Guild Wars 2

So the first two traitline choices are great, but whats up with the gm line? Two condi choices (RR not so good) and a signet mastery? Really? Its really depressing when I go to build for dps, I think, yay omg +15% crit chance for first choice, easy immob for second, then faceplant.

Anyone have some constructive ideas to make our choice of a gm a little better? I’ll start it off:

Radiant Retaliation – your retaliation activates twice against critical hits.
On second thought that sounds really op.
Radiant Retaliation – 1/3 of retaliation damage you deal heals nearby allies (360 radius).
Maybe a rework to signets.
Perfect Inscriptions – your signets maintain their passive effect when activated and recharge 30% faster.
Scrap RR altogether for a dps choice.
Deadly Precision – your critical hits inflict 10 seconds of vulnerability.

Radiant Retal and Perfect Inscriptions might need some work, but these are not the solutions.

Hi we earlier had an idea which could give the spec some new life.
Instead of:
Signets grant light aura on active.
Make it:
Signets proc a Symbol on active.

Either the GreatSword symbol on all for perma retaliation to keep it similar to light aura.
Or most interestingly a different symbol on each signet:
Heal procs vigor symbol(longbow) at feet
Immob procs swiftness symbol(staff) at feet
Knockdown procs retal symbol(GS) at target
Tanking procs protection symbol(hammer) at target(usually you are at melee anyway)
Res procs regen symbol(mace) on completion ground targeted
Elite procs res symbol(downed) on completion ground targeted

(They could all be standardised to at feet on completion for 4 seconds for simplicity)

PS. The retaliation trait needs some work also and for that my suggestion would be adding retaliation now procs on your attacks as well as when you get attacked.
Now your opponents can’t cleanse this source of condition damage, only boon strip it. (within the realms of balance of course, perhaps a % chance on hit)

Those grand masters are terrible.

Amplified Wrath is good, but only really shines with a condi build. A change from +burn damage, to +burn duration I think would be more helpful to both condi and power Guardians since you would have higher uptimes for your other “while burning” traits.

Perfect Inscriptions isn’t that bad of a trait, but I think it only illustrates how underwhelming our signets are compared to other utilities; which I think is a positive for our profession.

Radiant Retaliation is such a bad trait, since the only build that would pick this up is a condi build, but a condi build will always get Amplified Wrath over this. It would make more sense if they made it scale from toughness for Knight’s armor wearers, but it would still be in the wrong trait line.

Indure.5410:

Amplified Wrath is good, but only really shines with a condi build. A change from +burn damage, to +burn duration I think would be more helpful to both condi and power Guardians since you would have higher uptimes for your other “while burning” traits.

That would be awful. It’s already possible to cap burn duration with only a little bit of Viper gear. We don’t need more burn duration this would just kitten condi guards.

RR is completely useless though and needs to go. Honestly not sure what should be there instead. I actually like the “retaliation deals double damage when you are hit by a critical strike” idea.

^ Actually, I would love ways to get burn duration without resorting to gear to do so, especially viper. Not such an awful idea and longer burn durations are quite an improvement for Fiery Wrath where damage increase doesn’t.

Mallis.4295:

That would be awful. It’s already possible to cap burn duration with only a little bit of Viper gear. We don’t need more burn duration this would just kitten condi guards.

I’m unsure how this would hurt condi guardians. They would lose 15% damage on burns (their burst; odd to say for condi damage), but if they are getting an extra tick on their burns their overall DPS would be higher. Although the GM trait would have to give a tick to all your burns, so a flat % wouldn’t work.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Radiant Retal and Perfect Inscriptions might need some work, but these are not the solutions.

Ok good talk.

Arutha.9874:

Hi we earlier had an idea which could give the spec some new life.
Instead of:
Signets grant light aura on active.
Make it:
Signets proc a Symbol on active.

This is an interesting idea.

Indure.5410:

Perfect Inscriptions isn’t that bad of a trait, but I think it only illustrates how underwhelming our signets are compared to other utilities; which I think is a positive for our profession.

Its a positive when comparing bad utilities to good ones? Shouldnt they all be good to improve diversity?

I think the argument for condi guards and burn duration is that with another burn duration trait, they can choose tankier gear instead of vipers correct? I am not very well versed in condi guard so I’m trying to understand the situation.

People have been capping burn long before Viper’s or Trailblazer’s have existed. 15% duration is not actually that useful for a Burning Guardian. Iirc, Guardian only has 1-2 traits (Amplified Wrath, Radiant Power, and somewhat Inner Fire) that benefit from striking a foe while burned. Amplified Wrath is already the better option. Guardians have a unique way of using condition damage, and changing Amplified Wrath in that way would damage that niche.
I’d make no changes.

Perfect Inscriptions is kind of odd. I’ll agree that the trait itself is pretty good and most of the problem is on the signets themselves. This isn’t unique to Guardians, but signets kind of seem… undefined. 3/6 signets have stat boosts. 2/6 are timer based, and 1/6 is a flat damage reduction (variable stat boost essentially). 2/6 actives are CC, one is “power” based (knockdown) while the other is condition based (Immobilize, benefits from duration but not damage), 1/6 gives a support boon and condition, 3/6 have some form of healing (one is a res). In order to make a straightforward trait, you need a straightforward set of skills. The themes of Signets seem to be CC and healing support.
Personally, I would change:

• Signet of Mercy to a 10% Healing passive while keeping the revival active.
• For Signet of Wrath, I could see the passive becoming +20% condition duration. The active would likely stay the same.
• Signet of Judgement would keep its passive. The active would change to provide 2s Taunt
• Bane Signet would change its passive to grant Swiftness for 5s every 10s.
• With all that being said, Perfect Inscriptions would then change to inflict Weakness on enemies and improve Signet effects (20%, same as current).

Now onto Radiant Retaliation. Because it’s the retaliation trait, it should help provide the uptime. We can move Perfect Inscription’s Light Aura over to an on-hit effect while under Retaliation. 3s Light Aura, 10s icd. In addition, I would change the scaling to use the original power-based scale (power*0.075) and use that same number to scale from condition damage (cd*0.075). This would make it more of a hybrid styled trait. This makes the balance be between defensive and offensive stats.

Some of the other traits, especially involving retal, will still need some clean up and smoothing over, but this could give a good start to opening up some options.

Perfect inscriptions really needs work.

Before they changed the trait lines signets were actually better because they could cleanse a condition on use. Now all they give is a stupid light aura which has a CD and can be easily gained by doing finishers on light fields anyway.

If they make it do something nice like give protection or resistance when you use a signet then it would be worth taking.

Even with that however I doubt people would want to take signet of mercy or courage for anything serious.

Radiant retaliation also needs a major rework. As is even if you were using full rabid gear (which nobody will ever due to the loss of dps from all other sources) it would only result in a 5% increase in the damage retaliation does vs zerk.

Ghotistyx.6942:

People have been capping burn long before Viper’s or Trailblazer’s have existed. 15% duration is not actually that useful for a Burning Guardian. Iirc, Guardian only has 1-2 traits (Amplified Wrath, Radiant Power, and somewhat Inner Fire) that benefit from striking a foe while burned. Amplified Wrath is already the better option. Guardians have a unique way of using condition damage, and changing Amplified Wrath in that way would damage that niche.
I’d make no changes.

Perfect Inscriptions is kind of odd. I’ll agree that the trait itself is pretty good and most of the problem is on the signets themselves. This isn’t unique to Guardians, but signets kind of seem… undefined. 3/6 signets have stat boosts. 2/6 are timer based, and 1/6 is a flat damage reduction (variable stat boost essentially). 2/6 actives are CC, one is “power” based (knockdown) while the other is condition based (Immobilize, benefits from duration but not damage), 1/6 gives a support boon and condition, 3/6 have some form of healing (one is a res). In order to make a straightforward trait, you need a straightforward set of skills. The themes of Signets seem to be CC and healing support.
Personally, I would change:

• Signet of Mercy to a 10% Healing passive while keeping the revival active.
• For Signet of Wrath, I could see the passive becoming +20% condition duration. The active would likely stay the same.
• Signet of Judgement would keep its passive. The active would change to provide 2s Taunt
• Bane Signet would change its passive to grant Swiftness for 5s every 10s.
• With all that being said, Perfect Inscriptions would then change to inflict Weakness on enemies and improve Signet effects (20%, same as current).

Now onto Radiant Retaliation. Because it’s the retaliation trait, it should help provide the uptime. We can move Perfect Inscription’s Light Aura over to an on-hit effect while under Retaliation. 3s Light Aura, 10s icd. In addition, I would change the scaling to use the original power-based scale (power*0.075) and use that same number to scale from condition damage (cd*0.075). This would make it more of a hybrid styled trait. This makes the balance be between defensive and offensive stats.

Some of the other traits, especially involving retal, will still need some clean up and smoothing over, but this could give a good start to opening up some options.

I think these are very well thought-out suggestions and deserve to see the light of day. Hahahaaa, get it, because….radiance… and light! (someone please high five meeeee)

Signets could do to have a bit of rework, they aren’t overpowered in any way, and a lot of people don’t use them (other than a single signet for certain builds) because there are generally “better” options out there (pvp and wvw perspective here). As for the Radiance GMs, I totally agree, we need a bit of reworking.

Radiant Retaliation is just not at all a good grand master… even if you used absolutely no burn skills, didn’t use torch, had every possible skill that gave retaliation and had as few blocks as possible, I’d be willing to bet that Amplified Wrath would still be a better choice for a condition build. Ok perhaps not, but it’s that much better in most cases that I can’t ever see myself taking RR when playing as a condi guardian. Reworking of the GMs in such a way that Ghosti suggested could bring some life to this trait line!

I like how towards the end of designing Elite Specs, the devs tried to capitalise on three different trait “themes”. For Scrapper, there was a trait in each tier that corresponded to themes of stability, lightning fields and superspeed, and sustain. I’d like it if the devs put more of their work into updating the Core Traits so they aren’t simply outclassed by the new perspective of “themed trait lines”.

For Radiance, I’m getting the vibe that it’s supposed to focus on signets, condition damage, and critical chance, with an underlying theme of retaliation and Virtue of Justice.

Proposed Changes
Keep all minors the same

• Adept
  1. Right-Hand Strength (Critical)
  2. Perfect Inscription w/o increased passive effects. (Signet)
  3. Striking a foe with Virtue of Justice’s active effect creates a fire field at their location that causes burning. (Burning)

• Master
  1. Gain Fury when you gain retaliation (Critical)
  2. Wrath of Justice (Signet)
  3. Radiant Fire (Burning)

• GM
  1. Gain 50 precision for each stack of Virtue of Justice’s Passive. Activating Virtue of Justice increases your critical strike chance by 100% for 2 seconds. (Critical)
  2. Gain +8% movement speed for each Signet Passive. Light Auras last 2s longer. (Signet)
  3. Amplified Wrath (Burning)

Rationale:

I wanted to go for cross-synergy so that players could go “hybrid” if they chose to. I think it’s obvious that one who wants a critical chance focused build would choose all the 1 options, and someone who wants a burning build would go for the 3 options. But if someone who was going to direct damage had a good upkeep for fury (medis), then they might choose M3 for the torch 4 skill (does great direct damage) or M2 and GM1 for burst set up. Or someone who has poor fury upkeep could choose A2 and M1. They’d indirectly get fury for activating signets. Someone who wants to lockdown targets and cause burning would choose A3 and M2 (would also work better in teams) or be more traditional with A3 and M3.

I chose GM1 because it allows the player to set up burst and have even more critical chance. I think this is a little too strong, but I think it’s just a numbers problem and I intentionally limited it to “activation” not “strike with active effect”, because it puts the player in a position to trigger it at the right moments, rather than to activate VoJ and then wait for the moment. I chose GM2 because I feel like it’ll give substance and incentive to signet focused builds.

Let me know what y’all think, comments are welcome!

Indure.5410:

Mallis.4295:

That would be awful. It’s already possible to cap burn duration with only a little bit of Viper gear. We don’t need more burn duration this would just kitten condi guards.

I’m unsure how this would hurt condi guardians. They would lose 15% damage on burns (their burst; odd to say for condi damage), but if they are getting an extra tick on their burns their overall DPS would be higher. Although the GM trait would have to give a tick to all your burns, so a flat % wouldn’t work.

I’m sorry you just don’t understand damage multipliers at all. In the first place again you can cap burning duration as it is right now so another 15% would be completely wasted. And let’s say you use it for that last 15% it’s still much less damage than a 15% burning damage increase. On one hand you have 185% duration burning with 15% increased damage. On the other we have 185% duration with 15% increased duration. The difference is 212.75% damage vs 200% damage making duration much less.

Mallis.4295:

Indure.5410:

Mallis.4295:

That would be awful. It’s already possible to cap burn duration with only a little bit of Viper gear. We don’t need more burn duration this would just kitten condi guards.

I’m unsure how this would hurt condi guardians. They would lose 15% damage on burns (their burst; odd to say for condi damage), but if they are getting an extra tick on their burns their overall DPS would be higher. Although the GM trait would have to give a tick to all your burns, so a flat % wouldn’t work.

I’m sorry you just don’t understand damage multipliers at all. In the first place again you can cap burning duration as it is right now so another 15% would be completely wasted. And let’s say you use it for that last 15% it’s still much less damage than a 15% burning damage increase. On one hand you have 185% duration burning with 15% increased damage. On the other we have 185% duration with 15% increased duration. The difference is 212.75% damage vs 200% damage making duration much less.

I never said that if it was changed to +duration it should stay the same percentage, I specifically said that a flat percentage wouldn’t work. But I think a change to “1s increase to all burning damage” would, because it would guarantee a tick of damage for all your burns.

Assuming a proc of your passive Virtue of Justice = 350 damage x2s = 700 total damage. Currently Avenging Wrath gives 15% increase so it would add 105 bonus damage for a total of 805 over 2s. By changing Avenging Wrath to a 1s duration increase, it becomes 1050 damage over 3s. This would be a 30% DPS gain, but it would stretch the damage further over time thus keeping it somewhat balanced compared to the current Avenging Wrath. Since burns now stack in intensity (capping is irrelevant) this is a straight DPS gain and synergizes better with Fiery Wrath, Radiant Power, and Inner Fire.

Overall this is the same argument you can have over sinister vs viper gear. Sinister is going to give you an earlier DPS gain, but will ultimately become much weaker the longer the fight persist.

Also, I agree that keeping burning capped on berserker guardians is already doable, but it falls off easy in some of the harder content and especially in PVP.

Arricson Krei.9560:

Proposed Changes
Keep all minors the same

• Adept
  1. Right-Hand Strength (Critical)
  2. Perfect Inscription w/o increased passive effects. (Signet)
  3. Striking a foe with Virtue of Justice’s active effect creates a fire field at their location that causes burning. (Burning)

• Master
  1. Gain Fury when you gain retaliation (Critical)
  2. Wrath of Justice (Signet)
  3. Radiant Fire (Burning)

• GM
  1. Gain 50 precision for each stack of Virtue of Justice’s Passive. Activating Virtue of Justice increases your critical strike chance by 100% for 2 seconds. (Critical)
  2. Gain +8% movement speed for each Signet Passive. Light Auras last 2s longer. (Signet)
  3. Amplified Wrath (Burning)

I don’t like creating a fire field on VoJ active. Does it activate for allies, can it stack? Does the fire field even burn? Adept tier?

50 prec on VoJ Passive? What exactly constitutes a stack? Why doubling up on VoJ active, and why VoJ in general when there’s the Virtues line. VoJ is the vehicle for the Radiance theme, not the theme itself.

8% movement on unused Signet? That’s potentially 48% movement speed, or do you intend to limit the total amount in which case you invalidate the trait for taking too many signets.

I’m not a fan of these proposals.

Indure.5410:

But I think a change to “1s increase to all burning damage” would, because it would guarantee a tick of damage for all your burns.

You don’t have to try and get ticks to line up with second marks because every condition grants it’s residual damage. Regardless, adding duration is a weaker option.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Arricson Krei.9560:

Proposed Changes
Keep all minors the same

• Adept
  1. Right-Hand Strength (Critical)
  2. Perfect Inscription w/o increased passive effects. (Signet)
  3. Striking a foe with Virtue of Justice’s active effect creates a fire field at their location that causes burning. (Burning)

• Master
  1. Gain Fury when you gain retaliation (Critical)
  2. Wrath of Justice (Signet)
  3. Radiant Fire (Burning)

• GM
  1. Gain 50 precision for each stack of Virtue of Justice’s Passive. Activating Virtue of Justice increases your critical strike chance by 100% for 2 seconds. (Critical)
  2. Gain +8% movement speed for each Signet Passive. Light Auras last 2s longer. (Signet)
  3. Amplified Wrath (Burning)

I don’t like creating a fire field on VoJ active. Does it activate for allies, can it stack? Does the fire field even burn? Adept tier?

50 prec on VoJ Passive? What exactly constitutes a stack? Why doubling up on VoJ active, and why VoJ in general when there’s the Virtues line. VoJ is the vehicle for the Radiance theme, not the theme itself.

8% movement on unused Signet? That’s potentially 48% movement speed, or do you intend to limit the total amount in which case you invalidate the trait for taking too many signets.

I’m not a fan of these proposals.

Create a fire field at your enemy’s location. I’m sure the field itself can stack if multiple allies create a field in the same location. “creates a fire field at their location that causes burning”. I think we can all agree that tiers barely matter.

A stack of VoJ Passive = strikes accumulated until the next VoJ passive trigger. So if someone has hit an enemy four times, they have 200 extra precision. Basically, the amount of strikes needed to proc VoJ passive is proportional to the amount of precision one gains. I chose doubling critical chance once VoJ activates because it rewards a build that invests in critical chance. Radiance minors either directly or indirectly compliment Virtue of Justice. It’s also the virtue with the lowest cooldown, so more traits that revolve around it won’t fall off as badly as a trait that revolves around, say, VoC’s 75s untraited cd.

It caps at +25% (forgot to mention this). I chose +8% because it requires one to equip 3/5 slots with signets which I believe is fair and would give incentive to play signet builds. I don’t think it invalidates the trait if one wants to choose more than 3 signets; if they do, then that means they can expend the fourth and fifth signet while maintaining the +25% movement speed. Practically, the signets themselves provide good enough passive bonuses so instead of slapping on a typical +20% passive effectiveness, why not add more diversity. They can still reward themselves with the fourth and fifth signets by traiting into it (A2 M1), but they shouldn’t be gated into 5/5 signets for the sake of +25% movement speed. Signet of Judgement, Bane, and Courage are all good signets with great passives whose actives have very particular uses.

I like all of the ideas floating around, keep it up!

Really the guardian could stand to have access to a secondary damaging condition.

Having access to burns alone means its very easy to have your damage wiped by a cleanse, and it also means some enemies are completely immune to your conditions.

Personally I would scrap radiant retaliation & move right handed strength up to the grand master tier.
Then tack on “Your critical hits have a X% chance to cause bleeding (5 seconds)” onto right handed strength.

I would also reduce the burning applied by amplified wrath to 1 second, but get rid of the internal CD. (if someone is stupid enough to keep attacking while you block they deserve to be burned to a crisp)

Next I would change perfect inscriptions to do 1 of the following

Perfect Inscriptions: Signets grant protection when used (4 seconds), they also have 20% faster cool downs.

or

Perfect Inscriptions: Signets cure 2 conditions when used, they also have 20% faster cool downs.

Lastly I would change signet of mercy & signet of courage to

“Signet of Mercy Passive” Periodically heal nearby (600 units) allies every second, (about the same healing as virtue of resolve)

Signet of Mercy Active: Revive a nearby (600 units) downed ally. Cast time 3 seconds, cool down 180 seconds.

Signet of Courage Passive: Increases boon duration by 20%.

Signet of Courage Active: Break stun effects then grant nearby (600 units) allies protection (6 seconds) & stability (2 stacks for 6 seconds).
Cast time 3/4 second, cool down 50 seconds.