Guild Wars 2

I am no expert on game balance, but it’s quite painful to see how long the cooldowns are for their effects.

Thus, keeping in the design of the Warrior as a more brute-force type class, what if instead they had no cooldown (well, 1-2 seconds to avoid spamming it), but were toggles. While active, they would drain Adrenaline (offensive oriented) or Endurance (defensive oriented).

Example:

Balanced Stance consumes Endurance, but grants Stability and Protection while active. However, you are Crippled at the same time.

Berserker’s Stance consumes Adrenaline to grant you Quickness and Retaliation while active. However, you take boosted damage as per Frenzy.

Frenzy: Remove.

Thoughts/Suggestions?

I like the idea, but burst abilities are too important for some weapons to be draining it on stances. Perhaps if it took from another source, but I use a hammer and I need my adrenaline for Earthquake for several reasons.

I’ve always been disappointed with the cooldown on Frenzy, especially when compared to the first game. The skill has balance baked in, what with taking double damage while it’s active, so the long cooldown seems arbitrary and actively dissuades me from ever taking the skill. Heck, sigils of rage proc more and don’t have the double damage downside.

It was one of the things that first made me realise that a lot of the skills in GW2 are poor relations to those in the first game, stinking of traditional MMO punitive cooldowns with subdued effects in order to stretch out encounter length.

I love this idea, cause it would make a build oriented on having to build adrenaline, and berserkers might in the strength tree could actually be of use o.o, Not to mention how many ways we can to get adrenaline. It would mean less traits prioritizing and more focus on using stances at different points in a fight. Of course anet would tweek it for balances where they see it could work, imagine Endure pain/stability/berserk stance combine with the traits that give adrenaline for getting hit/or critical hits give extra adrenaline.

Mungrul.9358:

I’ve always been disappointed with the cooldown on Frenzy, especially when compared to the first game. The skill has balance baked in, what with taking double damage while it’s active, so the long cooldown seems arbitrary and actively dissuades me from ever taking the skill. Heck, sigils of rage proc more and don’t have the double damage downside.

It was one of the things that first made me realise that a lot of the skills in GW2 are poor relations to those in the first game, stinking of traditional MMO punitive cooldowns with subdued effects in order to stretch out encounter length.

I have a feeling they got that Frenzy downside affect idea from another MMO like WoW.

Warriors from that game when you’re Fury Warrior or Arms you spec into a skill called Death Wish which increases your damage, but also taken damage increases as well.

Their other move Recklessness performed the same way except it only increases your critical% by 50%, but doubles your taken damage more than Death Wish

If both Death Wish and Recklessness are applied the damage taken a warrior receives is between 30%-35%. It’s been awhile, but it seems GW2 Frenzy still have beaten both WoW skills taken damage done by another 15%.

Frenzy should work another way like similar to a thief Haste ability. You lose all your endurance when using Frenzy. In a sense you’re exerting a lot of energy out swinging weapons fast.

The way how Frenzy works now is like a Please Hit Me sign over your head when using Frenzy because the warrior goes down quick if you catch them off guard from their 100blades combo or any other weapon they use without having their babysitter skill Endure Pain to back them up from taking physical damage.

Erm, no; Frenzy in the first game was functionally identical to how it is now, except it could be kept up permanently as the stance lasted 8 seconds yet the cooldown was 4 seconds. So by the time the stance ran out, you could immediately activate it again.
They didn’t get Frenzy in GW2 from WoW; they already had it.

From what I understand looking at the original class descriptions on gw2.com, this was how stances were originally intended – although it said “Energy” so I assume it was adrenaline it drained to stay active (obviously not Berserker’s Stance).

I would much prefer it in that manner as it gives a bit more depth to the class.

A possible though was having them as the F2-4 somewhat like the engineer toolbelt… tied to your utility, one being active like now and the other (“tool” or utility) being either toggle or just a passive. I’m not sure if that would work, probably a bit too close to Engineer’s that there would be objections/issues.

Stances do seem like something that could be part of a profession mechanic but they would have to be weaker due to their no longer taking a utility slot. I know people have suggested having an F2-4 as shouts or banners built into the class (weaker versions) so further alternative is to have them as not a toggle but that “one stance is always active” without the adrenaline drain part, and F2-4 switch which one is active – of course being far weaker than existing stances (perma quickness would be a bit OP… but say the Endure Pain passive one would be % damage reduction).

There are many different ways we could adjust stances, either as profession mechanic or just by the turning them into a toggle. They would definitely need adjusting if they were changed in functionality though. Personally I’d like them changing just so we had more depth to the class :P

Mungrul.9358:

Erm, no; Frenzy in the first game was functionally identical to how it is now, except it could be kept up permanently as the stance lasted 8 seconds yet the cooldown was 4 seconds. So by the time the stance ran out, you could immediately activate it again.
They didn’t get Frenzy in GW2 from WoW; they already had it.

I know they did not get it from WoW, but it doesn’t mean they weren’t exposed to the two WoW skills I mention which made Frenzy perform that way.

Interesting ideas. I primarily play WvW and find stances to be pretty useless in big fights.

Sure. Reduce Balanced Stance cool down to 25-30 seconds. I mean if guards can have stability every 24 seconds why can’t Warriors? Also reduce Endure Pain’s cool down by half because again, why should Mesmers be able to go invulnerable every 45 seconds with little effort?

The stances right now are okay, just that their cool down times are bad.

Schwahrheit.4203:

why should Mesmers be able to go invulnerable every 45 seconds with little effort?

You mean every 10(8 traited) seconds right? Blurred Frenzy! ;D

How about if stances were to drain 1 bar of adrenaline as their source of “energy”?
I really feel that adrenaline isn’t really being used enough and this will somewhat bring back some GW1 adrenaline mechanics.
These stances could have no recharge time or a very shortened recharge time as the ability to use the stances is dependent on constant combat.

Schwahrheit.4203:

The stances right now are okay, just that their cool down times are bad.

I agree. A little lowering of the cooldown times might make them actually worth using.

As is, you might as well use shouts.

I think they should be toggle-abilitys tbh.

With pros/cons built in. Maybe make it 2 portions: an active, temp buff you get for toggling to that stance (lets say, switching to balance stance gives you 6 sec of stability), and while maintaining that stance, you take 25% less damage, but can’t crit or something (feels like a bunkerish stance you could toggle into).

Could do something similar with zerker stance, except flip it and make it an “aggressive stance”. Meh, whatever. I don’t think anet knows what to do with this class because warrior is a strong pub-stomping class, but it gets progressively worse the better your opponents are. Its like old tyndamere in LoL really.

I would like to see stances totally reworked as well. Stances should be toggles with pros and cons. It’s simple as that. For now Frenzy is the only stance that comes a bit close to this, but it has a short duration instead of being perma-active until turned off. The trait could be easily changed from increased stance duration to reduced cooldown after stance deactivation.

Some classes having 4 f mechanics while others have 1 seems to be the root of the issue here.

i think stance need totally rework ! why i have to spent a slot for a stance? i only like stance when they are triggered by my traits but it’s really useless to take them in your slots.

I wouldn’t mind the slot since engies also need to have their kits in the utility slot. I simply want stances to be stances, i.e. toggles with pros and cons that can be turned on and off at will, maybe with a little cooldown after being turned off. Currently they aren’t any different from shouts. Frenzy is somewhat unique but hardly worth the 4s duration (even if traited) and the 60s cooldown in PvE.

I also agree frenzy needs a rework because other professions have better ways to counteract the penalties from their respective quickness utilities. For example, the thief has access to signet of agility (short 30 second cd) to partially counteract the endurance lost from using haste. Also, the ranger’s inability to heal while using Quickening Zephyr is not a strong penalty as ranger’s mainly deal ranged damage from a SAFE distance meaning that they are less likely to take damage to even require healing.

On the other hand, warriors only have access to endure pain (a long 90 second cd) to negate damage. Furthermore, warrior dps mainly comes from melee weapons so there is a higher chance of receiving that +50% increased damage.

In my opinion frenzy should be changed to this:

Consume all 3 bars of adrenaline to gain quickness for 4 seconds.

this would make sense for the warrior theme because a warrior under frenzy would trade off power for speed (lose berserker’s power if traited in strength line), not care for own safety (lose adrenal health in defense line) and lose concentration (lose heightened focus in the discipline tree).

However this would also grant more synergy to other warrior traits such as Furious, Embrace the Pain, etc as warriors can quickly regain their adrenaline while under quickness.

Yeah i like your rework of stance (toggle and adrenaline consume) , but now the actuals stances don’t give me any reason to use them in my slots. Hope in devs reworking.