Guild Wars 2

Spent most of the last beta weekend on revenant, plus a couple extra days I managed to stay logged in on revenant(seriously why is this a thing? not complaining cause I got some extra hours out of it but still).

Overall I feel revenant is in a very good spot now, but only because of Glint. Glint is way, WAY too mandatory for Revenant. I fear for future elite specs not being able to give anything worthwile. Besides that I think Revenant needs some changes to certain skills that throw balance off the window (both buffs and nerfs).

First and foremost, the Glint heal NEEDS a bigger tell. That, or a cast time. I love getting spiked and healing back to full health, but that’s really not fair for the enemy if all they can see in such a high speed paced combat is a buff on my health bar. This needs a bright aura on the revenant for the duration. Adding a cast time would be an option (short enough to still be a fast “oh kitten” button, but you shouldn’t be able to use this while stunned).

As many pointed out, the shield needs work. Every time I encountered a fellow revenant in wvw and they used crystal hibernation I thought “great, free kill” and that should NOT be the case. Skill 4 seems lackluster and honestly I didn’t even bother using shiled at all, anywhere. Same for offhand sword, although I can see the appeal of the block, sword 5 is clunky.

Even though I was going for power based builds, I kept using mace over sword because sword is just not pve friendly. Very often would your UA cancel early because of collisions with any wall or nearby object, and having a projectile on sword auto that loses its comeback damage because of walls sucks too. I haven’t used sword 2 a single time, something about this skill just doesn’t feel right.

For the legends themselves, I’ll try to point out the stuff that hasn’t been said before. Mallyx imo is perfect, Jalis needs a fix on those hammers’ collision and that’s about it (although reduced energy on the taunt would be nice). Now the big stuff:

Glint, other than the healing skill I mentioned earlier, is pretty much spot on, although I’ve found myself having trouble using Gaze the Darkness. It just didn’t seem to work most of the time. Both on players and in PvE. Tried using it against Mossman and it just did nothing to him, he would stay on stealth even with the revealed debuff. Also, all the facets share the same “clock”, they all tick at the same time. I tried activating them with a 1s interval so I would benefit from the trait that gives might when you give a boon to alies but they eventually seemed to synchronize and pulse at the same time, making this trait essentially a stack of might every 3 seconds, which isn’t great at all.

Shiro: I know many love this one but I’m not a particularly big fan. Impossible odds is way, WAY too costly for what it does. It’s not just that -10 upkeep is insane, but having 10 energy on activation as well is just nuts. This needs a cost reduction. Phase traversal is potentially balance breaking. This skill alone makes the revenant the most mobile class in the game and honestly I don’t know how to fix this, but going back to how it was before is not an option. Now, Jade winds; this skill is way too strong. There is NO reason why this skill’s stun should be longer than the Reaper’s Chilled to the Bone. The reaper’s shout has an insane CD and also longer cast time. Sure it applies chill, but you can still cast Jade winds about 10 times in the time a reaper can cast CttB again.

Ventari IMO is alright. Could use some mechanic changes but those have already been covered up by other people.

Finally, Revenant needs a huge revision on its traits. Some are outright useless, while others are so powerful they don’t belong to the tiers they’re in. Demonic defiance should be a grandmaster, and venom enhancement needs to go. The Herald line is probably the most underwhelming of them all (honestly the only reason I took herald was to gain access to Glint, never cared about the traits or the shield skills), and devastation just has no options, you will always be taking the ferocity traits, hands down. Salvation needs variety in its traits, I get they wanted a healer line, but it should be usable with other legends and weapons other than the ones intended to. Some traits also need to move around lines, Dismantle fortifications fits more in the corruption or retribution line, same goes for Enhanced Bulwark.

I skimmed but I have a few comments.

Glint is NOT mandatory, I played and fought tons of Revenants without Glint and the profession feels fine. It only really shines when in groups and even then, you’re still fine without it. When it comes to roaming, it’s on the same level as other legends, I agree that the heal needs a bigger tell.

also, on note of Shiro, Revenant was designed to be a mobile class from the get-go. I even remember a dev saying “as mobile as a thief in combat.” You should also take note that though they can stick to targets well, their disengage isn’t the best, Riposting Shadow doesn’t do a good job at disengage, and only an incompetent player lets you get away with it. Also, I feel like it’s a good thing, once a Revenant is in battle, they have to commit to it. That means enemies have to keep fighting too.

Glint is good, but not mandatory..Shiro/mallyx for example wroks pretty well especially in PvE.

Glint’s heal: I agree on the huge tell, this is needed otherwise there’s no counter. NO cast time, let it be instant so is usable through stun (mind that you have to activate the passive facet first…so you have to prepare).

Agree Mallyx’s in great spot and that Jalis need an energy cost reduction, the utilities cost too much for what they do:
- stability road got a huge nerf, so at least -5 energy cost is supermandatory;
- taunt is a cc and i get that it shouldn’t be spammable but it’s not worth in current state, if you keep the cost, at least double the duration
- hammers are in great place now, just fix the selfdestruction on obstruction :-D
- elite is a bit costy for the 50% dmg reduction for few secs, and the cast time is really long. either cut some more cast time or -5 the cost.

Shiro is perfect imho, i won’t change a comma.

Ventari suffers the Jalis problem, for the fear of spam things we have good effects with high costs. It’s way more balanced than Jalis tho, so i don’t really know how to make it feel better. FOR SURE TABLET MUST BE AUTOSUMMONED on legend swap, otherwise there’s no reactionary gameplay here. Only doubt is the elite, never thought a single situation to use it (the CC is not worth imho). So i’d say to have the tablet perma summoned if we are in Ventari and rework the elite to not destroy it and maybe , dunno, pulse blind? Cast daze for 30 energy cost?

Agree on shield it killed more times than it saved me. #4 is decent (add some more prot duration pls) #5 need to be changed: i get you can’t move BUT if you can’t even contest points and old conditions still damage you for god sake remove the breakbar, make it a block like guardian heal (and reduce a bit the overall healing) or make the soft CC way less inpactful.. if i sit in a smoke field my shielding breaks ? I mean…wut?

Other weapons are in good place.

Traits are along story, some need movement around but not because of adept/master/grandmaster: this is an obsolete concept..you have all of them, so it doesnt really matters the order in tiers. What is important is the concurrecy with other traits.
But, i’ll save trait discussion for later ;_)

EDIT: typos