Guild Wars 2

Balance is hard, and PvP metas change over time. However, from what we’ve seen so far, The Power Shiro-Glint build is by far dominant in PvP, with Mallyx-Glint a distant second. Here are some suggestions that can help balance the class with minimal design change, given that most current bugs are fixed as well.

As always, many people will have different opinions , so please leave constructive comments only, which of course can include criticisms or proposed changes. EDIT: Some community suggestions have been taken into account in italics.

Weapons

Sword

• Unrelenting Assault: Reduce damage by 50%. This skill should be an evade and teleport, but the damage is too high. EDIT: Some in the community do not want to give up this damage + evade that has very little counterplay. I disagree with this on a fundamental skill design level. Another viable solution could be that the damage remains the same, but if the initial skill cast is dodged, the skill is evaded, like nearly every other skill in the game.
• Grasping Shadow: Reduce cast time to 1/4 second (-50%). Sword off-hand can be just as viable as shield if Grasping Shadow is buffed, adding a layer of complexity, skill, and variety. EDIT: Increase range to 300 (+130%). This skill is too difficult to land in it’s current form.

Hammer

• Coalescence of Ruin: Reduce damage by 33%. Just a moderately overtuned skill, like True Shot. EDIT: A better solution might be to simply increase the cooldown to 8s (+300%).
• Drop the Hammer: Reduce cast time to 1.25s (-29%). This skill is fairly useless in mid to high tier PvP, but could be more interesting with decreased cast time. EDIT: Another option might be to make this a fire and forget skill rather than a channeled skill.

Mace

• Misery Swipe (chain): Increase range to somewhere between 300 and 480. This weapon would see much more use in condi builds with some range on the auto attacks.

Axe

• Temporal Rift: Add a chain skill to detonate the rift, like mesmer’s focus 4 (Temporal Curtain). Decrease the range to 600 (-33%). This alone could make axe a viable choice.

Utilities

Mallyx

• Pain Absorption: Transfer 2 conditions from each ally and youself to the target. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows active counterplay to conditions, and gives revenants meaningful condition removal. This change alone makes Mallyx competitive with Shiro.
• Banish Enchantment: Corrupt 2 boons instead of removing them. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows for active counterplay to some boonful classes.

Ventari

• Remove from the game. (I kid, but this would need a major overhaul to be viable in PvP, it seems). EDIT: This line could be good in some situations, but requires more work than the scope of this article.

Jalis

• See Ventari.

Herald

• All facets: Add 1/4s cast time to initial cast. This forces Revenants to think when to activate the signets, rather than spamming them during Unrelenting Assault or Crystal Hibernation. (Leave Infuse Light and Gaze of Darkness chain skills as instant cast!) EDIT: Many in the community like the freedom of these instacast abilities. However, a small increase to cast time could bring the necessity of Herald in line with the other trait lines.
• Infuse Light: Make this skill about 5 times more visible (+400%). This is a great active mechanic but is currently not visible enough except in the buff bar.

Traits

Devastation

• Malicious Reprisal: Remove the hidden ICD from this trait. This allows active counter to bunker builds which rely on blocking. EDIT: The cooldown is 30s. Remove this cooldown to promote an active threat to bunkers.

Corruption

• Opportune Extraction: Reduce ICD to 6s (-40%). Optionally corrupt boon rather than remove. This allows condition-specced revs to be a threat to boonful classes.

Invocation

• Roiling Mists: Reduce critical chance while under fury increase from 20% to 10%. This is not vital, but it might be a good place to balance overall Revenant damage.

Herald

• Shared Empowerment: Reduce might duration to 5s baseline (-38%). Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes. EDIT: Many in the community are against a balance in damage. This suggestion would only remove around 12% damage. Please note that there are some significant buffs in Sword off-hand and Malicious Reprisal which would raise skill ceiling to the class even with this small reduction in damage.

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read. Before you dismiss me as abusive, there is a huge mega thread detailing real problems and things that should happen with the class. People are still bad, and no, I will not elaborate, because I’m tired of bad players.

I spent over two years telling people to get good at the Ele class, and got nothing but hatred. It’s the opposite deal here. The class seemed incredibly op at launch, people cried, got nerfed. What happened? People learned to play with their brain and now rev is easily exploitable. Run hard cc or condition or both and revs are free food. Rev has this design and for the right reasons. You want stun breakers? Run shiro. Want to stand a chance against conditions? Rin mallyx. It’s a perfect system as it is an has the perfect trade offs. When bugs are fixed, of course.

TLDR- Bad balance suggestions. Facets with cast time? Mallyx boon corruption? Jeez. Completely killing the flow of a class and making one legend really strong? Yes, you heard me, mallyx is better than Shiro.

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read.

Couldn’t agree more.

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read.

Here’s how to respond to a post you disagree with:

“I think your suggestion X is not great because Y. Perhaps Z would be better.”

For instance, I think that you forgot to actually add anything of substance to the conversation. Perhaps you should try that sometime!

EDIT: Looks like we got some clarification, but not much in the way of specifics. Revenant has some skills which are overpowered and some which are underpowered. These suggestions are in no way a nerf or buff, but a balance. So, answer specific questions, like why you believe facets with cast time are bad, and why boon corruption on Mallyx is not an optimal rebalance.

Versepelles.1972:

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read.

Here’s how to respond to a post you disagree with:

“I think your suggestion X is not great because Y. Perhaps Z would be better.”

For instance, I think that you forgot to actually add anything of substance to the conversation. Perhaps you should try that sometime!

I explained my reasons. It is still far too soon to be making any changes to any class at the moment. People need to get better at playing their classes. I may come across as elitist but I definitely have the skill and recognition in my classes to back it up. Rev is not even close to being one of the top classes or specs at the moment.

Hahahahaha. Yeah lets destroy revenant mr “balance”. You know revenant is not even considered to be strongest class let it be teamfight or 1v1 right? Yet you asking for some serious nerfs for no reason at all. I guess someone need to git gut.

Ah btw..in duels rev is rated to be a middle class. In teamfights he struggle as well, you can watch tourneys to see yourself. So what you really want to nerf? Tell me which class you play?

Razarei.2809:

Versepelles.1972:

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read.

Here’s how to respond to a post you disagree with:

“I think your suggestion X is not great because Y. Perhaps Z would be better.”

For instance, I think that you forgot to actually add anything of substance to the conversation. Perhaps you should try that sometime!

I explained my reasons. It is still far too soon to be making any changes to any class at the moment. People need to get better at playing their classes. I may come across as elitist but I definitely have the skill and recognition in my classes to back it up. Rev is not even close to being one of the top classes or specs at the moment.

“Geez” is not a good reason. It would probably be better to specifically state what you disagree with, then why you disagree with that statement. A big balance patch is on the way, meant to pave the way for a more balanced version of the current classes, so some changes are good- the ones listed above are some potential candidates to bring certain aspects of the Revenant in line with other classes.

Burtnik.5218:

Hahahahaha. Yeah lets destroy revenant mr “balance”. You know revenant is not even considered to be strongest class let it be teamfight or 1v1 right? Yet you asking for some serious nerfs for no reason at all. I guess someone need to git gut.

Ah btw..in duels rev is rated to be a middle class. In teamfights he struggle as well, you can watch tourneys to see yourself. So what you really want to nerf? Tell me which class you play?

Lets take a moment and talk about each of the listed items and why you may disagree with them- that’s constructive! Revenants are a great class and excel at many roles, and were used extensively (and to good effect) in the last ESL games, indicating that they are indeed a meta class. As such, they have a few aspects which could be brought into line with other classes- as detailed above.

I love the revenant class; it is my PvP main (swapping from mesmer). Lets not get into ad hominem attacks here, and lets not call this what it’s not- this is a list of possible balances, comprised of buffs, nerfs, and tweaks. What do you like about the list, and what do you dislike?

The bit that jumped out at me was:

Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes.

I don’t accept the premise that Revenant damage is that out of line with other professions. I keep hearing that there are others that are better. Which is it?

As for Roiling Mists, the suggestion given is actually how the trait operated during BWE1 and it was felt to be underwhelming, therefore changed to what we currently have. That doesn’t mean it shouldn’t, perhaps, be revisited in light of other changes, but felt this was worth mentioning.

Yeah I’m done. You swapped from mesmer to rev and you think rev damage output is too high. Kden. 10/10 would be trolled again.

My mesmer or any mesmer would school revs for free at this stage in the game.
Good day to you sir.

Misguided.5139:

The bit that jumped out at me was:

Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes.

I don’t accept the premise that Revenant damage is that out of line with other professions. I keep hearing that there are others that are better. Which is it?

As for Roiling Mists, the suggestion given is actually how the trait operated during BWE1 and it was felt to be underwhelming, therefore changed to what we currently have. That doesn’t mean it shouldn’t, perhaps, be revisited in light of other changes, but felt this was worth mentioning.

I have found that power Revenant damage is moderately higher than the other roamers in the same positions- namely, compared to thieves and mesmers which fulfill something of a similar role (in certain prevalent builds). For instance, in good winning game in soloqueue, I average around 450k damage, maxing around 650k damage (so not dueling a tank druid or anything silly like that). On a power chronomancer, I would probably average around 350k damage in the same role. Now, this is with around 750 games on mesmer versus 150 on Revenant- that is, some aspects of Revenant seem to be easier to deal significant damage- even burst damage- than other classes. Of course, this is anecdotal from my viewpoint, but others in the PvP scene seem to agree with this conclusion.

Of course, other classes (I’m looking at you, Scrappers and Reapers) have similar issues, and need similar balancing.

Also, thanks for the info on Roiling Mists- that’s good to know!

Razarei.2809:

Yeah I’m done. You swapped from mesmer to rev and you think rev damage output is too high. Kden. 10/10 would be trolled again.

My mesmer or any mesmer would school revs for free at this stage in the game.
Good day to you sir.

Given some of the mentioned potential changes to Mallyx and Corruption, do you think that a Mallyx condi build could be viable against chronomancers, given their notorious susceptibility to conditions, and the massive amount of slow that could be returned to them? Why or why not?

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

all the changes are ridiculous

Rym.1469:

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

lighter.2708:

all the changes are ridiculous

Which of the changes do you disagree with, and more importantly, why? What would you do to make a better (from the viewpoint of all classes in PvP) Revenant?

To note, The listed changes should be about a 20% decrease in Revenant dps, which is in no way mutilation. It still absolutely would serve it’s role of damage dealer, it’s quasi-role of point holder, and it retains nearly all of it’s utility. You may be hyperbolizing a bit here, Rym, which is terribly counterproductive. What revisions would you make to this list, and, again, why?

Hard to disagree with what my fellow revs said

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

For example CoR can be sidesteped and UA is only a 20% damage increase over AA.
And really you completely ignored those that need changes most.

Varezenem.2813:

Hard to disagree with what my fellow revs said

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

For example CoR can be sidesteped and UA is only a 20% damage increase over AA.
And really you completely ignored those that need changes most.

It has still yet to be clarified exactly what changes revs are in need of most, from the viewpoint of all classes in PvP. My viewpoint is that the active evades on Revenant are great, and the damage is great, but that revs should not have both at the same time (compare this to high-dodging thieves). Revs lack solutions to condis, so this is what we address above. What’s your take on this?

Versepelles.1972:

Weapons

Sword

• Unrelenting Assault: Reduce damage by 50%. This skill should be an evade and teleport, but the damage is too high.

Why do you think this? The damage on the skill has lower DPS than auto attacks, and is halved by just having one other target present. The game is not balanced around 1v1, the skill works fine in group situations (it does VERY LITTLE damage when near multiple foes, and forces you to appear where your enemy is even if you don’t want to, this balances out the evade/teleport/free damage aspect of it)

Hammer

• Coalescence of Ruin: Reduce damage by 33%. Just a moderately overtuned skill, like True Shot.

33% Would leave it doing LESS damage than an auto attack at close range, roughly the same at mid, and only marginally more at range, for a telegraph attack that can be dodged with an energy cost. This is tremendously bad.

If anything, the damage should be the same but with say a 1-2 second increase in CD so it’s not virtually spammable. The skill is easily dodge-able and hits appropriately hard for it’s ease to dodge (and the fact that it’s useless in close quarters dps-wise), the only problem is it can be spammed so easily.

• Drop the Hammer: Reduce cast time to 1.25s (-29%). This skill is fairly useless in mid to high tier PvP, but could be more interesting with decreased cast time.

Skill has it’s place as downed control. Personally I would simply change it to be more like dragon’s tooth, fire and forget, instead of basically it requiring you to channel. It’s a hard hitting ranged AoE KD. I think the long telegraph is necessary just not the cast time.

Mace

• Misery Swipe (chain): Increase range to somewhere between 300 and 480. This weapon would see much more use in condi builds with some range on the auto attacks.

Aesthetically this makes very little sense, and although I’m not opposed to it the fact that rev’s condition DPS isn’t strictly tied to weapons is an interesting part of the class.

Axe

• Temporal Rift: Add a chain skill to detonate the rift, like mesmer’s focus 4 (Temporal Curtain). Decrease the range to 600 (-33%). This alone could make axe a viable choice.

I think this is an interesting and fun change, but what would the detonation do? Condi application? CC? Damage?

Mallyx

• Pain Absorption: Transfer 2 conditions from each ally and youself to the target. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows active counterplay to conditions, and gives revenants meaningful condition removal. This change alone makes Mallyx competitive with Shiro.

While I agree Rev needs condi removal, I think Mallyx is the only legend that already has enough anti-condi play. A boon dura heavy rev can easily be 100% immune to condis unless someone pulls off a boonstrip. It seems to me condition removal should be added to Jallis’ utilities instead (to help it feel distinctly like a condition removal/tank spec), or perhaps even say glint’s facet of element’s final pulse as an interesting addition to the “play” of the skill (ie you can choose to use it for it’s exception offensive capability, it’s swiftness, or stand in it for the condition removal). I’d like that, but it’d make glint even stronger which is probably the last thing we need atm lol.

Herald

• All facets: Add 1/4s cast time to initial cast. This forces Revenants to think when to activate the signets, rather than spamming them during Unrelenting Assault or Crystal Hibernation. (Leave Infuse Light and Gaze of Darkness chain skills as instant cast!)
• Infuse Light: Make this skill about 5 times more visible (+400%). This is a great active mechanic but is currently not visible enough except in the buff bar.

I agree on infuse light being much easier to see, I disagree with adding cast times to facets personally.

Devastation

• Malicious Reprisal: Remove the hidden ICD from this trait. This allows active counter to bunker builds which rely on blocking.

Interesting to be sure…

Invocation

• Roiling Mists: Reduce critical chance while under fury increase from 20% to 10%. This is not vital, but it might be a good place to balance overall Revenant damage.

I very sadly agree. I love this trait and it’s the core of my current build (a no prec rev), but it’s definitely pretty op, such that invocation is basically necessary.

Herald

• Shared Empowerment: Reduce might duration to 5s baseline (-38%). Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes.

I do not agree with this at all, I don’t think the Rev has this excessively high DPS some people seem to think it does. Having that high passive might seems like a cool feature for rev to have.

Versepelles.1972:

Varezenem.2813:

Hard to disagree with what my fellow revs said

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

For example CoR can be sidesteped and UA is only a 20% damage increase over AA.
And really you completely ignored those that need changes most.

It has still yet to be clarified exactly what changes revs are in need of most, from the viewpoint of all classes in PvP. My viewpoint is that the active evades on Revenant are great, and the damage is great, but that revs should not have both at the same time (compare this to high-dodging thieves). Revs lack solutions to condis, so this is what we address above. What’s your take on this?

Condi control on mallyx should be OK after they correct the bugs. I would say that preferably Ventari should get some more condi removal do to his lack of damage and strong weakness to CC.

Versepelles.1972:

Rym.1469:

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

Which of the changes do you disagree with, and more importantly, why? What would you do to make a better (from the viewpoint of all classes in PvP) Revenant?

You should find most of the stuff out here:

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Feedback-Suggestions-Rym-s-Megathread

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Mallyx-Corruption-Changes/first

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Roy-a-suggestion-for-Unrelenting-Assault/first#post5465690

Arius.7031:

snip

Thanks for the great feedback! To adress some of the points (but not all):

Unrelenting assault’s damage should be reduced on the basis of skill design- an evade should not deal quite so much damage, even split amongst targets. The revenant has a great deal of active mitigation (dodge, sword 3, shield 5, staff 3, staff 5, shiro roll), which is fine, but it should not be coupled with high damage output at the same time.

Coalescence of Ruin CD increase seems a fine solution as well.

Axe 5 chain could operate as CC, similar to temporal curtain.

Jallis and Ventari are both fine places for condi removal, but unfortunately offer little else that would allow the rev to stay meta, which is why Mallyx might be a good place to put some condi removal or transfer, to promote active gameply rather than reliance on passive boons.

Absolutely does Glint’s heal need to be more visible, as do Dragonhunter traps. Facets are fine where they are, but Glint would still be perfectly viable with cast times for activation, and this could offer minor balance to the boon spam of revs.

I think that rev damage is not necessarily over the top; as in it can’t take out a bunker druid, but it could use some downscaling in favor of more active mechanics than simply popping facets to gain a passive damage increase. With that in mind, either Roiling Mists or Shared Empowerment should be downgraded a bit, and perhaps some active mechanics added elsewhere, like to Mallyx, as Shiro is still in a great place.

Nerf to Rolling Mists affects Condition and Hybrid builds way more than Power ones.

Rym.1469:

Versepelles.1972:

Rym.1469:

I pretty much straight disagree with everything you’ve suggested.

It’s no fixing and no easy changes. Mutilating Power builds and trying to make Mallyx pseudo-Necromancer while not coming up with any worthwile suggestions to things that are in need of changes is no “balancing Revenant”.

Which of the changes do you disagree with, and more importantly, why? What would you do to make a better (from the viewpoint of all classes in PvP) Revenant?

You should find most of the stuff out here:

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Feedback-Suggestions-Rym-s-Megathread

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Mallyx-Corruption-Changes/first

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/revenant/Roy-a-suggestion-for-Unrelenting-Assault/first#post5465690

It seems you are concerned with a few things, some of which are addressed here, and some of which are good contributions.

• Lack of a ranged weapon. Check out my suggestion for the increased range on mace. I agree that rev should have a better ranged option, but unfortunately that’s not an easy fix.
• Unrelenting assault. Can’t tell if you like its damage or not. It seems to me that an evade and damage skill that follows you through a number mitigation techniques (longer than a dodge, goes through teleports, can be used in conjunction with gaze of darkness, which is insta-cast, to negate stealth) should not have such a high damage coefficient.
• We seem to have different ideas about Mallyx, but both agree that it could be improved.

Thanks for some constructive ideas, but it would be great to have those summarized by you in the context of this thread if you would like to join the conversation, to avoid misinterpretations.

Rym.1469:

Nerf to Rolling Mists affects Condition and Hybrid builds way more than Power ones.

That’s a good point, what might be a better version of toning down some of power shiro rev’s damage then (or moving it somewhere more active than UA)?

the only thing need to be change is mallyx ventary and jalis

mallyx should condi transfer with 1 skill and elite should be little bit more appealing like proc for every condition on foes 1 more condition stacks and put icd on it like 10-20 sec. remove boon should be aoe with icd on the skill of 5 sec

jalis need more dmg on his skills as taunt is nice ability but cost too much and IR probably use for wvw or pve

ventary bit boring , so more dmg or control or debuff etc..

Versepelles you are a noob who needs to l2p. Almost all of your proposed changes come from the place of a bad player. Especially the unreleting assault change

Unrelenting assault is fine!! Have you seen the damage that mesmer shatter can do, or dragonhunter traps. Just go away and learn to play.

BFMV.3198:

Versepelles you are a noob who needs to l2p.

Can’t we have a discussion (or even disagree fundamentally) without resorting to name-calling or insults?

OP just went full r _ _ _ _ d

Versepelles.1972:

Arius.7031:

snip

Thanks for the great feedback! To adress some of the points (but not all):

Unrelenting assault’s damage should be reduced on the basis of skill design- an evade should not deal quite so much damage, even split amongst targets. The revenant has a great deal of active mitigation (dodge, sword 3, shield 5, staff 3, staff 5, shiro roll), which is fine, but it should not be coupled with high damage output at the same time.

Coalescence of Ruin CD increase seems a fine solution as well.

Axe 5 chain could operate as CC, similar to temporal curtain.

Jallis and Ventari are both fine places for condi removal, but unfortunately offer little else that would allow the rev to stay meta, which is why Mallyx might be a good place to put some condi removal or transfer, to promote active gameply rather than reliance on passive boons.

Absolutely does Glint’s heal need to be more visible, as do Dragonhunter traps. Facets are fine where they are, but Glint would still be perfectly viable with cast times for activation, and this could offer minor balance to the boon spam of revs.

I think that rev damage is not necessarily over the top; as in it can’t take out a bunker druid, but it could use some downscaling in favor of more active mechanics than simply popping facets to gain a passive damage increase. With that in mind, either Roiling Mists or Shared Empowerment should be downgraded a bit, and perhaps some active mechanics added elsewhere, like to Mallyx, as Shiro is still in a great place.

It seems that you haven’t played ventari a lot if you think the condi defence is fine…
Any heavy condi player takes your live in seconds and there is nothing you can do.
(Condi reapers are a particularly bad match…)

Versepelles.1972:

Balance is hard, and PvP metas change over time. However, from what we’ve seen so far, The Power Shiro-Glint build is by far dominant in PvP, with Mallyx-Glint a distant second. Here are some suggestions that can help balance the class with minimal design change, given that most current bugs are fixed as well.

As always, many people will have different opinions , so please leave constructive comments only, which of course can include criticisms or proposed changes.

Weapons

Sword

• Unrelenting Assault: Reduce damage by 50%. This skill should be an evade and teleport, but the damage is too high.
• Grasping Shadow: Reduce cast time to 1/4 second (-50%). Sword off-hand can be just as viable as shield if Grasping Shadow is buffed, adding a layer of complexity, skill, and variety.

Hammer

• Coalescence of Ruin: Reduce damage by 33%. Just a moderately overtuned skill, like True Shot.
• Drop the Hammer: Reduce cast time to 1.25s (-29%). This skill is fairly useless in mid to high tier PvP, but could be more interesting with decreased cast time.

Mace

• Misery Swipe (chain): Increase range to somewhere between 300 and 480. This weapon would see much more use in condi builds with some range on the auto attacks.

Axe

• Temporal Rift: Add a chain skill to detonate the rift, like mesmer’s focus 4 (Temporal Curtain). Decrease the range to 600 (-33%). This alone could make axe a viable choice.

Utilities

Mallyx

• Pain Absorption: Transfer 2 conditions from each ally and youself to the target. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows active counterplay to conditions, and gives revenants meaningful condition removal. This change alone makes Mallyx competitive with Shiro.
• Banish Enchantment: Corrupt 2 boons instead of removing them. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows for active counterplay to some boonful classes.

Ventari

• Remove from the game. (I kid, but this would need a major overhaul to be viable in PvP, it seems).

Jalis

• See Ventari.

Herald

• All facets: Add 1/4s cast time to initial cast. This forces Revenants to think when to activate the signets, rather than spamming them during Unrelenting Assault or Crystal Hibernation. (Leave Infuse Light and Gaze of Darkness chain skills as instant cast!)
• Infuse Light: Make this skill about 5 times more visible (+400%). This is a great active mechanic but is currently not visible enough except in the buff bar.

Traits

Devastation

• Malicious Reprisal: Remove the hidden ICD from this trait. This allows active counter to bunker builds which rely on blocking.

Corruption

• Opportune Extraction: Reduce ICD to 6s (-40%). Optionally corrupt boon rather than remove. This allows condition-specced revs to be a threat to boonful classes.

Invocation

• Roiling Mists: Reduce critical chance while under fury increase from 20% to 10%. This is not vital, but it might be a good place to balance overall Revenant damage.

Herald

• Shared Empowerment: Reduce might duration to 5s baseline (-38%). Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes.

I am sorry that you have gotten some rude criticism regarding these proposed changes. That said, I do agree with many of the others in that these changes may go too far. Some specifics:

-Unrelenting Assault: This is a powerful skill in 1v1 precisely because it combines strong damage with a long evade. However, it also has a long (3/4 sec) cast time, which allows some counterplay. Reducing the damage by 50% will turn it into a primarily evasive/defensive skill. I do not think a defensive skill needs such a long cast time. While I do not agree with the 50% damage nerf, I also think that even if the damage were nerfed, the cast time would also need to be reduced, probably to 1/4 second. Ultimately I think that if UA were deemed to strong, the energy cost should be increased a bit (e.g. to 20) so that Revenants are a little more conscious about using it at opportune times.

Grasping Shadow: I agree that this needs a buff. A shorter cast time would indeed help, but I think it could also use a slightly longer range (e.g. 300).

Coalescence of Ruin: This skill does hit really hard. I think we need to be careful with balancing though. If it’s nerfed too much, as others point out, it will not be used over auto-attack. I would rather see the energy cost increased to make Revenants really think about using it rather than spamming it on cooldown. And, it probably shouldn’t hit any target twice, that’s too much damage.

Pain Absorption: I’m not sure about this change…What if there are no targets in range? Can the skill be used without a target? Right now Pain Absorption has a minor synergy with the Mallyx healing skill, but this would be gone with the proposed change. Basically you are changing a defensive skill into an offensive one. Of course, during BWE 1 and 2, it could be used for either offense or defense due to the function of EtD, but that’s another discussion…

Glint skills: I don’t see a need to add a cast time to facet activation. It’s normal to see Revenants activating 2-3 facets at a time every time they enter Glint stance, and adding a cast time would make this process exceedingly cumbersome. Whether or not the boon output from facets is balanced or not is certainly something that can be discussed, but even if they are unbalanced, I don’t think that adding a cast time is a good way to balance them.

Revenant is already quite balanced.

Almost none of the changes you’ve proposed are a good idea. Everyone, please let this thread die.

You’re basically proposing that the Revenant be changed from a competitive class to a borderline useless one.

No thanks.

Sorry after I read nerf UA by 50% I quit reading.

Better off just removing every single sword skill for reveanant. People need to understand it’s there only real offensive skill on glint so nerfing that one skill kills the class

I pretty much disagree with everything here, so here’s some feedback on your feedback

Versepelles.1972:

Unrelenting Assault: Reduce damage by 50%. This skill should be an evade and teleport, but the damage is too high.

50% would kill this skill. Keep in mind it does less dmg per target. I remember playing with this at 50% during BWE1 and it was a total waste of energy.

Grasping Shadow: Reduce cast time to 1/4 second (-50%). Sword off-hand can be just as viable as shield if Grasping Shadow is buffed, adding a layer of complexity, skill, and variety.

This needs a range increase. I agree to the reason but I find I can never land it because I need to be at 130 range and I want to use it when I can’t auto attack. It’s also impossible to land if they’re moving with 130 range.

Coalescence of Ruin: Reduce damage by 33%. Just a moderately overtuned skill, like True Shot.

33% is harsh but 10-15% would be acceptable. (putting max dmg around 1700, similar to mighty blow)

Drop the Hammer: Reduce cast time to 1.25s (-29%). This skill is fairly useless in mid to high tier PvP, but could be more interesting with decreased cast time.

We have enough cc as it is, lowering its cast would make it op. All you need to do is aim it.

Misery Swipe (chain): Increase range to somewhere between 300 and 480. This weapon would see much more use in condi builds with some range on the auto attacks.

The auto attack is fine. It’s the 3rd skill that needs some love, as it is just “super auto attack” right now. Although, if this was buffed I wouldn’t complain.

Temporal Rift: Add a chain skill to detonate the rift, like mesmer’s focus 4 (Temporal Curtain). Decrease the range to 600 (-33%). This alone could make axe a viable choice.

I’m okay with this one, as long as the activation doesn’t cost energy.

Mallyx

• Pain Absorption: Transfer 2 conditions from each ally and youself to the target. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows active counterplay to conditions, and gives revenants meaningful condition removal. This change alone makes Mallyx competitive with Shiro.
• Banish Enchantment: Corrupt 2 boons instead of removing them. Increase cast time to 3/4s (+50%). This allows for active counterplay to some boonful classes.

There is so much more wrong with Mallyx than just this. I’d prefer a low cast time on Banish and it just removing them and pain absorbtion definetly needs a rework but that change would make it overly powerful to say the least. Imagine using it when everyone on the team has 3 burn stacks and it hits 5 people. That’s 15 transferred burn, enough to put anyone down to half health.

Versepelles.1972:

Ventari

• Remove from the game. (I kid, but this would need a major overhaul to be viable in PvP, it seems).

Jalis

• See Ventari.

Nope. I’ve seen ventari healers save teams and Jalis is almost viable, it just needs to have a different stun breaker.

Herald

• All facets: Add 1/4s cast time to initial cast. This forces Revenants to think when to activate the signets, rather than spamming them during Unrelenting Assault or Crystal Hibernation. (Leave Infuse Light and Gaze of Darkness chain skills as instant cast!)
• Infuse Light: Make this skill about 5 times more visible (+400%). This is a great active mechanic but is currently not visible enough except in the buff bar.

I really don’t think you get how these work. If they’re not instant activation I would hope they get a sever cut in energy cost. I like to not have them up in UA/CH so I can get more energy back. I do, however, need to pop them instantaneously when I’m on the run or blocking with my staff/off hand sword so I can get in and out of fights and I’m not useless.

Infuse light could have a more visible duration, but imo it’s pretty obvious. More of something you as a player have to learn to counter.

Versepelles.1972:

Devastation

• Malicious Reprisal: Remove the hidden ICD from this trait. This allows active counter to bunker builds which rely on blocking.

It’s 30s on the top right corner. It’s not hidden, all traits that have one work like this.

Corruption

• Opportune Extraction: Reduce ICD to 6s (-40%). Optionally corrupt boon rather than remove. This allows condition-specced revs to be a threat to boonful classes.

Way too strong. This trait is in a good place, any lower and you’re ripping boons like crazy. Making it corrupt just turns this into an auto fear on DHs, which while I would find hilarious, would also be broken.

Invocation

• Roiling Mists: Reduce critical chance while under fury increase from 20% to 10%. This is not vital, but it might be a good place to balance overall Revenant damage.

Honestly, yeah. Right now revs have a 94% crit chance with Maurader amulet since you can keep fury up indefinitely using the Invocation line right.

Herald

• Shared Empowerment: Reduce might duration to 5s baseline (-38%). Currently, this trait alone overpowers Revenant raw damage output. A fair reduction will put Revenant damage in line with other classes.

Unrelated, might buffs condi damage too, more so argueably.
I wouldn’t do this, cause the other two options for the trait kinda blow. While I would like Harmonized Continuity in concept, in practice it just doesn’t. The other two need to do more to be viable rather than nerfing shared empowerment.

I don’t know why you didn’t even comment on the useless trait for pvp, Improved Aggression which does next to nothing in pvp since it doesn’t effect players.

These balance decisions are terrible for a number of reasons:

1. They are pretty ignorant of past changes of Revenants. For example a lot of our damage abilities were increased due to their low performance in most scenarios. For example Unrelenting Assault has incredibly low burst damage against multiple targets and single target it’s outperformed by our auto attack. That doesn’t mean some perfect Unrelenting Assault against a single target isn’t going to ruin their day it just means in the average scenarios they were put in it wasn’t that bad (especially since a single dodge can negate it’s damage as much as you suggest over it’s hugely long animation).

2. You take a lot way and don’t give anything in return. That is not the definition of balance. Really your changes come off as, “I want to see more Condition Revenants so please buff Mallyx/Corruption/Mace/Axe and nerf anything Shiro/Glint related plz.” If you’re going to take away from Shiro and Glint, you have to balance back to those abilities in other areas they are weak in such as condition management (or the complete lack of) or vulnerability to CC.

Thanks to all those who have contributed constructive feedback! I’m glad this thread has sparked such interest, even with much of it being the unfortunately typical criticism without solutions. I’ll update the original post to reflect some of the community viewpoints.

The poster is asking to make our skill 3 damage reduced? what skill are we gonna use then for dps?. why does he think Rev are so OP? the dps is lesser than a Chronomancer and almost just as same as a reaper and Scrapper… this is the type of people I do not like. we already play smart with our facet and when 2 facet are on it is hard to use skills coz -4 on 2 facet does not regen energy enough. please learn how to play the classes and if you really think Rev are OP then please post a video of you killing everyone without skillful play.

Versepelles.1972:

Thanks to all those who have contributed constructive feedback! I’m glad this thread has sparked such interest, even with much of it being the unfortunately typical criticism without solutions. I’ll update the original post to reflect some of the community viewpoints.

what economy view point? Rev are already in a good place at the moment and the problem the community is having are the underwater skills/Ventari. and what creative feed back did they told you? all the poster just stated the fact. please if you are not a real Rev player and just here to make claims with no logic then you should go to pvp and try to learn how to dodge so you wont have issue with skill 3 sword and all those other claims you have.

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This is so much true.
50% nerf on UA? That’s destroying a skill not balance.

Lots of good suggestions here, some are too harsh, but why are some people up in arms against the op?

How about not nerfing the damage of unrelenting assault, but making it give the player 90% reduced incoming damage during the shadowsteping. This way you could still use it to prevent heavy damage but it will have a counter play since you can be cc’d out of it. Same goes for all other weapon skills that make you in to mist, they evade since they have longish animations and it was a bandaid way to make them less clunky. (this seems like a trend for anet, anything that has a cast/animation longer than .5sec gets a evade)

Coalescence of ruin needs to ether get a cd increase or a energy increase, it is simply to rewarding and too spamable.
Also the hammer auto attacks should be a 20% finisher like every other projectile auto attack.

The last thing is surge of the mists. This can be made to hit 1 person multiple times in a single cast, once saw thin thing knockback a rampage warrior (3 stacks of pulsing stability). It is also problematic in pve since this skill alone can destroy a bosses break bar (especially if the boss has a larger hit box). So just make the skill not able to hit 1 person more than 1 time in a single cast, but increase the distance of knockback and the damage per hit (since you can only hit once).
Or make the damage able to hit one enemy multiple times but the knockback can only affect him once (but also increase the knockback distance) .

Good players CC/Interrupt your UA while you are casting it, just saying.

Unrelenting Assault hit way too hard, track and evade. It needs some counter play, reduce damage or at best reduce the tracking zone.

It’s kinda like if whirlwind blade on warrior could track you and evade for for 2 seconds.

Nerf the two damaging skills that carry the class (other than the respectable auto-attacks) by 33% and 50% respectively, very subtle changes there, and buff nothing that matters.

Oh, and nerf might stacking also, by “only” 38%.

Great ideas, it is difficult to imagine why you’re receiving a chilly reception in the Revenant forum. This is some kind of sick joke, not constructive “balancing”.

Stop the increasing in CD.. That is so old! No rather turn up the energy cost. Energy is our ressources, which I thin A-net failed to implement.
We should be able to spam op skills like thieves.. But at the cost of only being able to cast AA if we decide to do this. And if we increase the cost we wont be able to pull out that many abilities. Also lower some of the upkeep cost on the other legends, so we are forced to watch it while spamming abilities, rather than just press it and watch it burn. Some like impossible odds should still have a 5+ upkeep or minimum 5! Cause else it would be way too op. If 5, then 35+ energycost when activated.
Other like the hammer and reflection could just have 4-5 upkeep cost.

It would, imo, make it alot more interesting.

Swiftwynd.1685:

Razarei.2809:

I logged in to say how awful your “balance” decisions are, and people like you are exactly why people with legitimately good balance ethos’ are ignored.

This this thread pains me to read.

Couldn’t agree more.

+1

I like the “remove from the game” suggestion, very usefull thread!

Why in the world are you selling Jalis so short? The heal alone is amazing in how it removes 3 conditions on a profession that otherwise has semi-problems with just that, conditions. The chain interrupts, it’s a quick on-demand interrupt. Our (not-so-yellow) brick road deals damage, and grants Stability, perfect for stomps and resurrection. The Elite may leave something to be desired, but it’s not horrible, and combined with Protection can make your opponents bursts tickle. And let’s not sell our swirling hammers short either, because they add up with all the other damage we are doing at the time. Use it while you hunker down with your Shield to heal in example. If anything, I think Shiro is overrated, even though it’s a good Legend.

I’m happy with Glint+Jalis. And Glint I refuse to replace if it can be helped. Energy, Upkeeps and Pips.. it’s like I’m playing an updated Guild Wars with more active combat. I absolutely love it!
_

In response to some of the topic proposals:

UA; 50% damage reduction on a skill that can largely be evaded through a dodge seems excessive. It can also be blocked and interrupted on startup. I interrupt them all the time. Let’s not forget how much diminished damage per target it is, when there are more than one target to bounce to. Anyone with minions take far less damage from it. When outnumbered, it will deal substantially less damage, etc.—Needs bug fixing, as anything near an object (e.g., a rock) and/or a wall/ledge will cause it to fizzle and not function.

CoR; Could perhaps do with some minor adjustments, I’d say start smaller, e.g., 10% damage reduction on the furthest cascade (not across each step), but the skill also needs to be fixed. It won’t travel up slopes, and down slopes it will often ignore dealing damage to targets. It’s a very broken skill that while powerful has way too many bugs to it.

Both your Herald suggestions are absolutely ridiculous. If you can’t tell when the big burst of white “wings” pops off the Herald, then you might just want to stop playing PvP. The heal has a massive tell, and a “clink” sound that’s highly noticeable. You can anticipate it, just like with any heal in the game. People heal under pressure, and when relatively low on health. This is obviously a “L2P” scenario. Facets should be as-is, if anything we should be allowed to use them mid-air. It’s annoying that you can’t.

Roiling Mists; It’s not our Critical Chance which makes us hit pretty hard you know.. so no, this can stay as-is. It’s a neat feature that Fury doubles in effect. It’s also something that allows Heralds, such as myself, to invest thousands of Gold in Infusions and such to make 100% Critical Chance reachable in PvE with expensive Infusions on mainly Berserker equipment, and a couple hard(er) to obtain Assassin trinkets. I’d be rather ticked off if they touched that trait now that I’ve invested so much Gold to minmax the profession as a damage dealer.

And yes, we have good Might generation, but so does other professions. Warriors, Elementalists, Engineers, even lockdown Mesmers, and so on forth. There is no need to tone us down on this front.

PS: I get hit for just as much damage by other professions. Scrappers, Tempests, Druids (with even more sustain than we Rev/Heralds got), Chronomancers, Dragonhunters, pretty much everyone, is dealing high amounts of damage. It’s not just Revenant and/or Herald. People need to calm down with the finger pointing.

Versepelles.1972:

Thanks to all those who have contributed constructive feedback! I’m glad this thread has sparked such interest, even with much of it being the unfortunately typical criticism without solutions. I’ll update the original post to reflect some of the community viewpoints.

If there ain’t a problem there’s no need to fix it.

If you start seeing 2-3 Shiro/Glint players mandatory per team like there was D/D Elementalist then there’s a problem to be fixed. However as people have already started figuring out the counters (heavy condi pressure, heavy CC pressure) Revenant isn’t in a bad spot for TEAM play.

The biggest complaints you see are from duelers who complain Revenant wins 1v1 which there is no 1v1 game mode.

Lol, sword 3, you know that skill deals 10K damage in 2s, so it has a DPS of 5K auto attacking with quickness does more damage per s.

People see the evades and think they are destroyed with, if there is a 2nd target in the vicinity that skill flat out sucks.

And Hammer 2, you know that you can only be hit with on of the hits, if you are under 240 range you will be hit like 2K damage and at 900 %K damage every 2s that is 2.5K DPS at 900 and 1K at 240 and it has such a long cast time crying for dodge me/dodge me and bugs all the time because of the ground.

I will tell you only this, don’t heal the herald to full and he will die like a stone.

How about they fix our bugs first?

And as far as the Revenant skills:

Unrelenting Assault: Gets interrupted during its 3/4s cast time by decent players. In team fights it hits for barely nothing as it doesn’t cleave and bounces around randomly. Bugs way too much for comfort by nearby objects like walls, flies and mosquitoes. If anything, increase the Energy cost by 5, but no more.

Grasping Shadow: Please make this skill hit on slightly mobile targets (walking) more often than not: lower the cast time, increase the range or make it home-in slightly for the last part.

Coalescence of Ruin: Damage is fine. Increase the cd to 4 or 5s to make it less spammy. Also consider buffing energy cost to 10.

Drop the Hammer: Make it a fire-and-forget. The cast time is clunky and you only really want to use it on downs/sidelines.

Facets: Fine as they are. It’s more about what to keep up, rather than playng tic-tac-toe with switching around upkeeps while taking a beating.

Glint Heal: Fine as is. The tell is already significant for 1v1s, and any decent player can tell when it’s about to go off from enemy buff bar. It’s really strong in team fights, but talented players already shut down Revs easily in 1v1s, want to shut them down from teamfights as well?

Glint Elite: Consider making it unblockable. Has a long tell and is easy to avoid in most cases.

They should also fix bugs on Staff 4, make Staff 2 more fluid, fix Soothing Bastion boon duration increase, make Sword 2 more reliable, and fix UA bugs (several).

Comparing Mesmer, Thief and Revenant damage is non-significant here. Revenant has to sty on the point the most to be effective, so naturally they have higher sustained dps. Thieves and Mesmers are more flexible with their movements and are (at least were) more bursty with their damage in general.

I feel like Revenant is strong. I also feel like it has BLATANT weaknesses (condi, area CC, not hitting heal of stupid, avoiding Shiro heal) easily shut down by good players. Is there really a reason for heavy nerfs here?

foste.3098:

Also the hammer auto attacks should be a 20% finisher like every other projectile auto attack.

To quote master Yoda: no, there is another.

posthumecaver.6473:

And Hammer 2, you know that you can only be hit with on of the hits,

It is possible to get hit twice, but that typically happens because an enemy is running away. I think you’d have to be extremely good or extremely lucky to hit a normal-sized target twice otherwise. Still, if they wanted to somehow make it so that couldn’t happen, I wouldn’t object.