Guild Wars 2

Out of all the ranger’s weapons I feel the main-hand axe could use the most work.

It is designed to be used with either physical or condition builds, but fails to excel in either. You have Ricochet which only does physical damage, but has low damage in a physical build let alone a condition based one, Splitblade which can apply 5 stacks of bleeding but typically does less DPS than a full Ricochet bounce would if you are in a power build, and Winters Bite which works well between the two.

Ricochet, its auto-attack, has an excessive after-cast that negates any weapon skills. It’s frustrating trying to use a skill during this after-cast only to see your character continue with auto-attacks.

The only trait it has (10% crit dmg) doesn’t fit well with its hybrid nature. It feels like they ripped this right off the warrior, which essentially has the exact same trait, the difference being that critical damage fits in far better with the design of the warrior and its axe.

For all 5 Splitblade hits you need to essentially be touching the opponent. This makes it a risky and difficult weapon to use in condition builds because much of your damage comes from this skill. Considering the risk and difficulty involved in lining up all 5 axes, the damage of Splitblade is not high enough.

Ricochet requires multiple opponents to bounce off, greatly reducing its DPS unless fighting multiple enemies. When fighting a single opponent in PvP I often find myself mashing the weapon swap button after exhausting my off-hand skills because the axe feels close to useless between its pathetic auto-attack damage and Splitblade requiring you to be in the enemies face.

Here are some ideas I’d like to throw out there to help address these things. Keep in mind these aren’t perfectly balanced so they may appear overpowered.

The after-cast on Ricochet should be lowered so it stops blocking other skills. This would also increase its DPS by a small amount which it could use.

Ricochet could bounce off allies granting 1-2 seconds of fury and have its hits increased from 3 to 4. This would sync very well with the pet and make the axe a stronger weapon against single targets.

Splitblade could cause 5 stacks of bleeding to any opponent it hits, regardless of how many axes hit them, and the physical damage of the skill should be increased by 100% This would make the skill far less conditional to use effectively while allowing players to get some minor burst damage in if they used it at close range.

The Honed Axes trait could give a 5% damage bonus against bleeding foes, as well as a 10% increase in bleeding duration This would make the trait fit in much better with the nature of the ranger’s axe.

People use something other than 1 hand sword/war horn for a DPS build ?? Never thought of the axe when I was tossing around ideas in my head a DPS build for sure.

I use Axe 90% of the time. Having high power, high crit chance and damage, and decent Condition makes the Axe great.

I would love to see those changes the OP posted.

MH axe is probably the most useless ranger weapon. spamming axe 1 as power will get u killed due to horrible range, and the dps is lower than spamming LB 1 from 1200-1500. MH axe is only used *effectively in condi builds.

MH axe needs more.

I agree with Vaxx. Its great with a decent crit chance. Obviously, its more efficient against more than one opponent, but we’re good 1v1 no matter what. I’d just call it versatile.

mistsim.2748:

MH axe is probably the most useless ranger weapon. spamming axe 1 as power will get u killed due to horrible range, and the dps is lower than spamming LB 1 from 1200-1500. MH axe is only used *effectively in condi builds.

MH axe needs more.

I disagree. I don’t die often. Hitting a group of enemies with Axe1 does more damage than spamming a single target with a LB, especially if you are sped’d into Axe. The chill on 3, is also good with a decent recharge. Split Axe is nice for tagging lots of targets as well as doing decent damage with decent condition damage.

I am not saying Axe MH is where it should be. It could use some love like the OP suggested. Then again saying its useless, is pretty close minded.

Vaxx.3178:

mistsim.2748:

MH axe is probably the most useless ranger weapon. spamming axe 1 as power will get u killed due to horrible range, and the dps is lower than spamming LB 1 from 1200-1500. MH axe is only used *effectively in condi builds.

MH axe needs more.

I disagree. I don’t die often. Hitting a group of enemies with Axe1 does more damage than spamming a single target with a LB, especially if you are sped’d into Axe. The chill on 3, is also good with a decent recharge. Split Axe is nice for tagging lots of targets as well as doing decent damage with decent condition damage.

I am not saying Axe MH is where it should be. It could use some love like the OP suggested. Then again saying its useless, is pretty close minded.

MH axe can be a good weapon, but effective use of it is extremely conditional which I think is the largest problem with it.

The best part about the axe is probably Winter’s Bite. The 4 seconds of chill and 10 seconds of weakness on a 10 second cool-down is great. However even this is somewhat conditional, requiring an alive pet to apply the weakness.

But if you manage to be in circumstances where you can effectively use its skills, with there being multiple enemies close to each-other for Ricochet, able to safely touch the enemy every 6 seconds for Split-blade, and your pet alive for Winter’s bite, then it can be a decent weapon.

It really needs some changes to make it easier to use. Ricochet being able to bounce off allies (pet included) and Splitblade being able to cause 5 stacks of bleeding regardless of how many axes hit, are two changes I think would accomplish this well.

Bri.8354:

The best part about the axe is probably Winter’s Bite. The 4 seconds of chill and 10 seconds of weakness on a 10 second cool-down is great. However even this is somewhat conditional, requiring an alive pet to apply the weakness.

But if you manage to be in circumstances where you can effectively use its skills, with there being multiple enemies close to each-other for Ricochet, able to safely touch the enemy every 6 seconds for Split-blade, and your pet alive for Winter’s bite, then it can be a decent weapon.

I run a chill build and mainhand axe mostly thanks to Winter’s Bite. Such a short cooldown! Would I love to see the changes mentioned here? You betcha.

MH axe doesn’t need more damage. Why does everyone go to one extreme or the other. People has so much trouble with content because of this. Why do you Need to go all dps or bunker. Why power or condition. The axe for me is that middle ground weapon. It is both a condition weapon and a power weapon. Both range and melee.

Its designed to do both. Doing one or the other leaves you lacking. This weapon also applies weakness. While this weapon is best use for multiple targets; it is great in reducing thieves backstab damage and heart seeker.

Speaking of weakness with all the issues rangers have with damage scaling we don’t get hit as hard by weakness as our pets damage stays intact.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

MH axe doesn’t need more damage. Why does everyone go to one extreme or the other. People has so much trouble with content because of this. Why do you Need to go all dps or bunker. Why power or condition. The axe for me is that middle ground weapon. It is both a condition weapon and a power weapon. Both range and melee.

Its designed to do both. Doing one or the other leaves you lacking. This weapon also applies weakness. While this weapon is best use for multiple targets; it is great in reducing thieves backstab damage and heart seeker.

Speaking of weakness with all the issues rangers have with damage scaling we don’t get hit as hard by weakness as our pets damage stays intact.

People specialize in one style because its often more powerful. You want to build your stats around the strength of your build; if it has mostly physical damage you focus on power, precision, and critical damage, if you have a lot of damaging conditions then you focus on condition damage, if you have a lot of heals you get healing power.

When looking at the axe it seems to be designed to fit in with both physical and condition builds, the off-hand being the main factor on which stat combo is more efficient. If you go with OH axe you’ll want to go with physical damage. If you go with the torch you’ll go with condition damage. Mixing your stats to suit both physical and condition damage will just result in a weaker build.

The problem here is that the main-hand has its skills split between both condition and physical, weakening its potential strength. If you go full physical you’ll be weaker because you won’t get much out of Splitblade. If you go full condition you’ll be weaker because you won’t get much out of Ricochet. If you mix physical and condition damage you won’t get as much from your off-hands, utilities, and other weapon.

I personally like the axe being a hybrid weapon, I just think think it needs some work to make it stronger in all builds, both physical, condition, or a mix of the two. One way this can be done by is by enhancing one aspect of the skill in order to make up for the shortcomings in another. For instance, because Splitblade has little place in physical builds it could be given more physical damage, and Honed Axes could increase physical damage while the opponent is bleeding.

Also look at the shortbow for a good example of a proper hybrid weapon. Its auto-attack, which makes up most of its damage, has strong physical damage and bleeds. It has poison and a bunch of control based effects, all of which work well for both damage types. This allows the weapon to be fully effective no matter what damage type you focus on, even a mix between the two.

And speaking of middle ground weapons:

Melee and ranged weapons are balanced around a risk vs reward system. Basically because melee weapons are put at greater risk when reaching and attacking their targets, they have higher damage than ranged weapons which can attack from a distance and can hit the target easier.

But despite the axe playing very close to a melee weapon due to Splitblade and its off-hand options, it is still balanced like a ranged weapon. Splitblade causing 5 stacks of bleeding and 1/3 the damage of a full Ricochet is not enough for the amount of risk involved in using this close range skill. Many ranged weapons cause more bleeding stacks than this while staying at a good distance from the enemy.

They should either lower the risk involved to effectively use splitblade or increase the damage to an appropriate level for the amount of risk involved.

I absolutely love mainhand axe it just needs a serious damage increase

I don’t like the 2 on axe, but I don’t like any of the split shots on any weapon really. It’s like the intent on split shots and their actual practical use are no where near aligned.

If you ignore the 2 (maybe use it for tagging in a zerg), Axe is a fairly decent weapon, just sorta boring.

i want axe as a melee with a chilling blast finisher and a cool spinning aoe attack

I haven’t seen any use for the axe outside of tagging during the invasion…

i want to see axe as a power based melee weapon. 2 fast and strong chop in a chain the 3rd could put a short weakness on the target and maybe a spin attack, winters should be an aoe blast finisher with chill, split blade is good as it now. we realy need a good one hand melee weapon. sword is launch or root you.

One thing you guys need to remember is that Axe main-hand needs an off-hand weapon to complete it. I’ve been using the Axe main-hand nonstop for the past 2 months and found that you’ll get the most utility out of it’s skills if you try the Dagger.

I’ve seen people run Dagger mostly with Sword. Now that can be good with all the evades, but that’s a lot of evades…5 respectively with dodges. One simply doesn’t need all those evades in one weapon set.

Now try using Dagger with Axe:
Stalker’s Strike can be used to fill that gap for Splitblade…problem solved.
Crippling Talon is great for more bleed pressure on target and kiting abilities.
Winter’s bite, perfect skill. Best kite and allows your pet (if melee) to land that weakness.
Ricochet is a ranged AoE auto attack, and your complaining? Yea 1v1 the DPS is lowered but you shouldn’t be autoing for that long considering the short CD’s of the weapon set.

There’s a lot more to Axe main-hand than just autoing people. Please try to be more open to what you have before you start QQing.

P.S . conditions aren’t just for condition builds. They actually can be used to force the target to use removals, certain skills, POISON (actually helps power builds more than you think), and overall constant pressure on top of those big numbers.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. If you want a melee axe go roll a warrior. All the QQing about not being the best ranged class in the game and you want to ruin our only ranged mh weapon. I shake my head sometimes.

Mh axe is not a bad weapon at all. It just needs a little tweak to make it more viable in both condi and power builds, an example would be adding a random condition to the ricochet or increasing the power. I run it with a hybrid rampager build and it works fantastic. Conditions are not wasted and the crit percentage is fairly good. The dagger works beautifully to set up split blade. With the chill and the cripple it makes up for the pet’s AI. A slower target makes it easier for your pet to hit.

Zorak is 100 percent right.

Also the axe makes your back slot items disappear during animation, then it reappears for a moment before you start the throw animation again.
Once you see it you can’t un-see it. I apologize in advance if you had not noticed it.

I like the ranger main hand axe and use it quite often. The only change I’d make to it is have Ricochet cause vulnerability.