Guild Wars 2

Alright, everyone else is doing it, and I’ve been participating, but it’s all getting too spread out. So I feel like putting my views all in one place. The idea here is to change as little as possible and for the changes made to help even out the class, not boost it over anything. I see far too many suggestions that just seem over the top, and I hope not to be doing that. I’ll be touching on the weapons (minus the Short Bow because I;ve never used it for longer than it took to get all the skills) and the Marksman line because it seems to be in the worse place right now.

To start, Longbow. It just got an update. Not a nice update, just a update. Things shifted around, its functionality was changed, but it didn’t actually improve the weapon, it just changed it.

Long Ranged Shot Range 0-500 max damage. Range 500-1000 max damage 5% critical chance. Range 1000+ max damage 10% critical chance.
The idea being it’s for shooting great distances, but an arrow is an arrow. Whether it hits you here or there it’s going to hurt as much, but your better at pin pointing your target the farther they are from you. This will have synergy with my changes to Marksman

Rapid Shot Version 1 stays the same. Version 2 stacks cripple per shot.
I’m not actually sure how I’d like to see this power work. The current state has less damage potential but I kind of like being able to apply vulnerable across a wider group, even if it isn’t as much per target. I also see rapid fire as a suppression ability, so making the target have to slow down as I spray arrows at them makes sense to me.

Hunter’s Shot Version 1 loses stealth gains ten seconds of weakness. Version 2 returns to what it was before the patch.
I’m not in love with weakness, but either way I’m taking stealth away from this attack so it needs to do something useful. Maybe 5 seconds of fury or a couple stacks of might.

Point Blank Shot 3 seconds of stealth and is a blast finisher.
This is our get away card, so why have to use this and then hunter’s shot to get all the benefit when we can just do it at once? Also you’re firing an arrow so hard it throws the target across the field, that sounds like a blast to me.

Barrage I like it the way it is.

Greatsword
I just don’t like the change to Maul, it was pointless. I also don’t see the need to bring bleed back. My thought it 3 seconds of fury which happens instantly such that the attack gains the benefit of it.

Longsword
There is nothing about this weapon I particularly like.

Slash, Kick, Pounce This is the major source of strife with this weapon, causing users to actually stop using the autoattack on an autoattack skill. Slash is fine. Kick is fine if you remove the jump. Pounce needs to go, make it anything else, just remove the jump. No more jump and the sword should become mobile again. The problem with this weapon is that it is obviously intended to be the most mobile weapon of all, but you can’t move while using it.

Hornet’s Sting Renamed to Stinging Swarm. Instead of jumping back to evade you cause a short blind and also evade in place. Monarch’s Leap is unchanged, allowing this skill to be a distance closer that doesn’t first put you farther from your target and possibly out of range.

Serpents Strike This one bugs me, but there are several powers that work similarly, so I suppose there’s no reason to mess with it.

Axe
Axe I like, mostly, but for two things, one minor, one major.

Splitblade While each individual projectile does individual damage, the power itself does 5 stacks of bleed. So if you’re hit with one axe you take a 5th of the damage and 5 stacks of bleed. If you’re hit with all five axes you take max damage and 5 stacks of bleed.
The weapon set is ranged, it may be mid ranged but it is 100% about being ranged, so why does it have a power that is only effective in melee?

Whirling Defense The changes they made are good. I just have one thing to add, the one thing they added to all other powers that worked similarly to this one. You can move while this power is in effect.

All the exclusively off hand weapons I like just the way they are.

Marksman
This is the worse minor trait line in the game. The reason for this is that every other trait line, regardless of how bad it is can potentially be used multiple times without needing to be augmented by yet another trait. This one can’t.

Opening Strike Renamed to Ranger’s Discretion, 20% chance to inflict 5 stacks of Vulnerable on critical hit.
Now it can be used any time, not just the first time. Since it’s not the first shot anymore it needed a new name, I pulled this one out my butt.

Alpha Training Stays the same

Precise Strike +10% critical damage when target is vulnerable
It would make no sense that 20% of the time it happens 100% of the time, so I made this one about damage.

Remorseless Inflict Torment on critical hit if target is vulnverable.
This trait now becomes worth having, but not required in order for the minor traits to be worth anything at all.

And this is where Long Ranged Shot synergizes. When things are at greater distance you have a greater chance of critting and therefore a better chance of making all these traits proc.

Alright community, do your thing.

I would definitely love to see some type of cripple on the longbow to help keep distance.

Lethal Njection.8741:

I would definitely love to see some type of cripple on the longbow to help keep distance.

Well, there is cripple on the barrage already. That’s part of the reason I’m not 100% behind my idea there. I don’t know if having that much cripple would overpower the set or if it would be alright. Also, not doing it, would still leave Hunter’s Shot up in the air for purpose.

You should think through this one more time… You are giving the MM tree a lot of crit

solrik.6028:

You should think through this one more time… You are giving the MM tree a lot of crit

I’m giving the MM tree a lot of things that happen on crit or have a chance to happen on crit. But generally that’s how the traits work when they’re variable. Since it’s the Power tree it’s also not granting all the much necessarily.

Besides that, the numbers are just there for an idea. I don’t know the proper weights for balancing, I’m just basing my numbers on what similar trait lines offer for the other classes, while trying to do something that is actually useful. The current trait line is not actually useful in any way, which is something that is not the case for any other trait line of any other class.