Guild Wars 2

Just a quick thread to keep the idea alive, Please fix or do something to improve the Sword auto attack animation lock. Thanks

Agree. Needs to be fixed.

Even without it turned on, I got downed 3 times in a row yesterday just against the stupid Fire Shama because using dodge after pressing 1 + 1 = still not fast enough for the stupid attack queue system to realize you don’t want to keep attacking but instead want to dodge. ….hurp durp…. programming issues that were completely solved back in 1994….

I dont think this is something they will fix, since it is not broken. The auto attack roots you deliberatly. (I think I read that somewhere, forgot where) You can still get out of the lock by switching weapons.

Put the same broken rooting to pets attacks, make him jump like stupid. No one can argue that with this rooting we are missing our attacks

Silvos.8653:

I dont think this is something they will fix, since it is not broken. The auto attack roots you deliberatly. (I think I read that somewhere, forgot where) You can still get out of the lock by switching weapons.

Yes, it is deliberate and anet has stated so before.

You have to realize that the swords ability to stay on target is insane. And in my opinion it outweighs its minor effect on evading.

Soilder.3607:

Silvos.8653:

I dont think this is something they will fix, since it is not broken. The auto attack roots you deliberatly. (I think I read that somewhere, forgot where) You can still get out of the lock by switching weapons.

Yes, it is deliberate and anet has stated so before.

You have to realize that the swords ability to stay on target is insane. And in my opinion it outweighs its minor effect on evading.

ArenaNet has also stated (when talking about Ranger sword #1) that the control of your character is the most important part of the combat system in GW2 and that this skill violates this concept, and while working as intended is being looked at in order to bring it inline with the rest of the combat mechanics of the game.

The main problem being since 2&3 in the auto-attack chain are leaps they cannot be interrupted by a dodge. Maybe changing these to blinks/shadowsteps might be the solution but in any case that’s the main fly in the unguent.

Wasbunny.6531:

Soilder.3607:

Silvos.8653:

I dont think this is something they will fix, since it is not broken. The auto attack roots you deliberatly. (I think I read that somewhere, forgot where) You can still get out of the lock by switching weapons.

Yes, it is deliberate and anet has stated so before.

You have to realize that the swords ability to stay on target is insane. And in my opinion it outweighs its minor effect on evading.

ArenaNet has also stated (when talking about Ranger sword #1) that the control of your character is the most important part of the combat system in GW2 and that this skill violates this concept, and while working as intended is being looked at in order to bring it inline with the rest of the combat mechanics of the game.

The main problem being since 2&3 in the auto-attack chain are leaps they cannot be interrupted by a dodge. Maybe changing these to blinks/shadowsteps might be the solution but in any case that’s the main fly in the unguent.

Why can’t they just change it so (in this situation only) skills two and three can be canceled by a dodge, even though they’re a leap? It may not make sense, dodging in mid-air, but really who cares.

They’ve probably said something in regards to this before, but I can’t recall anything.

Also, I don’t want to hear from them that it would cause tons of game breaking side effects, because they said that would happen if pet f2’s were instant cast, and look what happened.

Soilder.3607:

Wasbunny.6531:

Soilder.3607:

Silvos.8653:

I dont think this is something they will fix, since it is not broken. The auto attack roots you deliberatly. (I think I read that somewhere, forgot where) You can still get out of the lock by switching weapons.

Yes, it is deliberate and anet has stated so before.

You have to realize that the swords ability to stay on target is insane. And in my opinion it outweighs its minor effect on evading.

ArenaNet has also stated (when talking about Ranger sword #1) that the control of your character is the most important part of the combat system in GW2 and that this skill violates this concept, and while working as intended is being looked at in order to bring it inline with the rest of the combat mechanics of the game.

The main problem being since 2&3 in the auto-attack chain are leaps they cannot be interrupted by a dodge. Maybe changing these to blinks/shadowsteps might be the solution but in any case that’s the main fly in the unguent.

Why can’t they just change it so (in this situation only) skills two and three can be canceled by a dodge, even though they’re a leap? It may not make sense, dodging in mid-air, but really who cares.

They’ve probably said something in regards to this before, but I can’t recall anything.

Yeah totally agree but don’t really know. Seems like the obvious solution but maybe it’s more complicated to implement than we realize. The ‘leaps’ not really being leap finishers however makes me think that there might be some way to customize this. Again I have no idea, need to grab a beer or two with a dev to find out the full scoop I think.

Soilder.3607:

Yes, it is deliberate and anet has stated so before.

You have to realize that the swords ability to stay on target is insane. And in my opinion it outweighs its minor effect on evading.

#1, I don’t believe you. Sauce, nao
#2, insane WHERE??? … Structured PvP only? most of the people who rolled rangers, never wanted to PvP in the first place. Why do they have to suffer for an advantage that only exists in one tiny little niche mode of the game?

Sword has two built in evades use them. There is a slight delay but you have more then enough time to react so don’t wait till the last millisecond.

The ability to evade and still stick to the target is the weapons function. Do what rangers do best adapt, Then master this weapon.

for PvE two words , Double tap (No auto attack)

Detargeting after a double tap of sword 1, always leads to a leap in your mouses/camara direction , if that 3rd hit hits.

so time Sword autos, get to know the animations , double tap the sword 1 Just before the end of the second attacks animation the round house kick, you can dodge as soon as your foot touches the ground, you’ll have a few millisecs between that and the leap.

as soon as the round house kick foot lands on the ground the animation for the leap begins, thats your window to dodge. a very short millisecond time gap.
its unavoidable the swords a homing weapon and can’t be controled too well through brute force of W,A,S,D keyboard keys.

have to go with the flow and wait for the tide to stop , athough in the end if you don’;t have auto attack on , your the one thats in control , don’t forget the Millisecond gap betweek sword chain 1,2-3.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Do what rangers do best adapt, Then master this weapon.

More than enough of us “Mastered” the weapon already. Don’t you tell us Lrn 2 Play. Get that trash out of here. This is bad programming. Lrn 2 Program. Ya like that? Do you even know advanced Client-Server C++?? No? So let’s not go there.

If that the case what is all the qq about. What do we need to circle strafe so we can call our selves skilled. You cant dodge in mid air, you can indeed move when your not in the air.

Adapt to the concept of evading with your weapon skills and not the dodge. One is still able use the normal dodge. By Mastering I mean just know which your able to do without thinking about it. Having a basic understanding of what needs to be done or being able to do it sometime even 75% of the time isn’t mastering it.

This is all about PvP players wanting their weapon skill to chase down PvP enemies for them because they want to be skilful with their clicks instead of skilful with their movement. How about the PvP rangers actually master their movement, like every other class, and let everyone have a reliable #1 skill, like every other class.

Every class has a weapon that moves a player in one way or another. I for one spend most of my time in PVE. Mob animation are way easier to evade then a players. Sword is the best weapon we have hands down.

There are some problem with the sword but the root and having to time your dodge aren’kitten The jump after you have killed your target due to sever lag. That such a minor issue that I chose to craft bolt as my first Legendary.

Your relying on it to do what it wasn’t intended to do, and then call it unreliable.

This weapon bring more evades to the table not less. It outputs more damage than any other choice. These are some of the reasons people like it. Maybe in time.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Every class has a weapon that moves a player in one way or another.

Name one other weapon that moves the PC on auto attack

I honestly never understood the resistance to change for this weapon. You shouldn’t need a ‘work around’ to use the primary attack of a weapon regardless of how cool the animation is. Even with auto cast turned off, the skill is still highly frustrating and the locking mechanic isn’t something any other class has or needs for their weapon.

you could say this weapon is the meaning of the ranger combat style, plus every class is unique in its own way.

plus although a thief and spam leaps through smoke, the sword autos can be treated the same.

from a PvE point of view , against bosses there isn’t a problem.
unless they are fractal bosses but those are more about use of skills rather than spamming auto 1 , i realy don’t want onther spam auto ranger weapon, we already have , gs , shortbow and main hand axe where the main source of damage sustain is in the autos.
many threads have been over this , a full redesgin of the sword auto maybe hiding in Anets filing cabnet but its up to them if they think it will balance or not .

plus if they change the leap , that i rather like as i can control it 75% of the time,( the only time i can’t control it is if my target drops dead infront of me , then the leap flys me away) but i found during the leap you can retarget and it will leap again if done quick enough.

the only place i see the sword auto bugging people, is in high end fractals where mobs are involed during boss fights.

I was referring to Stooperdale comment about pvp ranger wanting to be skill full with the click rather than skillful with their movement.

I also didn’t say aa. People can claim that the aa on the sword leads to less skilled play when clearly this isn’t the case.

Look at it from the other side. Removing the root and the timed dodge would just make this weapon op. With all the sources of vigor plus the evade on this weapon and the possible evade of the off-hand weapon set. Even without specing into vigor we are able to get the amount of dodge other class can if they spec into it. This allow us to traits for other things or we can go full blast with the vigor. It isn’t just the weapon. This weapon is already use in condi builds mainly for the evades. It has one skill that would benefit from condition damage.

So my question is what are you willing to give-up. Why do you have to give something up because that is anet pattern.

So what will it be one of the evades or maybe alittle bit of damage. I have it, the evade and the posion on serpents strike ( your asking for two thing makes sense to lose two) instead of poison make it a bleed.

If you think they are just going to give you want you want with no side effects go back and look at every weapon fix or change. Look at what we got and what we lost.

For the people who like this weapon and use it, We love it. Most of u who hate it do not really use this weapon. A lot of you who hate this weapon hate a lot of other things about the class.

Most of the people who started thread about the aa on sword don’t even play ranger and more.

For the record I was one of the people who complained about it, now I see how great this weapon is.

Most people find it hard to hate something when they are good at it.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

For the people who like this weapon and use it, We love it. Most of u who hate it do not really use this weapon. A lot of you who hate this weapon hate a lot of other things about the class.

Been playing Ranger since beta and have 2 lvl 80’s simply because I got tired of my original Sylvari, I’ve hated the sword lock since day1 and it’s still my most used weapon.

I remember when we we’re in such agreement about the sword as a community that we even got Peters to look into a possible fix and people got genuinely excited. Naturally we never heard anything of it again but now it’s nothing but “learn to play” and “I love the sword so you all must just suck at the game if you don’t” platitudes over and over from the couple people or so every time one of these threads pops up.

“Look at it from the other side. Removing the root and the timed dodge would just make this weapon op. "

Well no. Players still wouldn’t be able to get more than the current maximum from this weapon. There would just be less handicap on players who don’t want to invest effort in micro managing this sword.

You also seem to be making a strange argument that the weapon is best with the leap but if the leap is removed the weapon would be even better. That seems like nonsense.

“A lot of you who hate this weapon hate a lot of other things about the class.”

Please don’t tell us what we like or don’t like. Please don’t try to characterize us as fools and bad players.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Look at it from the other side. Removing the root and the timed dodge would just make this weapon op. With all the sources of vigor plus the evade on this weapon and the possible evade of the off-hand weapon set. Even without specing into vigor we are able to get the amount of dodge other class can if they spec into it. This allow us to traits for other things or we can go full blast with the vigor. It isn’t just the weapon. This weapon is already use in condi builds mainly for the evades. It has one skill that would benefit from condition damage.

So my question is what are you willing to give-up. Why do you have to give something up because that is anet pattern.

That wouldn’t be overpowered. That would be intentional balance, as defined by ANet’s balance philosophy statements. Our defined combat niche is a melee skirmisher, able to deal sustained melee pressure, with evade as our primary defensive mechanism.

Rangers are intended have more evade than other classes. The class is already balanced assuming we have access to vigor, stamina evades, plus additional weapon skill evades.

The price of our evade has already been paid. Rangers have limited burst potential compared to a thief, with the intent that we can outlive situations that they cannot. We also have caps on our stun-break potential, because a ranger is expected to dodge that stuff.

The fact that Sword AA interferes with dodge & free movement is a balance breaker away from the developer intent.

Stooperdale.3560:

This is all about PvP players wanting their weapon skill to chase down PvP enemies for them because they want to be skilful with their clicks instead of skilful with their movement. How about the PvP rangers actually master their movement, like every other class, and let everyone have a reliable #1 skill, like every other class.

I see wut u did thar,
i liek it very much

Seraph you’re outnumbered. It’s beyond obvious now. Go find another fight / fishinghole.

leap. enough said.

Back in february 2014 they said they would work on a fix for sword

watch at 48:50

There’s honestly nothing wrong with it. It’s actually helpful in some situations, Lupicus for example. Use off hand skills to interrupt the AA chain.

Casino Brawl.1249:

There’s honestly nothing wrong with it. It’s actually helpful in some situations, Lupicus for example. Use off hand skills to interrupt the AA chain.

Can you give an example of where the sword mechanic is helpful, be able to use an off hand weapon isn’t a good example of how good the sword is.

Belzebu.3912:

Casino Brawl.1249:

There’s honestly nothing wrong with it. It’s actually helpful in some situations, Lupicus for example. Use off hand skills to interrupt the AA chain.

Can you give an example of where the sword mechanic is helpful, be able to use an off hand weapon isn’t a good example of how good the sword is.

Sword #1:
Sword Auto-Attack shines on moving targets, in that it’s very difficult to shake a Ranger once he’s locked on. In PvP/WvW, that would be pretty much everything. In PvE, that’s a fairly limit set, but not something that never happens.

Second big plus on sword AA is the rate of attack, plus it has a cleave-like effect. For RaO or sigil triggers on hit/crit, AA with QZ is usually the best option for a burst.

Though fairly minor, AA has the effect of placing might on your pet. While the might itself isn’t significant, this can be useful as part of a might-stacking build or as a continuous trigger for the +dmg on boon trait.

Sword 2:
This has three different applications that it is useful.

First, it’s a leap finisher. This combos will with torch, trap fields, and in particular healing spring. Consider dropping healing spring & a combo through GS3/Sw2 for a large burst heal on top of the regen.

Second, it can be used as an evade. Sw2 is sufficient to throw you outside of the AOE range of most attacks, even dungeon boss attacks. You can wait the split second for the AOE to clear, and then Sw2 again to instantly return into close combat.

Third, Sw2 is a mobility skill. If you clear your target you can use the direction you are facing to control the direction of leap. By mouse looking in 180’s while leaping you have a repeatable short burst of speed where you are faster than swiftness speed. Another method is to use Sw2 to disengage a target, select a new target of opportunity while in flight, and leap/AA lock the new target – easily and quickly crossing a battlefield to the target of your choice.

Sword 3:
Evade, poison, and flank. Possibly the least interesting of the sword skills because it’s straight forward in use. Dodge an attack and/or change your positioning to get your flanking bonus trait. This can also be used as a positioning skill for Sw2.

What is vaguely… neat… is as a part of an evade chain. Like consider, Dg4→Sw3→Sw2→GW3→GW4→SigStone… Evade, Evade, Evade, Out of Range, Blocked, 0 dmg… It has a decently fast recharge with martial mastery, which enables you to chain evade/dodge windows one right after another.

Belzebu.3912:

Casino Brawl.1249:

There’s honestly nothing wrong with it. It’s actually helpful in some situations, Lupicus for example. Use off hand skills to interrupt the AA chain.

Can you give an example of where the sword mechanic is helpful, be able to use an off hand weapon isn’t a good example of how good the sword is.

When enemies don’t stack up on each other. You can go through your auto chain (stacking might) and never miss a beat because of the leap effect. In pvp groupfights this can also be good for missing some aoe etc but isn’t as reliable. The sword is meant for a higher skill level than the longbow etc and that is why it rewards skilled players with the highest possible damage. It has two built in evades on short cds that I absolutely love and, with Fortified Bond, it can add good damage to your pet.

Those are just a few reasons I use sword off the top of my head.

*ninja’d: nice breakdown too Seth

Technically anet don’t really need to fix it. It’s a bother in PvE because it’s the best DPS weapon ranger has, add another weapon to fit that role and the complaints will go down.

I can’t really think of a situation in PvE where I found the sword to be helpful enough to be worth the problems associated with it.

I mean, I’m used to the playstyle and think the animations are cool but there is no way I can agree that the animation locks/leaps are helpful in PvE. Being able to instantaneously dodge, circle strafe and max melee range is much more helpful than being able to chase enemies in an environment where they are mostly stationary.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Look at it from the other side. Removing the root and the timed dodge would just make this weapon op.

Is that a joke? The unanimous argument of the sword root defenders is that the root is a non-issue once you learn how it behaves, and that they have no problem dodging. You yourself on this thread say that you have “more than enough time” to dodge.

Dismissing the issue with one hand and calling it op if addressed with the other…

I was kinda making a question knowing the answer, his example of why sword was good was a bad example.

I agree with TurtleDragon, in PvE the sword “annoyance” doesn’t make up for the benefits, GS has almost every benefit of the sword (a leap finisher, an active block instead of an evasion, and an extra evasion in the AA instead of a root …) and you pretty much never need to actively run to get the target since mobs barely move, and the DPS difference isn’t that high (considering 1v1, in AoE the difference may favor the GS)

In WvW and PvP, sword is great, the removal of the root in the leap from the AA would be amazing, but all in all it is good.

Seth.1308:

Belzebu.3912:

Casino Brawl.1249:

There’s honestly nothing wrong with it. It’s actually helpful in some situations, Lupicus for example. Use off hand skills to interrupt the AA chain.

Can you give an example of where the sword mechanic is helpful, be able to use an off hand weapon isn’t a good example of how good the sword is.

Third, Sw2 is a mobility skill. If you clear your target you can use the direction you are facing to control the direction of leap. By mouse looking in 180’s while leaping you have a repeatable short burst of speed where you are faster than swiftness speed. Another method is to use Sw2 to disengage a target, select a new target of opportunity while in flight, and leap/AA lock the new target – easily and quickly crossing a battlefield to the target of your choice.

Sword 3:
Evade, poison, and flank. Possibly the least interesting of the sword skills because it’s straight forward in use. Dodge an attack and/or change your positioning to get your flanking bonus trait. This can also be used as a positioning skill for Sw2.

I have been seeing this stated a lot recently and it is not entirely accurate. I have used the sword with a love hate relationship, similar to my feelings for pets, since beta and i can say from my hours spent in WvW that you in fact travel no faster than swiftness. Slower if you’re terrible with the camera or have latency issues lol. I did at one point see it being discussed long ago in a thread far far away and it made me take a closer look at the skill myself. In the end i came to the same conclusion as the other posters. Simple enough to test if anyone is unsure. Get a buddy with swiftness and race like the moas. Place bets if it pleases you to do so. All in all I think it would be possible if there were no cast time/ animation delays on the skill but sadly the only way you’ll be outrunning say another ranger with swiftness, is if you throw GS3 into the mix. My favorite mobility pair by far.

Sword 3 just has garbage pathing at times but that is my only, albeit minor, complaint with that skill honestly. I should be able to dodge and attack as the skill was intended but often it simply doesn’t connect.

umm.. bump?

I just started playing, going through and sort of testing the waters with each of the weapons to see what I like.

The no-dodge animations are horrible. Every other weapon allows me to dodge out of the way (this is kind of helpful so I don’t get 1-shot in WvW or killing stuff that is 10+ levels above me) when an attack is inc.. except for the sword AA.

It wouldn’t be so bad if the AA had an “immune to damage while leaping to the target”.. but that would make it overpowered, so, the only real option is to either change the coding of the game, or changing it to a shadow-step maneuver or something equivalent.

Honestly, the only place that the sword no-dodge auto attacks have gotten in the way for me is some high level fractals, so I’ve started using the greatsword in those instances… outside of those fractals, I still use sword+X… Especially since I got the fractal sword skin

Just change the chain and 2nd skill to that of warriors and I’m happy.

Don’t mindlessly mash the AA and you will be fine.

Gotejjeken.1267:

Don’t mindlessly mash the AA maximize DPS and you will be fine.

Fix’t

There is a time to mindlessly spam and a time not to…sometimes you can’t just ‘maximize DPS’ (what I call spam). This is honestly why most other Rangers anger me…it is always ‘maximize DPS’ with every weapon…long bow spam, short bow spam, sword spam….

All the while we disregard the fact that those chain attacks from the sword will lock on to your target (that is, the sword does NOT root you). This makes them excellent for chase down. Somehow I’m expecting the ‘OMG but it threw me off a cliff!’ reply now.

For any other #1 skill for any other weapon in the game, is there ever a time you wouldn’t want to use it to maximize your DPS?

I can think of one: Symbol of Protection. And this one doesn’t harm you in the process.

Shortbow and Longbow also. If they pop reflection or retaliation you best stop auto-attacking them.

Unless you mean from a PvE standpoint, then yeah, spamming #1 is probably the way to go.

But from a PvP / WvW standpoint, wisely using even the #1 skills is a must.

Gotejjeken.1267:

Shortbow and Longbow also. If they pop reflection or retaliation you best stop auto-attacking them.

Unless you mean from a PvE standpoint, then yeah, spamming #1 is probably the way to go.

But from a PvP / WvW standpoint, wisely using even the #1 skills is a must.

No, I mean any attack anywhere that has a noticeable ill effect on the player or their allies when pressed.

Your projectile example is just counterplay. That goes beyond the scope of the discussion imo.

The only other attack in the entire game that you wouldn’t spam because it would have a negative impact on you or your team is the Guardian’s Hammer… and only then because the field would overlay a high priority one.

So unless we go with the popular theory that all bad players somehow chose the Ranger class and ANet decided to give Rangers this attack to offset the fact that they have so many bad players, why else do we need something so counter-intuitive on a spammable attack that the overwhelming majority of the playerbase no doubt has on auto cast (and I’d wager a similar overwhelming majority has no idea they can turn it off).

Firstly, I can think of PBS as something 99% of the player base HATES to see a Ranger use. Ill effects include…well anything you wouldn’t want KB’d, now gets KB’d way out of range.

As far as the sword, It is like that because of the leap chains. You cannot just cancel out of a leap. It just so happens your ‘overwhelming majority’ thinks everything in the game stands still, and thus gets stuck in a leap animation when that thing eventually moves.

What I am getting at is, spamming in general is bad. Yes, it may have worked in situations such as early dungeon runs where you shove something in a corner and spam at it. That does not mean its good game design. As a result something like the Ranger’s 1H sword suffers…because it punishes you for spamming.

Gotejjeken.1267:

Firstly, I can think of PBS as something 99% of the player base HATES to see a Ranger use. Ill effects include…well anything you wouldn’t want KB’d, now gets KB’d way out of range.

As far as the sword, It is like that because of the leap chains. You cannot just cancel out of a leap. It just so happens your ‘overwhelming majority’ thinks everything in the game stands still, and thus gets stuck in a leap animation when that thing eventually moves.

What I am getting at is, spamming in general is bad. Yes, it may have worked in situations such as early dungeon runs where you shove something in a corner and spam at it. That does not mean its good game design. As a result something like the Ranger’s 1H sword suffers…because it punishes you for spamming.

Again, you’re going outside the scope of the discussion we’re having. We’re comparing spammable attacks, which for 7 of the 8 classes, is the #1 skill for each weapon.

Of these dozens of attacks, only the Ranger’s has a negative impact on their DPS when using the attack in its default implementation.

I’d bet money on the only reason the attack has the leap in the first place is because ANet designed the attack animations and needed the leap on it to make it look good.

The weapon is great on a condi build where you don’t care what’s going on. It’s less than ideal on a power build that needs more control than what the evade and dodge provides.

Atherakhia.4086:

I’d bet money on the only reason the attack has the leap in the first place is because ANet designed the attack animations and needed the leap on it to make it look good.

Didn’t “Kick” use to knock back the target a bit during early beta? Might be why we leap forward constantly.

Substance E.4852:

Didn’t “Kick” use to knock back the target a bit during early beta?

According to the history of the corresponding wiki-article, yes.

One more for the “sword is fine” band wagon.
Time the animations with your actions. I’m even able to carefully WASD to aim the cleave effect, one thing I can add is to quickly 180 with mouse view, coordinated with a sidestep to disengage the chain, on top of the previous mentioned tricks (weapon swap, off hands, utilities-lightning reflexes says hi).

I can safely say I have near total control without turning AA off and I don’t PVP mainly.

But hey, people will always have stubbornness to adapt.

I only wish the sword was not the best dps thing there is for ranger. I would honestly prefer if sword and one of the bows were same in terms of DPS, so that there is larger degree of freedom.