Guild Wars 2

Hello! (Prepare for massive Wall of Text)

My Name is Mike and I’ve been in various Alpha/Beta Tests and currently work on my own RPG-Maker Game (not that actively tough), and I’ve been a fan of Guild Wars ever since I started with Prophecies about 10 years ago. I’ve also had a look or two at pretty much every known MMORPG (I’ve started with Tibia…) so while I’m not a expert, I sure have my share of expirience.

I did spend a lot of time looking trough the new Specializations and while it’s save to say they are ways from being finished, I also think it’s a good time to bring in some ideas. Thus I decided to boldly plant my ideas for the Specializations into the Forums.

Before I begin there’s something important I’d like to mention:
My “Ideas” are not supposed to make the Specializations stronger or weaker, the only intention is to make them feel better to play – thus I will (for now) not include any numbers on damage. A explanation for the changes will be placed at the end of the Post because it would make it difficult to read if I’d add it to each “idea” right away. Some of it will be self explaining (I hope) anyway.

Here we go with the “DragonHunter”:

Lore/Name Changes
I suggest changing him from a “DragonHunter” which wants to destroy Dragons and anything related to them, to a “Dragon Warden”, who recieved Glint’s Blessing.

[b]Profession Mechanics[b]
Spear of Justice:
Active Range increased to 1200
Tether Range increased to 1500
Cooldown increased to 20s
Changed from Piercing to Single Target.

Wings of Resolve:
No Changes (for now).

Shield of Courage:
Aegis Refresh increased to 60s.
Cooldown increased to 120s.

Weapon Skills
(1) Seeking Arrow (replaces puncturing shot)
Activation Time: 1/2
1500 Range
Will hit the enemy affected by Spear of Justice, if no enemy is currently affected by Spear of Justice, it will hit the nearest enemy within Range.

(2) Deflection Shot
1500 Range
Activation Time: 1/4
Cooldown 5 Seconds.
No Longer blinds enemies.

(3) Pin Down
1500 Range
Activation Time: 3/4
Cooldown: 10 Seconds
Cripple Duration: 3s
Fire a Spread of 5 Arrows in a narrow Arc, which cripple enemies hit.

(4) Dragon Shot (former True Shot)
1500 Range
Channel Time: 2 Seconds.
Cooldown increased to 12 Seconds.
Channels the Power of a Dragon into your Arrow, allowing it to pierce trough enemies.

(5) Symbol of Energy
No Changes (for now)

Slot Skills

General:
All Slot Skills changed from Traps to Survival!!

(Healing) Purifying Spring.
Radius: 240
Activation: 2 Seconds
Duration: 20 Seconds
Cooldown: 20 Seconds
Pulses every 5 Seconds.
For 20 Seconds, you and all allies in Range are healed and lose one condition every 5 Seconds.

(Utility) Throw Dirt
Activation: 1/2
Cooldown: 10s
Blind Duration: 5s
Radius: 240
All enemies within range are Blinded.

(Utility) Fragments of Justice
Activation: 1 1/2s
Cooldown: 30s
Radius: 240
Fragments of Faith + Light’s Judgement in one Skill… obviously numbers have to be adjusted accordingly.

(Utility)Blades of Faith
Activation: 1 1/2s
Cooldown: 30s
Radius: 240
Test of Faith + Procession of Blades in one Skill with instant Action, obviously the Numbers will have to be adjusted accordingly.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

(Elite) Dragon’s Ward
Activation Time: 3/4
Cooldown: 60s
Duration: 5s
Number of Targets: 5
Radius: 600
Trap foes around you with Barriers. Trapped foes take damage and additionally are crippled and slowed until the Barriers are Destroyed.

Traits (only changed ones are mentioned)
Zealot’s Aggression -> Zealot’s Justice
Deal Extra Damage to Enemies Affected by Justice.

Dulled Senses -> Pierced Senses (… I definetely need to rethink that name)
Enemies you pierce are crippled.

Heavy Light -> Piercing Light
Longbow arrows pierce when enemies are within the range threshold.

Explanation for Virtues:
I wanted to make them feel more dynamic, which imo did sort of succeed with the introduction of “Warden’s Faith” (based on Serpent’s Quickness of GW1) and “Seeking Arrows” benefitting from Spear of Justice. Also, the new Utilities work along nicely with Wings of Resolve, as you don’t prepare with Traps anymore, now you can just Jump to assassins invading your Backline and stop them right away.

Explanation for Weapon Skills:
Puctured Shot had to be replaced, as it was essentially a free 2x Hit+Cripple in almost any situation besides actual Dragon Hunting/Raids, with the Range increase, this would have been broken. Thus, the cripple went to the former Heavy Light Trait (which is impossible to balance properly with it’s Knock-Back) as well as Pin Down and the new 1 became a “hit nearest target”-Skill which interacts with the Spear of Justice – homing on the Target affected by it.

Deflection Shot became the new 2 and lost it’s blindness, but got it’s CD lowered. Along with it being a 1/4 Skill, it’s not only a defensive one, as it does apply not only the Piercing Light Trait but also lowers the CD of Virtues faster with Warden’s Faith.
Also, Spear of Justice’s passive might also have a decent synergy with it.
Along with the 1500range which by default raises the flight time, the Skill should “feel” better than being just a blind with lucky-block.

Pin Down is a means of slowing the enemy advance towards your squishies, basically it’s a narrower, longer range version of the Ranger’s Poison Volley, which cripples instead of poisoning. However it isn’t supposed to stack damage if one enemy takes more than one arrow. (Would be broken due to it being narrower)

Dragon Shot (former True Shot) got tweaked a bit so it feels like you channel some REALLY powerful thing. For the animation I tought of a white/light blue dragon (like the one seen in Dragon’s Maw) flying towards the enemy, causing heavy damage.

Explanation for Slot Skills:

First of all: I think traps are a incredibly poor choice for the specialization because of two main factors:

1. You can’t use them underwater… so your specialized char is completely compromised there.

2. It doesn’t fit. The Ranger uses traps so he can then gain distance on the enemy trough his utility, but the Guardian would actually have to enter the fight by himself, which means the previously placed traps are within reach after having jumped with Wings of Resolve to assist your allies (most likely after Weapon swap), which would de-facto leave only the Virtues from your specialization for the most part. This would quite likely exclude the Dragon Hunter from WvW etc.

Purifying Spring is the Healing Skill of the Warden, it’s basic concept is the same as that of the Healing Spring from Guild Wars 1. Which allows him to bring AoE heal into the Backline at the cost of a long cast time and as a heal over time.

Throw Dirt should be really self explaining… basically it allows you to AoE blind a Trap-Sized-Area. I think it’ll have a nice synergy with Wings of Resolve as well.

I merged the 4 former Utility Skills into 2, with a 2s channel time. One of the reasons was that the effects were so massive on the old ones but you always placed them over each other. The way I merged them, it should look decent. Also, the damage needs to be adjusted.

Warden’s Faith is a tweak of Serpent’s Quickness of GW1 and further helps to make the Virtues feel more dynamic (imo).

Dragon’s Ward is supposed to be a mix of Dragon’s Maw and Hunter’s Ward which at the end of the Day will work somewhat similar as the Ranger’s Entangle. (Also quite cool with Wings of Resolve I think).

Gameplay:
For me at least, the old DragonHunter feels like a rather egoistic mid-range char lacking the means of helping his allies. Even the heal trap is all but reliable…

The new Dragon Warden is sitting in the Backline while having enough dynamic components to not become boring, with his AoE Heal, Deflection Shot and Shield of Courage he has active means of supporting while dealing damage and his crippling volley can slow the enemy advance.

However at the same time, the Guardian does not have to passively wait on his Traps but can actively engage “intruders”. Wings of Resolve along with his Utility Skills and Shield of Courage allow him jump into a battle and turn it around. Tough, he’d better change his Weapon for that.

I tried to not give him too much utility on his Bow Attacks, so he doesn’t feel like a Ranger which is more geared towards Escaping/Stealth etc. and more like a pure means of being good on long range, assuming the Guardian would switch Weapons for Melee combat (which he can easily engage as mentioned) as soon as the squishies around him are in Danger.

Something imporant at the end: this is a WIP, I wrote it all in one go and didn’t expect it to get that … long, it’s quite possible I’ve overseen something. But I hope the basic idea is obvious.

Edit: I had to make 3 Posts because the Forum didn’t allow such long posts…

I extremely dislike these changes.

You can’t accuse something of being broken if we haven’t tested it… so just stohp right there mister.

The F1 tether range change of 1200 to 1500 will Never happen.
1. You just removed any form of counterplay possible.
2. We like tethering multiple foes so our dmg modifier on burn targets effects the group rather than a single person.
3. Power Guards will never proc it in this range… Guardians of all build types, would want to be in close and personal when F1 is activated.

Guardians don’t need Survival skills… we’re Guardians. Besides, that would goes against Anet’s excuse for the Dragonhunter turned Witch Hunter analogy.

I very much condone the majority of these changes as it’s not the type of playstyle I prefer. More importantly, mechanically, it doesn’t make sense on the Guardian.
If you want to suggest changes to our Traps then by all means, go for it.

Realistically speaking, the Devs are not going to merging their hard working SFX utility skills into one… no reason to. As a game maker yourself, you’re not going to take two projects you’ve spent hours on only to merge them together. You’ll realize a single SFX from either item would have sufficed and all you really had to do was buff that one item. The two SFX may even be overwhelming (and overkill) compared to other skills.

No.

Message Body length must at least be 15

I agree with Saiyan

Sounds like a fat whopping nerf. Dragonhunter is a “hunter” because it’s supposed to be an offensive take to the Guardian. Even though Ranger’s LB is 1500 range, Guardian would do fine without 1500 range.

Weapon skills : Seeking Arrow… Nothing is worse than hitting something other than your target. Why should an enemy escape your AA by standing anywhere behind another enemy? Like I said, Dragonhunter is supposed to be an offensive Guardian. So when you reap the supposed main source of damage – True Shot – and give it a ghastly cast time with horrid cooldown, how do you expect there to be any damage? Guardians need long range damage options and the curernt dh has it.

Slot skills : Purifying spring isn’t even a water field and it has a three second cast time?. We don’t need more blind spam with Throw Dirt. Aren’t survival skills instant cast by nature? Two second cast times are just screaming for interrupts.

If there’s something important you have to say, say it at the beginning so your audience will have that in mind while reading.

all of those proposed changes looks absolutely horrible.

Saiyan.1704:

I extremely dislike these changes.

You can’t accuse something of being broken if we haven’t tested it… so just stohp right there mister.

The F1 tether range change of 1200 to 1500 will Never happen.
1. You just removed any form of counterplay possible.
2. We like tethering multiple foes so our dmg modifier on burn targets effects the group rather than a single person.
3. Power Guards will never proc it in this range… Guardians of all build types, would want to be in close and personal when F1 is activated.

Guardians don’t need Survival skills… we’re Guardians. Besides, that would goes against Anet’s excuse for the Dragonhunter turned Witch Hunter analogy.

I very much condone the majority of these changes as it’s not the type of playstyle I prefer. More importantly, mechanically, it doesn’t make sense on the Guardian.
If you want to suggest changes to our Traps then by all means, go for it.

Realistically speaking, the Devs are not going to merging their hard working SFX utility skills into one… no reason to. As a game maker yourself, you’re not going to take two projects you’ve spent hours on only to merge them together. You’ll realize a single SFX from either item would have sufficed and all you really had to do was buff that one item. The two SFX may even be overwhelming (and overkill) compared to other skills.

About Spear of Justice:
F1 is currently 900 and about 1200tether , assuming melee range even a Ranger couldn’t come close to breaking the tether with his Point Blank Shot.

What I did was integrating F1 into the Build as a Dragon Hunter, if you use it with weapons other than the Bow+Warden’s Faith, you’ll find the only change is a longer CD, and no more Multi-Target.

Having it a multi-target 10-12s AoE Burn along with Damage and the Traits which synergize with burning or Spear of Justice itself is utterly broken as it shifts a lot of the D.H.’s potential just to this one skill. This would pretty surely lead to having Mace+Shield Guardians running around as “dragon hunters” just for the virtues.

About Survival Skills
The Traps won’t work underwater and have 0 synergy to his build at all.
His healing trap needs a enemy to trigger it while ideally the allies (squishies) he guards in the backline will have gotten out of that range.

Really the only way those Traps are used is on top of each other for a huge spike…

As example, the DH will sit in:
Light’s Judgement
Test of Faith
Procession of Blades
Dragon’s Maw
Purification

As soon as you’re engaging him, you’ll be blinded, bleeding, crippled, vulnerable, trapped, unable to anything for a short time, revealed and slowed.

While you’re about to go down in a fancy mix of white and blue, the DH will follow up with F1, Symbol of Energy and Hunter’s Ward… which most likely will only trap the remainder of you but in case something still stands he can just true shot or use his AA which comes again with free 2x dmg and cripple unless there’s a single target.

That is, unless you just annihilate a target which is close to go down anyway, a pet/minion or whatever… then you’re down to just F1 and whatever.

About the SFX
The SFX are not going to be washed away, you just get 6 skills made into 3:

Hunter’s Ward + Dragon’s Maw = Dragon’s Ward, basically you get Hunter’s Ward in a 600 radius around you and have the poor souls trapped inside getting nomnomed by Dragon’s Maw. The end result will be a alternate of the Ranger’s Entangle (but look much cooler).

Fragments of Faith + Light’s Judgement = Fragments of Justice.
Basically you’ll just have the Fragments of Faith dropped around Targets struck by Light’s Judgement.

Test of Faith + Procession of Blades = Blades of Faith
Quite simple actually, you get the whirling blades inside that Blade-Fence which damages you if you want to escape it.

As you see, there’s no change in the SFX at all, they would just be used in a different way.

Arricson Krei.9560:

Sounds like a fat whopping nerf. Dragonhunter is a “hunter” because it’s supposed to be an offensive take to the Guardian. Even though Ranger’s LB is 1500 range, Guardian would do fine without 1500 range.

Weapon skills : Seeking Arrow… Nothing is worse than hitting something other than your target. Why should an enemy escape your AA by standing anywhere behind another enemy? Like I said, Dragonhunter is supposed to be an offensive Guardian. So when you reap the supposed main source of damage – True Shot – and give it a ghastly cast time with horrid cooldown, how do you expect there to be any damage? Guardians need long range damage options and the curernt dh has it.

Slot skills : Purifying spring isn’t even a water field and it has a three second cast time?. We don’t need more blind spam with Throw Dirt. Aren’t survival skills instant cast by nature? Two second cast times are just screaming for interrupts.

If there’s something important you have to say, say it at the beginning so your audience will have that in mind while reading.

Well, as I said the objective is not to buff/nerf but to change the way he feels to play to something more dynamic.

Seeking Arrow will lock on to your target if it’s affected by Justice and it’s also faster than puncture shot, meaning it is able to proc justice’s passive effect more often as well as reducing the cd of your virtues (that’s why the base CD was raised) significantly when used along with “Warden’s Faith”.

True Shot got a very long casting time and a medium CD so it can be made more powerful. Basically, you target it into a Group and they better dodge it. You can think of it as a single-projectile Version of the Ranger’s rapid fire, which deals all the damage in one big blow. The goal behind this was to make it feel like you’re actually doing a very powerful attack rather than using a flat out better AA whenever it’s off CD.

Purifying Spring would be a Water Field, I just didn’t really get that much into details. Same for the Numbers they are more or less just to showcase if something is faster/slower or has a longer/shorter CD. Also, it’s more of a Backline-Support Heal, than something you’d use in actual melee combat.

Throw Dirt got the blind from deflection arrow, and it’s supposed to synergize with Wings of Resolve to immediately take off damage from your allies.

Cast Time on Slot Skills is that high because I wanted to prevent a huge AoE Spike from them, which ultimatively would be broken in a lot of occasions. Just imagine Guardians with defensive builds going for farming and just mow stuff down with their Slot Skills without any sort of potential danger. But as said these Numbers are just to say it’s going to have a longer cast time. And the one on “Dragon’s Ward” actually got lowered significantly when you compare it to the previous skills Dragon’s Maw and Hunter’s Ward. I also think that a slightly longer cast time for the trade of having lower cooldowns (from 45 on the normal traps down to 30) is somewhat more fun. It’s also worth mentioning that the former Traps took about 1 Second to Cast and another 1 or so to trigger, so the time between starting the cast and getting the result is pretty much unchanged.

(had to double post again due to the post-lenght limit)

Edit: I’ve changed some numbers on the CD. I think the initial ones were indeed a bit too high as you said (esp. Purifying Spring).

Why the hell would I want a weapon that doesn’t attack the enemy that I have targeted?

Black Box.9312:

Why the hell would I want a weapon that doesn’t attack the enemy that I have targeted?

To guard the squishies around you from the nearest thread… And if you focus on someone and land your F1 on him, the Skill will target them.

So it actually rewards landing your F1. As it’s supposed to be notably faster and only single target instead of the old puncturing shot, it’s allows for more focusing instead of less. If you use Warden’s Faith, you’d have your F1 up pretty much non-stop.

Mike.3460:

Black Box.9312:

Why the hell would I want a weapon that doesn’t attack the enemy that I have targeted?

To guard the squishies around you from the nearest thread… And if you focus on someone and land your F1 on him, the Skill will target them.

So it actually rewards landing your F1. As it’s supposed to be notably faster and only single target instead of the old puncturing shot, it’s allows for more focusing instead of less. If you use Warden’s Faith, you’d have your F1 up pretty much non-stop.

why not just target the nearest threat and guard your allies that way instead of using a clunky mechanic?

I agree with saiyan and what looks to be everyone elses opinion that these suggested changes are not good.

we haven’t even gotten to play the DH yet nor have we seen and played against all the other class specializations so you can’t rightly assume anything is OP and needs to be altered.

Wow, you had a well thought out suggestion that would make Dragonhunter not suck and all of these fanboys kitten on it. I don’t know why you even bothered. Anet has some of the most delusional fanboys I’ve ever seen.

Shield of Courage:
Aegis Refresh increased to 60s.
Cooldown increased to 120s.

What????!!!!!

These changes are terrible. What game mode did you have mind when thinking of these changes? It would suck in PvE, PvP, and WvW. No one would ever take this specialization over the existing trait lines.

Was it really necessary to write a multiple-post essay about changes to a class nobody has played yet? If you have this much time, work on your RPG maker. I mean, really, I wrote shorter midterms in college.

rajule.8054:

Mike.3460:

Black Box.9312:

Why the hell would I want a weapon that doesn’t attack the enemy that I have targeted?

To guard the squishies around you from the nearest thread… And if you focus on someone and land your F1 on him, the Skill will target them.

So it actually rewards landing your F1. As it’s supposed to be notably faster and only single target instead of the old puncturing shot, it’s allows for more focusing instead of less. If you use Warden’s Faith, you’d have your F1 up pretty much non-stop.

why not just target the nearest threat and guard your allies that way instead of using a clunky mechanic?

I agree with saiyan and what looks to be everyone elses opinion that these suggested changes are not good.

we haven’t even gotten to play the DH yet nor have we seen and played against all the other class specializations so you can’t rightly assume anything is OP and needs to be altered.

I did not plan to post it prior to the Beta Weekend initially, but I tought feedback on my initial impression would help to provide a more finished suggestion after the BWE.

I did not say the DH is OP as-is, but he relies too much on flat out damage or “free” conditions because his Build isn’t really fleshed out.

There’s a lot of reasons why I changed the first Weapon Skill.
To be blunt I don’t think a (then) 1500range AA Skill on a Full-Plate Character should hit up to two targets by default while at the same time cripple the enemies.

The numbers (the last one I know at least) for the DH are overall way too high in comparsion. Leaving out the 2x hit and cripple, just the base damage on his 1 is atm around twice as high as a Rilfe Engi’s 1, the Longbow Ranger’s 1 (500-1000 distance) or the Hammer Revenant’s 1 (which is stated as 1s, rather than 3/4 of puncture shot).

If the Numbers on the DH would be adjusted accordingly to his prof mechanic, armor etc. he’d be flat out unplayable with the current Kit, which is the main reason I suggested a different kit rather than having a class around which is only good because it got flat-out numbers and free conditions.

Assic.2746:

Shield of Courage:
Aegis Refresh increased to 60s.
Cooldown increased to 120s.

What????!!!!!

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Basically, if you want to focus on long range, you’re supposed to take this instead of say… “Throw Dirt”. The new 1st Weapon Skill I suggested is also faster than the old one, meaning you’d be able to use your virtues notably more often than with the old CD.

I also think you spinned out of control here. I do not want to bash your affort because it can be fun to spin things around but I also feel that neither the tme nor your assumption are right.

Your first reason is really yet to be prooven valid. you do not know if traps do not work underwater at release. pretty sure anet will see to that. they can work as spheres and having stationary objects float where you released them is already a thing with engineers. on top of it … who cares about underwater. I dont get your second reason against traps at all. the DH traps will be absolutley fantastic in keep defenses. my guess is you only have a gripe about the delayed activation – which is a valid point to have but a personal preference rather then a problem of the skill itself.

Dragonhunter is obviously a control and ranged dps focused class. you twisted that way to much by removing hunters ward, the LB knock back and so on. On top you missed a lot of implications imo.

two utilites now have cripple and multiple hit attacks one does vurnability and the other is a little supporty. That is redundant and OP at the same time in combo with permeating wrath.

how wings of resolve an throw dirt work so well together that is worth mentioning is beyond me. giving the DH a utility that he gets as a minor by taking radiance is redundant. this thing is not needed at all if the bow keeps its blind.

your Wardens faith is tied to bow which is a no go imo. there are no utilities ingame that are specifically tied to a weapon. if you do not use bow this is completely useless. on top it encourages bad play and is again totally worthless if you do not want or need to pop virtues(condi guard) or the effect is to marginal (VoC). The mechanic is interesting though but it should work regardless of the weapon – but in this case it would be extremely OP again. Maybe this should be a trait and not a utility.

you nerfed the elite the pull is awsome – again CC removed.

All in all I think making a DH a cripple monster will be more boring then actual CC. I really think you missed your goal making it more dynamic. I think it would get more boring with these changes.

Mike.3460:

Black Box.9312:

Why the hell would I want a weapon that doesn’t attack the enemy that I have targeted?

To guard the squishies around you from the nearest thread… And if you focus on someone and land your F1 on him, the Skill will target them.

So it actually rewards landing your F1. As it’s supposed to be notably faster and only single target instead of the old puncturing shot, it’s allows for more focusing instead of less. If you use Warden’s Faith, you’d have your F1 up pretty much non-stop.

Sorry, but no. There are a lot of things that I don’t like about the dragonhunter, but this would most certainly make it even worse.

Rabidd.9458:

These changes are terrible. What game mode did you have mind when thinking of these changes? It would suck in PvE, PvP, and WvW. No one would ever take this specialization over the existing trait lines.

As opposed to the totally not sucky choices anet made right? What a joke. Nobody is going to use traps or that garbage longbow that anet designed either but you keep being a fanboy.

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

Darknicrofia.2604:

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

Well, let’s be honest though: Traps are not going to be a game changer. They might be good for WvW zerg warfare where people are just going to blob and not pay attention to where they’re stepping, but other than that they are mechanically flawed by design.

Darknicrofia.2604:

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

No, I can 100% without a doubt say for a fact that the traps are useless and now and will be useless at launch. I can also say that you are absolutely deluded if you’re calling the dragon hunter longbow as anet has presented it a heavy hitting power weapon. It is a piece of kitten with no real damage capability. I bet you also run guardian staff and think that hits hard too.

Dinks.2478:

Darknicrofia.2604:

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

No, I can 100% without a doubt say for a fact that the traps are useless and now and will be useless at launch. I can also say that you are absolutely deluded if you’re calling the dragon hunter longbow as anet has presented it a heavy hitting power weapon. It is a piece of kitten with no real damage capability. I bet you also run guardian staff and think that hits hard too.

A crap ranged weapon with 85% damage modifiers …. We will see.

Glint’s blessing is going to be a Revenant thing probably. I’d love “Dragonslayer” instead of hunter.

Somebody didn’t watch the recent live stream of Grouch playing Dragonhunter. LB and traps are going to be fine additions.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Somebody didn’t watch the recent live stream of Grouch playing Dragonhunter. LB and traps are going to be fine additions.

If you’re talking about during the Dragon Hunter POI I watched that. He fought an NPC and an afk thief. Good job! /s

No, the livestream that happened yesterday. He had success and he didn’t even play the class particularly well.

But even in the POI, he dueled a pvp dev, and you could see the potential of hambow there.

Dinks.2478:

Darknicrofia.2604:

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

No, I can 100% without a doubt say for a fact that the traps are useless and now and will be useless at launch. I can also say that you are absolutely deluded if you’re calling the dragon hunter longbow as anet has presented it a heavy hitting power weapon. It is a piece of kitten with no real damage capability. I bet you also run guardian staff and think that hits hard too.

No clue what anyone did to kitten you off but lets set a few things straight here…

• You don’t speak for the Guardian community (thank goodness)
• Whether you like it or not, the Bow WILL be a nice addition for people who wants a more viable ranged weapon. Is it meant to do massive amounts of damage? Heck no! Look at the weapon’s skills for goodness sake. It’s AoE CC abilities are on part with Hammer and/or Staff. Learn to read between the lines and realize what the weapon is meant to do.

I can 100% without a doubt say for a fact you will eat your words when you see people using the Bow Specialization in WvW, PvE and even PvP.

Asmodal.6489:

-snip-

Traps won’t be usable underwater. And even if, they remain a bad choice unless you want to abandon everything the Guardian stands for and go for a pure 1vsNoob build, nuking somebody with your traps+bow so low that you can easily kill him without any sort of effort. Your Wings of Resolve would allow to quickly engage and protect nearby allies, yet traps won’t be able to follow up on that. If you had read my OP entirely you’d have seen that I did keep ALL (!!!) effects of the Traps and turned them into new, instant-action skills.

LB knockback is a joke atm, it’s range is very close and only works once in 7 seconds. If you’d buff it, it would become OP very quickly… but as-is, I can’t see it being valid.

Hunter’s Ward isn’t gone, it’s just paired with the Elite. Both had a 60s CD previously.

wings of resolve an throw dirt work that well together, because you deal damage, heal allies and lower the damage taken. It’s of yourse a skill made for Guardians which will switch weapons.

Wardens faith Is tied to a bow for a good reason. First of all you’re playing a SPECIALIZATION, meaning it’s not the end of all days to use a connection between utility and weapon of the same Specialization. If you make a DH and don’t want to use bow (???) you’d still be able to take throw dirt instead. Well… having a dimished effect when not using the virtues is surely a thing… but why wouldn’t you use your virtues?

the elite Didn’t lose anything… it’s a instant AoE which uses the old Hunter’s Ward AND Dragon’s Maw effects in a way comparable to the Ranger’s Entangle.

And I don’t think the cripple will make up for anything, however the Guardian should NOT have means of keeping the enemy at distance 24/7, like a longbow ranger with lightning reflexes etc. He has Heavy Armor and is supposed to swap weapons when the enemy comes into melee range. If you give him the ability to maintain distance, while keeping the damage he has, then it would be flat out OP to other ranged chars.

Darknicrofia.2604:

The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

Anet can not and will not make the Dragon Hunter as-is a heavy damage dealer, in terms of Balance this is flat out impossible. They’ll either nerf the CC or the Damage from the numbers we know from the Wiki. I get that people see the Numbers, range, armor and fall in love with the tought of being a heavy-armor-ranger, but this will NOT be the end result.

Saiyan.1704:

• Whether you like it or not, the Bow WILL be a nice addition for people who wants a more viable ranged weapon. Is it meant to do massive amounts of damage? Heck no! Look at the weapon’s skills for goodness sake. It’s AoE CC abilities are on part with Hammer and/or Staff. Learn to read between the lines and realize what the weapon is meant to do.

The numbers attached to it now are dealing massive damage in comparsion to others.

Inevitably Anet will adjust it towards either the CC or the DMG part, as both (as-is) will not be balanced. That’s why I changed a lot of things and wrapped the CC/DMG into actual gameplay, rather than handing out flat numbers.

PS: I’m sorry if I can’t respond to any post, but I don’t have a lot of time. The whole OT was just something that crossed my mind after seeing the Dragon Hunter having almost no Gameplay.

Sorry but now I can not take you seriously anymore. Knock back not valid but buffing makes it OP? Taking away a pull that stacks enemies is “not losing” anything? Ignoring a fact that you created the first and only utility exclusively tied to a weapon is very questionable. Your Instant Action term speaks for itself … not realizing that their combined effects Are too strong does not call for defending but coming up with numbers that would be acceptable.

Lets Come back After the weekend … This Is too much fantasy

Passive knockback every 7second which also can be used in a trueshot ji blinding blade combo is weak…Okay i have seen everything in this thread. Also they reduced hunter wards to 45cd.

Honestly i believe outside of that gm minor trait, dragonhunter and lb are quite solid as they are and i definitely looking forward to it. Traps are for different thread, but its not my playstyle at all so i wont commend on them. Tomorrow its time for medi gs/lb guard.

So basically you want to make changes to something you have not yet tried and have no experience with and if any it’s only a tiny bit.

Thanks but no thanks.

These changes are yuck all around.

Killyox.3950:

So basically you want to make changes to something you have not yet tried and have no experience with and if any it’s only a tiny bit.

Thanks but no thanks.

Rest assured I did spend plenty of time going trough the Skills/Traits and watched the Vids over and over.

However, most of the people here flame everything I wrote without giving it a single tought.

The changes I actually made are minor, most of the stuff just got shifted around. The most notable change is F1 and 1 which will provide notably higher dps against a single target but no more AoE (for the sake of balance).

The main goal of this post was giving some ideas to the Devs rather than demanding the DH to be like this.

During or after the BWE1/2 I’ll post more compact suggestions which keep more of the original design.

Dinks.2478:

Darknicrofia.2604:

Oh man those generalizations. “Nobody” is going to use traps or longbow? I didn’t realize when you spoke for me or for every other person too. The kitten class hasn’t even been played live once yet, you have ZERO clue on how the traps will affect the metagame or how much of a game changer a heavy hitting 1200 CC/power weapon will help guardians.

But keep speaking for everyone anyways, you do not look anything like a fool.

No, I can 100% without a doubt say for a fact that the traps are useless and now and will be useless at launch. I can also say that you are absolutely deluded if you’re calling the dragon hunter longbow as anet has presented it a heavy hitting power weapon. It is a piece of kitten with no real damage capability. I bet you also run guardian staff and think that hits hard too.

true shot critting for 5k in marauder amulet…gg

Mike.3460:

However, most of the people here flame everything I wrote without giving it a single tought.

I gave it at least two thoughts. The first was:
“Wow, this is bad.”
The second was:
“Oh my goodness, I don’t want anything like this”
But hey, you can’t win everything.

Watching the recent streams, DH is going to be perfectly fine. Traps will have their place, LB will be useful, and DH traits are all around quality.

Wow the people here are hostile. All the guy did was make some suggestions. TBH I am on the wait and see train but given Anet’s kitten poor ability at making things useful, I’m doubtful.

Well I wonder how people will react now that some of us have had a chance to play the class. That said, I’d like to thank Mike for his pre-beta feedback? I mean to say thanks of course. But not sure if he played the class before us or something. Either way, I’ll be responding to his words as if he played the Beta today and then typed this. Now…

Name – I like the name as is. But if it was changed, I wouldn’t lose no sleep over it. Considering these are Guardians now taking the fight to Dragons, Dragonhunter does fit… but a LOT of people want a name change. If I had to pick my battles… this is one I’d give up right away.

Profession changes – I am surprised they would receive such nerfs. I don’t think they are so necessary, but that would require more testing.

Longbow 1 – This is the change that gets me the most. But I’ll start off with saying making the auto attack 1/2 is a good idea. 3/4 is too slow. But it sounds as if in combination with the suggested change to Spear of Justice, that Longbow 1 would ONLY attack enemies afflicted by Spear of Justice. Only then will it hit another enemy. That makes changing targets on the fly really hard. That worries me the most.

True Shot & Deflecting Shot – The changes to True Shot I like (with it being called Dragon Shot and actually doing damage). But I would apply those to Deflecting shot. Deflecting Shot feels more like a chore then a worthwhile attack. True Shot as is, isn’t too bad when compared to in game Deflecting Shot. Deflecting Shot is the really bad DH move. But… if I am reading this right, making True Shot (Dragon Shot) the 4th skill and Deflecting shot the 2nd skill would be okay. TS would be a longer cooldown powerful shot and Dshot would be the 2nd attack for damage. I could live with those changes.

Symbol of Energy (suggested Pin Down replacement) – Symbol of Energy is meh and needs fixing. But replacing it with Pin Down isn’t necessary if SoE is fixed. And I think it can be.

Losing Traps – As a Ranger main… DH would be lucky to lose ‘em. Traps BLOW. They are bad with Rangers and DH have inherited the bad. So changing them to something else is fine by me. I wouldn’t argue the “they are Ranger feeling” factor but having used them in game… they are subpar to any other Guardian skills. Oh and Dragon’s Maw is super bad. So yeah. Though I doubt in all honesty that Anet would just drop Traps for DH like that. But Traps need to be THROWABLE. That would help DH and Rangers. Except Dragon’s Maw. Still super bad.

Extra: I can’t clam to have ever played the old DragonHunter class from GW1. But I get the feeling that DH are to be offensive Guardians while their defense/utility becomes secondary. This is the opposite of current Guardians. I wouldn’t change that. Let DH stay offensive. And I like the DH class that is in the Beta. I don’t know if I would argue major changes to it. Sure the Longbow needs tweaking. But that’s it. I would argue to ditch traps but that is because traps are broken from another class and I wouldn’t want to bring that to DH. And even if Traps stay subpar, DH doesn’t suffer from bad utility skills like Revenant might as the old Guardian skills are still for use in combination with the Longbow.

Now I think I rambled on enough. Just trying to give Anet some feedback. Pick their brains and what not. And whether anyone agrees with me or Mike or anyone else, please respect that we took the time to try and better this class. Please & thank you.

The Wiki doesn’t seem to have been actualized yet, so I can post a little update here on how the skills were changed. However, I dont know how the wiki people made their numbers so a direct comparsion is impossible.

What I did was using Zerks Armor (exotic) with the default runes and only Amulet, so it matched the 1085 damage stated for Whirling Wrath in the tooltip. All other Skills were notably stronger than the ones stated on the wiki:

Strike and Hammer Swing are stated with 296+(0.8) in the wiki, on the char I used for testing they were rated at 330.
Assuming the Char I used for testing is stronger than whatever spawned the Numbers, I’ll place > in front of the Numbers I’ve gotten on the current Skills.

Spear of Justice:
Damage: 354 to >206
Cooldown: 16,25s to 25s

Wings of Resolve
Healing: 1625 to 2614 (possible I missed something with the healing power)
CD: 60s to 50s

Shield of Courage
CD: 90s to 75s

Punkture Shot
Damage: 574 to >318

True Shot
Damage: 1641 to >825

Deflection Shot
Damage: 615 to >309

Symbol of Energy
Damage: 2050 to > 1030
Burning duration from 2s to 5s

Hunter’s Ward
Initial 205 to >103
Final 1641 to >619
Cooldown: 60s to kitten

Purification
Damage: 97 to >77

Fragments of Faith
Damage: 1462 to >1031

Light’s Judgement
Damage: 1100 to >770

Test of Faith
Damage: 1462 to >1031
CD: kitten to 30s

Procession of Blades
Damage: 1930 to >1360
CD: kitten to 25s

Dragon’s Maw
Damage: 1462 to >825

So while it’s important to keep in mind that the Numbers are not obtained the same way those on the wiki were, it’s quite noticable that the damage got reduced. A lot.

Pucture Shot was previously listed with 574 damage, now it’s weaker than the first Skills with Hammer/Greatsword which are listed with 296… So with the wiki’s way of obtaining numbers, Puncture Shot would be about 285.

That’s exactly what I said Anet would have to do when intending to keep it balanced as-is and the reason why I did change the 1 skill and F1 this drastically.

Sonickeyblade.8415:

-snip-

^had to snip it, otherwise forum would have made me double or triple post again.

Longbow 1 The change suggested would make the skill target the nearest enemy by default, unless a target is affected by spear of justice, then it would attack this Target only. I’m fully aware of the many downsides this comes with, but keep in mind that the 20s CD of Spear of Justice could be lowered by “Warden’s Faith” and the new 1 Skill (1/2s) rapidly. So you’d use F1 to Pick a Spike-Victim. The inability to change the target at will is a balance factor, as it would otherwise get out of hand rapidly.

Deflection Shot I wanted to take blindness off it and make it a fast, short-cd skill, which really should just get rid of projectiles. Nothing for dmg etc, just a utility.

True Shot (Dragon Shot) Yeah, I wanted to give the player a feeling of preparing something that REALLY hurts if it lands. Since there are plenty of ways to prevent it (projectile-barricades, deflection shot etc. etc.) there should be no holding back on the Damage part and no reason to place a super long CD.

Symbol of Energy (suggested Pin Down replacement) Pin down would replace Hunter’s Ward, not SoE. SoE would become the 5th skill because it’s got the longest CD. The Skill order would be:

1 = Seeking Arrow
2 = Deflection Shot (5s)
3 = Pin Down (10s)
4 = Dragon Shot (12s)
5 = SoE (15s)

Losing Traps My highest char is also the Ranger, but recently the kitten yness of my Animals is kinda driving me off from him. I was initially hoping I could sort-of get away with the Guardian as my Ranger until something comes close. But the weapon skills aren’t really well made overall… it was obvious from the start that the numbers would need to be lowered if all else is kept. Basically all he can do now is sitting somewhere with his Aegis up and rely on the 20% from that. I could live with passing on the traps alltogether and go for consecreations instead.

To be frank, I’d currently see the Scepter in front of the LB, since you don’t have to sacrifice that much for it and the difference isn’t that big. However, right now… I’d see the Revenant WAY ahead of the range-guardian and the Ranger.

Edit: The old GW only had Monks, Eles, Necros, Mesmers, Rangers, Warriors, Assassins, Ritualists, Dervishs and Paragons.

Mike.3460:

snups

Don’t forget, the numbers on the wiki aren’t actually super reliable when considering what to expect. Way back when the first beta with Revenant was available, the damage numbers were appropriate for the 6/6/6/0/0 style traits. After the specialization update, those skills had to be increased by around 30% or so. A lot of what they showed us during the DH reveal wasn’t necessarily accurate to the state of the game.

And of course, with recharge changes, lower damage could still end up being higher dps. If not, there’s certainly more utility from lower cooldowns.

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Mike.3460:

snups

Don’t forget, the numbers on the wiki aren’t actually super reliable when considering what to expect. Way back when the first beta with Revenant was available, the damage numbers were appropriate for the 6/6/6/0/0 style traits. After the specialization update, those skills had to be increased by around 30% or so. A lot of what they showed us during the DH reveal wasn’t necessarily accurate to the state of the game.

And of course, with recharge changes, lower damage could still end up being higher dps. If not, there’s certainly more utility from lower cooldowns.

I’m aware of that, but the recharge etc. hasn’t gone down notably… on spear of Justice it even went up – a lot.

Also, what I tried to show was that the relation of the skills has changed, i.E. that the LB now deals less than the Hammer Attacks.

AFAIK, the numbers on the wiki are done without traits.

However, I don’t understand why they’re not taking numbers from lvl 80 chars with a exotic weapon and no equipment otherwise for the base, then add something with X power to get the damage added trough power. Would certainly make it a lot easier to follow.

BIGHARSHNESS.3510:

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Mike.3460:

BIGHARSHNESS.3510:

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Why even add that playability to begin with? I don’t want to stay on the bow longer than I have to while also be dependent on the bow hit rate at 1200 range. I most definitely don’t want to feel like I’m penalized by not doing so.

Sorry for the harsh criticism but if you develop your games around your own personal playstyle, it’s going to fail. My original post still stands.

Saiyan.1704:

Mike.3460:

BIGHARSHNESS.3510:

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Why even add that playability to begin with? I don’t want to stay on the bow longer than I have to while also be dependent on the bow hit rate at 1200 range. I most definitely don’t want to feel like I’m penalized by not doing so.

Sorry for the harsh criticism but if you develop your games around your own personal playstyle, it’s going to fail. My original post still stands.

Your argumentation makes no sense.

You don’t want to stick with the Longbow (which is the core of the specialization) for long, that’s fine. But why would I lose you at the 120s CD for Shield of Courage then?

It’s not like the SoC is that essential for your Melee Combat and if, you can still get it off CD and save it before you go in.

The Base CD I suggested for Spear of Justice actually is lower than what Anet changed it to now.

Also, the other changes I made can be considered HUGE improvements for those who’d change to melee Weapons accordingly.

Mike.3460:

Saiyan.1704:

Mike.3460:

BIGHARSHNESS.3510:

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Why even add that playability to begin with? I don’t want to stay on the bow longer than I have to while also be dependent on the bow hit rate at 1200 range. I most definitely don’t want to feel like I’m penalized by not doing so.

Sorry for the harsh criticism but if you develop your games around your own personal playstyle, it’s going to fail. My original post still stands.

Your argumentation makes no sense.

You don’t want to stick with the Longbow (which is the core of the specialization) for long, that’s fine. But why would I lose you at the 120s CD for Shield of Courage then?

It’s not like the SoC is that essential for your Melee Combat and if, you can still get it off CD and save it before you go in.

The problem is that you’re taking a base class mechanic that can be incorporated into all playstyles and nerfing it heavily unless players take a specific utility along with a specific weapon. That’s not good design, and it would do needless harm to DH build diversity. Furthermore, even DH’s who take the LB and your suggested utility are still going to be utilizing their weapon swap, which disables the effect of the utility that you’re trying to balance the specialization around.

Soryuju.8164:

Mike.3460:

Saiyan.1704:

Mike.3460:

BIGHARSHNESS.3510:

You lost me at increasing a cool down to 120s. Nope.

(Utility)Warden’s Faith
Activation: Instant
Cooldown: 45
Duration: 45
Your Arrow hits reduce the cooldown of your Virtues by 1 Second, ends when your Health drops below 75%.

Why even add that playability to begin with? I don’t want to stay on the bow longer than I have to while also be dependent on the bow hit rate at 1200 range. I most definitely don’t want to feel like I’m penalized by not doing so.

Sorry for the harsh criticism but if you develop your games around your own personal playstyle, it’s going to fail. My original post still stands.

Your argumentation makes no sense.

You don’t want to stick with the Longbow (which is the core of the specialization) for long, that’s fine. But why would I lose you at the 120s CD for Shield of Courage then?

It’s not like the SoC is that essential for your Melee Combat and if, you can still get it off CD and save it before you go in.

The problem is that you’re taking a base class mechanic that can be incorporated into all playstyles and nerfing it heavily unless players take a specific utility along with a specific weapon. That’s not good design, and it would do needless harm to DH build diversity. Furthermore, even DH’s who take the LB and your suggested utility are still going to be utilizing their weapon swap, which disables the effect of the utility that you’re trying to balance the specialization around.

It is not a class basic mechanic, it’s one unique to the Dragonhunter specialization.
So I gave the DH a DH-only Utility which allows his DH-only profession mechanic to be used to greater effect if he uses the Weapon which makes the DH interesting in the first place.

The Guardian’s Utility skills offer A LOT, so I can’t see anyone taking the DH Line for utility and then choose Scepter over LB… after the Changes I suggested to LB, at least.

As he is now, the DH feels like a flat out inferior hammer-revenant to me. I’m not just talking about Damage, it’s the whole feel that currently makes the DH look rather boring, despite a Longbow-Guardian being one hell of an announcement initially.