Guild Wars 2

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/revenant-the-master-of-the-mists/

Revenant is getting two big things, both of them being things that we’ve wanted for ages: meaningful condition manipulation and “upkeep” skills. Upkeep was exactly how I was hoping they’d implement Orders, allowing us to “toggle” on an AoE buff skill that had a degenerating LF/HP cost. And their Demon form not only has a set of what are essentially corruption skills, but has the ability to copy conditions from themselves to enemies in the area; an idea for a trait that has been thrown around a lot.

Also, there is a new boon that gives temporary condition immunity (a la berserker stance), and a condition that is the opposite of quickness.

Now, I’m not saying this to complain that “they got it and we didn’t Q.Q”, but I wonder if this means we might see similar changes in the future as well. Thoughts?

Hopefully we’ll see similar mechanics on the Necromancer. They mentioned it several times that a lot of these new toys will be shared with other classes (and their specializations). It’s a shame though, that demon form thing to spread condis would have been one hell of a trait to see for death shroud so it was more valuable to condi builds.

I’m curious how Resistance will work. They specifically mentioned berserker stance, but didn’t go so far as to say it would be changed to use resistance as well. I wonder if all immunities will be changed over to boons, including the physical alterantives like endure pain and signet of stone. If so, this certainly puts a lot of power in the hands of the Necro.

Who else looked at Resistence and immediately thought… Another tool for classes to secure stomps against necromancers?

Who else looked at taunt and thought… So it’s like fear but it can’t be condition cleansed and it is better because they run into your attacks instead of away from them?

Who else looked at slow and thought… It’s a good thing that necromancer cast times aren’t insanely long for no reason?

Okay…

Resource management, stances that need to be used with caution, freaking Mallyx transformation, looks like amazing customization, Condition flipping, Tanky stance, multiple legends, energy regeneration and degeneration, room for skill…..

Unless they’ve packed some Hiroshima-sized bomb into Necromancer, I fear I can switch my main. Will only regret losing Epidemic.

I’m jealous already :>

Anet, PLZ don’t forget us poor necro’s

Well I’ll definitely be exploring revenant when it comes, but looking at this from a Necro perspective, I am more concerned about the new boon than the revenant’s abilities.

Rym you forgot the personal reflect wall that allows counter play.

Would kill for one of those against the pew pew rangers who I’m helpless against at range.

I think the new boon probably isn’t too big a deal, unless classes with superior condition removal like elementalists get it.

You will still be able to apply conditions through the boon. 3 seconds of immunity isn’t better than a clear. 5 might be. Depends on duration.

If anything the problem is that the boon is near total immunity to our downed state — it hoses the #2 and #3 skills.

From a ranger/warrior perspective I think this class looks awesome
From a necro perspective i agree with Rym, i really hope we get something big or Rev will be new main…

now all that we need the new class to have will be blink, stealth and mobility!

RIP necro

RIP warrior, shall delete

oh right almnost forgot…slow a slow necromancer, inturrupt and chain cc poor suckers even more than now into oblivion

Was just me who had the impression that the condition “slow” is already in the game and it’s named freeze?

freeze affects skill recharge while slow affects skill activation

Really reminds me of Dervish.

But yea back at GW2’s launch I was hoping that Necro would have a big focus on controlling opponents.
Skills like Spectral Grap and Spectral Wall are really fun to use but usually inferior to other skills.

It sounds like the Revenant is very focused on positioning.
I think that I would greatly enjoy playing one.
Of course way too early to say how they will play in practice.

Also I will say that Demon Stance Revenants will be great Epidemic targets.
Strip their Resistance, too, while at it!

Roe.3679:

Well I’ll definitely be exploring revenant when it comes, but looking at this from a Necro perspective, I am more concerned about the new boon than the revenant’s abilities.

Yea looks Powerful.
Condi Necros (and condi Thieves? lol) are probably the least impacted condi users, though.
If everyone starts running skills that apply Resistance Necros start using more Boon stripping.
I’m more curious about how it impacts Engineers. haha!
I’m kinda out of the loop, not having played in a long time… but last I played I don’t remember Engineers really having many ways to remove boons.

Anyway, seeing how Necro has gotten most Conditions so far I would expect Necro’s specialization to get Taunt or Slow. Or both.
(Slow seems more Chronoman- err I mean Mesmer, though!)

Taunt could be hilarious when used together with Fears.
“What? You stunbroke my Fear? Well have a Taunt!”

Also something to consider is that Necros might get skills or traits that apply Resistance on them…
Fits Necromancer’s condition manipulation theme.
Synergy with skills that draw conditions from allies to yourself for example.

But I like the idea of having some boon that is a counter of conditions, instead of a skill that has no counterplay besides running until it effect ends. This may give the necromancer ability to convert boons into conditions even more power.

Freeze slows movements and cool downs. Slow will make casts longer to take effect.

For example, consume conditions will now take two seconds to cast.

LastDay.3524:

Really reminds me of Dervish.

But yea back at GW2’s launch I was hoping that Necro would have a big focus on controlling opponents.
Skills like Spectral Grap and Spectral Wall are really fun to use but usually inferior to other skills.

It sounds like the Revenant is very focused on positioning.
I think that I would greatly enjoy playing one.
Of course way too early to say how they will play in practice.

Also I will say that Demon Stance Revenants will be great Epidemic targets.
Strip their Resistance, too, while at it!

Roe.3679:

Well I’ll definitely be exploring revenant when it comes, but looking at this from a Necro perspective, I am more concerned about the new boon than the revenant’s abilities.

Yea looks Powerful.
Condi Necros (and condi Thieves? lol) are probably the least impacted condi users, though.
If everyone starts running skills that apply Resistance Necros start using more Boon stripping.
I’m more curious about how it impacts Engineers. haha!
I’m kinda out of the loop, not having played in a long time… but last I played I don’t remember Engineers really having many ways to remove boons.

Anyway, seeing how Necro has gotten most Conditions so far I would expect Necro’s specialization to get Taunt or Slow. Or both.
(Slow seems more Chronoman- err I mean Mesmer, though!)

Taunt could be hilarious when used together with Fears.
“What? You stunbroke my Fear? Well have a Taunt!”

Also something to consider is that Necros might get skills or traits that apply Resistance on them…
Fits Necromancer’s condition manipulation theme.
Synergy with skills that draw conditions from allies to yourself for example.

Being a engineer most of the time, I can say that the warrior berserker instance it’s really hard to deal with. I try to keep distance if I can when they use that. And you’re right, engineers don’t have feasible options of boon striping.

Depending on how they put this new boon in the game (across multiple classes), this can make the engineer as it is today useless, since they rely on conditions.

I even think Revenant should have been the necro specialization name..

I just thought of the best thing ever….
Taunt into power necro Well of Suffering, Well of Corruption, Fleshbag, Tainted Shackles and Dagger AA……………. MADNESS ^^

This is what i was afraid of to be honest. It looks like revenant might satisfy my aethetic needs so i will probably switch to it (ele is fun its just not the style i want). Also its confirmed to already have projectile blocks and serious support options. Its already better than necro.

But Bhawb might be correct. These new technologies for skills on new specialisations is encouraging. So we might see toggle orders and other stuff weve been asking for on the necro specialisation. I hope so anyway. I would also like to see arcane echo on mesmer but thats not really relevant to this topic.

On the other hand, they haven’t shown any leaps/swiftness/stun breaks on weapons, and hammer/mace/axe may be unlikely to have these.

This means that they (like necromancers) will be pigeonholed into utility skills, rendering their class mechanic pointless.

And other classes will get the new boons and buffs, making the immobile tanky condition master less relevant than ever.

@nekretaal: Please put the razor down, you’re making a mess.

Am I the only one who looked at Resistance and thought “Finally, they have a reason to make ‘Condition Immunity’ garbage Boon-based, which means it can be corrupted/stripped, which means we can actually do something about things like Zerker Stance”?

Am I the only one who looked at slow and thought “Sure my casts might be longer, but I have a large array of ways to transfer/remove condis, so not bad”?

If they blanket classes in the ability to keep the new boon/condi on for long periods of time, the game is probably going to take a dive into the trash can, but I see things like Resistance as a means to actually give counter-play to condition immunity.

Zerker Stance can just give Resistance for 6 or so seconds.

Diamond Skin could apply 30 seconds of Resistance on a 30 second cooldown (or a longer cooldown/shorter duration) when an Ele is above 90% health.

Automated Response could apply 20 seconds of Resistance on a 30 second cooldown (again, can be tweaked) when below the health threshold of 25% or 33% or whatever it should be.

Necros could get a trait that gives their minions Resistance based on some action/spell/etc. (see: Minion Master discussion).

Counter-play to Condition Immunity.

And Taunt can be used with Wells for a team-play option that can drop a lot of damage.

Possibilities, man. Sure, they might mess it up, but I prefer to live positively.

Hopefully we’ll see a few of these things expanded into Necromancer territory, since I still maintain expanded degen / regen / consumption of Life Force could be very interesting. Too bad it’ll probably be Specialization-exclusive.

I mean, the best thing I can see out of all of this is it confirms that ANet is okay with adding these features into the game. In addition, ANet is really big on copypastaing mechanics from one profession to another, with small “flavor” changes.

Not that I’m getting my hopes up too much, but it could be good. Either way I’m planning to immediately level a revenant to 80 when the expansion hits, already gathering up my consumables for it.

Deletes Necro

nekretaal.6485:

Who else looked at Resistence and immediately thought… Another tool for classes to secure stomps against necromancers?

Who else looked at taunt and thought… So it’s like fear but it can’t be condition cleansed and it is better because they run into your attacks instead of away from them?

Who else looked at slow and thought… It’s a good thing that necromancer cast times aren’t insanely long for no reason?

1. Secure stomps were always easy like on a warrior/engi, only thing they need to do is timed dodge roll / someone standing in between for a secure stomp. The only thing I was thinking, oh hey, a new boon = new thing to corrupt

Nah Terror now causes Taunt to do damage,more damage if your foe is AAing, Necro Style:Retaliation!!!

I won’t QQ until it’s added. As of right now, I’m grinding my teeth though. We’ll see how it works in practice because on paper, it looks very annoying. Having low mobility and relying heavily on our fears, it sounds almost like a good Revenant will hard counter us, not to mention this whole “condition immunity boon” thingy that I’m not very excited about either.

Wonder what happens if you’re feared and taunted. Which way do you run?

Plexxing.2978:

Wonder what happens if you’re feared and taunted. Which way do you run?

What currently happens when you are knocked down while already feared, or feared while knocked down? Probably the same.

Quickness isn’t necessarily a boon that can be stripped/stolen etc right? Or am I mistaken? Wouldn’t that mean we can’t transfer slow?

Zetsumei.4975:

Quickness isn’t necessarily a boon that can be stripped/stolen etc right? Or am I mistaken? Wouldn’t that mean we can’t transfer slow?

Quickness is not a Boon, but Slow is a condition. So yes, we should be able to transfer it.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Zetsumei.4975:

Quickness isn’t necessarily a boon that can be stripped/stolen etc right? Or am I mistaken? Wouldn’t that mean we can’t transfer slow?

Quickness is not a Boon, but Slow is a condition. So yes, we should be able to transfer it.

They said there are improvements to both. So we might see quickness become a proper boon.

I think that necromancer is the profession, with warrior, that have an in build mechanic which could make it a candidate for some upkeep skills. That’s a good point, ain’kitten

Now, does revenant get all we’ve always wanted? I don’t think so. They get a bunch of things that are Necromancer’s like, sure, but they do as well get things that’s related to other profession and that fit the fact that they can channel ancient legend (with different base professions).

I think it will be more that the revenant will have a “taste” of each profession depending on it’s legend “attunement”. Like Mallyx is necromancer’s like as well as Jalis seem guardian like.

From the look of it, the revenant right now feel balanced. Absolutely not overpowered but with some different mechanic that could be refreshing in the current game. Condition wise, it feel like the revenant will struggle to apply large amount of them even while in mallyx attunement but they will be good at managing them. And mallyx elite definitely feel like Dagger #4 with a longer CD (because elite have loooooong CD).

All in all, this new profession don’t really hype me (maybe when I will play it I’ll fall in love with it but it doesn’t feel really appealing at the moment) and other classes specializations haven’t been enlighten right now, there are still tons of things to look for.

Well I see the malyx elite as more of a plague signet on drugs

Good god… Just reading some of this it already cries out for a nerf. Either they roll out something for necro specialization to deal with all of this or they just doomed the necro class altogther with this hard counter.

Also wondering if I AOE 5 of them with conditions and they all pop legendary and resistance, would I then get all stacks x5 on me? This would instantly break any sort of zerging or bombing. Instantly.

In the next revenant information update they’ll reveal that they come with capes too.

spoj.9672:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Zetsumei.4975:

Quickness isn’t necessarily a boon that can be stripped/stolen etc right? Or am I mistaken? Wouldn’t that mean we can’t transfer slow?

Quickness is not a Boon, but Slow is a condition. So yes, we should be able to transfer it.

They said there are improvements to both. So we might see quickness become a proper boon.

I would imagine you’re correct because what would Slow turn into if a Guardian converted conditions to boons? I suppose they could lazily choose to simply convert it to something like might, but to add some real depth to the game it would be healthier to make it a proper boon/condition.

It’s my hope they do the same thing for Berserker Stance where activating berserker stance simply gives you resistance for 4 seconds. Hopefully this would mean something similar is in the works for Endure Pain as well.

Dhemize.8649:

Good god… Just reading some of this it already cries out for a nerf. Either they roll out something for necro specialization to deal with all of this or they just doomed the necro class altogther with this hard counter.

Also wondering if I AOE 5 of them with conditions and they all pop legendary and resistance, would I then get all stacks x5 on me? This would instantly break any sort of zerging or bombing. Instantly.

In the next revenant information update they’ll reveal that they come with capes too.

I don’t feel Mallyx stance will get that new boon. It would collide with mentioned “risk/reward” and amount of conditions you can withstand for maximum perfomance. Being logical, ofc…

On the other hand, I feel like Mallyx stance users may really swear at all those shout guards and wars, coupled with eles and engis, for cleansing their conditions. Heck, even we could troll with it. Especially underwater.

Unless they get “cleansing immunity” for the duration of stance, surely.

I really wouldn’t worry about anything until we get actual specifics on things. I mean, of course everything about Revenant is going to seem awesome andpowerful; they’re trying to hype the class. You don’t hype a class going “Yeah, we’ve spent a lot of time going over the math to make sure every skill is balanced versus the other classes”. You do it by going “OMG, LOOK AT ALL THE COOL kitten THIS CLASS CAN DO, COME AND PLAY IT”.

For all we know, Revenant could end up being horribly week or horribly OP. It could be perfectly balanced. It’s skills could sound awesome on paper, but end up being horribly clunky and unfun to play. All we’ve gotten are the obvious hype attempts which clearly worked since I’ve already seen quite a few “OMG, SCREW -my current class-, I’M MAKING A REVENANT” despite not really knowing much about the class.

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/473/feature/9418/Guild-Wars-2-An-Exclusive-Preview-of-the-Revenants-Skills.html

New axe skill is basically a way stronger version of our dark path. Im expecting a lot of new skills to be like other class skills but way better. Just like necro has always had very weak versions of skills compared to other classes.

AXE: Frigid Blitz – This allows the player to hurl an ice axe through the air, chilling everyone (slowing them), and when it reaches the actual highlighted target you teleport to him and do a melee spinning attack that ends up behind the enemy, chilling him too. A key thing Jon noted is that you can use one Axe skill mentioned in the blog to pull together a clump of enemies, and then use this to go through them all and wind up at the rear-most one.

Latest interview says that the “in combat movement speed of the Revenant is like the out of combat movement speed of theif.”

That’s another thing we always wanted.

Meanwhile (and this deserves another post, perhaps even in the general forum) Necromancers are stuck with access to chill instead of mobility.

Nobody expects the new greatsword to have good mobility because it has access to chill.

But chill just got a HUGE NERF.

Chill does two things: (1) acts as a cripple and (2) affects cool downs. But, the new Revenant class operates on energy, not cooldowns. Chill does zero, nothing against thiefs who don’t have cooldowns for the most part and now it will do nothing against a second class.

At no point did they ever say a Revenant lacked cooldowns.

Bhawb.7408:

Plexxing.2978:

Wonder what happens if you’re feared and taunted. Which way do you run?

What currently happens when you are knocked down while already feared, or feared while knocked down? Probably the same.

I don’t think that’s ever happened to me. I assume you get knocked down when you’re feared or start running if you’re knocked down?

Game doesn’t need another super mobile class. It needs another class with no mobility options at all and a POS gap closer so someone keeps the Necromancer company at the back of the line

Plexxing.2978:

I don’t think that’s ever happened to me. I assume you get knocked down when you’re feared or start running if you’re knocked down?

I have no clue lol. But I would assume it is the same: one of them will probably have a “priority”, depending on which was applied first/last or something.

I believe the last CC used is what effects you. In PvE defiant stacks prevent us seeing this interaction. But if you get chain CC’d you get tossed around like a ragdoll. So im guessing if you fear first then taunt. It will fear until taunt is applied and then cancel the fear and switch to taunt. But the fear will probably still tick for its full duration. Kind of like how you can be feared while immobilised. Maybe it will cause them to run towards you but due to the fear they wont auto attack.

You can see the opposite happen from champion giants. If they knock you down and then do a fear. The fear actually cancels your knockdown animation and immediately starts making you run away in fear. Or atleast thats what i remember. I havent experienced that recently so dont quote me on it.

I’m really really trying not to be bitter about this. I really am. But by grenth is that hard to do. If anyone has been following my posts for a while, they’ll see a very big similarity between my contagion suggestion and the Mallyx demon stance.

nekretaal.6485:

But, the new Revenant class operates on energy, not cooldowns.

No Revenant will have cooldowns on most skills but they will be much lower to compensate the energy costs. They made an example with one of the hammer skills it is a aoe knockdown costs energy and has a 15 second cooldown (which is really low for an aoe knockdown but i guess the energy costs will balance it out).

They have both energy and CDs, as Muchacho said. They also have upkeep skills, meaning that they can end up having neutral or even negative regeneration. It will be more like GW1 Assassin than Thief, where you build up energy and then expend it via certain combos. Although not quite as faceroll since you can’t bind your combo to be 1→2→3→4→5 (RIP Assassin).

Well its actually pretty much just like energy was for all classes in gw1.

Projectile finisher auto attack. Life Siphons that dont require traits…