Guild Wars 2

I honestly do not get it, it does about as much damage as staff on auto.

The vulnerability amounts to basically zero. 10% increase in damage when we manage to keep the stack going? big whop. that adds about 100 to every 1000 damage done. BiP gives that much in a single go, plus the bleed.

And talking about bleed. Once scepter has the stack up, it does double the damage of axe main in bleed alone. And it has greater range. And you can spread the hurt around with epidemic.

And if you want to generate LF, go dagger. Possibly with warhorn for 5 and spectral walk on a utility. Never mind that the damage will be insane as auto attack sequence will do more than axe 2, and with no cooldown.

All in all, i do not see where it fits in the grand scheme of things.

In the same boat as you never really understood it also. the range is horrible the number 2 needs a 3 seconds channel to do 3k.. to 4 maybe 5 if youre full berserker amulet glasscannon spec.. 3 seconds 4k damage wich probably gets evaded 60% of the time.. if only the damage would be the damage that actually shows.. 9x 1700+ then it would be actually worth using..

the number 3 is it saving grace retaliation is nice especially if it hits multiple enemies you can basicly keep it up constantly on a boonspec.. but yea..

Axe is incredibly UP atm.
You better go with offhand focus and Well of corruption for Vuln, especially because Focus4 also gives LF and Health as well as a good ammount of dmg.
Axe wa sinitially supposed to be an Arc-Like weapon like ALL MELEE WEAPONS ON ALL CLASSES (except Dagger) but was scratched in favor of increased range.
I really find it stupid that Staff1 is our only way of dealing multiple enemy-dmg with an autoattack, while all other classes have at least an arc-like swing. And then there’s the Dagger for Elementalist, OH how envious i am of those skills!

Axe plus dagger combination can be quite nice. 5-6 attacks with axe, switch to dagger and you will pull of some nice damage.

Actually the other day Ascii and I came up with a pretty decent hybrid bleeding /power axe build. Stacked bleeds faster than my scepter/staff builds and did moderate damage both in and out of deathshroud. I did fairly well in tpvp and spvp testing it out.

In my book, the axe needs at least a 15-25% damage boost to be viable.

You better go with offhand focus and Well of corruption for Vuln, especially because Focus4 also gives LF and Health as well as a good ammount of dmg.

Ah yes, the focus. That is another “huh?” in my book. i can’t figure out why they gave focus 5 a 1 second windup. Sure, it strips boons. But we are necromancers, if we want to mess with boons we use one of our utilities that will convert boons into conditions. The thing also has a 15 second recharge so it is not like we can go spam it everywhere. On most of the PVE stuff it is a single target chill and a soso damage ability.

The axe+focus combo does give a lot of vulnerability, however they both are really lack luster in PvE. With the two of them combined you end up having really poor damage in group fights.

I’d love it if the focus bounced around up to 5 targets and could bounce until it hit the same target 3 times. This leaves it the same in a one on one fight (5 bounces total) but increases it’s capabilities in group fights. I’m not sure how to balance the life force it gives though.

The axe 1 and 2 both need slight improvements for each.

For the auto attack they could increase the vulnerability stacks applied up to 3 per hit, and increase the damage by 10%.

For the channel they could increase the life force gained by about 1%, making it the weapon with the fastest life force gain. This gives it a good niche. (the dagger has the niche of being the self heal weapon).

I wanted, I REALLY wanted to use the Axe with my new power build to farm.

I love the #3 skill, it’s a bit low damage but at least it slows people and retialiation is good.

But 1 and 2, man they are lacking. Axe Range is really bad, so you have to go under fire to use it. But the risk isn’t worth it.

2 is a channel damage, and it onyl does that except refiling LF. You don’t have any other effect. I can do more damage with my #1 dagger, sure I have to be in melee range, but with axe #2 channel, if you don’t stay in melee range you will miss half your hit. And it has a cooldown.

the #1 is the worse. Sure it’s stack invul, but you have to stay close, and use this slow 2 hitting low damage output skill.

Like somoene said, #1 staff does the same damage at 1200 range, and pierce people.

And the worse, is the only trait to make axe better, is a GrandMaster tier that nobodies take, because the other traits is a must have. You have the choice between 20% bonus damage on ALL direct damage under 50% hp, or 15% damage on 3 skill (one low damage, the other one on CD) and 20% faster CD. It just not worth it. Close to Death is so much better, and apply to every damage attack!

I WANT MY AXE BACK!

I feel bad for switching to dagger for WvW and farming, but when I don’t use staff, that’s because I’m in melee range. And Dagger is a lot better, damage and control wise.

@Kardiamond: when I saw the screenshot of your necro you posted in the WvW forum and saw the axe I simply chuckled and thought “He hasn’t realized yet”

Good to see you finally came around just as I did and realized Axe is by far our worst weapon. Its outdone in everyway by every other weapon pretty much besides ability #3, which honestly I still don’t think is as useful as dagger #3.

Yeah well I really loved the mecanism of Axe attack.

It just so sad I have to switch it for dagger now I still think about trying back my axe but I think I won’t :P

But don’t judge my gear! My necro is still in farming mode, and I was using the axe to tag the creeps in DE with #3. And if you knew what I was wearing in that screenshot, Axe is not the worse. :P

I’M in full traveler + pirate rune + magic find opal.

Let’s just say I’m in Farming gear. Not the best thing for WvW :P

Axe plus dagger combination can be quite nice. 5-6 attacks with axe, switch to dagger and you will pull of some nice damage.

outside of the maintainability of the damage increase you get pretty much the same benefit from BiP now that it grants might. And said might goes with you if you switch target, vulnerability does not.

Also, you’re giving up our best source of AOE, the staff, to carry two fairly short range single target weapons.

you know what it is not only does the staf do more damage but so does the sceptre on a power build.. just switch to sceptre and see the 1k+ on 900 range pile up i seriously went sceptre for a while because i couldnt stand the axe anymore better 1k + damage and tiny bleed then 700 damage annoying twirling sound and stupid 3k channel for 3 seconds that hits half the time because enemy went ouf of range again..

i tried to like it also i really tried but to me it seems near impossible to kite a half decent warrior or any melee class with it the 600 range means instant death the moment you make a mistake.. at least with dagger you can choose the moment you want to attack..

digiowl.9620:

Axe plus dagger combination can be quite nice. 5-6 attacks with axe, switch to dagger and you will pull of some nice damage.

outside of the maintainability of the damage increase you get pretty much the same benefit from BiP now that it grants might. And said might goes with you if you switch target, vulnerability does not.

Also, you’re giving up our best source of AOE, the staff, to carry two fairly short range single target weapons.

To be fair, might only buffs up your personal damage while vulnerability makes that target take more damage from everyone.

I wonder if lowering the Axe Training trait from grandmaster to master or maybe adept would indirectly buff the axe? That way you could get the increase damage with axe, AND the +20% damage with Close to Death. Thoughts?

I would love that personally.

Axe is useful for engaging, but if you’re using daggers as well it means giving up a staff which is one of the most important utility/LR damage tools.

People underestimate the value of channeled damage. It’s basically a counter to blinds, blocks, and evades.

A blind, block, or an evade can totally negate a single “big” hit. However, with a channel most of that damage is getting through against blind or block and at least some of it is getting through versus an evade.

Now, if you are running power with dagger and axe and you have some lifeforce you can do your three channeled attacks back to back and that is a good bit of damage that is not easy to avoid.