Guild Wars 2

In title. The damage buff to Vital Shot was needed, but the buff to Unload was counter-productive. The entire problem with P/P is that Unload is too good relative to Vital Shot, which pushes you to dump all of your Initiative into Unload. The set also severely lacks in utilitarian value with no AoE whatsoever. This would be a perfect way to restore the badly needed Ricochet functionality in a way that’s more controlled.

We need both ricochet and unload buff.

Shogun.7401:

We need both ricochet and unload buff.

Perhaps Unload needed a small buff, but not a bigger buff than Vital Shot got.

It was a bandaid buff and fully necessary. Unload needs AoE capability, but so does Vital Shot. Give us piercing and increase the cast speed of VS to 1/3s or 1/4s. That way the damage ratios are a bit more balanced, Unload will still offer on-demand high burst capability.(Which is the P/P niché and the thing many of us playing P/P love.) Also, if these changes came into play, the sustained DPS loss of actually using our utilities wouldn’t be even nearly as drastic as it is with the current setup.

I assume you’re talking about PvE because untactfully spamming Unload in PvP is a one way trip to getting yourself killed.

In which case, pretty much every weapon the thief has works like that because of we got no cooldowns.

It isn’t smart in PvE either. You’re losing damage by spamming it. You cast it 1-2 times(Depending on do you have Steal ready to be used so it restores atleast a part of the extra initiative the 2nd Unload uses.) and pool back initiative, once back to full/nearly full, repeat the process. Basically attempt to hover around 8-10’ish minimum initiative at all times, to get as much benefit as possible from Lead Attacks.

Shimekiri.1580:

It isn’t smart in PvE either. You’re losing damage by spamming it. You cast it 1-2 times(Depending on do you have Steal ready to be used so it restores atleast a part of the extra initiative the 2nd Unload uses.) and pool back initiative, once back to full/nearly full, repeat the process. Basically attempt to hover around 8-10’ish minimum initiative at all times, to get as much benefit as possible from Lead Attacks.

Yeah, I play this way too, but that isn’t the point. The point is that Unload hogs all your Initiative, regardless of how quickly or not quickly you spam it.

Einlanzer.1627:

Shimekiri.1580:

It isn’t smart in PvE either. You’re losing damage by spamming it. You cast it 1-2 times(Depending on do you have Steal ready to be used so it restores atleast a part of the extra initiative the 2nd Unload uses.) and pool back initiative, once back to full/nearly full, repeat the process. Basically attempt to hover around 8-10’ish minimum initiative at all times, to get as much benefit as possible from Lead Attacks.

Yeah, I play this way too, but that isn’t the point. The point is that Unload hogs all your Initiative, regardless of how quickly or not quickly you spam it.

Not my experience but then I am playing WvW. There I use trapper runes and get a lot of damage off the AA sneak attack which is now higher. I rely on the might from setting traps for the extra power lost when using said runes.

Unload has to be used carefully so as to ensure it not dodged as you can not lose that INI thus a few sneak attacks usually pressure an enemy into using said dodges followed by unload.

I do not mind this extra damage at all. I do feel it not yet enough and think they need to work on making skill 2 work as the survival tool.

The dropping of the extra range from Ankle shots does hurt. I am not sure using that skill warranted any longer as that was the main reason I took it. One is likely better off with the extra ferocity or even sundering strikes.

I doubt we will see ricochet back.

buffing unload alone will not suddenly make the set magically appealing

Oslaf Beinir.5842:

buffing unload alone will not suddenly make the set magically appealing

Yes and Karl indicated P/P is going to be looked at.