Guild Wars 2

Im curious to know what Anet planned retaliation to be now.

The wording they used in the patch notes is very vague to me and i cant quite grasp their meaning by what they mean by turning it into a counter vs a boon to keep up?

Anet,

My understanding of a boon in general is something that benefits your character and something you’d want to keep on you as long as possible (if managable through skills/utilities chosen by the players personal preference)

Meaning… If i turned my character into something that just about always generates retaliation. (Aegis breaking / signet of judgement / Save Yourselves / Hold the Line ) wouldnt i be breaking what this patch for guardians was all about? Or am i not allowed to stack Retaliation in duration any more?

Im confused Anet. You changed my GS skill locations and made me question how i should be using Retaliation (lest i use it wrong in the heat of battle and get killed for it)

Please ellaborate for me

- Tzenjin / Server: Ehmry Bay

I suggest make retaliation an effect not a boon and make the damage “Reflect”.

Not sure, but it was an essential part of my support build…. I’m very upset about this. Also in spite of all the other bugs and issues in the game they decided reordering our greatsword skills was worth the time (so now we get to relearn that weapon in a way) regardless of if player wants it that way or not (most probably reworked keybindings, key word there beings “worked”)

The worst nerf to our profession yet.

I’m steering away from retaliation as of now. I don’t know what they have planned for it, but it doesn’t look good. I’d rather get used to a different playstyle at my own pace than be thrust into it with their upcoming changes.

We are moving towards retaliation being more of a counter to taking many hits rather than a general boon to keep up all the time.

Felt like a direct response to use Guardians who are overly angsty about the 70% reduced duration from the Wrathful Spirit trait.

Will have to check the effectiveness of relying on a signet for it… still hoping for a balance change to make returning a fixed amount to a percent of damage received scaling with power…

I’d just like some clarification on what they meant?

Things like the 25% Retaliation Duration Increase in the Virtues tree use to be one of my go-to traits too choose. But now im confused as to what that actually does for me now… I mean they explicitly said “Rather then a general boon to keep up all the time”.

To me it sounds like Anet is tell me, i shouldnt be stacking duration on Retaliation and that i’m some how using a “broken skill” by doing so.

In WvW As a guardian (particularly a GS/Hammer/Sword+Shield) you have to get into a fight close range. Which means your on the Front Line which is the first to get targeted. Whether its by one person or a couple your getting fired upon on with Big Hitting Attacks and Multi-Hitting Attacks. Is my retaliation less effective now in those situations?

Anet if your reading this. Im not mad, i’m just really confused. As a player i notice tooltips not reflecting certain key factors of abilities. Patch notes are vague when “new ideas” are introduced. Its easy to under stand a percentage nerf (hence pistol whip reduction), hard to understand a mechanic-nerf without input directly from the developers.

I hope i’ve made an easy to understand message and i look forward to a informative reply when you’re able to. Thanks guys.

-Tzenjin

I`m actually really upset here. Symbol of Wrath was one of the skills I used within every aspect of the game(PvE, Dungeons, WvW, sPvP). I´m a greatsword wielder with Mace/Shield as secondary. The Damage and retaliation was a part of my dps output but now it´s been nerfed, I feel the dps output has been lowered alot.

In dungeons I could rely on it when facing a group of mobs in melee but now it feels like I can only activate it ones and then pray to god the mobs are dead before the symbol effect wears off. It will now be more of a skill you save for certain situations making the 1 and 2 skills the only reliable ones to use in fights, and yes that makes this the greatsword guardian more boring to play.
No guardian uses the 3 skill(which is now the leap attack) in the middle of the fight. It´s just an attack to shorten the distance beteen you and the target(s) imo. The dps output is better with 1 than using 3 in the middle of the fight. About the same thing applies to the 5 skill. You only pull max 5 targets to you instead so you can gain aggro easier from the mobs. And yes 5 skills cooldown is sometimes annoyingly long. This talk about the other skills are relevant since the nerf just gave the greatsword guardian another less reliable skill.

In WvW it definitely had its use. I was even conservative about using the skill, saving it for situations where I would take alot of dmg/tank. But now I have to be even more careful about using this skill.
Fights in PvP(and dungeons) can be long and the cooldown on the skill is just horrible now! The cooldown factor + the skills demand of one standing still when using it(you can´t run while using this skill) is just bad. Sure I can just switch to another weapon, but that would ruin the whole fact of being a greatsword guardian.

“We are moving towards retaliation being more of a counter to taking many hits rather than a general boon to keep up all the time.”
Darn it Anet! I do not agree to this. I really relied on this skill. This “general boon to keep up all the time” demands that we stand still within the symbol too! In pvp the enemies just need to take one single step away to counter this and stop attacking till we no longer got the retaliaiton boon, same about PvE when mobs just aggros another player who´s not within the symbol! This explanation could be alot better explained!

I very rarely write on any forums. But this really made me upset, wanting you Anet to know at least my feelings about this nerf to us greatsword guardians! Don´t want this to turn into an essay so I´ll stop right here.

Basically they’re saying that to many noobs are melting their faces against retal in PvP and are changing the way it works to keep these noobs from quitting the game in frustration. Otherwise, there is no other plausible explanation for what they’re doing. It’s that simple.

I tried reassigning my skills to what it was before. Not only does how they changed it feel less intuitive, reassigning them messed up my alternative weapon AND my underwater weapons. /sigh

What the h3|| anet.
Why would you simply not allow people to reorder skills or deny this change.
So we have to relearn our weapon, our muscle and keyboard memory? What about other classes, you should change their most popular weapon skill slots around to balance this.

/sarcasm

Wow. Just wow. Anet is messing up. Logged in for 30 minutes today, tops. Since release it’s been hours+/per day.

I could care less for a boon, but with the increased duration they took my only combo field away. My build is fully on greatsword both in combat strategy and traits build. I used to make it so I could use the cleansing bolts and so my party members could shoot out remove conditions. I don’t really see retaliation as a good choice in PvE O_O
I have low health points, I run around in exotic knight’s armor so I don’t get hit that much and if I do I don’t have a lot of HP to withstand all that damage. It’s not like retaliation is absorbing and reflect x.x

I am just like the OP wondering why would they do this. I do feel a lot useless now in dungeons, not that I did much, I couldn’t tank mobs anyway, and now I get no bonus DPS and no combo field support. I’ll just make 3k+ damage with the whirl every few seconds, but basically every other class would out-dps that amount in 10 seconds.

So basically guardian is no good for DPS (with greatsword that is), it’s not a tank either and I want to ask, why did you really change this part.

Could you please think about switching the field’s boon to w/e I don’t really care, I just want my low CD light combo field bacl :| And no I’m not going to switch over to hammer if that’s your intend, i’d rather switch the profession. Hammer is granted a good DPS wep but it’s extremly slow and inefficient by my playstyle. I like to move around, and I don’t see how could I do that after all my skills go into CD.

I’d really like some input from someone at ANet, why would you increase the CD of the field.

My second weapon is staff and I do have light combo field with low reuse but
a) DPS is halved than what my GS can do
b) I get 10 seconds “reuse” of weapon swap
c) I don’t really want to use staff as my main wep, it’s extremely supportive, I don’t like it.

I used to win 2vs6 in WvWvW with my girlfriend thanks to the combo field and being almost always immediatelly cleansed of any conditions. Now THAT was nice. And I can assure you that I didn’t use the retaliation much in PvP. It was like, field → whirl → run to leap range because people start to run → leap → pull back to me → whirl again → Symbol again to cleanse any debuff and extra DPS from field damage → repeat → ??? → profit
And now it’s gone v.v

Ah sorry about the double post, I couldn’t find “edit post” option, but it really bugs my mind.
So the field’s retaliation was 1 second right ? So the second you step out you momentarily lose it, you have to be in the field to have it on. But then again, I get 10 second retaliation if I leap out of light combo field, and I’m really feeling like, wth is going on here. Do you guys put much thought when you balance stuff out o.o ? I know stupid question, I guess you do but … I could still put 15 second retaliation on me if I find this skill usefull, which I don’t.

So the real question is, are you doing this because you want to make retaliation used only when absolutely needed, or because you want to limit the combo field usage. I don’t get it :/

Ravenmoon.5318:

I could care less for a boon, but with the increased duration they took my only combo field away. My build is fully on greatsword both in combat strategy and traits build. I used to make it so I could use the cleansing bolts and so my party members could shoot out remove conditions. I don’t really see retaliation as a good choice in PvE O_O
I have low health points, I run around in exotic knight’s armor so I don’t get hit that much and if I do I don’t have a lot of HP to withstand all that damage. It’s not like retaliation is absorbing and reflect x.x

I am just like the OP wondering why would they do this. I do feel a lot useless now in dungeons, not that I did much, I couldn’t tank mobs anyway, and now I get no bonus DPS and no combo field support. I’ll just make 3k+ damage with the whirl every few seconds, but basically every other class would out-dps that amount in 10 seconds.

So basically guardian is no good for DPS (with greatsword that is), it’s not a tank either and I want to ask, why did you really change this part.

Could you please think about switching the field’s boon to w/e I don’t really care, I just want my low CD light combo field bacl :| And no I’m not going to switch over to hammer if that’s your intend, i’d rather switch the profession. Hammer is granted a good DPS wep but it’s extremly slow and inefficient by my playstyle. I like to move around, and I don’t see how could I do that after all my skills go into CD.

I’d really like some input from someone at ANet, why would you increase the CD of the field.

My second weapon is staff and I do have light combo field with low reuse but
a) DPS is halved than what my GS can do
b) I get 10 seconds “reuse” of weapon swap
c) I don’t really want to use staff as my main wep, it’s extremely supportive, I don’t like it.

I used to win 2vs6 in WvWvW with my girlfriend thanks to the combo field and being almost always immediatelly cleansed of any conditions. Now THAT was nice. And I can assure you that I didn’t use the retaliation much in PvP. It was like, field -> whirl -> run to leap range because people start to run -> leap -> pull back to me -> whirl again -> Symbol again to cleanse any debuff and extra DPS from field damage -> repeat -> ??? -> profit
And now it’s gone v.v

telling Anet how you could 2 v 6 in wvw isn’t exactly a good way to disagree on a nerf…

I’m not a noob mate, I run in fully exotic gear and pretty kitten trait build. I also forged my GS in the mystic forge. I’m not a noob and I know my character’s strengths and weaknesses. And my gf is a thief, so add sick conditional damage and healing stealth every once in a while. We are team with somehing more than laggy VoIP program, we actually talk in the same room (nod). I also know how to whirl to maximize my damage output since unlike warrior’s whirl, ours needs some adjusting because otherwise it’s extremely inefficient x.x

Also wall of reflection beats retaliation at any given day, and the healing dome its on the tip of my tongue but i forgot the skill name…was it Sanctuary ? is pretty sick too

It took us awhile to do it, and it surely wasn’t easy, and it required A LOT OF team effort to do it, while our enemies were chaotic. Obviously if the 6 were team we would’ve died in the first few seconds.

I understand their explanation as they want Retaliation to be a situational counter (like blind) rather than a 100% uptime boon. I’m wondering if they’ll make Retaliation stronger (deal more dmg) if they reduce our ability to keep it up.

Our Whirling Wrath is fine. Our Leap of Faith was fine (and im pretty sure we got a reduced cooldown on it). Our Binding Blade is fine. Our Auto-Attack is fine.

20 Sec CD on Symbol of wrath? Not the end of the world. Its not like i was always itching to use it (depends on your build i know)

We’re not underpowered by any means. But i didn’t know we we’re overpowered or in need of fixing. Retaliation can be powerful siutationally, i used it for warriors Hundred Blades, Thief’s, and Short Bow Rangers, but i thought that was our Trade-Mark of sorts, being a Boon Based Profession since the beginning.

Thiefs can crit over 10k (or so i’ve heard) and as a guardian that is built damage i have trouble reaching 5k with a Dead-On Whirling Wrath. (Against an enemy of my own lvl in WvW, were not talking about getting crits on the lowbies, those are fun crits not real crits). Guardians being placed in the lowest tier healthpool isnt a secret either. So a condition dmg thief or a good warrior could plow through us, if we’re caught off-guard. Even when we are on-guard its still a struggle.

retaliation only works wonders in 1v1. Which currently there is no real or organized system for 1v1. Which only makes me wanna think we got this balance BECAUSE a 1v1 is coming soon.

But still, being a “Boon” and the definition of a Boon being something in which gives you a benefit, its only natural to want to stack something that appealing if you have the want or power too. But it seems like to me that the average guardian is being told that using Retaliation like that goes against “developer intentions”.

Before anyone gets on what i say and says “blah developers are wrong” or “developers messed up”. Give them a chance to explain. That all i’d want is an explaination on what their plan is, hopefully more then a couple sentences worth but and actually explaination of the proper theory of retaliation as it is now, as well as, if they plan to alter it any further.

Again not mad, not going to quit, not going to threaten. Doesnt get me anywhere. Im just curious and Anet has always been responsive in the past.

Thanks guys.

-Tzenjin

Bump.

Again i’d like to reiterate that i’m not really all that mad about the patch to us guardians. I believe we, even the symbol guardians, will get use to this change and wont be “destroyed” as most would like to hype it up too be.

But again, my curiosity is gnawing away.

You mentioned a fix for Retaliation that was done (accomplished?) through the increased duration of Symbol of Wrath was put to balance Retaliation stacking issues. But then turned and said you wanted to “improve” finisher-type skills of the guardian.

What type of improvement do you wish to see for Finishers? Is something wrong with ours currently?

How does reorganization actually improve finishers? Or was it an effort to make the Combo Field/Finisher usage more obvious and apparent to anyone who couldn’t piece it together themselves?

Symbol of Wrath is also our only Combo Field attached to the GS (not mentioning purging flames or other utilities) so how does that give us an improvement on Finishers by limiting how often we can utilize the Finisher? Which means we should rely on other players combo fields to activate our finishers on.

Not too mention that out of all the professions, we we’re the class that didnt actually get told in the notes that we had anything “reduced” it just stated a whole new Cool Down. I understand this may seem like a trivial thing to most but not too me.

Clear communication is big with me, you guys have usually been absolutely awesome with being clear and precise. But i look at the patch notes, guardians tab, make an issue of a “Boon” but changing “Skills”, Improve Finishers but Penalize Combo Fields.

I’m not angry for a nerf. Ok i’ll deal. No problem

What im angry about is being kept in the dark, not told or informed of key specifics. Told one thing, and see another. Being left to discover the repercussions of the patch by myself.

Im honestly concerned of my choice of profession as of right now and whether or not the almost 200 hours i’ve put into character (my guardian is my one and only character) is going to be for nothing because of the way i interpreted the class before compared to the changes you have in store that we are not aware of.

I hope i’ve stated this as clearly and maturely as possible. I dont want to stop playing this game. But if everytime a patch comes, i should fear my profession being reorganized, it would severely limit the enjoyment i get through playing my profession of choice in this game.

While i only saw this for Guardians, this is an issue that is relevant to all Classes