Guild Wars 2

Among the many issues warriors seem to have, today my crusade revolves around banners!

Now banners are highly useful, I am not denying that. Providing AOE bonuses, an active banner-specific-2, and the ability to place them for your allies to use makes it a great coordination/teamwork ability. You can take advantage of combo fields, and use them to change the tide of battle.

However, the current version of banner can be a bit tedious and clunky. You have to pick up a banner constantly to use it’s abilities, and then drop it to resume combat. Got multiple banners? Prepare to spend time summoning each one, only for them to be left behind constantly in mobile events, dungeons, WvW, or sPvP.

On top of the fact that picking up a banner wastes time, it’s complicated by three other issues/bugs…

1. Attempting to pick up a banner when moving will often cause your character to autorun for about 3 seconds. During this time, you cannot stop, or change direction. I have been forced-run into AOE death rings, off ledges and cliffs, and in general lost valuable time in combat. This seems to be a general GW2 issue with picking up any item while moving, but as a banner warrior, it hits hard and frequently.

2. When doing the ~ quick-swap-drop on a banner, it will sometimes refuse to drop after a single ~ press. Pressing it a second time will drop the banner, and switch me to my secondary weapon and incur a swap-cooldown. Meaning im stuck on that weapon for the next 9 seconds. (Or sometimes less now that fast hands seems to be more reliable)

3. Banner 1 does less damage then most melee weapon 1’s, which is fine by itself, but it also hits only a single target, instead of 3. This means you almost never want to be holding it unless you have an immediate reason to.

I propose that Banners be changed to work using a toggle on/off system not unlike an engineers toolbelt.

-Each individual banner still takes up a single utility slot as usual.

-When toggled on, your character wields the banner in their hands just like when it’s currently held. It can be dropped with ~ or 5-slammed, and picked up by allies.

-If dropped or slammed, it starts a 60 second cooldown on your banners utility skill. At the end of the cooldown, the banner vanishes and is returned to your back. Picking it up, clears the cooldown. This is mainly to prevent “losing” the banner for more than a minute at a time.

-When toggled off, the banner sits on your back, providing the typical AOE bonus.

Yes, you can have 3 banners on your back (or visually, 1 pole with 3 flags) and gain the bonuses from all 3. So what? You can currently have 3 banners on the ground, and get the bonuses from all 3. All this changes is the location and management of the banner(s).

Yes, this means 100% banner uptime. That’s fine. The AOE bonuses are nice but small, and do not stack with other banners of the same type. And even if two 90’s end up being too strong, just slightly rebalance the stats. Instead of90 for 90 seconds every 120 seconds (66% uptime currently), it could be +60 with 100% uptime.

Yes, the banner trait, which reduces CD by 20%, would be useless. ANet could instead have the trait buff the passive bonuses.

No, I don’t count our elite banner amongst this post. I can’t think of a good way to make that feasible, due to the long CD and powerful battle-rez when summoned. Maybe one of you can?

This is a semi-repost of mine from another thread. All constructive comments or criticism are welcome.

Good post i wish the devs would see this, banners could deffinetly use a remake as the pick up to use abilities render them pretty weak in many scenario

Agreed. Banners seem like an early idea that was implemented and then forgotten about.

the slow pickup animations are annoying and why i use shouts. banners should probably be summoned on our backs so you don’t have to pickem up, with a button that would have the pickup delay to activate thier skillset, that way passive benefits wouldn’t slow you down (aside from casting time), but you could still whip one out for the speed, special, and rush skills.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/warrior/Bunker-Warrior-tPvP-prototype/first#post915714

Made an efficient build with a banner (You only need one). Definitely going to work in PvE. Don’t know how this will work in WvW due to “Banner thieves” but it has potential in tPvP.

Banners should be easier to pick up, other than that they are nice.

I have a warrior build which revolves entirely around banners, more of a warleader than a warrior though who hangs behind the front lines unless forced to melee, provides DPS boosts, does healing and revives other people with the warbanner. It’s been working out better than I expected, even WvW in static defense situations.

Good post. I just recently made a healy shout-banner warrior, and I’m loving it. The auto-run bug hits me hard a lot. Makes me sad

i dont really find them all that useful, i mean the buffs are extremely minimal and the CDs on the banners are too long to make up for it. unless youre in WvW ofc, cause the buffs arent limited to a certain amount of people, correct? the regen might be useful in that case, but thats really it.

i did run into a banner “point defense” warrior in a free tourney once though. easiest “bunker” ive ever had to kill, no joke.

Schwahrheit.4203:

but it has potential in tPvP.

no it doesnt, sorry

I tend to use in a regeneration banner in my shout build and the most tedious is to find the banner, pick it up (with all the issues you mentioned), cast a slow animation, then slam it back or drop it. This all takes ~30% of the time because I have to do this every 10 seconds. I’m all for this change, great idea!

Banners on your back would be an interesting change. Would need some thought on running multiple banners though. This would be a way to make having them as part of your build less irritating.

lol @ warhammer picture. But yes, that’s more or less what I was picturing. Actually while we’re at it, think we could convince the ANet devs to give us some of that sexy power armor as well?

In all seriousness, I have given my idea a good deal of thought, and I think this change is just what banners need. It’s not even much of an actual buff, more like a QoL (Quality of Life) buff. The fact that I dont see any real negative feedback (yet) is also encouraging!

Vicarious.3047:

i dont really find them all that useful, i mean the buffs are extremely minimal and the CDs on the banners are too long to make up for it. unless youre in WvW ofc, cause the buffs arent limited to a certain amount of people, correct? the regen might be useful in that case, but thats really it.

i did run into a banner “point defense” warrior in a free tourney once though. easiest “bunker” ive ever had to kill, no joke.

Schwahrheit.4203:

but it has potential in tPvP.

no it doesnt, sorry

I said it had potential (It doesn’t have to bunker you could just roam), I never said it was practical. Also I’d like to point out that “no it doesn’t” without supporting arguments is a “low skill player input.” Seriously, basing things off of “one match” doesn’t make your opinions even plausible.

Anyways, I’ll see you tPvP. I don’t mind free wins from simple-minded FOTM GS + Axe/Shield Warriors like you

Though lets be reasonable, I bet your Warrior probably can’t even get this build to half HP. You’re probably going to dodge this challenge though because you’re probably one of those people who are scared to be proven wrong.

Vicarious.3047:

i dont really find them all that useful, i mean the buffs are extremely minimal and the CDs on the banners are too long to make up for it.

Here where your are wrong !!

I got -20 % banner recharge which allows me to use Banner of Strength all the time.
I’m doing very good with my warrior build >> http://tinyurl.com/ckqnjm9

1 thing I hate is that picking up banners is the last priority for “f” interactions when multiple interactions are available.

Imagine some lootable corpse is under your banner with an npc standing right next to it. Picking up the banner is the last thing you get to do.

Talk to npc → loot → pick up banner

It’s worse if the npc is some random guy that does absolutely nothing for when you talk to them.

Schwahrheit.4203:

I said it had potential (It doesn’t have to bunker you could just roam), I never said it was practical. Also I’d like to point out that “no it doesn’t” without supporting arguments is a “low skill player input.” Seriously, basing things off of “one match” doesn’t make your opinions even plausible.

Anyways, I’ll see you tPvP. I don’t mind free wins from simple-minded FOTM GS + Axe/Shield Warriors like you

Though lets be reasonable, I bet your Warrior probably can’t even get this build to half HP. You’re probably going to dodge this challenge though because you’re probably one of those people who are scared to be proven wrong.

well someones a little touchy! lol

first off i play hammer warrior in frees, but not in paids (most teams in paids have an aoe condition dealer and blind is usually one of the common ones applied making hammer hard to hit anything with :P).

second i didnt offer anything practical to your post cause i LITERALLY just said it above the quote…….. good job NOT reading lol

ill spell it out for you again though, slowly so you can keep up this time; the boons applied from the banners are extremely minimal, FAR from game changing and they wont help give you an edge damage or survival wise over any other decent player. on top of that all but the banner of strength have a very long CD. any stance or shout warrior will walk all over a banner warrior in tpvp EASILY.

but nice try, and by that i mean claiming you play (and win) tourneys as a banner warrior LAWL

Vicarious.3047:

Schwahrheit.4203:

I said it had potential (It doesn’t have to bunker you could just roam), I never said it was practical. Also I’d like to point out that “no it doesn’t” without supporting arguments is a “low skill player input.” Seriously, basing things off of “one match” doesn’t make your opinions even plausible.

Anyways, I’ll see you tPvP. I don’t mind free wins from simple-minded FOTM GS + Axe/Shield Warriors like you

Though lets be reasonable, I bet your Warrior probably can’t even get this build to half HP. You’re probably going to dodge this challenge though because you’re probably one of those people who are scared to be proven wrong.

well someones a little touchy! lol

first off i play hammer warrior in frees, but not in paids (most teams in paids have an aoe condition dealer and blind is usually one of the common ones applied making hammer hard to hit anything with :P).

second i didnt offer anything practical to your post cause i LITERALLY just said it above the quote…….. good job NOT reading lol

ill spell it out for you again though, slowly so you can keep up this time; the boons applied from the banners are extremely minimal, FAR from game changing and they wont help give you an edge damage or survival wise over any other decent player. on top of that all but the banner of strength have a very long CD. any stance or shout warrior will walk all over a banner warrior in tpvp EASILY.

but nice try, and by that i mean claiming you play (and win) tourneys as a banner warrior LAWL

People like this, you have no kitten idea whether it will work or not, you just say no because you don’t like the idea. No wonder all the noobs are all running the same build, someone comes up with an idea and someone who doesn’t like it, just says nope it’s not going to work, not viable, then we get 8649164917 people on the forums repeating this filth without ever trying the build for themselves. Just because one person who thinks they are hot kitten said so.

People like you are the reason people are pigeonholed into playing one spec, when there are other viable options out there that should have been known from the first month in the game. Just saying no it’s not viable without a shred of action taken. Someone worked hard on a build and produced good results that they are happy about, they come to the forums looking for help tweaking or fine tuning, but people like you refuse to try it, and then complain about us warriors only having 1-2 decent specs.

Ok, could everyone try to keep this civil? I really dont want to have the thread hijacked like this, or worse, locked.

BlueprintLFE.2358:

Wow whose attacking who?

The guild I am in is stomping frees right now, sorry mate your ego s huge but I’ve never heard of you.

We are working on paids as well. Anyways it’s a video game and there is too much nerd rage in this thread for me.

Banner warriors keep trying things out, there may be a viable spec out there for us.

i stated that i didnt believe banner warriors were viable in tpvp and i stated why, then idk which of you was first but someone bashed me for “claiming something without even offering a reason,” so when i pointed out they obviously just didnt read my post they raged at me, then the second one of you joined in with the same stuff the other had already said.

since you asked i figured id clarify.

and i never said anything about my own talent, i simply said it was dumb of you guys to assume id never tried it when i had. you only say i have a big ego to try and divert the attention of your own hurt ego, dont fool yourself.

anyway back on topic: i tried one of the banner specs for spvp listed above for arguments sake and the regen from the banners was pitiful even with a clerics amulet. using the healing shouts and soldier runes worked MUCH better for bunkering, three 2.6k team heals every 20-25 secs plus a team condition removal on each shout (and two on “shake it off” which is also a stun breaker), every one of them not requiring 0 interference to “plant” like the banners do, all on top of the basic heal.

the shout spec simply makes the banner spec not worth it, in tpvp at least. using at least one regen banner in pve helps and if not for the banner stealers in wvw it would also be better then shouts (since shouts only hit 5 teammates i think it was), and then in general pug spvp any spec can work when playing the multitudes of bad/new players that simply zerg around looking for more points lol

I agree, banners can be quite annoying. I do like your system of the Toggle. However, there is no need to drop ANY banners. Convert the banners to say “Encouragement” and have it do everything the current banners do, except you don’t have to drop/plant anything. They take up tool bar slots, provide AOE buffs/heals/damage, and have the same timers as the previous banners. Would make things a heck of a lot simpler, and would not irritate people trying to run around and loot, and have to pick up and replant your stupid banner out of the way

This is actually a really good idea, but I can see some problems.

Having banners being able to be active on your back, and with zero cooldown is basically a more powerful version of the passive effect of a signet, with no active ability.

What I think would work just as well while also being a little more balanced is for things to basically work as they do now, except re-pressing the banner utility button removes the banner and there would be no cooldown. You would still be able to pick it off the ground to use its 1-5 abilities when the situation demands.

This would be a quick solution to some of the glitches, and the extra time involved in picking it up. It also solves the problem of having all your banners on the field and not being able to grab them all and move them to a new spot. This gets around the balance issue of your suggestion, being able to toggle it to your back and still have it active, while still maintaining a way to quickly pick up, and redeploy all your banners again. Nothing is worse than using a banner for one fight, being unable to pick it up again and having to wait 100s for the cooldown to use it again.

typing this on my phone while on the bus, so forgive my lack of typical finesse. . .

I would like to see banners made more like Engineer kits, in terms of their utility. activating a banner utlity would equip the banner in your main hand, or both hands if off hand is empty,

banner skills wouldnt change much, but the benefit wouls be their mobility, and the option of an off hand, including the pethora of new weapon combos. the penalty is that only “two hand” banners can plant for combo field (since its skill 5). banners cannot be equipped in the off hand.

banners need a bigger traited range.

imagine equipping your banner, with your warhorn, or your mace, or shield?

the Improved Battle Standard trait could be the requirement to allow “two hand” banners, and woulf properly buff range. inspiring banners would remain the same.

Condas.7056:

Banners on your back would be an interesting change. Would need some thought on running multiple banners though. This would be a way to make having them as part of your build less irritating.

This is The solution…honestly.

IMO, banners on the back is a horrible idea because it is too much for us to be able to do at once. And i dont mean being able to manage all the skills buffs, I mean it brings too much to the table without a penalty.

If warriors are the control class, you can’t give them something glaringly different or better than other classes like that, it needs to be balanced with give and take. Giving us the ability to carry a banner while still fully equipping our weapon sets is too much. It would be like giving an engie a grenade kit and allowing him to keep his rifle, or whatever other analogy you want.

nakoda.4213:

Giving us the ability to carry a banner while still fully equipping our weapon sets is too much. It would be like giving an engie a grenade kit and allowing him to keep his rifle, or whatever other analogy you want.

What??? What I’m suggesting here, is almost EXACTLY what the engineer currently has.

Engineers have various kits they can toggle on/off. When on, their weapon is effectively stowed, and 1-5 become their kit abilities. They can switch back to their rifle on a whim by toggling it off.

What I’m proposing is that warriors have banners they can toggle on/off. When on, their weapon is effectively stowed, and 1-5 become their banner abilities. They can switch back to their weapon of choice on a whim by toggling it off.

Engineer Kits EACH provide 5 powerful kit-specific active abilities.

Every Banner provides the same 4 abilities (slot 1,3,4,5), and 1 banner-specific ability (slot 2). The abilities are generally much weaker then engineer kits, but the banner also provides a small passive bonus (+90 to two stats) which balances it out.

In effect, the only thing my suggestion really changes, is that the banner will “follow” you around, rather then needing to be picked up and moved constantly.

Now, for the rant portion! (Small children, pets, and anyone allergic to sarcasm should avert their eyes)

Think about how annoying it would be if engineers had to place their kits on the ground like banners?
-1 second cast time to summon them on the floor nearby.
-1 second delay to pick them up. And that’s IF your F key does that, instead of looting a body, or talking to an NPC, or trying to harvest a node, or operating siege, AND it doesn’t glitch out and send you auto-running uncontrollably for 3 seconds instead of picking up your kit.

And what if you have to emergency dodge roll away while not holding the kit? It’s left on the ground over there, where you were. Want to use it again? Sure, just spend the time to run back to where it was midfight, and pick it up again. I sure hope it doesn’t force you auto-run for 3 seconds yet again, while people are beating the crap out of you!
But no worries, the PvP in this game requires characters to have almost no mobility, right?

Oh, mr engineer, did you leave your kit behind? No worries, just wait a few minutes, you can resummon it on the ground nearby eventually and start the whole cycle over again.

Oh! Did you want to have TWO kits and switch seamlessly between them? Sure, just place both on the ground, casting each one individually, and then pick them up (suffering the F priority and auto-run glitch) individually whenever you want to switch.

Oops, some random WvW guy grabbed your kit and ran off with it.
Oops, you got knocked back and your kit is over there, behind those two guys trying to kill you.
Oops, when trying to drop your kit, it changed to your secondary weapon and locked you there for 9 seconds, when what you REALLY need is primary right now.
Oops, you’re immobilized JUST out of reach of your precious kit.
Oops, this is a highly mobile fight, with lots of AOE rings everywhere. Guess those kits you left behind don’t help much.

@Dand

I think he’s just saying, it would be a little unbalanced to be able to carry around all three banners on your back, and receive the passive bonus with absolutely zero downtime. It’s just +90 to 8 stats, all the time, is what I took from your initial post.

Like I said in my earlier post, I think an easier and more fair change would be to have the ability to press the banner utility button again to pick up the banner, returning it to your utility slot, and resetting any cooldowns.

Engine kits replace weapon skills. So does an equipped banner.

What you want to do is add engine kits to warrior without replacing our weapon skills, in an attempt to homogenize the professions to make things “equal” and “fair” …

That is not how you achieve balance.

Paper beats rock, rock beats scissors, scissors beat paper. This is balance; no where does scissor get to borrow paper to dodge the rock.

nakoda.4213:

IMO, banners on the back is a horrible idea because it is too much for us to be able to do at once. And i dont mean being able to manage all the skills buffs, I mean it brings too much to the table without a penalty.

If warriors are the control class, you can’t give them something glaringly different or better than other classes like that, it needs to be balanced with give and take. Giving us the ability to carry a banner while still fully equipping our weapon sets is too much. It would be like giving an engie a grenade kit and allowing him to keep his rifle, or whatever other analogy you want.

This entire post does not make any sense to me whatsoever.FYI,Banners are used For Allies,not personal use,why should i keep carrying it being useles besides pressing 2 – 3 every now an then ? Instead of wearing it on my back,buffing my allies,and be able to smack things with my normal weap.Being able to atleast carry One banner on your back,would be a great idea to be implemented because as of now banners are clunky to use and it happens to often that you are Forced outside of the banner area,and forget it,or need to pick it up again (if you want the effects to do anything usefull ) while people are smacking away at you.

Banners are fine. They are stronger then something like say shouts which are mobile (Aka come with you) so its balanced that they need to be picked up if you move around.

The on use effects are strong, and spending time using them is fine. Banner’s are not designed for a highly mobile fight, such a skirmishing in PvP, not every skill is ideal in every situation.

Banners are strong, no issues.

Kazin.2073:

Banners are fine. They are stronger then something like say shouts which are mobile (Aka come with you) so its balanced that they need to be picked up if you move around.

The on use effects are strong, and spending time using them is fine. Banner’s are not designed for a highly mobile fight, such a skirmishing in PvP, not every skill is ideal in every situation.

Banners are strong, no issues.

No,Banners has a less noticable effect then shouts but a longer duration and range,other then that,more cons then pro’s.

Banner of disc:
90 Prec 10% crit dmg 170hp/sec can be picked up for fury swiftness – takes 1 utility slot

I’m sorry but no shout comes close to that much usefulness for 1 utility slot. Also remember banner traits effect your elite banner which should be used at all times except puzzles and soloing

There is no denying that banners are powerful, if you are going to be remaining in one area for an extended period. The long cooldown on them however, makes them near useless.

In sPvP, say you get to a point, cap it and an enemy shows up. You place the banner(s) for the fight, and in about 20s, its over. If you have more than one banner, you then have to wait 100s for a utility that isn’t worth a 100s cooldown. They gave it that cooldown because they expected you to carry your banners around, and when it expired to have a 20s cooldown between the next one, untraited.

So why not have the ability to retrieve your banner, with no cooldown involved? When traited I assume there is no, or almost no cooldown anyways right? Maybe make the trait also let the banner return to your utility slot when you press it a second time. They would still serve the exact same purpose, the only difference being that you don’t need 3 people to carry all your banners, or risk losing them for 100s

Caedmon.6798:

This entire post does not make any sense to me whatsoever.FYI,Banners are used For Allies,not personal use,why should i keep carrying it being useles besides pressing 2 – 3 every now an then ? Instead of wearing it on my back,buffing my allies,and be able to smack things with my normal weap.Being able to atleast carry One banner on your back,would be a great idea to be implemented because as of now banners are clunky to use and it happens to often that you are Forced outside of the banner area,and forget it,or need to pick it up again (if you want the effects to do anything usefull ) while people are smacking away at you.

because the benefit of a banner is the buffs it provides, but the complaint is lack of mobility.

then, as i’ve stated, putting the banner on the back so it moves with you is too much … it does not tax our class at all because it gives us mobile buffing without the penalty of weapon reduction.

so the point of making it more kit and less turret is to make the skills (1-3) more viable as a tool in hand (the banner man in a war never puts it down, lest he be uninspiring), with the bonus of having off hand abilities like your warhorn (talk about a support buff, banner + warhorn?) or your shield (riot control!) or a sword (commander defense) or …. well I could go on; then you have the option (traited) of going 2 hand banner (a proper “inspiring battle standard” trait) which gives you the ability to plant the standard (which is what a flag in the ground is called, a banner is carried … and yes, the meaning of words does matter) so that your banner gains combo field (while up) and increased range when put in to the ground. putting it into the ground is a permanent move that lasts, say, 70% of the CD of the banner. if you never put it down on the ground, the CD is 1 sec like a kit. and so on, and so forth.

the point is to give and take, not just take.

What you guys are asking for is the ability to have the skills of grandmaster traits from more than 2 trees in a spec by having superb banners and still having your pimped out dps. You are being greedy.

if you want to make it more turret than kit, then it is the buffs the banners provide that need to be changed, not their functionality at all, and then the abilities you get when picking up a banner need to be nerfed to compensate.

lastly, people getting upset about this theory crafting (myself included “banner on the back is a horrible kitten”) is moot because this is all fantasy football league talk, none of it matters. ANet is pretty clear about their control over their class visions, etc.

Levian.6742:

@Dand
I think he’s just saying, it would be a little unbalanced to be able to carry around all three banners on your back, and receive the passive bonus with absolutely zero downtime. It’s just +90 to 8 stats, all the time, is what I took from your initial post.

Like I said in my earlier post, I think an easier and more fair change would be to have the ability to press the banner utility button again to pick up the banner, returning it to your utility slot, and resetting any cooldowns.

I already addressed that in my initial post. Having this sort of uptime is hardly unbalancing or overpowered. Especially since you can currently achieve something like 98% uptime with the banner trait currently! If it’s so overpowered, where are all the dozens of banner warriors running around abusing it?

My suggestion actually nerfs the stats from 90/90 to 60/60, but greatly improves the fluidity, and ease of use. It’s just extremely clunky to actually use the banners currently, and often the time your character spends managing them would be better spent doing something else to help the group.

Your idea, resetting the banner on a second press, only addresses SOME of the issues. You still need to spend time resummoning it, and picking it up, suffering through the F priority, pick-up-autorun bug, the drop-swap bug.

nakoda.4213:

Engine kits replace weapon skills. So does an equipped banner.

What you want to do is add engine kits to warrior without replacing our weapon skills

How did you get this wrong again? Go re-read my original post, and my more recent post, which directly addressed your misconception. Actually, I’ll quote myself, pretentious as that may be =P

Engineers have various kits they can toggle on/off. When on, their weapon is effectively stowed, and 1-5 become their kit abilities. They can switch back to their rifle on a whim by toggling it off.

What I’m proposing is that warriors have banners they can toggle on/off. When on, their weapon is effectively stowed, and 1-5 become their banner abilities. They can switch back to their weapon of choice on a whim by toggling it off.

nakoda.4213:

What you guys are asking for is the ability to have the skills of grandmaster traits from more than 2 trees in a spec by having superb banners and still having your pimped out dps.

I’m fairly certain you’re either not reading, or grossly misunderstanding everything you do read. Any chance you could stop trolling my thread now, please?

im glad you take this all personally. it makes me feel good inside to know that i have caused you such anguish over a video game and that you have no idea what it means to disagree and have a … discussion … about something.

no one is perfect mate, but that doesn’t make someone a troll.

. . .

i still think your idea sucks. why go through all the hassle of making it a kit that does exactly what it does now? just .. pick up your banner ..

you have yet to address any penalties to balance your changes.

nakoda.4213:

im glad you take this all personally. it makes me feel good inside to know that i have caused you such anguish

nakoda.4213:

that doesn’t make someone a troll.

See the contradiction?

nakoda.4213:

i still think your idea sucks. why go through all the hassle of making it a kit that does exactly what it does now? just .. pick up your banner ..

If it were as simple as picking it up, there would be no issue. I’ve already listed why picking up the banner is a nightmare in prior posts. In my opinion, it’s a clunky, unfun, and troublesome system, which could be greatly improved upon. You’re entitled to your opinion as well, but I would suggest you go actually go try and run 2-3 banners in a FotM 10+ dungeon, a few rounds of sPvP, and then a day of WvW. You might be tempted to reevaluate that opinion afterwards.

nakoda.4213:

you have yet to address any penalties to balance your changes.

Untrue. Again, prior posts, including my original post. That’s why I suspect you’re either not reading or trolling.

60s cool down with 100% uptime, 3 available banners hot swappable at will, no penalty to weapon skills a la engie, slight nerf to stat bonuses, and so on. I have read your post. I am not a troll. The ideas are cool but are not feasible.

Warrior is the control class. You have added too much without taking enough away. That’s all I’m saying. That’s why I said it sucks, not because it isn’t cool, but because it isn’t realistic given the direction ANet has taken.

I’m sorry my sarcasm was too much for you to handle. Mebbe spec auto-“shake it off” ? :s

I also recommend you search “banner” on the forum and you’ll find I do run 2 banners at all times with a sword/war horn and shake it off. I’ve even got a banner post in the thread for builds up above. Might need some updating… But…anyway, since you still think criticism equals insult…

my kitten is bigger than yours, etc etc, pewqqpew

if banners go on back i will use them. Ive done every build for war except banners. Well i did em but ditched it fast cus fools either pick up and run off or no one picks em up. I hope they make banners go to your back which would look effin awesome and i will defiantly play them instead of the forced GS/axe/x builds.

nakoda.4213:

60s cool down with 100% uptime, 3 available banners hot swappable at will, no penalty to weapon skills a la engie, slight nerf to stat bonuses, and so on. I have read your post. I am not a troll. The ideas are cool but are not feasible

Well, then suggest maybe ways to make the idea more feasible instead of blasting it?

Do you think allowing only a single banner at a time would make more sense? Under the current system you can still get 3 banners, all providing bonuses. The complication there is that its clunky to keep them with you when mobile, people steal them, bugs, etc… all the stuff I’ve said a dozen times.

HOWEVER, none of these problems with banners really seem to have been INTENDED as a limitation, to balance them out. People stealing, buggy pickups, etc, all seem to be oversights, something ANet failed to consider fully. (No hard feelings ANet, we all make mistakes.)

The only limitation I see as being an INTENTIONAL limit, is the immobility.

Given the fact that currently banners are largely considered to be Underpowered, and that I suggested reducing the stat buff slightly, removing this ONE limitation, the immobility, would seem to balance out quite nicely.

Wearing it on your back addresses the immobility of multiple banners: BUFF

Reducing the stats makes them less potent: NERF

The toggle eliminates the pickup/drop/cast time: BUFF

The toggle eliminates the pickup/drop bugs: BUG FIX

The toggle/place/60s return greatly reduces banner theft: QoL BUFF (Quality of Life)

The toggle removes the ability to blast finisher or choose location when summoning: NERF

So three Buffs, Two Nerfs, and a Bug Fix. Net gain of 1 buff, and 1 bug fix. Since its currently underpowered, that seems like a good move to me.

I’ll give it a go.

1. Banners require player targeting instead of ground targeting. Target a player to apply a banner on their back (120sec cd) giving their weapon skill 1 additional (not new) abilities.
- strenght adds aoe stack of might (5sec) on a 10sec icd
- defense adds aoe protection (3sec) on a 10sec icd
- tactics adds an aoe heal + aoe regen (5sec) on a 10sec icd
- discipline adds an aoe stack of fury (8sec) on a 10sec icd
- battle standard adds an aoe stability (3sec) on a 10sec icd

2. When summoned the banner skill itself changes function (like how an engg’s kit changes to “stow kit” if the kit is active) to (lets call it) Battle Cry on a 10sec cd.
- apply swiftness (3sec)
- blast finisher
- shares a cd with all other Battle Cry utility skills.

Tbth, banners ought to be like turrets, no cd on pick up other than global cd. No one but the warrior who planted it should be able to retrieve it. (Turrets also need to have no cd but global).

Each banner should provide an aoe combo field (not a blast finisher), ie defence=water, or whatever is appropriate.

Buff/boons are appropriate as is, but range needs to be buffed and bug fixed.

T1 trait should buff range.
T2 trait should grant combo finisher.
T3 trait should provide regen and boon increase.

Banners need tweaks, not overhauls.

Replying to Dand’s issue with applying this overhaul of sorts to the elite skill Battle Standard, I have a solution. Make the auto-res a banner skill, much like Banner of Discipline’s Furious Rally (obviously on a much longer cooldown).
Actually for that matter, I feel like any weapon skills the battle standard provides would have to be on a long cooldown, kinda like a thing to use when push comes to shove, or else it runs into just being a more powerful AOE version of the elite signet. In fact, I don’t know. I personally like the Rage Signet, and I would hate banners turning signets obsolete (which is I suppose a possible issue with doing any of this). I guess a lot of moves kind of run into each other like that, whether you want to compare banners with signets or shouts. For example currently the Banner of Strength is useless with the “For Great Justice” shout which provides stronger bonuses overall (135 strength and condition damage as opposed to 90, I think. Might have to check the numbers) as well as a crit bonus for a third of the time.
So yeah, really banners need to be fixed somewhere and I like where this is going. From a role-playing standpoint, it really would make a banner warrior feel like an actual banner warrior.