Guild Wars 2

Let’s be honest here for a moment… Distracting Strikes was subpar as it was before, and is rendered virtually useless after the confusion damage nerf for WvW.

Here’s a few facts…

1. Confusion scales off of Condition Damage.

2. Warrior’s primary source of interrupts (Hammer/Mace/Shield) inflict no damaging conditions on their own.

3. Warrior’s primary source of conditions (bow/sword) have no potential interrupts.

This leads to a problem wherein the only players who would potentially consider this trait, have no (or very little) condition damage, and after the nerf to WvW confusion damage… I can’t forsee a situation where this trait is viable compared to other options.

my suggestions are as follows.

A ) Remove it, and add a new (better) trait.

B ) Rework it, so that it instead extends stun/knockdown duration on interrupt, or in some way counter Stability.

I’m more a fan of B ) myself. Warrior has no boon removal, period. Sigil of Nullification is the only thing to potentially remove stability, and good luck with that. In lieu of this, extending the duration would also work.

Something along the lines of either 33% chance to remove stability on crit (10~20 second cooldown) or +50% stun/knockdown duration.

Warrior has some of the worst underpowered traits/skill lines in the game. Needs a serious revamp, IMO.

Daecollo.9578:

Warrior has some of the worst underpowered traits/skill lines in the game. Needs a serious revamp, IMO.

I agree that tons of traits are entirely bad, but this one in particular… It just… what.

Final Thrust (Sword’s ‘3’) should be an interrupt, IMO.

I agree that the trait is bad and should be replaced.

Not sure what you could replace the trait with, or keep the trait and gain might when interrupting

Why would it be an interrupt Daecollo? It would be better applying 1-2 bleeds since that’s the warrior Sword’s main focus.

Grok Krog.9581:

I agree that the trait is bad and should be replaced.

Not sure what you could replace the trait with, or keep the trait and gain might when interrupting

Why would it be an interrupt Daecollo? It would be better applying 1-2 bleeds since that’s the warrior Sword’s main focus.

Interrupt because its a thrust in your face attack. Also so it would proc distracting strikes.

I like that it gives us the option to apply confusion in some way, but the skill ceiling on this is very high and as mentioned, you would have to really have to spec around this trait and still likely not receive the desired benefits.

If the confusion was applied from more than just ‘interrupts’ or if the trait synergised with another trait that allowed the warrior to interrupt much more easily, then it could be worth it.

By that logic daecollo my Hammer should apply a 1 second stun on every hit, and insta-kill with backbreaker.

Final Thrust is more of a stab to the stomach anyways

I play a Sword/Shield condition warrior in WvW and I love Distracting Strikes. It’s great to interrupt an opponent with Shield 4, putting three stacks of confusion on him, and follow up with Sword F1. I also sometimes run Bull’s Charge for another interrupt. Underwater, I can use Spear 3 and F1 and Harpoon 5 to interrupt. I haven’t tried it, but a Hammer build with sufficient condition damage might be interesting too.

The recent confusion nerf hurt Distracting Strikes, but the trait is still playable in a condition build (50% confusion damage is better than no confusion damage).

TLDR: Distracting Strikes is a niche trait that some builds, such as mine, actually take advantage of.

make it proc off of immobilizes. Then all weps can use it…except for mace…. sadly.

It could apply confusion every time you stuns are prevented by stability… but the problem of not having condition damage in stun builds will still remain.
Maybe increase the amount of stacks to compensate?

Better yet, why not change it from Confusion to Daze?

It stays in line with the whole Hammer/Mace theme of stuns and knockdowns, and actually gives us a way to mitigate damage on us by allowing us to lock out the enemies damage/escapes for a short duration.

Change it from confusion to blind/weakness/or 5 stacks of vulnerability on interrupt and it would be far better.

A much more generic version of the ability would have it cause confusion on burst.

Or

Confusion on stun/daze/knockdown/knock back, instead of just interrupt. This would give rise to a condition/cc build for warriors. Number of confusion stacks would have to be dropped for balance of course.

The second doesn’t really help the fact that none of our cc weapons are condition weapons though

Spifnar.4712:

Confusion on stun/daze/knockdown/knock back, instead of just interrupt. This would give rise to a condition/cc build for warriors. Number of confusion stacks would have to be dropped for balance of course.

The second doesn’t really help the fact that none of our cc weapons are condition weapons though

Sword/Shield can be played around conditions and realy shines in therm of versatility, because you get acces to high duration bleeds.

Rifle can also be runned with condtion but you have to build around a Rampager set because without power, neither precision, riffle is pretty useless. Critical damage or Condition damage are just alternatives for more burst or sustained damage.

You can also play with a longbow and use physical utilities, kick does a good job at interupting foes and is on a short cooldown. You can also use Bullcharge and Stomp but those have very long CD and usualy don’t fit well in condition builds that already get gap closeners and root/snare skills.

But personnaly, I like the concept of confusion when interupting skills, because it forces you to play strategicaly with your CC(s) and rewards you for doing so. It also allows you to achieve a whole new skill level with your Warrior in SPvP because you automaticaly learn to interupt your foes healing skills and prevent them from stomping your allies down.

I think more traits should be like this one, rewarding you for using skills at their maximum potential to get an extra is for me the way to go.

Spifnar.4712:

Confusion on stun/daze/knockdown/knock back, instead of just interrupt. This would give rise to a condition/cc build for warriors. Number of confusion stacks would have to be dropped for balance of course.

The second doesn’t really help the fact that none of our cc weapons are condition weapons though

I’d like to see that happen. The “only on interrupt” stipulation is bogus now that confusion is dealing half the damage it used to.

I don’t think it would be overly powerful. I mean, you could unload 12 stacks of confusion on someone with bull charge, and hammer 4 / 5 / f1, but what are those stacks going to accomplish while they’re being stunlocked? By the time they can get up and fight back, half of the stacks will be timing out anyway.

Honestly it should be a 33% Chance to cause 4 seconds of confusion on critical hit. This change would make sword a lot more viable as a weapon.

When ppl will learn that sword inst a condition weapon..Anyways ty, everyone in wvw focus on my weak bleeds rathen than the real damage that comes from direct attacks.

Scoobaniec.9561:

When ppl will learn that sword inst a condition weapon..Anyways ty, everyone in wvw focus on my weak bleeds rathen than the real damage that comes from direct attacks.

Good lord… you just made my day! XD

Daecollo.9578:

Final Thrust (Sword’s ‘3’) should be an interrupt, IMO.

umm. no hammer auto attack should interupt at the end of the chain but the chain should be 4 long.

Epic.3950:

Daecollo.9578:

Final Thrust (Sword’s ‘3’) should be an interrupt, IMO.

umm. no hammer auto attack should interupt at the end of the chain but the chain should be 4 long.

Both would be terribly overpowered. Stop spouting nonsense.

Numot.3965:

Epic.3950:

Daecollo.9578:

Final Thrust (Sword’s ‘3’) should be an interrupt, IMO.

umm. no hammer auto attack should interupt at the end of the chain but the chain should be 4 long.

Both would be terribly overpowered. Stop spouting nonsense.

because a dodge on 3rd chain is balanced right? How terrible it would be for hammers to be able to remove defiant stacks or punish idiots who stand in your punishment distance for 2 whole seconds

Maybe a 10-20% chance of knockdown on the last hit of the auto-attack for hammers. I also like the idea of changing the confusion effect from distracting strikes into something like weakness, vulnerability, or blind.