Guild Wars 2

I play the game since Launch and it always seems odd to me that Axe and Sword do not have distinct dmg roles like the other Ranger weapon have.

Axe is meant to be a condi ranged weapon with pet involvement and sword is basically an evade-heavy melee power weapon, but both of them have skills in them that jump out of the weapon identity.

Serpentstrike: Has an awesome animation but the poison it provides basically contradicts the power weapon theme sword has and doesnt give any use to power builds.
Axe AA: It does raw dmg and stacks might. The might is useful but it does not provide any condi potential.

My idea for Sword 3:
The snake animation is cool and all but i would move it to dagger 5 and change the sword 3 to a pure power attack. Ramp up the number of targets hit from 1 to 3 and add an execution effect (do more dmg if target under 50% health).

My idea for Axe AA:
Axe bounce to 2 additional targets as it has before. First target bleeds 1 stack, second and third give you and your pet might (max 6 stacks each, instead of 9 only on ranger).
In addition Wintersbite does torment instead of bleed for some condi diversity.

Bonus Idea:
I thought that the GS AA has an evade frame but the sword (which is the evsive weapon) has not. What if the last chain of the Sword AA has the evade frame with the dmg of the current GS and the GS gets a might stack o the last hit with better dmg? Sword could still do decent dmg if traited (especcially now^^) and it would give an interesting aspect of survability.

Any feedback is welcome.

Sword : Agree and I was disappointed the Sword trait evade wasn’t working on GS. Serpent’s Strike is your way to get evade with sword. What I hate with sword is all that animation wiggle (Losing damage, so must of time you just AA if you don’t need to evade). The evade backward of Hornet Sting/Monarch’s Leap and the evasive roll of Serpent’s Strike.

What annoys me, is that we need to evade to get the quickness. If you look how they changed the Warrior equivalent on Axe, it’s unfair. (Dual Strike : Strike your foe with both weapons. Gain quickness with each hit. This skill cleaves, hitting up to 6 times. Since quickness stacks only up to 5 times, it has a potential of 7.5 seconds of quickness without boon duration.). They don’t need to trait and just hit.

Axe : Axe is always problematic. I don’t believe it’s a pure condition weapon. Right now, it’s a hybrid weapon that excel better at condition, because of Splitblade and Winter’s Bite. When it comes to Ricochet, this thing is one of the highest damage AA we have (lol, ikr). To confuse even more, they make the trait gives 250 ferocity. So, which one is it really ? Ah, funny/sad thing, Warrior is throwing axes harder than Rangers now.

Krispera.5087:

Sword : Agree and I was disappointed the Sword trait evade wasn’t working on GS. Serpent’s Strike is your way to get evade with sword. What I hate with sword is all that animation wiggle (Losing damage, so must of time you just AA if you don’t need to evade). The evade backward of Hornet Sting/Monarch’s Leap and the evasive roll of Serpent’s Strike.

What annoys me, is that we need to evade to get the quickness. If you look how they changed the Warrior equivalent on Axe, it’s unfair. (Dual Strike : Strike your foe with both weapons. Gain quickness with each hit. This skill cleaves, hitting up to 6 times. Since quickness stacks only up to 5 times, it has a potential of 7.5 seconds of quickness without boon duration.). They don’t need to trait and just hit.

Axe : Axe is always problematic. I don’t believe it’s a pure condition weapon. Right now, it’s a hybrid weapon that excel better at condition, because of Splitblade and Winter’s Bite. When it comes to Ricochet, this thing is one of the highest damage AA we have (lol, ikr). To confuse even more, they make the trait gives 250 ferocity. So, which one is it really ? Ah, funny/sad thing, Warrior is throwing axes harder than Rangers now.

Yeah i forgot about the Axe trait: Wintersbite should be multitarget by default and axe attacks should give you an increasing precision buff everytime you hit with an axe equipped.

Sword could have better uses if serpent strike is the second chain of monarchsleap and hornetsting is a stand alone.