Guild Wars 2

Burst abilities are, for the most part, mediocre. Some aren’t even worth using if you’re using a full adrenaline bar to supply that lauded 12% damage boost. (Remember, kids! Don’t use your abilities! That’s bad game design! Just use auto attack! Go, Team Warrior!)

Let’s talk, shall we? This will concentrate on PvP, as it’s easy enough to imagine these in PvE, where just about anything will work somewhere.

Axe (Eviscerate) – Deals damage. No utility other than a bonus combo finisher. No way to balance this other than adjusting damage. It currently deals mediocre damage because very specific glass cannon builds in beta abused it. As such, it’s just sort of there.

Greatsword (Arcing Slice) – Grants Fury. That’s all. As most Warrior builds already have perma-Fury, this is worthless in every way. The burst ability should instead be Hundred Blades, with Arcing Slice being the #2, but unfortunately sane people aren’t in control of this sort of thing. Sometimes I like to imagine Arcing Slice cutting a big gash in the earth that then explodes, dealing damage in a line (and making a combo field) and setting people on fire. That’d be cool, wouldn’t it? Oh well.

Hammer (Earthshaker) – Deals damage, performs a leap attack and stuns enemies in an area. An excellent burst ability, and something all other young burst abilities should look to as a model for success. Currently is not overpowered, as its function is tied to utility and not to just being a high damage move. Very useful. I love you, hammer, even with your many shortcomings.

Longbow (Combustive Shot) – AoE fire field that causes burning. More importantly, it is the only combo field in the entire game that Warriors can create. It’s otherwise fairly mediocre, being outperformed by normal field abilities across other classes. But on a Warrior, it’s rare enough to be invaluable. Almost exclusively a PvE skill, as a result.

Mace (Skull Crack) – Single-target stun. Mainly useful when adrenaline is maxed out. Can be useful on more specialized builds that focus on using disruption as a means of mitigating damage or outright shutting enemies down. On more balanced builds, this is mainly a cute trick. Definitely worth using, but not basing any builds around.

Rifle (Kill Shot) – Similar to Eviscerate in that it only deals damage. Very obvious, long wind up animation (probably the longest in the game). Self-roots. The damage it performs, again like Evis, used to be higher until it was nerfed. Its damage is now mediocre, for the most part. People lauding its damage are usually only seeing the unfixed penetration damage multiplier bug in action. Has no utility at all, other than being a projectile finisher. Basically worthless.

Sword (Flurry) – Multi-hit bleeding attack that roots enemies with immobilize. Mildly useful for the immobilization effect. Sword and condition builds on Warriors in general currently have problems, though, so once you have the enemy in place, there’s not a lot to do with him. Can be used as a secondary set, then immediately ignored in favor of switching to a better weapon set. The bleeding it applies is somewhat mediocre. Good utility, good burst ability idea. However, the weapon it is tied to is not very good due to Warrior problems with laying condition stacks into people and the abundance of condition removal abilities on other classes. Could be useful in the future, as Sword is meant to be a chaser and pressure weapon, in a game currently dominated exclusively by spike damage.

Water burst skills – lol. Forceful Shot is just the rifle burst underwater. It’s terrible. Whirling Strike is an AoE stun. Works all right. But you’re still underwater.

(tbc)…

Discuss. How do you improve these abilities? Should some be dropped entirely, changed in some way? Is it bad to encourage players to build adrenaline and then sit on it? Is adrenaline under-utilized as a profession-specific resource by limiting it exclusively to a single skill?

What about the currently worthless Discipline line? 0.1% burst damage per point for a laughably poor 3% increase to burst ability damage. Especially considering how rarely you use burst abilities, even if they happen to be useful. What should this passive bonus do, if not raise damage? (And I believe making it just raise damage is a stupid bonus to begin with, especially on a utility-deprived class that is currently obsessed about min-maxing damage values.)

Personally? It should have decreased the recharge time on burst abilities. Unfortunately they made that a trait. Quick Bursts, which basically does the same exact thing that Adrenal Reserves does, and they both compete with one another as Grandmaster traits. How poorly thought out was that? It doesn’t matter which of the two you take. One makes them cost less, which effectively means you can use them faster, and the other reduces the recharge time, which… is the same thing. I guess for a minor difference between people who use adrenaline gain abilities and people who don’t? I have no idea what they were smoking here. Not that you’d want to ever waste 30 points investing in Discipline to begin with.

How about this for a Grandmaster Discipline trait? One makes burst abilities grant you stability. The other makes using a burst ability remove all your conditions. How about that for a trait? Put me on the design team, coach! I’m ready!

@plague,
Very well thought out explanation mate, kudos.
we need more rational warriors like you.

You know something is wrong when a light armor class can mitigate damage better than a heavy armor class and take on 3 opponents, kill them all and still have room to spare for the next fight.

My reasoning, I was watching what to many is considered one of the best US tPVP warriors on the scene, and even he admits, he likes the warrior but only roles one because no one else wants to play one and he only runs it for special occasions where lock down builds are required.

As a warrior he died instantly almost everytime no matter how good he played, and trust me he is insanely good.

As a mesmer he was untouchable destroying 3 opponents on a point, never died once as a mesmer in 3 whole tournaments that I saw him play.

How utterly kitten is it that some traits discourage using your F1 skill by giving you increased damage when you have full adrenaline? How does that even make sense? I just don’t even understand some of the designs in gw2.

Ive been doing WvW mostly and my warrior is pretty much built around Crit damage and Condition. I run with a Sword/Shield and A Longbow.

My F1 usually is my I win button(Sometimes). Perfectly timing it with Shield bash so they cant heal back in panic when I use it around 50% of their HP. The Only thing I hate about it is when it misses due to its low range and rooting you when activated.

As for the bow, It works wonders when clashing with Zergs and attacking Towers and Keeps, no one stands inside that ring of fire and walks alive most of the time and no one in their right mind would want to stand inside that either and usually works well to control where the opposite group walks on. Good terrain control I say.

As for adrenaline, I always have full as my traits are revolved around Adrenaline gain.

adamian.9638:

How utterly kitten is it that some traits discourage using your F1 skill by giving you increased damage when you have full adrenaline? How does that even make sense? I just don’t even understand some of the designs in gw2.

I thought this was there to supplement burst damage?

Like with a rifle I chose that trust so at full adrenaline my kills hit gets an extra 12% damage. Is that not how it works? Because if it does work like that then it’s definitely a good trait. I run axe/shield and hammer or rifle depending.

Kill shot and eviscerate are great burst skills, the gap closer on eviscerate is great, and they are both high damaging abilities on low cool downs. I play with multiple classes and would love an on demand 6k-10k hitting ability on my necro or ele, the damage is amazing compared to other classes minus thief. Plus the low Cooldown. These abilities are great to supplement heavier defensive builds and still pack a punch.

I like eviscerate except that it utterly fails at hitting a moving target. Killshot is fun to use but honestly I don’t get much use out of it unless I specifically build around using killshot.

Earthshaker is awesome. Combustive shot is nice, but I don’t use a bow all that much so idk.

The rest don’t even exist to me.

adamian.9638:

How utterly kitten is it that some traits discourage using your F1 skill by giving you increased damage when you have full adrenaline? How does that even make sense? I just don’t even understand some of the designs in gw2.

Do they? I use those for the burst skill.

Switch HB with Arcing Slice that would be so amazing. I would be playing greatsword all the time.

I hate the HB stand in one place mechanic it is so awkward but I feel kittened if I don’t use it. A swapping with arcing slice would mean I can trait for adrenaline and not have to use HB so much.

gwawer.9805:

Switch HB with Arcing Slice that would be so amazing. I would be playing greatsword all the time.

I hate the HB stand in one place mechanic it is so awkward but I feel kittened if I don’t use it. A swapping with arcing slice would mean I can trait for adrenaline and not have to use HB so much.

Nerfing our only viable PvP weapon to the ground like that would be crippling.

Edelweiss.9815:

gwawer.9805:

Switch HB with Arcing Slice that would be so amazing. I would be playing greatsword all the time.

I hate the HB stand in one place mechanic it is so awkward but I feel kittened if I don’t use it. A swapping with arcing slice would mean I can trait for adrenaline and not have to use HB so much.

Nerfing our only viable PvP weapon to the ground like that would be crippling.

Ahahaha are you serious?

Hammer, rifle, axe shield, made and shield, sword bleeds all of these are EXTREMELY viable, people are just complaining to complain, warrior is in a good place as of now (minus bugs and a few other items)

I don’t really know a good format to tackle these with(but I think it’s a great topic, so I want my 2 cents:P), so I’m afraid I’m going with the maligned “quote/response” (with quote shortened because I got too wordy for the forum)format. I apologize for this in advance.

Plague.5329:

Axe (Eviscerate) – Deals damage. No ut…….st sort of there.

I somewhat disagree here, as I have managed 10k crits against light and 8k crits against medium armor with it. Since axe/axe can whip up an adrenaline bar virtually at will, I find it to be a strong and useful burst skill. The small gap closer with it is icing on the cake.

Greatsword (Arcing Slice) – Grants Fury. That’s all. As …………….amage in a line (and making a combo field) and setting people on fire. That’d be cool, wouldn’t it? Oh well.

I agree here. For lack of a better description, I find this attack to be a steaming kitten Running a greatsword build means I get all the “full bar bonuses” with every spec because I’ll always have that full bar. I’ve no reason to empty it with the GS out.

Hammer (Earthshaker) – Deals damage, ………………..h damage move. Very useful. I love you, hammer, even with your many shortcomings.

Agree here, probably my favorite overall burst ability. It just plain works, and meshes well with the rest of the weapon.

Longbow (Combustive Shot) – AoE fire field that causes burning. ……………….classes. But on a Warrior, it’s rare enough to be invaluable. Almost exclusively a PvE skill, as a result.

Probably my third-favorite burst ability, primarily to bring a combo field to the table. If longbow itself didn’t field such wretched damage, I think this one would be livable due to utility.

Mace (Skull Crack) – Single-target stun. ………………not basing any builds around.

Another one that, in my opinion, showcases the overall weakness off the main weapon abilities. Mace auto attack is pretty slow, and 2,3 add little to nothing in terms of damage. In a game with no trinity, the 1,2,3-burst of this weapon are tailor made for tanking style combat. That said, as an “off weapon” to set up something like 100b or similar, it has its uses.

Rifle (Kill Shot) – Similar to Eviscerate in that it only deals damage. Very obvious, long wind up animation (probably the longest in the game). Self-roots. …………. other than being a projectile finisher. Basically worthless.

Nearly every other class in the game begs to differ on the “basically worthless” kill shot. This thing hits, and hits big. If your opponent doesn’t burn something to mitigate or avoid this damage, you win the fight, hands down.

Kill Shot, in my opinion, is a good example of what a high damage burst ability should be. The damage is brutal and stacks well with buffs/gear, but it’s slow and obvious, which makes it avoidable. They could rename this one “cull the herd” and it’d be more fitting, because the key to using it is to successfully find the guy that isn’t smart enough to avoid it, and you will kill him.

Sword (Flurry) – Multi-hit bleeding attack that roots enemies with immobilize. ………………………useful in the future, as Sword is meant to be a chaser and pressure weapon, in a game currently dominated exclusively by spike damage.

I wanted to like this ability. I spent a good deal of my first hours at 80 trying to make sword primary work. It really just doesn’t.

Again, a burst ability that doesn’t mesh well with the weapon. Sword is about bleeds and mobility. The burst yields bleeds, to be sure, but completely abandons the mobility concept. It suffers the same “I stand there and flail wildly” problem as 100b, except there is no real payday. For this thing to work, a person needs to have no immobilize breaker, no condition removal, and no means to down the warrior before the bleeds do their job.

In my opinion, it could almost swap places with the off-hand sword #4 ability(perhaps with a commensurate burst sized damage boost added) and not be out of place.

Water burst skills – lol. Forceful Shot is just the rifle burst underwater. It’s terrible. Whirling Strike is an AoE stun. Works all right. But you’re still underwater.

I agree on Forceful Shot. While I find plenty of use for kill shot on land, in water is a different game and it just doesn’t work. The AOE stun works well enough, and it’s a good addition to a group underwater, but on its own merits it seems awfully weak. In PvP, it rarely decides a fight and in PvE, it’s more likely to add a neutral water mob to the fight than actually mitigate damage over the course of the contest.

Well, I can’t really comment on the axe or longbow, as I don’t use either weapon in any of my builds.

Arcing slice is definitely completely useless.

I agree on earthshaker, easily the best burst skill… it’s absolutely essential to my sPvP build, nothing bad to say about it. I don’t find the hammer to have that many shortcomings… especially against glass cannons, which seems to be 90% of what you find in PvP as most of the time they’re stun/knocked down until they’re dead.

skullcrack I find moderately useful, good if you can ever find a 1vs1 fight in any type of PvP but I find these situations few and far between, and just as good as earthshaker when dealing with boss type enemies PvE wise if it’s just one boss in the fight (a little more useful with the shorter cooldowns of mace skills I think actually, and you can use it while having a shield)

killshot does what rifles do, does damage to one thing.

Flurry I guess is useful for GS warriors in PvP to set up HB? I don’t really know, I find that any competent player can usually wreck a GS warrior, so while I use it in PvE I haven’t used it much in PvP.

All in all I don’t find burst abilities useless, I do however find most of them dreadfully boring.

I agree.
Most burstskills are just not worth using.

Some burst abilities seem to have been too powerful in certain situations so they have been nerfed until a way to fix them was found. Only that that seems to have been forgotten or deemed impossible.

For example Arcing Slice of the Greatsword.

It deals lower damage than the auto attack
and only grants Fury which most warriors have in abundance,
but uses all adrenaline, which leaves the warrior weaker than before,
if certrain traits are in use.

It used to grant might, which in my opinion was ideal,
as it compensates for the relativly weak auto attack
and reflects the way the greatsword was described:

“Sweeping, brutal attacks which carry the greatsword’s momentum from foe to foe. "

Fury is very different from might, either way restore the old arcing slice or increase arcing slice´s damage to adjust the usefullness of this skill.

Which leads to the problem with the discipline trait line.

30% more burst damage was too strong for some builds,
so it has been reduced from 1% more damge to 0.1% more damage
per trait point, as an emergency measure one would think.

But months have passed and it still stays that way.
I imagine a rework of both the traitline and the burstkills takes time,
but there definitly has to be done something about it.

Thrym.9436:

Nearly every other class in the game begs to differ on the “basically worthless” kill shot. This thing hits, and hits big. If your opponent doesn’t burn something to mitigate or avoid this damage, you win the fight, hands down.

Kill Shot, in my opinion, is a good example of what a high damage burst ability should be.

I can agree to disagree on Eviscerate, as Axe is basically just a damage weapon anyway, and at least one burst skill should probably just be damage, as that’s its personality. But nooooooooo on Kill Shot being what you say it is, by any stretch of the imagination.

Just dodge. Seriously. You don’t need a hold your breath HERE IT COMES moment where you frantically look for your one counter skill. Just move a little. It’s the easiest skill to dodge in the entire game. Well, maybe other than a couple of basic Ele skills. The Warrior can’t control when it fires. They can only cancel it. Just wait about three seconds, then dodge roll. He’ll never hit you. This isn’t Backstab we’re talking about here, which in that move set combination actually does more damage than Kill Shot and is far more difficult to dodge in addition to not being a primary class mechanic. It’s three whole seconds. There is no excuse at all for being hit with Kill Shot, other than you didn’t know the Warrior was there. That’s it. It’s only good for picking at people in WvW or as a rare lead-in attack in sPvP.

Kill Shot is an example of everything a Burst Ability should not be. Focuses only on damage, no utility, no depth to its execution, massive windup, incredibly easy to negate, completely pointless. I know it’s easy to get infatuated with a poorly designed skill because it deals a lot of damage, but really now.

While I certainly don’t mind “super moves” that can deal massive damage but have high wind up animations, you aren’t going to catch anyone in PvP with it unless they’re stupid or unaware you exist. And certainly not when the easiest counter for it is just moving out of the way.

Ah yes, swapping 1h sword burst with sword 4 would make 1h sword main hand so much more fun.

Plague.5329:

Thrym.9436:

Nearly every other class in the game begs to differ on the “basically worthless” kill shot. This thing hits, and hits big. If your opponent doesn’t burn something to mitigate or avoid this damage, you win the fight, hands down.

Kill Shot, in my opinion, is a good example of what a high damage burst ability should be.

I can agree to disagree on Eviscerate, as Axe is basically just a damage weapon anyway, and at least one burst skill should probably just be damage, as that’s its personality. But nooooooooo on Kill Shot being what you say it is, by any stretch of the imagination.

Just dodge. Seriously. You don’t need a hold your breath HERE IT COMES moment where you frantically look for your one counter skill. Just move a little. It’s the easiest skill to dodge in the entire game. Well, maybe other than a couple of basic Ele skills. The Warrior can’t control when it fires. They can only cancel it. Just wait about three seconds, then dodge roll. He’ll never hit you. This isn’t Backstab we’re talking about here, which in that move set combination actually does more damage than Kill Shot and is far more difficult to dodge in addition to not being a primary class mechanic. It’s three whole seconds. There is no excuse at all for being hit with Kill Shot, other than you didn’t know the Warrior was there. That’s it. It’s only good for picking at people in WvW or as a rare lead-in attack in sPvP.

Kill Shot is an example of everything a Burst Ability should not be. Focuses only on damage, no utility, no depth to its execution, massive windup, incredibly easy to negate, completely pointless. I know it’s easy to get infatuated with a poorly designed skill because it deals a lot of damage, but really now.

While I certainly don’t mind “super moves” that can deal massive damage but have high wind up animations, you aren’t going to catch anyone in PvP with it unless they’re stupid or unaware you exist. And certainly not when the easiest counter for it is just moving out of the way.

You can’t just say dodge.

Sure in a perfect 1v1 scenario you can dodge it, but if a warrior is using kill shot in a 1v1 he’s wrong.

My targets NEVER see the kill shot coming. They are always engaged with other players, I wait until they are far away so they have a less chance of seeing it, and I pick out the highest health target in the mass chaos, because once it connects they are going down.
They should never know what hit them if you are using it right. Wait until the get locked in combat with a thief, or a clone factory Mesmer lol not a kitten chance in the world to dodge the 8-10k kill shot coming from left field.

Pvp in this game gets very chaotic due to animations and lots of players, this is why you can’t just say wait 3 seconds and dodge. If you get jumped by a thief who hits you with basilisk venom mug cloak and dagger and is trying to backstab you along with mesmers all over, clones phantasms, you will never even notice a warrior kneeling down in that corner about to take you from 75% to 0. I run rifle axe and shield and I just destroy players with kill shot and eviscerate. The class is extremely deadly and I much enjoy it, but if you think you “can just dodge kill shot” or “just count to 3 and dodge” in pvp, then you must not pvp. It’s extremely chaotic, you have toons dying in seconds from high burst builds, elite abilities and npcs all over, clones and phantasms. Not a chance. You will never see it coming.

Ha this doesn’t even take into Account using it on a cc’d target someone that is knockbacked or immobilized (leg specialist plus rifle 3? Is great for this) and in WvW it’s worse.

Kill shot is a phenomenal burst ability for doing just that bursting.

^ If your argument is that they don’t see it coming, so it’s irrelevant, then there’s no point in even saying the wind-up is a good balance to the skill’s design, since your enemy won’t see it anyway.

You also run into the problem of, “Well, Kill Shot isn’t meant to be used in 1v1s, so when you’re in a 1v1, you just can’t use it.”

Bad design. Terrible, in fact.

You (OP) want to trade arcing slice with hundred blades, and then you say designers were not sane for not having made it so from the start? Come on man, talk about bad ideas.. hundred blades as a burst ability would give us a MASSIVE dps downgrade. It would cut greatsword dps clean in half at least in pve settings, while changing absolutely nothing in pvp settings. I’m sorry but this is just a horrible idea.

In pvp, hundred blades is pointless, and in pve, where hundred blades is the only decent source of damage, making it a burst ability would be a gigantic downgrade to warrior greatsword, and no one would ever use that weapon anymore.

I agree arcing slice is bad, but replacing it with hundred blades will make things even worse. Arcing slice just needs to do something else than fury, the move itself is fine, the name is fine, just the bonus it gives is a bit lackluster. To be honest I rather keep it as it is than end up having it made even worse though. When we get a change and it’s even worse, we might end up realizing how 9 seconds of fury, after rage boons run out, isn’t so bad after all.

Warrior just doesn’t need any radical weapon changes right now, we’re in a pretty good place, especially compared to some other professions, we could just use some changes to our utilities to increase pvp viability. Shortening the cooldowns on the physical abilities for example would be a good start.

Zsymon.8457:

You (OP) want to trade arcing slice with hundred blades, and then you say designers were not sane for not having made it so from the start? Come on man, talk about bad ideas.. hundred blades as a burst ability would give us a MASSIVE dps downgrade. It would cut greatsword dps clean in half at least in pve settings, while changing absolutely nothing in pvp settings. I’m sorry but this is just a horrible idea.

I know. And that’s why it’s a great idea. In fact, it’s brilliant. The greatsword has no business doing that much damage, that often. That’s what the axe is for, from a design point of view. HB is currently just a spammy noob button, and the burst ability is a joke. By moving the two, you do two things: you give the GS its identity as a sweeping multi-target sustained pressure weapon back, and you turn the burst ability into something that’s not only worth using, but requires some thought about when you want to use it.

You also neglected to mention the innate quickness that scales with adrenaline, which is by far the most important part of the switch. This lends itself to a variety of possibilities: do you build only one level (which is easy enough, even without any adrenaline gain abilities or traits at all) and supplement that with a normal stun or Frenzy? Do you build two levels and just try to get it off as quickly as possible for sustained DPS? Do you build three levels and simply spike someone when their health is low, and they’re ready to heal?

I think you’re not concerned about the design of the weapon at all. I think you just want your damage number to be as high as possible, and don’t realize how easy that is to adjust. You can alter a damage value on any design, across any weapon. Your concerns there are completely irrelevant. If switching the two means you take away overall DPS, then raise the damage values across the other skills. It’s easy. Switching the two skills is better design. That’s all there is to it. You turn the burst skill into something that is versatile and serves a purpose, and also can’t be spammed but is also powerful enough to be considered a class specific special move.

Again, maybe this is my background in design talking, but try to imagine if every weapon in the game just did 1 damage. Don’t even worry about the damage values. Try to think about the weapons in terms of what they do and why they do those things. Design the weapon for that role (which is exactly how the developers do it) and then adjust the damage values accordingly. Arguments about reduced DPS are 100% irrelevant in any discussion about weapon design. Those are afterthought numbers you adjust after designing the weapon around concepts. Never, ever the other way around.

Plague.5329:

^ If your argument is that they don’t see it coming, so it’s irrelevant, then there’s no point in even saying the wind-up is a good balance to the skill’s design, since your enemy won’t see it anyway.

You also run into the problem of, “Well, Kill Shot isn’t meant to be used in 1v1s, so when you’re in a 1v1, you just can’t use it.”

Bad design. Terrible, in fact.

I just have two things to add to this:

1. There’s a reason Kill Shot has 1,500 range and can pierce targets (when traited of course…but what kind of rifle warrior doesn’t bring that trait?).

2. This game is NOT designed around 1v1. It is designed around 5v5.

That is all. Take from that what you will.

I think swapping 100b with arcing has a great deal of merit. Atm, GS is very much an easy-to-use but worthless if countered weapon. By making 100b an adrenal skill, it could be better balanced to allow this to be a more flexible option, as well as motivating people to be more skillful as opposed to the “GW1 Assassin” builds that effectively let people push buttons in a pre-set order without thinking, and get kills against targets that aren’t prepared. Zsymon’s incorrect in that it would change things in PvP – you’d need to build adrenaline before using it, so it can’t be part of your opening gambit, and as such would drastically change the GS (for the better imo).

Forceful shot does differ from Kill shot in that you can move while activating it. Even though it’s UW (with everything that comes with that), it’s still a better option because self-rooting on-land makes you extremely vulnerable, both in PvP and even more so in PvE.

Combustible shot doesn’t really bother me being an exclusive PvE/WvW skill, as the longbow is basically an exclusive PvE/WvW weapon. Making it PvP viable wouldn’t help a great deal, because you’d still have to get round the fact that the weapon skills still wouldn’t be.

I agree with you on Earthshaker – it’s a great skill that takes planning and forethought, plus works well as requiring you to weigh using it early on vs getting more levels.

Argis.7049:

Plague.5329:

^ If your argument is that they don’t see it coming, so it’s irrelevant, then there’s no point in even saying the wind-up is a good balance to the skill’s design, since your enemy won’t see it anyway.

You also run into the problem of, “Well, Kill Shot isn’t meant to be used in 1v1s, so when you’re in a 1v1, you just can’t use it.”

Bad design. Terrible, in fact.

I just have two things to add to this:

1. There’s a reason Kill Shot has 1,500 range and can pierce targets (when traited of course…but what kind of rifle warrior doesn’t bring that trait?).

2. This game is NOT designed around 1v1. It is designed around 5v5.

That is all. Take from that what you will.

I may agree if not for the fact that in 5v5s, Conquest is designed to split those five into at least three groups, resulting in… 1v1s. Or 2v1s. Maybe a single 3v2, at best. That, and the fact that due to the Warrior lacking mitigation utilities, they are often the first target, because they’re so easy to burn down, as they can’t stealth, clone themselves, portal away or what have you. As such, trying to design a burst skill around the idea that no one is going to be attacking you, in a game mode designed to create very small skirmishes in which you will most likely be the primary target is… not good, at all.

I think this skill and many other elements of the profession are relics of early alphas when they still weren’t sure how they wanted the game to be played. Just as the greatsword is intended to be a large group sustained pressure weapon, but is instead played as a chasing spiking weapon, things like Kill Shot seem designed around the idea that the Warrior is a support, sustained presence profession that is most effective applying pressure across multiple targets. Which obviously… that’s just not how the game is played, at all. In large enough encounters where that could be the case (true 5v5s, for example), melee can fall apart fairly easily, and there are of course much better ranged damage options than a Warrior with a gun.

If GvG actually existed, I imagine Warriors would play a much bigger role. Unfortunately, that sort of combat doesn’t exist yet. It’s a larger overall problem with the game that’s associated with the Warrior being considered “done” way too early in development, in combination with the game being so early into release that it’s missing lots of vital features, along with not being old enough to warrant any major changes in the class.

Plague.5329:

^ If your argument is that they don’t see it coming, so it’s irrelevant, then there’s no point in even saying the wind-up is a good balance to the skill’s design, since your enemy won’t see it anyway.

You also run into the problem of, “Well, Kill Shot isn’t meant to be used in 1v1s, so when you’re in a 1v1, you just can’t use it.”

Bad design. Terrible, in fact.

I’m sorry that may have came out wrong. I meant that I try not to use it in 1v1’s not because its hard to use in fact it’s easy to set up with rifle but or an immobilize, I would rather not use it in a 1v1 so I can use it when there is a group of people to hit multiple targets.

Rifle (Kill Shot) – good at 1 hit K.O. Theif, Ele, Mesmer, Ranger, Engineers. When you trait into crack shot, it penetrates through so you can kill 3 cloth wearers in single SHOT.
Sword ( Flurry) – good at immobilizing dynamic event mobs, other players will pissed when you immobilize horde of mobs.
Longbow (Combustive Shot) – pretty strong finisher in WvW full group fights.

Our burst skills are terrible for the most part. Only usual in niche situations or not very effective/reliable, something other classes are not limited to(referring to their special mechanic). Nov 15 patch is supposed to be 5 pages long for the professions. If Warrior is barely touched I think I will be done with this class for awhile. I’m getting tired of dealing with these flaws just to be subpar at best.

I agree, a 2H shield would be amazing. Captain America style.

auto attack: Bash, Mash, Stagger (cripple for 2sec)
2 – Shield Throw: throw your shield like a frisbee, slicing and bleeding emenies
3 – Shield Launch: Uppercut and launch foe in to air

Burst – ???

If they introduce a Call of Duty style riot shield I think I would have to stop using any other weapons.

for a 2 hand shield, skill 5 should definitely be shield stance but it should last longer and block attacks and peeps from getting past you in a certain line aoe, skill 4 should definitely be shield charge :P, grant protection, retaliation,aegis and charges 1200-1500 range towards the target, knocking stuff in the path to one side ( down if they are directly in the path)

as for burst….. how about a leap straight at the the target dealing small aoe of stun, medium aoe of daze and large aoe of cripple? call it….. judgement of aegis or something ( oooh maybe it can give a small aoe of aegis, medium aoe of retaliation and large aoe of protection too :P)

Edit after reviewing, this seems kinda op but its just a suggestion, who cares :P

gwawer.9805:

I agree, a 2H shield would be amazing. Captain America style.

auto attack: Bash, Mash, Stagger (cripple for 2sec)
2 – Shield Throw: throw your shield like a frisbee, slicing and bleeding emenies
3 – Shield Launch: Uppercut and launch foe in to air

Burst – ???

Knock your foe down and gain protection. Effects scale with adrenaline level.

I think that if you swap Arcing Slice and 100B, warriors will
1) Lose their, really only good weapon for PvE, axes arent that good
2) Less warriors.
Both of these things would happen, and i would stop playing warrior too most likely.
He was gonna be my main too. (Speaking IF this happens, which it most likely WONT, thank the legions)

(Please note that I have no interest in PvE, speaking only from PvP point of view here)

Sword (Flurry) – very situational. Low damage, bit of bleeding. The only useful thing about it is AoE immobilize. Can be used as a setup for burst (since you don’t need a full channel for immobilize effect, you can chain it into 100b). It’s hard to catch multiple enemies with it though, unless fighting in a tight place, like Henge or Clocktower. Self root isn’t much of a problem, unless you sit through the whole channel. Overall, medicore skill.

Axe (Eviscerate) – One of the strongest single-hit abilities in game, next to Backstab and Kill Shot, critting up to 10k. Small gap closer makes it a great finishing move.

Hammer (Earthshaker) – Decent damage, stun and a gap closer. Awesome ability, the only downside being very obvious animation.

Greatsword (Arcing Slice) – I completely forgot this skill exists. Completely useless, dealing next to no damage. Couple seconds of Fury is not worth wasting adrenaline on, not when those 3 bars can give you permament 9% crit chance and 12% damage bonus. Not to mention 90% of the time we already have Fury up from Signet of Rage. I agree it needs to be changed. I disagree that swapping it with 100b is a good idea though. GS autoattack is not worth using. Bladetrail has a billion of collision issues, and it’s damage is pretty low (if we do not count bug exploit ofc). Rush is nice single target damage, but very situational. That only leaves Whirlwind Attack as another viable AoE damage skill. Making 100b burst skill would require a serious rework/rebalance of all the other skills. I think simply reworking Arcing Slice would be much easier solution. I like idea of making it a ranged attack, something like Blade Beam from FF7 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEsj2RV9Lq0). Perhaps knocking down/interrupting foes in a line, or creating a combo field.

Mace (Skull Crack) – My experience with mainhand Mace is quite limited, so can’t really say much here. 2 second stun is pretty decent and might work well in a lockdown build paired with Hammer. But on the other hand, if you use Hammer as 2nd weapon, it’s much better to just use Earthshaker.

Longbow (Combustive Shot) – This skill looks nice on paper. Fire field big enough to cover whole capture point sounds interesting, but due to other bow skills being rather weak (and autoattack being completely useless – insanely slow and rarely hitting moving targets), weapon as a whole is not really viable in PvP.

Rifle (Kill Shot) – High damage, long range… That’s it for positives. Long channel, self root, obvious animation… There are dozens of ways to stop this skill from hitting – interrupt, dodge, block, reflect, LoS break, invulnerabilty, death shroud etc etc. As Warrior is usually prime target in tPvP, I doubt you’ld get enough breathing space to fire it often.

Change “Increases Burst damage” to “Leadership”
-When using a burst skill you will now give a boon to your group* depending on weapon burst skill in main hand. Each point in Leadership increases boon duration by 1%.

Great sword – Gain fury 5s
Hammer – Gain Retaliation 3s
Longbow – Gain 3 Might 6s
Rifle – Gain 3 Might 6s
Axe – Gain Vigor 2s
Mace Gain Protection 3s
Sword Gain Swiftness 3s

*Group being 5 nearby allies, 600 range.

BlueprintLFE.2358:

Edelweiss.9815:

gwawer.9805:

Switch HB with Arcing Slice that would be so amazing. I would be playing greatsword all the time.

I hate the HB stand in one place mechanic it is so awkward but I feel kittened if I don’t use it. A swapping with arcing slice would mean I can trait for adrenaline and not have to use HB so much.

Nerfing our only viable PvP weapon to the ground like that would be crippling.

Ahahaha are you serious?

Hammer, rifle, axe shield, made and shield, sword bleeds all of these are EXTREMELY viable, people are just complaining to complain, warrior is in a good place as of now (minus bugs and a few other items)

Yeah, too bad nobody in tPvP or sPvP really uses any of those as a primary weapon… but I’m sure they’re just all wrong.

gwawer.9805:

I agree, a 2H shield would be amazing. Captain America style.

auto attack: Bash, Mash, Stagger (cripple for 2sec)
2 – Shield Throw: throw your shield like a frisbee, slicing and bleeding emenies
3 – Shield Launch: Uppercut and launch foe in to air

Burst – ???

Change your option for number 2 to the Burst. Shield Throw: Throw your shield, dazing enemies on the way out and pulling them to you on the way back in. Daze increases with adrenaline level. 1s, 2s, 3s. (Keep in mind this is DAZE not stun). The Warrior would gain a much needed pull ability.

Edelweiss.9815:

Yeah, too bad nobody in tPvP or sPvP really uses any of those as a primary weapon… but I’m sure they’re just all wrong.

I actually see a lot of people using these weapons, axe/mace seems to be a very popular (and quite effective) combination, eviscerate paired with a 2 second stun? I myself love the hammer with a sword/shield or mace. Being able to stun multiple opponents for as much as 6 seconds? That’s an eternity in any type of PvP.

I’m hardly a competitive tournament player or anything of the sort, mostly sticking to quick join games with at most 1 or 2 friends and WvW.

I don’t believe all GS warriors are inexperienced, but I do believe that the vast majority of inexperienced players rock a GS because it’s easy to use and be marginally effective (and can be very effective in the hands of a skilled player). This seems to me to be a fairly logical explanation as to why the majority of warriors you see are GS users.

Is it just me or do warrior players complain a lot? Quite frankly I find few classes that I have much trouble with. Hell, me and a guard took a group of 5 in WvW a few days ago, not unskilled ones either as there were multiple dead friendlies around them when we got there.

Thieves and mesmers are tough, but they’re hardly unbeatable. Generally in these fights I find the winner to be whoever got the jump on the other. As long as you have gap closing, condition removal, stun breaks and CC you’ve got a fighting chance against any class imo. Maybe things are different in competitive tourny play, which I wonder how many players constantly complaining participate in. If anything I want to see classes like ele’s get buffed up a bit so I can constantly have fights that challenge me the way thieves/mesmers do.

On the original topic I think HB most definitely should be a burst skill, with appropriate damage scaling of other abilities of course (hell, if it was a burst skill it probably wouldn’t have to root you for the sake of balance either).