy we need with other traitlines.

I wish the passive effects for the profession mechanic would be something else, new and exciting as well instead of the old “passive fire, passive healing, passive aegis.”

I thought I read in a bwe3 post that true shot would grant stability? But I don’t see it on the DH spec. Someone quote me to answer please.

Instead of giving us Runes of the Traveler, you should implement a 25% flat movement speed buff on a traitline. Eventhough everything got better, i cant change my opinion on those traps, elite skill, grandmaster traits, minor and major. Just beeing better and not garbage, doenst mean they are compareable to whats already there. Sure people can say now, Dragonhunter was kinda ok, or even decent. But so far, its still better if you dont chose to be a Dragonhunter.

Longbow: #2 still shouldn’t be rooted. #5: Barrier animation should be first; feels off.

Virtues: Actives are interesting, but not worth removing passives. Should maintain passives during active use or cut cool downs even more.

Traits: Ranges from meh to a mess. No build defining traits. The majors and even grandmasters feel like minors. Missing something “build defining” (like a movement speed trait).

Traps: Even worse. The only one I liked was Procession of Blades, but moving back and forth was painfully slow between the Longbow without swiftness or movement speed as a pure “Dragonhunter”. Again, should be ground targeted and/or provide mobility to the class. I feel like these will go with “signets” and “spirit weapons” as trash utilities on a Guardian.

Overall: I played as a Herald first, and that felt more like what an Elite specialization for a Guardian should be than Dragonhunter. Trap utilities as designed are huge misstep, and none of the traits are really exciting. With Virtues not being new and different enough for me, the only reason to play Dragonhunter is really the longbow, but I found myself wanting to just go back to my current build in order to get things done in the new areas.

To recap for changes requested:
1) Add a 25% movement speed trait
2) Keep the passives up when activating virtues or cut the cooldowns in half.
3) Make traps ground targetable.
4) Unroot #2 longbow

The increased passive doesn’t work. The tooltip of Wings of Resolve state that it would heal 105 per second but it’s actually the default 84 I would have without Absolute Resolution. This bug was arround since the last 2 weekends aswell so I don’t really understand why it’s not fixed. I mean it’s pretty minor but come on.

Apart from that the changes are great. Being able to use Deflecting Shot and the Symbol behind you increases the defense of DH a lot and makes the skills way less clunky.

The auto is cool.

I keep getting interrupted with Wings of Resolve, which puts it on a full cooldown, no heal, no condi clear, and next to no distance traveled.

1s Evade?

Shield of Courage cooldown is still high for the short 5s duration and small area covered by the blocks.

True Shot – unusable against anyone moving away from you as they are out of range by the time the shot gets there, huge liability in small skirmishes with the rooting effect.

The block effect on Hunter’s Fortification is great but the passive is utterly pointless. There are 13 conditions in this game and they are plastered over all weapon and utility skills, some causing multiple conditions each time.

There are more skills flying around that inflict conditions than don’t, it’s literally impossible to find yourself in a fight and not under the effects of a condition if you are taking damage.
This passive part of this trait needs to change to a 10% condition damage reduction to be worthwhile.

Just going to add onto the complaining about the judges intervention change, was really looking forward to comboing wings immob with it and now i cant do gs 3 hammer 2 or wings with it, is so frustrating. Please change back, it would make the class 10x more fun to play.

As for the rest of pvp I was obliterating people with medi dragon hunter, greatsword autos critting harpooned people for 3-4k. harpooning multiple targets then bursting them was really satisfying too. Overall the class is great, ji just needs to be usable in the air again.

I feel like all skills should be as well tbh, other mmos that allow that are way more fun because of the freedom of movement. Being able to jump off a cliff in wow then charge back up was always fun etc. In archeage you could do a backflip up a cliff if you timed it right, the main thing this game is missing is freedom of movement.