Guild Wars 2

Radiant Retaliation has been completely non-functional for 6 months, but despite that, is included unchanged in the Specialization AMA preview. It is now competing with 2 grandmaster traits that received buffs.

Specialization AMA Preview Traits:

• Amplified Wrath: Burning Damage is increased 33%. Burn enemies whose attacks you block.
• Perfect Inscriptions: Gain Light Aura when activating a Signet. Signets recharge 20% faster and have 20% improvement on passive effects.
• Radiant Retaliation: Retaliation damage scales from Condition Damage instead of Power.

Your choice for this slot is:

• Bonus burning damage allows the highest Burning Damage possible, and apply tons of Burning when using Shelter.
• The one Signet trait needed for your Signet build, and get free Retal and Vuln.
• Bonus Retaliation damage (if you are running Condition Damage) allows the highest Retaliation Damage possible. (does not provide Retaliation)

Question: How do you explain Radiant Retaliation remaining unchanged, and how would you change it to compete with the buffed Amplified Wrath and Perfect Inscriptions?

They said they’ve increased in numbers the sources for retail.

Does anyone know where they said something like that?

All I heard in the Guardian section was something like “retaliation is a core thing for a Guardian, so we have it all over the place.” That was when they were going over the unchanged retaliation on heal trait. I didn’t take it as indicating any increase, just pointing out that guardians have always had lots of ways to gain retal.

Lol gotta love all those standalone 3 second retaliation traits :p (3 secs retaliation on heal, 3 secs on aegis break, 3 secs on hard cc etc)
Its insulting that those get to be standalone traits that compete with 10% damage modifiers and the like

I doubt the already non-functioning Radiant Retaliation will compete against the other grand master traits. Maybe if it actually worked, then add 50 more retaliation damage to it, will I consider looking at it again.

“For Rabid user Guardiand”
Rabid is terrible on Guardians. It simply does not scale very well. Period.

Hopefully they remove the kitten 33% damage reduction for retaliation in spvp/wvw or just bring it back to what it was at release. Then maybe retaliation builds and traits will see some actual play.

ZoroDaOtter.3859:

Hopefully they remove the kitten 33% damage reduction for retaliation in spvp/wvw or just bring it back to what it was at release. Then maybe retaliation builds and traits will see some actual play.

Oh please don’t. Back then retaliation was always the top thing that killed you.

Askadia.4395:

They said they’ve increased in numbers the sources for retail.

They did. However – amusingly, if I didn’t miss anything – the additional Retaliation comes from a Signet trait which is in the same slot as Radiant Retaliation. What a twist of fate….

Of course, we do not know to what extent the devs might have changed the conversion on Radiant Retaliation. It might be very powerful. Still, I’d still prefer having an additional component. For example: Take x% less damage while being affected by Retaliation.

Regardless, Guardians need better access to Retaliation which is not linked to spamming VoJ (which would lock you into a x/6/x/x/6 set up) if Radiant Retaliation should ever be considered a valid condition replacement. Retaliatory Subconscious needs a higher Retaliation uptime or nobody will pick it. Healers Retribution has no business being in Radiance at all. They could turn it into ‘Gain 3s of Retaliation when landing a critical hit.’, 15-20s ICD. It would be miles better than it currently is. Retribution needs to provide condi damage as well.

Xaylin.1860:

Askadia.4395:

They said they’ve increased in numbers the sources for retail.

They did. However – amusingly, if I didn’t miss anything – the additional Retaliation comes from a Signet trait which is in the same slot as Radiant Retaliation. What a twist of fate….

Of course, we do not know to what extent the devs might have changed the conversion on Radiant Retaliation. It might be very powerful. Still, I’d still prefer having an additional component. For example: Take x% less damage while being affected by Retaliation.

Regardless, Guardians need better access to Retaliation which is not linked to spamming VoJ (which would lock you into a x/6/x/x/6 set up) if Radiant Retaliation should ever be considered a valid condition replacement. Retaliatory Subconscious needs a higher Retaliation uptime or nobody will pick it. Healers Retribution has no business being in Radiance at all. They could turn it into ‘Gain 3s of Retaliation when landing a critical hit.’, 15-20s ICD. It would be miles better than it currently is. Retribution needs to provide condi damage as well.

It seems to me that all the retaliation skills/traits were balanced for release state retaliation but were never adjusted after the major nerfs to the boon, hence the short durations and fairly lengthy CDs.

An idea I have is that retaliation could be changed to a stacking boon and reflect however many number of hits in relation to the number of stacks and the damage reflected can be increased substantially (or changed to percentage of damage taken). This way you have a choice in whether to mitigate the incoming burst or face-tank it and reflect the damage back.

Well, seems Retaliation is pretty core for Warriors now because they are getting Spiked Armour (GM trait now) that gives 50% uptime of Retaliation as a minor trait in Defense. Seems absurd to me that a heavy armor class with the most health and lots of immunities in the Defense line already, are getting a trait that punishes people for even attacking them 50% of the time.

Really what they should do is make radiant retaliation a base line effect for all classes if your +condition damage stat is half or more then your +power stat.

Then they could create a trait that is actually worth taking. (I say this because condi builds often dont have great retal up time anyway)

Radiant retaliation won’t be used until 1. it gives a secondary effect or 2. it uses both power AND condi damage. I realize that can be a problem with might but there are ways around that (mathmatical ways). Also yeah its placement is kinda awkward because u cant use that light aura with it.

3 traitline setups with Radiant Retaliation and full Condition Damage in mind.
Included are the number of traits that provide Retaliation and the number of non-conflicting traits that could help you apply Burning.

Radiance + Zeal + Virtues maximizes Justice, and offers the most Burning. Aegis can grant retal. Lots of self-Might possible. (5 retal traits, 7 burning)

Radiance + Zeal + Valor Offers the ability to grant Aegis and Radiant Retaliation to all nearby allies on a 20s cooldown but can be hard to use effectively. Has defensive and Meditation traits. (3 retal traits, 5 burning)

Radiance + Honor + Zeal offers the best Symbols. Symbols burn foes, cause vuln, are larger, last longer (for constant AoE Retaliation hammer blasts). The bonus crit-chance from Radiance is used for Might and Vigor and healing on dodge. Aegis can grant retal. (3 retal traits, 5 burning)

Radiance + Honor + Virtues offers the highest boon uptime for allies with improved virtues, AoE Might on crit, AoE Might on Justice, and improved shouts or long-lasting symbols (for constant AoE retaliation hammer blasts.) Still has great burning. Crit-chance from Radiance is used to trigger Might and Vigor. (3 retal traits, 4 burning)

Radiance + Valor + Virtues Offers more balance between defensive and offensive traits. Spamming F1 to grant AoE Might to allies can trigger Altruistic Healing. (1 retal trait, 4 burning)

Radiance + Valor + Honor Offers the tankiest trait options with toughness, and vitality boosts. Crit-chance AoE Might can trigger Altruistic Healing. (1 retal trait, 2 burning)

Amplified wrath will trump radiant retaliation EVERY SINGLE TIME. heck even for power builds it seems like the best GM in radiance due to us not having a precision signet.