(edited by Daniel Warren.4968)
Sword Flurry Discussion / Improvement
Honestly I like Flurry how it is now. And for clarification 8 stacks of bleed are only for 1 bar of adrenaline, with 3 bars you get 12 hits and 12 stacks of 2sec bleed (3s if traited) (plus maybe additional bleeds from critical hits).
I’d assume the reason the bleeds are spread out are for balance reasons in PvP/WvW (and to a much lesser extent PvE). If they were all tied onto the last hit we would “never” land it, seeing how people will stun break and dodge out, or some NPCs will stun/knockdown. If they were all tied to the first hit then it would be the exact opposite, and we’d always land all of our bleeds. And if anyone bothered to cleanse they wouldn’t get much out of it (considering the very short bleed duration).
It’d also allow us to chain it to something stronger, but still get maximum damage. Flurry (12 stacks of instant bleed and 4s immobilize) —> switch to a different weapon set mid attack and use some high damage attack or another burst skill while they are still immobilized (I’m thinking either 100blades or a different burst skill).
Also thematically I think it ties into the way the skill works now. Each auto attack gives 1 bleed (besides the cripple) just like each swing of flurry gives 1 stack of bleed. Also mechanic wise, currently 1h sword and bow are the only surefire ways to use cleansing ire. Technically it’d still work with the sword even if all the bleed was on the first swing (but then the blind would still negate almost all of the damage by making you miss on the first hit spike). Plus there have been times when I’d hit my main target with Flurry, only to have other targets walk into the path mid skill. They wouldn’t be immobilized, but they would take damage and get bleed stacks. Another perk of leaving it the way it is. I think the fact that the damage is spread out gives for a more consistent dps.
I agree, apply the bleeds instantly and let the immobilize go on like normal. It’s a very good skill and can be used with Guardians greatsword skill to drag all enemies in and then BAM flurry. But yeah i think flurry has pretty weak damage.
So why not instantly apply 8 stacks for Flurry?
Because Flurry can apply 8/10/12 stacks depending on how much Adrenaline you have. Also because the current multihit animation lets you regenerate Adrenaline and generate extra bleeds with Sigil of Earth and Precise Strikes. For example, whenever I flurry with my 85%+ crit sword at max adrenaline, I usually end up with about 17 bleeds on my foe. And that’s very important, because:
- 4 seconds of 12 stacks of bleeds for 48 ticks of bleeding
- 10 seconds of 1 stack of bleed for 10 ticks of bleeding
- 6 seconds of 4 stacks of bleeding (on average) for 24 ticks of bleeding
- total ticks of bleeding: 82
So to me, the bleeds themselves count for 58% of the damage it does, with everything else coming from the way I customized my character.
it has absolutely terrible damage even if you spec FULL condition damage and duration. Let’s say you land 18 stacks (froms crits + sigil of earth + base 12) of 4s (100% bleed duration) bleeds that do ~131 damage
That’s 9.4k damage
I really shouldn’t have you tell you how much damage a full berserker Eviscerate hits for. But it’s like 20k.
Personally to improve it I’d increase the direct damage dealt by Flurry by maybe 250%. That:
1) reinforces sword as the hybrid weapon they wanted it to be
2) keeps flurry as the “burst damage” they wanted it to be with short, high intensity bleeds
3) increases it’s damage without increasing the bleed stacks or bleed duration so you don’t completely screw over your friends’ condition damage whenever you flurry wiping out all bleed stacks after 4s
4) makes it not entirely useless to a power build using sword, and might actually promote following through with the entire flurry rather than immediately cancelling it for the immob
I just like it for the instant immobolize.
Please leave that lone.
it has absolutely terrible damage even if you spec FULL condition damage and duration. Let’s say you land 18 stacks (froms crits + sigil of earth + base 12) of 4s (100% bleed duration) bleeds that do ~131 damage
That’s 9.4k damage
I really shouldn’t have you tell you how much damage a full berserker Eviscerate hits for. But it’s like 20k.
Well that’s not a fault of the skill itself, that’s a fault of the difference between Direct Damage and Condition Damage.
FYI, with 1500 condition damage, Flurry would need to apply 25 stacks for 7s to go over 20,000 damage. And by the way, that would also be 20,000 damage in PvP against any foe.
Personally to improve it I’d increase the direct damage dealt by Flurry by maybe 250%. That:
1) reinforces sword as the hybrid weapon they wanted it to be
2) keeps flurry as the “burst damage” they wanted it to be with short, high intensity bleeds
3) increases it’s damage without increasing the bleed stacks or bleed duration so you don’t completely screw over your friends’ condition damage whenever you flurry wiping out all bleed stacks after 4s
4) makes it not entirely useless to a power build using sword, and might actually promote following through with the entire flurry rather than immediately cancelling it for the immob
- Currently, Flurry has a coefficient of 1.05. In comparison, Eviscerate at full adrenaline has 3.0. Increase it by 250% would mean it would be 3.675, which would mean Flurry would be 100% superior to Eviscerate. Which is ridiculous. Heck, considering that Eviscerate has a 2.0 coefficient with 1 stage of Adrenaline, I think if you’re increasing Flurry, it should be like 1.95 at most.
- Which it already is?
- And what about solo situations? It’s not exactly hard to take Burst Mastery so that you can have 50%+ uptime on Flurry’s 12 stacks of bleed.
- Sword is already very useful to a power build with Final Thrust having Eviscerate’s damage and Sword having about the best mobility out of all of Warrior weapons
(edited by Olba.5376)
I actually like Flurry, the only problem I have is I find myself activating it alot right as the enemy goes out of my reach, so I’m stood there for a second or two slashing at thin air doing absolutely no good.
I wish you were able to move while using it, though it would also need a new animation as the one I can imagine in my head looks awful.
it has absolutely terrible damage even if you spec FULL condition damage and duration. Let’s say you land 18 stacks (froms crits + sigil of earth + base 12) of 4s (100% bleed duration) bleeds that do ~131 damage
That’s 9.4k damage
I really shouldn’t have you tell you how much damage a full berserker Eviscerate hits for. But it’s like 20k.
Well that’s not a fault of the skill itself, that’s a fault of the difference between Direct Damage and Condition Damage.
FYI, with 1500 condition damage, Flurry would need to apply 25 stacks for 7s to go over 20,000 damage. And by the way, that would also be 20,000 damage in PvP against any foe.
Agreed, I never realized how much extra damage you can do (and I mean that in a bad way). I crafted a set of zerker gear to help with the trials, and from my knights gear (0/30/30/0/10) to zerker (30/10/0/0/30) my sword auto attack went from ~400-450 on a crit to 1.2k on a crit. It’s a problem that power, crit dam, and precision all play off each other, while condi dam is left by itself (and other reasons I’m sure). While it was scary to feel so squishy, I didn’t feel three times as squishy in zerker gear compared to knights, if that means that toughness needs a boost (to counter zerkers) or power needs a nerf, I don’t know. Not to mention the 25 condition limit stack not being character specific for champs/world bosses, and that condi builds can’t hurt structures/items (If I can make things bleed that don’t have blood, why can’t I make a tent bleed).
The sad thing is, with the 2min time limit (for the new dome matches), I did have to switch to wearing un-runed zerker gear just to be able to do enough damage for a fight or two. That time limit encourages wearing zerker gear.
I actually like Flurry, the only problem I have is I find myself activating it alot right as the enemy goes out of my reach, so I’m stood there for a second or two slashing at thin air doing absolutely no good.
I wish you were able to move while using it, though it would also need a new animation as the one I can imagine in my head looks awful.
You can dodge roll to cancel the attack (I think changing weapons also works, but can’t log in to check).
Honestly I like Flurry how it is now. And for clarification 8 stacks of bleed are only for 1 bar of adrenaline, with 3 bars you get 12 hits and 12 stacks of 2sec bleed (3s if traited) (plus maybe additional bleeds from critical hits).
All the tooltips suggest the bleed rate is a flat amount regardless of adren, only immobilize increases. This wouldnt be the first time the tooltip was wrong, though. Disregard that, tooltip was correct on last test.
Untraited, I flurried a mob with full bars and got 2sec bleeds, but the stack number never climbed past 8. Probably due to the short duration.
I’d assume the reason the bleeds are spread out are for balance reasons in PvP/WvW (and to a much lesser extent PvE). If they were all tied onto the last hit we would “never” land it, seeing how people will stun break and dodge out, or some NPCs will stun/knockdown. If they were all tied to the first hit then it would be the exact opposite, and we’d always land all of our bleeds. And if anyone bothered to cleanse they wouldn’t get much out of it (considering the very short bleed duration).
See, I like the idea of bleed stacks on opening hit, but it should also be tied to the immobilize if that were the case. I dont actually see a hit for the immobilize. And with all the condition cleansing available you dont usually land those extra hits, but would make it extra dangerous as a burst skill if they can’t excape.
It’d also allow us to chain it to something stronger, but still get maximum damage. Flurry (12 stacks of instant bleed and 4s immobilize) —> switch to a different weapon set mid attack and use some high damage attack or another burst skill while they are still immobilized (I’m thinking either 100blades or a different burst skill).
And in this case, even if we cant, the burst damage does its full job for condition application.
Also thematically I think it ties into the way the skill works now. Each auto attack gives 1 bleed (besides the cripple) just like each swing of flurry gives 1 stack of bleed. Also mechanic wise, currently 1h sword and bow are the only surefire ways to use cleansing ire. Technically it’d still work with the sword even if all the bleed was on the first swing (but then the blind would still negate almost all of the damage by making you miss on the first hit spike). Plus there have been times when I’d hit my main target with Flurry, only to have other targets walk into the path mid skill. They wouldn’t be immobilized, but they would take damage and get bleed stacks. Another perk of leaving it the way it is. I think the fact that the damage is spread out gives for a more consistent dps.
If we let it stay, I think the duration of the applied bleeds should be increased. 50% seems too big a bump, though. Maybe 25? I dont know how partial seconds count for bleeding, if they count at all.
(edited by Daniel Warren.4968)
Personally to improve it I’d increase the direct damage dealt by Flurry by maybe 250%. That:
1) reinforces sword as the hybrid weapon they wanted it to be
2) keeps flurry as the “burst damage” they wanted it to be with short, high intensity bleeds
3) increases it’s damage without increasing the bleed stacks or bleed duration so you don’t completely screw over your friends’ condition damage whenever you flurry wiping out all bleed stacks after 4s
4) makes it not entirely useless to a power build using sword, and might actually promote following through with the entire flurry rather than immediately cancelling it for the immob
- Currently, Flurry has a coefficient of 1.05. In comparison, Eviscerate at full adrenaline has 3.0. Increase it by 250% would mean it would be 3.675, which would mean Flurry would be 100% superior to Eviscerate. Which is ridiculous. Heck, considering that Eviscerate has a 2.0 coefficient with 1 stage of Adrenaline, I think if you’re increasing Flurry, it should be like 1.95 at most.
- Which it already is?
- And what about solo situations? It’s not exactly hard to take Burst Mastery so that you can have 50%+ uptime on Flurry’s 12 stacks of bleed.
- Sword is already very useful to a power build with Final Thrust having Eviscerate’s damage and Sword having about the best mobility out of all of Warrior weapons
Don’t get me wrong, I love sword with all my heart but Flurry is kind of objectively terrible, damage wise, right now. It gets a very utilitarian 4s immob at max adren, but that’s not going to do you much good outside of PvP.
1) I wasn’t being particularly literal about the damage increase percentage, I was just saying something along the lines of “make flurry’s base damage not completely terrible and equivalent to ~140% of an autoattack because it takes ~3s to cast during which I could have autoattacked 3 times getting much more base damage and 16% of the bleed I would have landed with Flurry”.
2) I said “reinforce”. With my change now Flurry does both moderate base damage and moderate bleed damage.
3) I honestly don’t consider solo situations important enough when it comes to balancing skills. The main bulk of content is dungeon spelunking with 4 other people, champion killing with multitudes of other people, and PvP.
4) I didn’t say the other skills weren’t useful. I was saying it’d make flurry useful.
I actually like Flurry, the only problem I have is I find myself activating it alot right as the enemy goes out of my reach, so I’m stood there for a second or two slashing at thin air doing absolutely no good.
I wish you were able to move while using it, though it would also need a new animation as the one I can imagine in my head looks awful.
You can dodge roll to cancel the attack (I think changing weapons also works, but can’t log in to check).
I go over proper attack canceling in that video.
Hits damage needs be fixed.
Sword #1 deals more dmg that all Flurry hits toguether.
I think each individual hit need deal more dmg, or sword will be viable only in condition builds.
Theres 3 things that are bad in it:
-selfroot without any defensive option to make up for that (like blurred frenzy)
- direct damage just sux hard, its even worse than axe #5.
- long casttime
Untraited, I flurried a mob with full bars and got 2sec bleeds, but the stack number never climbed past 8. Probably due to the short duration.
Yeah that’s most likely the case. I’ve never timed the animation but I think it’s around 3.5 to 4s because the immobilize is still on after flurry ends.
See, I like the idea of bleed stacks on opening hit, but it should also be tied to the immobilize if that were the case. I dont actually see a hit for the immobilize. And with all the condition cleansing available you dont usually land those extra hits, but would make it extra dangerous as a burst skill if they can’t excape.
There are two problems I have with this. 1) It makes the burst problem that we have against blind even more pronounced (and really screws over condition builds that rely on the static bleed stack), it makes blind remove almost all damage from flurry. And I realize in PvP that usually someone throws a stun breaker and then gets out of range, but to me that’s been part of the meta considering we have access to lots of other CC, and flurry will recharge faster than their stun breaker.
And in this case, even if we cant, the burst damage does its full job for condition application.
But in 1 hit in ~0.5sec (2sec for the bleed damage to set in) instead of the ~3-4sec it takes now. The sword isn’t designed to be a burst weapon, we already have the riffle and the axe for that.
If we let it stay, I think the duration of the applied bleeds should be increased. 50% seems too big a bump, though. Maybe 25? I dont know how partial seconds count for bleeding, if they count at all.
If I recall, a long ways back I remember reading on the forums (and also somewhat supported by what the wiki says about bleeds) “one pulse of damage per second” so any .X sec durations have no actual effect on damage (I think).
Also there’s one other thing to take into consideration. The sword (flurry included) can hit, immobilize, and bleed more than 1 target at a time. I’ve used that countless times in fractals (and dungeons) and also it’s helpful in PvE and PvP as well. To make 2-3 people in PvP blow their stun breakers for 1 of my burst moves seems like a good team compromise even if they avoided most of my damage, and if they don’t move, everyone gets bleeds. Heck I usually rely on that to have max adrenaline again before flurry even finishes. Look at our other (land) burst skills, to my knowledge only the hammer, the bow, and the 1h sword can hit more than 1 target at a time. All three being of a utility instead of damage type. Hammer for knockdown, bow for burn and area control, and sword for bleed and immobilize.
Though I just had an idea that’s somewhere between your idea and where it is now. Don’t know how much I like the idea myself, but just throwing it out there. Leave the immobilize duration as is, but as you go up in adrenaline have the intensity of bleeds go up but the duration go down. (1 bleed per hit at lvl 1 at a 4sec duration, 2 bleed per hit at lvl 2 at a 3sec duration, 3 bleed per hit at a 2sec duration), not those exact numbers mind you, rework the number of bleeds match to have a similar dps as they do now, but at higher adrenaline levels we’d be rewarded with more of a bleed spike. Major downsides are, 1) it’s easy to get max adrenaline, so really the lower levels would be almost pointless, 2) you can’t go below a 2sec duration for bleeds otherwise, the “bleeds last 50% longer trait” is completely pointless (unless that trait was reworked to add some integer lvl bleed to flurry but 50% to other sources, but I’d assume that’s outside of code’s ability) .