First and foremost, I realise that Beta is Beta and doesn’t represent the final product. However, I’am concerned about the attention (or rather, the lack thereof) being given to the Revenant’s and it’s gameplay capabilities underwater.
After the previous weekend, there was a thread on this issue that recieved no response from ANet, and the fact the issue still seems to persist with no change, concerns me. I would not be surprised if ANet literally have overlooked it, and I feel it’s important we remind them that this issue is still around before the final release of the expansion at the end of the month.
I know ANet right now are trying to phase out underwater content, but the fact of the matter is, alot of the current game world is based underwater, and Revenant’s should have just as much right to play effectively in this water based content as any other class as a result. Especially because some of us actually like this game’s underwater combat system, and wish it would recieve a bit more attention from the devs, but that’s another issue.
Anyway, the problem is this:
Underwater, the Revenant only has access to two sets of utility skills; Shiro and Mallynx. This isn’t necessarily the issue itself, but read on. Now, most classes have a limited pool of skills to choose from underwater, so this in of itself might be fine. However, due to the way the Revenant works and is implemented, it causes problems for the class.
See, the other utility skill sets, Glint, Jalis and Ventari, don’t work underwater. However, as your chosen utility skillsets remain the same for underwater as they do for land, if your chosen Legends are Glint, Ventari, or Jalis, when you enter water you will literally have no access to any utilities (including no self-heal!) whatsoever.
This means that in any fight you will be at a massive and unfair disadvantage. In WvW (which does currently include and will still include underwater combat sections in the expansion), this is basically an automatic loss for the Revenant player if any fight occurs with a body of water nearby. It also basically prevents a Revenant from effectively running the Honor of the Waves explorable dungeon paths, not to mention all the heart quests in the world that require underwater activities.
You could switch Legends whenever you enter water, if out of combat, but this is not possible when dipping between land or water while in combat which happens quite frequently in some PvP formats (WvW). Plus, having to swap Legends whenever you go underwater is unintuitive and annoying anyway, not to mention then having to swap back to what you were originally using when you get back onto land. Once again though, this is not a possible workaround if switching into water mode while already in combat.
To compound this problem, the starting Legend for Revenant’s is Jalis; A Legend without any underwater utilities. What if the player doesn’t unlock Shiro or Mallynx’s utility skillsets till last when levelling?
A solution must be implemented to this issue before final release;
Possible Solutions
1 – Enable all Legends’ utility skills underwater. The best fix, but also the most work for ANet.
2 – Have the game remember a Revenant’s Legend selection when underwater, and swap between a different set of selected Legends whenever you enter water, or come up onto dry land, respectively. This is currently how the Ranger’s pet selection works, so it’s definitely doable and would be less work for ANet. It would also be more consistent with other classes, as other classes can pre-pick a different set of utility skills for underwater combat as opposed to land combat.
in addition, one of these must be implemented:
3A – Make Shiro the starting legend for Revenants instead of Jalis.
3B – Enable the use of the Jalis Legend’s utility skills underwater (preferable).
These changes are necessary to bring Revenant up to the same high standards of polish and general practical usability as other classes in the game in general. Don’t keep ignoring all underwater content ANet! Imagine how off-putting this issue could be to a new player who joins GW2 for Heart of Thorns and creates a Revenant as his first character. It could cause him to quit, or at least reroll with a bitter taste in his mouth, don’t risk losing players, new ones in particular, over this!
Please stop forgetting about the underwater portion of your game ANet!
(edited by KotCR.6024)