Guild Wars 2

Assuming these leaked patch notes are real (but i’m not hedging my bets just yet) then it sounds like sword/axe could be a real asset in wvw and potentially pvp.

If path of scars will supposedly be updated to pull the enemy on the return hit then that leaves room for an entangle and whirling defense follow-up, which in itself would pack a punch if you are running a full serker build, not to mention the fact that there is potential for path of scars to get two 7k crits (perhaps more) with buffs.

If you are not a fan of whirling defense then the second option is to entangle after the pull and follow up with either traps or quickness-buffed sword dps. Add on pet damage and you’ve got some serious fire power if timed well. Of course it’s just theorycrafting based on unconfirmed patch notes but if true then i will definitely try this out on my serker ranger.

Im thinking more along the lines of moment of clarity. You’d have an interrupt on a 15 sec cd. The disable would potentially be 2 sec. With quickness that’s most of your whirling defense channel hitting the target.

With how much Anet hates rangers, they will nerf it before release because you brought it up.

Time to go Kholer.

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

1200 range pull that pierces on a 12 second cd. I can already picture the trolls you can pull off with this hehe.

The return hit on PoS is more difficult to get off than you might think. People will generally dodge after that first big hit in my experience, and sometimes, the movement which has occured since you sent PoS out will cause the return hit to be obstructed, other times, it’ll just bug out and not return at all, or miss or something. It’s a delayed ability, and despite a low CD, if they do choose to keep the CD the same, I think it’ll be fine because most of the time it just won’t work.

Personally, I would love to see a knockback on the initial hit INSTEAD, increase the CD to make this appropriate.

How hilarious would a knockback on the way out and pull on the way back be though ?! haha, pushing them around like a ragdoll

Ray.3780:

How hilarious would a knockback on the way out and pull on the way back be though ?! haha, pushing them around like a ragdoll

Actually – I would love this in WvW – particularly to interrupt an enemy about to stomp an ally.

Ultravalefor.5038:

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

Daemon.4295:

Ultravalefor.5038:

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

The reduced aftercast on the long range shot means that instead firing 1 arrow every 1.25s, you fire 1 arrow per second.

jcbroe.4329:

Daemon.4295:

Ultravalefor.5038:

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

The reduced aftercast on the long range shot means that instead firing 1 arrow every 1.25s, you fire 1 arrow per second.

Are we sure about that? I’ve never seen ‘aftercast’ mentioned before so I don’t know for sure whether aftercast reduction does in fact translate to increased attack rate. In any case, if these leaked notes are true, aftercast is pretty much getting reduced across the board. Just look at Warriors and Eles.

How often do you see Scorpion Wire used?

Daemon.4295:

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

Well in zergs most people don’t really dodge out of Barrage, especially if you wait until they’ve already dodged out of the other aoe to use it. It has no place in small scale fights except for maybe when you want to dissuade a stealthed thief from getting close to you and weapon swap is on cd.

I’ve run 0 BM for some time now.. Zephyr’s Speed was never a factor for me, and I run Power. I use the Longbow to put vuln on people and burst them with crit Point Blank Shot, one of our highest damage dealing skills. Have you tried using it just for damage and not for defensive purposes? Sure, the range is bad but it’s both an interrupt and a high damage skill. Overall, the Longbow does less damage than the shortbow, but I find steadily pecking away at someone’s health with auto attack to be less satisfying (and less effective) than bursting them. SB crits never go much over 1k for me, and I run 96% crit damage and something like 2.2k Power.

Daemon.4295:

jcbroe.4329:

Daemon.4295:

Ultravalefor.5038:

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

The reduced aftercast on the long range shot means that instead firing 1 arrow every 1.25s, you fire 1 arrow per second.

Are we sure about that? I’ve never seen ‘aftercast’ mentioned before so I don’t know for sure whether aftercast reduction does in fact translate to increased attack rate. In any case, if these leaked notes are true, aftercast is pretty much getting reduced across the board. Just look at Warriors and Eles.

Yes I’m certain. There was a dev explaining aftercast on the forums a few months back, but I’m not in the mood to go forum hunting to find it. But every skill in the game has some sort of aftercast (delay in which after using the skill, another action can’t be performed).

Currently, the longbow autoattack has a .75s channel and kitten aftercast, which results in 1.25s (the longbow shoots an auto attack every 1.25s).

By reducing the aftercast, it effectively means that after one shot is fired, you’ll now be able to fire another shot sooner, .25s sooner is the leaked notes are accurate.

Which results in the 1s fire time that I mentioned.

jcbroe.4329:

Daemon.4295:

jcbroe.4329:

Daemon.4295:

Ultravalefor.5038:

Sword/Axe is already a great combo. PoS crits like a truck and Sword provides tons of mobility and makes you almost impossible to escape from—which the new pull will only make worse for your enemies.

Though I’m also looking forward to the new longbow—if these “leaked” notes are real, that is.

Think about it, this is what we’ve been asking for right? More damage on the Ranger, less on the pet? The best thing I ever did playing this class was stop trying to use the pet as anything other than a walking buff provider. Once we adapt to these new changes, I think we’re going to be a lot more dangerous.. well, maybe. We’ll see what how much Torment screws us.

Biggest thing to watch for is that PoS’s return hit is somewhat unreliable… gets obstructed quite a bit, and I bet they haven’t fixed -that-

What’s there to look forward to on the longbow? It’ll miss slightly less due to the increased projectile speed but that’s it. The longer cripple on barrage is pretty much useless, the issue with that skill is people dodging out and not getting hit at all. Anyone running a power longbow build will only be hurt by this patch due to the loss of Zephyr’s Speed, assuming these patch notes turn out to be legit.

The reduced aftercast on the long range shot means that instead firing 1 arrow every 1.25s, you fire 1 arrow per second.

Are we sure about that? I’ve never seen ‘aftercast’ mentioned before so I don’t know for sure whether aftercast reduction does in fact translate to increased attack rate. In any case, if these leaked notes are true, aftercast is pretty much getting reduced across the board. Just look at Warriors and Eles.

Yes I’m certain. There was a dev explaining aftercast on the forums a few months back, but I’m not in the mood to go forum hunting to find it. But every skill in the game has some sort of aftercast (delay in which after using the skill, another action can’t be performed).

Currently, the longbow autoattack has a .75s channel and kitten aftercast, which results in 1.25s (the longbow shoots an auto attack every 1.25s).

By reducing the aftercast, it effectively means that after one shot is fired, you’ll now be able to fire another shot sooner, .25s sooner is the leaked notes are accurate.

Which results in the 1s fire time that I mentioned.

Ok I missed that clarification of aftercast, thanks. So having no cooldown, LB1 should see a 25% damage increase? I.e. 5 shots every 5 secs vs 4 shots every 5 secs? Nice, you still have to consider the reduced aftercast for other profession skills but that’s a pretty hefty boost for LB autoattack dps.

Aftercast would be comparable to GCD from other games.

So before Longbow had a .50 GCD

After the patch its GCD will be .25

With both the DPS and accuracy (projectile speed) of the longbow buffed, and the general nerfs to pets, we may see a lot more power longbow builds. Point Blank Shot into Rapid Fire with Moment of Clarity is some very respectable burst.

If you could somehow pull off a double hit Path of Scars to pull them up close into a Point Blank Shot with a Rapid Fire followup and get interupts on both the pull and knockback for Moment of Clarity procs in full berserker gear…Well, it’d be hard to do but I don’t think most enemies would survive it without an invulnerability cooldown.

I’ve used a LB since BWE1. This will be a welcome change. Still woulf like to see pther weapons (like axe mainhand) get damage buffs due to pet nerfs. Also, kinda sad to see 2 spear cooldowns get nerfed. But at least the 2nd whirl lasts a little longer now. Woild like to see the sword auto “lock” get fixed too.

(PS: can’t wait for hammer/staff ranger)

jewishjoyride.4693:

Im thinking more along the lines of moment of clarity. You’d have an interrupt on a 15 sec cd. The disable would potentially be 2 sec. With quickness that’s most of your whirling defense channel hitting the target.

Interesting thought but which attack do you want to use the moment of clarity buff with? Your best bet would propably be the sword 2 skills but I still think GS Hiltbash into Maul is much better for MoC.

Overall I like all the changes btw. Finally making a difference between LB/SB ranges was much needed. The removal of Quickness hurts LB a lot but the buffs might make up for it.

Ray.3780:

The return hit on PoS is more difficult to get off than you might think. People will generally dodge after that first big hit in my experience, and sometimes, the movement which has occured since you sent PoS out will cause the return hit to be obstructed, other times, it’ll just bug out and not return at all, or miss or something. It’s a delayed ability, and despite a low CD, if they do choose to keep the CD the same, I think it’ll be fine because most of the time it just won’t work.

Very true. Been using Axe offhand since I picked up my sword (over 5 months now) and all these improvements to PoS is great. It is harder to dodge the first path but most dodge on the return so in many 1v1 or 1v2 situations, the pull wont happen but it would be amazing in a zerg to pull in up to 5 into your pre-laid traps and into your zerg.