Guild Wars 2

Remember, it is a Grandmaster Minor. Key Word being grandmaster

They split the traits up into minor and major for a reason, with the minor meaning to compliment almost all types of builds available in the line. It is in the grandmaster slot, which is its tier level. people are just complaining because it is always going to be there. Remember, with all the power creep from other classes, and the fact it only mitigates damage and not conditions means it is being far over valued. I like this trait in its place personally, and it is a very suitable exchange for hidden assassin.

We’ll see how it turns out, it’s needed since Cloaked in the Shadows went to GM,Infusion went to S.Rej.,might was removed they made it more tank/heal as intended. It won’t carry us but I do like they gave us more utility and possible openings rather then pure burst creep or more frequent stealth/evade.No PS+Executioner+SoH is not that.

Also many people don’t know they’re getting more trait points, that you can add up to 18 trait points post patch. (3 FULL LINE)

Everyone will be able to complete a decent build with this many trait points.

Yea I think this change will be good. I certainly won pick sa unless trying venom share in pvp. Only wvw…

Curious to know how builds will be after patch… Prob going to try 6/4/2/0/6… Gotta have that condi removal…

swinsk.6410:

Yea I think this change will be good. I certainly won pick sa unless trying venom share in pvp. Only wvw…

Curious to know how builds will be after patch… Prob going to try 6/4/2/0/6… Gotta have that condi removal…

You cannot distribute points as you please between the trait lines (specializations).

You’re gonna have to choose 3 and that’s it. So it’s gonna have to be 06660 or something like that. Rather, no more points at all, just a thief with deadly arts, critical strikes and shadow arts.

I’ve kept saying this. Let’s look at what else would be included in this new meta:

Guardians = enormous boost to Meditations, more and stronger damage modifiers (20% damage in symbols!), bunker potential from 00666

Warriors = can take shout AND banner heals at once, GS trait merges mean that it’s easier to go DPS mode (GS + Hammer 60606 will be monstrous), Rampage is now Physical, large boosts to condition damage and sword mainhand, more Longbow burning pressure to add to Shoutbow

Rangers = insane boost to Rapid Fire and Maul burst potential with changes to keep regaining Opening Strike, survivability and condi pressure potential increases with changes to Survival traits and Troll Ungent, Taunt on pets in Beastmastery

Mesmers = Illusionary Persona + Elasticity baseline, blinds on shatters, huge shatter damage boosts, PU double duration stealth, more damage multipliers, more access to Protection while using Staff or any Ethereal field, more condition removal by having it baked in with more healing on Mantras, all shatter improvement traits merged

Necro and Ele are going to need some work, but yeah. We may very well need these kind of buffs to compete in that environment. It depends how much everyone else gets toned down.

Auesis.7301:

I’ve kept saying this. Let’s look at what else would be included in this new meta:

Guardians = enormous boost to Meditations, more and stronger damage modifiers (20% damage in symbols!), bunker potential from 00666

Warriors = can take shout AND banner heals at once, GS trait merges mean that it’s easier to go DPS mode (GS + Hammer 60606 will be monstrous), Rampage is now Physical, large boosts to condition damage and sword mainhand, more Longbow burning pressure to add to Shoutbow

Rangers = insane boost to Rapid Fire and Maul burst potential with changes to keep regaining Opening Strike, survivability and condi pressure potential increases with changes to Survival traits and Troll Ungent, Taunt on pets in Beastmastery

Mesmers = Illusionary Persona + Elasticity baseline, blinds on shatters, huge shatter damage boosts, PU double duration stealth, more damage multipliers, more access to Protection while using Staff or any Ethereal field, more condition removal by having it baked in with more healing on Mantras, all shatter improvement traits merged

Necro and Ele are going to need some work, but yeah. We may very well need these kind of buffs to compete in that environment. It depends how much everyone else gets toned down.

Ranger’s damage modifier actually decreases slightly (eagle eye completely dissappeared). Most other traits’ damage modifier are either unchanged or forced into different trait lines. It just that now ranger can go offensive while being defensive too, like Warriors and Guardians always could be.

Guardian and Warrior, on the other hand, have a straight increase in dps thanks to all the new and enhanced damage modifier. Don’t compare ranger to these 2 over-buffed “Meta classes.” (They are the best classes currently, and now they’re getting way more than other classes, Guardians Warriors 2 confirmed)

I’m not talking about damage modifiers, I’m talking about the capability to keep refreshing Opening Strike consistently with Fury and always landing critical hits with immense Vuln stacks, along with the capability to reduce the Skill #2 recharge by 66% on weapon swap. Those far outweigh any minor modifier changes. However, I will agree that it’s not as good as Guard/Warrior changes.

That being said, they have been saying that if a trait has vanished, it’s probably baseline now. Eagle Eye might just be baseline. We were lucky enough to get +5% Dagger damage base + extra Venom charges, so…

Toxsa, It’s ok, when spec’d right you will be able to make a ranger with near permanent protection and high resistance to conditions while still being able to take the whole marksmanship line. Ranger won’t be in too much trouble if things don’t get changed too much from the preview,

Ario.8964:

Toxsa, It’s ok, when spec’d right you will be able to make a ranger with near permanent protection and high resistance to conditions while still being able to take the whole marksmanship line. Ranger won’t be in too much trouble if things don’t get changed too much from the preview,

The Nature magic line has a whole lot of nice stuff in it and compares favorably with SA.

Indeed, that and the wilderness survival grandmaster minor giving the damage reduction above 90% hp and the excessive condi removal that will be available through SOTF is gonna give rangers a ton more survivability while still being able to take marksmanship to get the damage buffs they need to be an effective burst class.

I agree with OP I like this trait where it is now, and we’ll probably need it with the buff to the other classes.

Something else to consider here, RoS becoming a minor trait for Shadow Arts is actually going to be something of a necessary change for most thieves that utilize that line (needing resilience in WvW, for example). Trait lines will no longer grant any stats, so for all of those SA thieves, they will suddenly be short by a whole 300 toughness and healing power. Unless you adjust your gear to compensate – you could mix in some Soldier’s or a few more Valkyrie pieces maybe without cutting your offense too much, but the healing power will cost you even more offensive stats if you try to spec for it – you will just be straight-up squishier than before.

RoS will give a nice little compensation for that, and remember, while 50% reduction is a lot higher than the amount you used to get from 300 toughness, you won’t be in stealth most of the time and you’ll be hit in stealth even less. It will reward more strategic use of stealth to mitigate damage spikes and survive big AoE hits, in exchange for likely being a little less durable when out of stealth. (In theory.)

Would just say make it 25% and make it baseline. Now there’s a reason for any power build to not be in SA. I think this trait alone is going to kill trait diversity for any builds with stealth access just because it’s too rewarding.

Jio Derako.7638:

Something else to consider here, RoS becoming a minor trait for Shadow Arts is actually going to be something of a necessary change for most thieves that utilize that line (needing resilience in WvW, for example). Trait lines will no longer grant any stats, so for all of those SA thieves, they will suddenly be short by a whole 300 toughness and healing power. Unless you adjust your gear to compensate – you could mix in some Soldier’s or a few more Valkyrie pieces maybe without cutting your offense too much, but the healing power will cost you even more offensive stats if you try to spec for it – you will just be straight-up squishier than before.

RoS will give a nice little compensation for that, and remember, while 50% reduction is a lot higher than the amount you used to get from 300 toughness, you won’t be in stealth most of the time and you’ll be hit in stealth even less. It will reward more strategic use of stealth to mitigate damage spikes and survive big AoE hits, in exchange for likely being a little less durable when out of stealth. (In theory.)

You just need to respec your gears abit to retrieve those lost armors. For roamers, you get an auto boost in your berserker sets, moving all the unneeded traits into your dps. I’d say you didn’t lose anything.

SA significantly lowers the skill floor of thieves and it just annoys me that thieves will no longer be punished for taking it in spvp. I was fine with it in wvw as long as it stayed there, but thief is headed in a bad direction right now.

oEnvy.3064:

SA significantly lowers the skill floor of thieves and it just annoys me that thieves will no longer be punished for taking it in spvp. I was fine with it in wvw as long as it stayed there, but thief is headed in a bad direction right now.

Agreed, but as I’ve learnt from experience, this is the wrong forum to think so – I’m getting the impression that a substantial amount of active users here on this subforum trait into SA, and are more happy to get buffs, than to be reasonable :/

Verilan.2963:

oEnvy.3064:

SA significantly lowers the skill floor of thieves and it just annoys me that thieves will no longer be punished for taking it in spvp. I was fine with it in wvw as long as it stayed there, but thief is headed in a bad direction right now.

Agreed, but as I’ve learnt from experience, this is the wrong forum to think so – I’m getting the impression that a substantial amount of active users here on this subforum trait into SA, and are more happy to get buffs, than to be reasonable :/

You couldn’t be more wrong.

The defense for SA comes not from those who trait it, rather from those who wants to trait it. It is through reason that drives the conversation if the trait is even good enough to take. Unreasonably taking things away like a lot of suggestions here will leave the trait line unusable — and who will benefit from that?

Sir Vincent III.1286:

You couldn’t be more wrong.

The defense for SA comes not from those who trait it, rather from those who wants to trait it. It is through reason that drives the conversation if the trait is even good enough to take. Unreasonably taking things away like a lot of suggestions here will leave the trait line unusable — and who will benefit from that?

Everyone else

Verilan.2963:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

You couldn’t be more wrong.

The defense for SA comes not from those who trait it, rather from those who wants to trait it. It is through reason that drives the conversation if the trait is even good enough to take. Unreasonably taking things away like a lot of suggestions here will leave the trait line unusable — and who will benefit from that?

Everyone else

Yeah pretty sure that’s their whole point…

Verilan.2963:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

You couldn’t be more wrong.

The defense for SA comes not from those who trait it, rather from those who wants to trait it. It is through reason that drives the conversation if the trait is even good enough to take. Unreasonably taking things away like a lot of suggestions here will leave the trait line unusable — and who will benefit from that?

Everyone else

And you call that “reason”?

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Verilan.2963:

oEnvy.3064:

SA significantly lowers the skill floor of thieves and it just annoys me that thieves will no longer be punished for taking it in spvp. I was fine with it in wvw as long as it stayed there, but thief is headed in a bad direction right now.

Agreed, but as I’ve learnt from experience, this is the wrong forum to think so – I’m getting the impression that a substantial amount of active users here on this subforum trait into SA, and are more happy to get buffs, than to be reasonable :/

You couldn’t be more wrong.

The defense for SA comes not from those who trait it, rather from those who wants to trait it. It is through reason that drives the conversation if the trait is even good enough to take. Unreasonably taking things away like a lot of suggestions here will leave the trait line unusable — and who will benefit from that?

No, the defense comes pretty much entirely from the trait line.

I trait into SA when I want to troll by being OP or need the ridiculous defense for doing things like soloing Mai Trin. I do nothing to change my style of play aside from not being stupid, and the trait line literally does all of the work.

RoS is overkill here. I could see this being made as 25% baseline to the class to compensate for the bonus in damage everyone will be getting in HoT, but quite frankly, I cannot argue any situation aside from a foe that does not attack back where not using SA is more beneficial. Even S/P and P/P primary builds focused on very limited stealth are going to get more out of this trait line than others.

That said, I’d also argue that it should be 25% baseline when not stealthed to promote stealth-less play and knowing when or when not to reveal. Hell, put Descent of Shadows as the minor, move CiS down, and put Infusion of Shadow back in as a GM. Now the line is cohesive for stealth-based players but not ridiculously tanky for being passive.

That this line will see its use in basically every build, stealth-heavy or not should raise a red flag.