Guild Wars 2

This is not a thread about the recent change to Symbol of Wrath. Symbol of Wrath, however, is illustrative of a larger problem with the Zeal trait line, and therefore makes an excellent launching point into a discussion about Zeal. So let’s start from there.

The October 7th patch doubled the recharge on Greatsword’s Symbol of Wrath, which inspired a response from the community ranging from apathetic shrugs to furious indignation. But I contend that change to Symbol of Wrath had a more profound effect on the Zeal line than it did on the Greatsword weapon. The Greatsword functions much as it did before, but its synergy with the Zeal line is all but broken. This is a problem with Zeal before it is a problem with Greatsword.

Zeal isn’t a bad line. It seems much maligned because most Guardians have difficulty extracting some useful builds out of it. As it stands, Zeal has three basic uses:

• An ancillary trait line you drop 10-20 points into to help round out another build, almost always for Fiery Wrath, Greatsword Power or Focused Mastery.

• Spirit Weapons, for which Zeal is an essential line. Spirit Weapons are an effective and powerful build, but rigid and leave very little room for flexibility and build variation owing to deep Trait investments.

• Symbolic support, making use of Symbolic Power (which requires 25 Zeal) and Symbolic Exposure (which requires 15 Zeal), both of which are Minor traits.

Prior to the October 7th patch, Zeal offered one more option: Greatsword Symbol support. Zeal’s Greatsword traits and Symbol traits, combined with Greatsword’s readily accessible Symbol of Wrath, made 30 Zeal/30 Honor an attractive builds, with damage, fast recharge and very powerful symbols.

Unfortunately, the build depended entirely on Symbol of Wrath. And this is a problem with Zeal, rather than Greatsword. Zeal offers very little else to Greatsword other than Symbol improvement. The Greatsword traits available in Zeal (5% more damage, 25 HP per swing) are insufficient to cover the loss of Symbol of Wrath.

An entire Trait line should never hinge on the use of a single ability on a single weapon.

The Problems, Summarized

• Zeal’s Grandmaster traits are difficult to justify and difficult to build around. Radiance’s “A Fire Inside” grants more damage and utility to Spirit Weapons than Zeal’s “Wrathful Spirits,” which is a Grandmaster Trait and provides a paltry 10% damage boost. The “Zealous Blade” trait has very little, if any, additional synergy with other traits, and contributes a negligible amount of mitigation over the course of an average fight. Furthermore, Zealous Blade’s theme (mitigation through Greatsword) is at odds with the rest of the Zeal line (aggressive Symbols, improved damage and rewards for Burning).

• Zeal’s Minor Traits support Symbol use, but its Major traits offer very little of value to weapons that depend on Symbol use. Consequently, builds that emphasize Symbol use dig into Zeal almost exclusively for Minor traits.

• Spirit Weapons is a powerful build, but restrictively rigid. A good Spirit Weapons build requires at least 20 in Zeal, 20 in Radiance and 10 in Virtue, leaving 20 points to distribute elsewhere. Because Symbolic Power requires 25 Zeal, and both Writ of Exaltation and Writ of Persistence require 20 Honor, you need—at minimum—25 Zeal 20 Radiance 10 Virtues and 20 Honor to make full use of Spirit Weapons and Symbols, which is impossible by 5 points.

• A preponderance of purely statistical traits leaves Zeal uninteresting, static and largely invisible. Greatsword Power, Scepter Power, Wrathful Spirits, Zealous Blade and (to an extent) Fiery Wrath all seem interesting on paper, but provide no interesting tactical variations.

_TL;DR: Excessively expensive Spirit Weapons, Symbol support in Minor traits but no Major traits that offer anything to Symbol-using weapons, and Grandmaster traits that are difficult to build around.

Proposed Solutions

Zeal is not inherently a bad Trait line. It is the sum of several design choices, most of which are statistically insignificant, uninteresting or incompatible with one another. It has its strengths, but these strengths are overshadowed by the sum of several small disadvantages.

This is a blessing in disguise. Zeal can be fixed piecemeal, in steps, incrementally, and does not require big, sweeping changes. The following are my own suggestions for improving the Zeal line after some thought and consideration. Implementing just one of these changes should be, in my mind, sufficient to give Zeal the boost it needs to stay relevant.

Please give me your feedback on these ideas. Remember that the implementation of just one idea will go a long way toward improving Zeal.

I. Give Scepter A Symbol

Giving Scepter a Symbol will significantly improve its compatibility with the Zeal line, which already offers Scepter Power and Binding Jeopardy, both of which work well with Scepter. Symbolic Exposure + Binding Jeopardy turns Scepter into a reliable source of Vulnerability, with anywhere from 4-8 stacks using Scepter, Focus and Blind Exposure. Because Scepter is our only reliable Ranged weapon, every Guardian will see some use out of a Scepter symbol.

• Symbol of Vigor: Burn a mystic symbol into the target area, damaging enemies and granting Vigor to allies. Combo Field: Light
• Symbol of Vigor (Alternate): Burn a mystic symbol into the target area, Burning enemies (1s) and granting Vigor to allies. Combo Field: Fire

II. Combine Improved Spirit Weapon Duration with Spirit Weapon Mastery

Improved Spirit Weapon Duration is a Virtues trait, with no necessary or evident synergy with anything the Virtues line has to offer. Consequently, this trait is essentially a “trait tax” on Spirit Weapons, forcing a prohibitively restrictive build. Merging these two traits frees up 10 points in Spirit Weapons, allowing for the following:

• 30 Zeal, 20 Radiance, 20 Honor builds that make full use of Symbols and Spirit weapons, therefore turning Zeal into a weapon-flexible line that works fine with Hammer, Mace, Staff or Greatsword. Take 10 points out of Zeal and have enough flexibility to either maximize Radiance, maximize Honor or dip in to Valor and Virtues.

• Allow a symbol-based playstyle distinct from Altruistic Healing Symbol builds, therefore creating build diversity.

• Encourage the use of Spirit Weapons by loosening the restrictive trait tax, therefore solidifying Zeal’s identity as a Spirit Weapon + Symbol Support line with room for flexible options.

III. New Grandmaster Trait: Harmonious Might

Harmonious Might – Your Combo Finishers grant 3 stacks of Might to nearby allies. Replace Zealous Blade.

Zealous Blade is a poor Grandmaster trait. Numerically, the mitigation provided by Zealous Blade is negligibly low, even if you combine multi-hit swings. Altruistic Healing heals for twice as much, and activates far more frequently. Furthermore, Zealous Blade is totally dependent on the use of Greatsword, and the bonus disappears entirely if you swap weapons. Harmonious Might seeks to address these problems by creating a weapons-neutral Trait that still favors Greatsword, but allows for greater build diversity and encourages use.

• Precedence for this trait exists. See: Empowering Might, Honor 20, which grants 1 stack of Might to nearby allies after every crit, with a 1 second internal cooldown. You can tweak Harmonious Might’s numbers, but 3 stacks of might for a 2-3 second duration seems reasonable, and compares well to—and synergizes with—Empowering Might.

• Synergizes well with both Greatsword and Hammer, two weapons which also make use of Symbols.

• An alternate spin on Altruistic Healing. Altruistic Healing synergizes well with this trait, and two 30-point trait means you can’t stack Altruistic Healing, Empowering Might and Harmonious Might.

IV. New Grandmaster Trait: Exalted Spirit – Your Spirit Weapon Command skills become Combo Finishers. Replace Wrathful Spirits

Exalted Spirit is a natural advancement of Eternal Spirit, which allows your Spirit Weapons to stay active even after you use Command. Right now, Wrathful Spirits grants a flat +10% damage bonus to Spirit Weapons which, besides being invisible, offers very little tactical nuance to the Spirit Weapons—skills which require a committment of Utility slots to even use. This change will accomplish the following:

Bow of Truth – Command: Projectile Finisher (20% chance)
Hammer of Wisdom – Command: Blast Finisher
Shield of the Avenger- Command: Projectile Finisher
Sword of Justice – Command: Blast Finisher

• At the cost of 10% damage, Spirit Weapons become more tactically viable. Because Spirit Weapons are already a set-in-stone build, there is very little room for maneuvering. At 30 Zeal, 20 Radiance and 10 Virtues, this build is highly specialized. The proposed change will add two Projectile Finishers to the Guardian’s current selection of “0”, and two Blast Finishers compared to Guardian’s two.

• Most Spirit Weapons builds only use one or two weapons: Bow, or Shield, or Bow and Shield, or Sword and Hammer. This limits a Guardian from being able to stack too many Finishers, and maintains a little more balance.

What do you all think? I’d like to open it up here to comments, discussion and critique. Please keep it civil, and please don’t overreact. This thread is NOT intended to bash the recent Oct 7 changes, and it is NOT an implicit argument that Guardians are somehow underpowered. It is intended to discuss the merits and shortcomings of the Zeal line and provide constructive feedback to the community (and, if we’re very lucky, the dev team).

Even if im a sostenitor of the: “Strip SOW from retaliation and give as a faster SOW”
I really like this thread, and i really like your idea.

+1

Reading your post, make me think that if they give to scepter a simbols, the longsword become the only MH weapon without a simbol. (it’s not a request or something else, its only a reflextion.)

Excellent thread, Eveningstar.
The Scepter getting a Symbol is something I’m a strong advocate of, so I can only endorse it further.
The problems you highlight are indeed the issues I have with Zeal, making this post a bit unnecessary, since it gives me little to add.

Giving a Symbol to each weapon isn’t a solution, the weapons aren’t supposed to be equal – Symbols are an unique . effect (this was getting kitten filtered) to our 2 Handers – so it would only make us overpowered.

Just swapping the Zeal minor Traits for some of the Major ones (ones that help a wider range of weapons) would make it more attractive to other weapon sets other than 2 Handers.

Minor traits shouldn’t be more specific to a weapon or two, so anyone could pick Zeal even if they use Swords/Scepters, while getting decent Minor Traits and being able to pick Symbol boosting ones if they use 2 Handers, or something else if they don’t.

Though we could use some more better Grandmaster Traits, that isn’t necessarily a must – after checking other professions, not all of them have really desireable Major Grandmaster Traits in every line…

I generally think your proposal doesn’t go far enough but it’s late here and I got plans for tomorrow. I’ll put those thoughts in more detail later.

For starters however, I think that Harmonious Might would need some beefing up for a Grandmaster Trait. Simply because Empowering Might is a Master Trait that can proc once a second. Harmonious Might, even in a GS/Hammer setup would be hard-pressed to even just match Empowering Might due to the cooldown on Weapon Swap. Never mind that you’d need a team to reliably set up Combo Fields.

That said, I like the basic idea immensely. I’m tempted to suggest… wait. I got it.

Instead of proccing Might it should proc Symbol of Might. Same or lesser effect (1-3 stacks of Might) plus the damage you’d expect from a Symbol, plus the ability to start a new Combo. This should by all means be a Fire Field, not a Light Field. It still won’t be possible to continue proccing endlessly but with some smart playing you’d be assured of a Combo Field without having to spec into Purging Flames and Hallowed Ground just to make the most of the Trait.

Plus, it would loop back into all the Symbol-specific Traits you may or may not have picked up (or had to pick up anyway) to get to Grandmaster. Of course, both Symbol damage and duration would need to be on the low end of the scale, but… well, I’m sure you can see where I’m going with this suggestion.

This is some good discussion, and I’m glad people are thinking this over. That was half my goal in starting this thread—getting some constructive ideas percolating in the community’s consciousness.

One of the reasons I wrote up Harmonious Might the way I did was to deliberately keep it a bit on the low end, for a few reasons. First, it’s easier to sell a small improvement that can be buffed later than ask for a big buff that ends up being imbalance and needs a nerf later.

To that end, I understand Harmonious Might probably doesn’t compete with Empowering Might on paper, and part of that is by design. But the design of the Trait is also pretty modular—you can tweak it by bumping up the duration or the number of Might stacks.

The other thing to think about is the way Harmonious Might would interact with other traits. Sure, on paper, Harmonious Might seems lowball, but what if you took Harmonious Might plus Empowering Might? In fact, it’s a natural combination given that symbol builds will go for both Honor and Zeal anyway. So in that sense, it’s a reward for Symbol builds.

@Danicco

I do get what you’re saying, and I’m hesitant to proliferate Symbols as well. However, I want to note that, actually, Symbols are not exclusive to 2H weapons. Mace has one, and if you want to split hairs, so does Downed. Giving Scepter a Symbol actually knocks out two birds with one stone: Scepter’s Symbol gives Guardians a little more ranged flexibility without giving us an entirely new weapon set, and furthermore, dovetails ideally into the Zeal trait line (Zeal has good Symbol support, Scepter support, and Focus support).

I get what you’re saying about Minor traits also, but right now, the Minor traits are the reason a lot of Guardians pick Zeal. Symbolic Power and Symbolic Exposure are essential tools of the Symbol build, and yet Zeal has no Major trait that helps weapons with Symbols at all. Giving Scepter a Symbol would solve that problem neatly. Conversely, a Grandmaster trait that works with Symbol builds (and Honor builds and Crit builds and Spirit Weapon builds) encourages build diversity and, as a bonus, creates incentive for going deep Zeal.

That’s the issue I want to address here. With the exception of a rigid Spirit Weapons build, Zeal is a very secondary Trait line right now. A line you just dip your Trait points into and snag one or two decent Adept traits. It has very little relevance in the overarching discussion of Guardian builds.

As always, I agree with everything Eveningstar. Smite becoming a symbol will always get my support. I’m not sure how powerful builds would become if the spirit weapons traits were combined, but I definitely agree that they should be. I’d even trade some of the stats effectiveness (e.g. +40% duration, -15% recharge) if they were combined.

I have mixed feeling about your grandmaster traits. Although I was brainstorming about using your Exalted Spirit with Bow of Truth and Purging Flames for stacking burning, healing, and condition removal… and maybe giving double area might with another spirit weapon and equipped hammer.

Yeah, Zeal isn’t a bad line, it’s just the leftover pile where the misfit traits go xD

“II. Combine Improved Spirit Weapon Duration with Spirit Weapon Mastery”

I have to disagree. It seems that every proposal now has these. Combine two very powerful traits, because I don’t want to spend two major traits on them.

It’s fine to propose things like that if one of the traits is a complete filler and is never taken by anyone. Like the +90 Tou when you have the Shield equipped. These two traits, however, are very powerful. You don’t have to spec for both of them, it’s just the fact that we have these powerful traits is what makes you think we’re stretched, but that’s not it, it’s all about options.

That being said, I’d be totally for combining Wrathful Spirits and Spirit Weapon mastery. Wrath Spirits just isn’t so good. It’s 10% damage, which is “ok”, but it only affects Spirit Weapons (unlike, say, Slashing Power on the Warrior), which aren’t up all the time and a lot of their damage comes from A Fire Inside, which isn’t affected by Wrathful Spirits, SW normal damage is not that high, actually.

I’d certainly combine Greatsword Power and Zealous Blade. God, Zealous Blade is bad… however, all that’s nice, but combining traits forces devs to make new ones, creating more imbalance in an already imbalanced game. But these two should be buffed, at least the Zealous Blade trait… so bad.

“The Scepter getting a Symbol”

That would be a massive buff. It would synergize well, but would require a CD increase or a damage nerf.

“The Scepter getting a Symbol”
That would be a massive buff. It would synergize well, but would require a CD increase or a damage nerf.

Responses to scepter damage mentioned in this forum are incredulous. Why compensate a damage increase to a weapon considered weak with a nerf?

I also think the subtext of this entire thread is troubling. Guardians are supposed to be warrior-zealots, but we’re talking essentially about “fixing this trait line for a post-greatsword world” .. e.g. — retiring greatsword to irrelevance rather than holding ANet accountable and demanding they make it useful.

plasmacutter.2709:

I also think the subtext of this entire thread is troubling. Guardians are supposed to be warrior-zealots, but we’re talking essentially about “fixing this trait line for a post-greatsword world” .. e.g. — retiring greatsword to irrelevance rather than holding ANet accountable and demanding they make it useful.

ANet’s forum mods have been very trigger happy with merging threads. That would be one reason to very specifically cut a part of the issue from the greater discussion and put it under a magnifying glass.

I’m sure everyone here would prefer if Symbol of Wrath was returned to its old cooldown. But even if that happened Zeal would still be a stinker of a Trait line. One isn’t exclusive of the other.

That said? Greatsword itself is still perfectly viable. Symbol builds are kittened, yes, but the hit to PVE AOE damage output didn’t break it. Claiming in a roundabout way it was useless now is preposterous. (Except where it refers to Greatsword Symbol builds, because 25% unmodified Symbol uptime is just useless compared to what you can get out of other weapons).

Schakal.6091:

(Except where it refers to Greatsword Symbol builds, because 25% unmodified Symbol uptime is just useless compared to what you can get out of other weapons).

Which is what is really agonizing, because that’s exactly what I was going for after becoming peaved with lack-luster out-of-box support abilities on my GS mesmer.

As I move to various options getting into this game, ANet closes the door.

“Cry of Frustration” no longer simply applies to my mesmer’s hotbar.

WTH ANet? are you on a personal crusade to kill of the specs i’m after? I did the condition thing for years in other MMOs, I dont want to go back to necro if I can avoid it.

More gathered thoughts on Eveningstar’s OP

Symbols in general

Regarding Symbols at large. I feel that there should be a way to Trait for more Symbols that don’t require weapons. Symbols are a core mechanic of Guardians only available through weapon Skills (and Zealot’s Speed but we all know that one’s a bit weird). If not all weapon Skills have a Symbol, then there should be another way of getting them.

This would circumvent turning Smite into a Symbol (though I’m not really opposed to that either) and also make Sword and Greatsword viable for Symbol builds. Such a Trait should obviously be in the Zeal line. A percentage chance on Crit like Glacial Heart might actually work for this because the two weapons that have no Symbols at all can make use of Right-Hand Strength. Plain proccing on Crit with an internal cooldown that ensures no more than 30-40% uptime might work just as well and is less random.

I could see both Vigor and Might working for this. But that’s kind of a recurring topic. And they’re pretty much the only Boons not already used in a Symbol, barring Fury or Quickness.

The addition would fix viability of Zeal for both Scepter and Sword and present an option to Symbol builders in general. The need to invest in Precision would keep the Trait in balance.

Improved Spirit Weapon Duration

It’s my impression that it’s in Virtues so as to have it congruent with extended Boon duration. But it’s just a guess. Combining it with any other Spirit Weapon Trait does however seem iffy to me. Swapping it with an Adept Radiance Trait would seem just as easy. Both Healer’s Retribution and A Fire Inside sound like good candidates for a swap.

@plasmacutter,

The subtext of this thread is not a failure to hold ANet ‘accountable,’ which is a line of thinking I find a bit too reactionary to get us any sort of decent response. The argument I (try to) clearly articulate in the post is that the recent change to Symbol of Wrath didn’t break Greatsword so much as it illustrated the deeper issue with Zeal. Symbol synergy is the only thing Greatsword Zeal builds had going for it, and a Trait line should never depend fundamentally on a single skill on a single weapon. That goes against the principle of Trait lines.

@Edelweiss,

I was also hesitant to combine those two traits, but my argument is that opening up ten points for Spirit Weapons builds somewhere actually allows Zeal to solidify itself as a Spirit Weapon line that also leaves enough room open to capitalize on its Symbol traits (i.e, you can go deep Spirit Weapons and take Honor as well for Spirit Weapons + Symbols). If you’re arguing that it would give too much strength to a Spirit Weapon build, then I can certainly see your side of the argument, and I can see where you’re coming from.

@Schakal,

Really interesting idea about making Symbols something you unlock. However, (and please correct me if I’m wrong) I don’t believe there is any precedence for any Traits actually unlocking an entirely new ability. Now, there is precedence for Traits changing the nature of a skill (i.e, Consecrated Ground making Consecrations ground-targeted), so if you want to have a trait that, say, turns Smite into a Symbol, then that does seem like an attractive compromise.

Also, Spirit Weapons aren’t boons, so unfortunately they do not benefit from Boon Duration.

I like these ideas! Well thought out post for sure.

Scepter does not need a Symbol. I would rather the animation be more on par with the Mesmer’s Scepter #1. Make it a chain. 1st attack uses the current animation shooting a semi-homing projectile, 2nd attack uses a back handed swing animation that shoots a semi-homing projectile and the 3rd attack has the Guardian raise the scepter into the air and calls down a targeted lightning bolt to smite the enemy.

As for Symbol of Vigor I would love to have Staff’s Symbol of Swiftness replaced with Vigor. Other then traveling I find it to be lack luster in a fight or keep defense. In those instances Swiftness isn’t as necessary, Vigor would be more useful. I think Staff needs the biggest rework.

1: Change to a targeted damage skill akin to Elementalist’s Scepter #1 except the animation should be a blue Guardian flame.
2: Change to a frontal CAoE damage (AKA use old Staff #1 animation) skill that applies Swiftness.
3: Change to Symbol of Vigor
4: Reduce channel time by 1 second and increase stacks per second to 4
5: Cause wards to deal damage to enemies that pass through them with Stability.

I think the “Improved Spirit Weapon Duration” trait should not be combined with Spirit Weapon Mastery due to the fact that Spirit Weapons do not go on cooldown until after their duration is up.

I would rather have a Sword of Truth for 30 seconds with a 24 second cooldown then have a Sword of Truth for 45 seconds with a 24 second cooldown. Chances are the fight is over in 30 seconds and a new fight will start within 24 seconds. If I win the fight with 15 seconds left on my Spirit Weapon then I have to wait 39 seconds for the next chance to use it.

If they were to combine Improved Spirit Weapon duration with a trait it should be Eternal Spirit. This would actually make for a Grandmaster trait unlike the current Wrathful Spirits trait. I think Wrathful Spirits needs an improvement I would like to see it give additional effects to the Commands of Spirit Weapons.

Bow – Removes Boons
Sword – Cripples (4 sec.)
Hammer – Vulnerability x5 (8 sec.)
Shield – Dazes (2 sec.)

And just a small request I think the Bow of Truth’s Command should be Ground Targeted.