Guild Wars 2

Before the concerns, I want to list this: Changing a condition-based auto attack to a power-based one in a weapon with a power-based damage dealer and a power-based burst skill is a GOOD THING. It’s the same problem that P/P thieves have. But it has to be done well.

So, the two concerns.

1) With the removal of the Condition based auto, now BOTH ranged weapons for the Warrior rely on Conditions. Wouldn’t it be advisable to also change Dual Shot (Warrior Longbow #1) to cause considerably less damage but to cause a bleed? This would synergize with the burn caused by Fan Of Fire (Warrior Longbow #2) and Combustive Shot (Warrior Longbow Burst) and the heavy bleed on Pin Down (Warrior Longbow #5).

2) While the proposed 20% damage increase sounds tasty, let me look at the numbers right quick: Right now, my warrior with 1 566 power and 828 condition damage, lists Bleeding Shot as dealing 264 damage… followed by a 756 bleed. Changing that to just 317 damage is a 69% damage reduction. That’s massive. Now, yes, I realize this is in large part due to the brilliant synergy with Deep Cuts (Warrior Arms III, +50% bleed duration), but that trait is in the same tree as the Rifle buffing trait Crack Shot (Warrior Arms IV, 20% rifle and harpoon gun reduction + piercing). Again, that’s massive.

Now, there are mitigating factors – building heavier Power will make my Volley (Warrior Rifle #3) and Kill Shot (Warrior Rifle Burst) hit harder, and the extra adrenaline on Vulnerable targets will let me Kill Shot more often (painfully slow as it is to do), and that’s before crits, but I just want to point out that every crit, currently, means a 33% chance for a 336 damage bleed from Precise Strikes (Warrior Arms Adept Minor) and a 60% chance for another 5s (actually 7.5s) bleed from the Sigil of Earth. We’re talking about a severe damage decrease here, and I think it might hit far too hard.

So there. Two concerns of mine.

Im really unhappy about this nerf. Condition warrior now has no long-ranged weapon. and I don’t care what anyone says, the Longbow is not a condition weapon, just because it gets like, a 1 second burn that can hardly be boosted using sigils+runes.

I supposed all I can do is just get a rifle, give it Sigil of Earth and Precise Strikes trait, then use Volley, and hope for random bleed procs during long-ranged combat.

i’m glad that they decided to look at the rifle. the auto attack is terrible and needed to be changed for a long time.

i don’t think this change is going to change much to see it used more often though. the problem with the rifle has never been it’s auto attack. the weapon seems to actively fight against synergy with the warrior. no weapon sets really set up the rifle to work better. to get good trait synergy you have to spread your trait points too thin. the trait for the rifle should have been in tactics instead of arms. we don’t really have any active utilities that work well with the rifle.

it’s nice that the auto attack will help build adrenaline faster, that’s always been a huge problem with the rifle. but i don’t think it will be enough to let it see play. (oh well, every profession seems to have a kitten weapon it seems)

The problem with the change is the completely underwhelming damage boost. The rifle needs a solid auto-attack to deal steady DPS between bursts, yet this auto-attack will be among the weakest in the entire game. The rifle simply does not have any advantages to make up for that with two hard hitting attacks that can be easily dodged.

186 Base power with a .4 modifier is incredibly weak. I don’t like to compair skills between classes in a vacuum, but just looking at thief shortbow 1 or engineer rifle 1 quickly shows how weak this attack really is. Honestly, a 40% damage boost would be more like it.

Also, to the people crying about the loss of a ranged condition weapon, what? Seriously, you were using rifle to stack bleeds? Who is letting you do this to them?

Longbow works very well on condition builds. Every longbow skill is useful for both power and condi.

Not that i use Rifle….

But yeah your AA will do less damage AND you miss:
+10% dmg on bleeding target

This traits was good for rifle..

nicknamenick.2437:

But yeah your AA will do less damage AND you miss:
+10% dmg on bleeding target

You still have bleeds from Precise Strikes and other players.

nicknamenick.2437:

Not that i use Rifle….

But yeah your AA will do less damage AND you miss:
+10% dmg on bleeding target

This traits was good for rifle..

Only if you went the required 25 into discipline. Which would mean that you would lose quite a few points that could be invested in other trait lines

Longbow has always been a better option for Condition builds than Rifle anyways. Rifle gives you a single attack that provides conditions, and then a bunch of Power skills that do nothing for conditions.

Longbow gives you a dual-projectile AA (allowing for more bleed stacks via Precise Strikes and/or Sigil of Earth), a lengthy immobilize/heavy bleed combo, and a heavy burn burst skill.

It works well as a Power weapon too due to Arcing Shot, etc. but it has always been far more suitable as a condition weapon than the Rifle ever has been. Soooo….sorry if you’re using them incorrectly. Rifle should’ve always been purely a power weapon. Glad they fixed it…I wonder if they’ll keep Cracked Shot in the Arms tree?

Brutal shot → Fierce shot = youll do more damage in 12 seconds than you would with old bleeds.

THEmeltor.7295:

Longbow has always been a better option for Condition builds than Rifle anyways. Rifle gives you a single attack that provides conditions, and then a bunch of Power skills that do nothing for conditions.

Longbow gives you a dual-projectile AA (allowing for more bleed stacks via Precise Strikes and/or Sigil of Earth), a lengthy immobilize/heavy bleed combo, and a heavy burn burst skill.

It works well as a Power weapon too due to Arcing Shot, etc. but it has always been far more suitable as a condition weapon than the Rifle ever has been. Soooo….sorry if you’re using them incorrectly. Rifle should’ve always been purely a power weapon. Glad they fixed it…I wonder if they’ll keep Cracked Shot in the Arms tree?

Actualy Rifle builds can be set around heavy condition damage too, I actualy was one of the first players using distracting strike (yes even when it sucked back then) and I worked my condition build around heavy bleeds and heavy confusion instead of heavy burning, moderate bleeds, and (low torment).

By switching from a Longbow to a Rifle and by replacing my off-hand sword with a shield my current build is able to generate up to 12 stacks of confusion and 25 stacks of bleeds.

While the build was very limited in PvE because of the condition cap, it did fairly well in structured PvP with a Rampager set of items. Some decent mobility, controls and utilities. And with the extra confusion with the Rifle butt, Kick and Shield bash it was able to retaliate against its foes even with very glassy oriented gear.

I am personnaly going to miss my old build, but it is probably best if Rifles become more power oriented in the nearest future.

vonBoomslang.8296:

my warrior with 1 566 power and 828 condition damage, lists Bleeding Shot as dealing 264 damage… followed by a 756 bleed. Changing that to just 317 damage is a 69% damage reduction

if your using rifle with condition damage your doing it wrong.

Argon.1563:

Im really unhappy about this nerf. Condition warrior now has no long-ranged weapon. and I don’t care what anyone says, the Longbow is not a condition weapon, just because it gets like, a 1 second burn that can hardly be boosted

Longbow is definitely the long range condition weapon.
your speaking of fan of fire but you forget about combustive shot which your can almost keep a constant up time of burning ,
and lets not forget burning is the best condition in the game
and also pin down which gives 6 stacks of bleeding…
how is that not a condition weapon???

once again, if your using rifle as a condition weapon,
youre doing it wrong.

dday.9532:

vonBoomslang.8296:

my warrior with 1 566 power and 828 condition damage, lists Bleeding Shot as dealing 264 damage… followed by a 756 bleed. Changing that to just 317 damage is a 69% damage reduction

if your using rifle with condition damage your doing it wrong.

Argon.1563:

Im really unhappy about this nerf. Condition warrior now has no long-ranged weapon. and I don’t care what anyone says, the Longbow is not a condition weapon, just because it gets like, a 1 second burn that can hardly be boosted

Longbow is definitely the long range condition weapon.
your speaking of fan of fire but you forget about combustive shot which your can almost keep a constant up time of burning ,
and lets not forget burning is the best condition in the game
and also pin down which gives 6 stacks of bleeding…
how is that not a condition weapon???

once again, if your using rifle as a condition weapon,
youre doing it wrong.

I think you underestimate the power of the conditions on the Rifle, like I explained above my build consist in high intensity and duration of bleeds with the Rifle and relatively high confusion uptime. But I will agree with you going full condition on a Rifle build is not good, you need that extra power and precision from Rampager to make it work.

You can actualy get better sustained damage with a Rampager Rifle build compared to a Berserker Rifle build because when you build it right you can keep that high intensity of bleeds on the target while at all time while dishing some ok damage with your physical damage skills.

Yes, you might not have the burst of a Berserker build, but the sustain is there, and even superior to that Berserker rifle build, when it isn’t borked by the ridiculous condition cap in team fights.

Also the Longbow isn’t a condition weapon, it has always been a support weapon wich was build around buffing team with might and deal AoE damage. The only reason people use the bow for condition builds comes from the fact it grants you the Burning condition wich stacks on top of your bleeds and 1 fire and forget skill with a long lingering bleed that helps Sword/Sword to maintain 25 bleeds while burning the target and support your character with the firefields.

Longbow alone is a horrible condition weapon, the rifle can be build around some condition damage but is much more reliant to power and precision to actualy make it work.

THEmeltor.7295:

Longbow has always been a better option for Condition builds than Rifle anyways. Rifle gives you a single attack that provides conditions, and then a bunch of Power skills that do nothing for conditions.

This is exactly why I think the bow should cause bleeds with the auto.

Cygnus.6903:

186 Base power with a .4 modifier is incredibly weak. I don’t like to compair skills between classes in a vacuum, but just looking at thief shortbow 1 or engineer rifle 1 quickly shows how weak this attack really is. Honestly, a 40% damage boost would be more like it.

Seeing as that’s a near 70% damage reduction…

I’d start around the +80% – +100% mark and tune from there.

Argon.1563:

Im really unhappy about this nerf. Condition warrior now has no long-ranged weapon. and I don’t care what anyone says, the Longbow is not a condition weapon, just because it gets like, a 1 second burn that can hardly be boosted using sigils+runes.

I supposed all I can do is just get a rifle, give it Sigil of Earth and Precise Strikes trait, then use Volley, and hope for random bleed procs during long-ranged combat.

pindowns good too and combustion shot + arching arrow gives free might to you and allies always handy.

the bigger issue is…. imaple is getting beaten and batter with the nerf bat.

i play a condi warrior in spvp most of the time, let’s face it impale is probably the strongest skill in the entire s/s – lb setup.

it hurts REAL bad, it has a really long duration, reasonable cooldown and it’s easy-ish to land. not only that but it’s a difficult skill to cleanse because it delivers over a few seconds so if you want to fully recover from it you have to wait for it to peak (= you already ate a few seconds of 1-4 torment stacks). it’s also hilarious that most thieves have 0 ways to cleanse it.

reducing the torment duration by 33% is not going to make it any less useful.

of all the nerf that are coming this is one of the few that made me go “yeah that’s fair”.

vonBoomslang.8296:

1) With the removal of the Condition based auto, now BOTH ranged weapons for the Warrior rely on Conditions. Wouldn’t it be advisable to also change Dual Shot (Warrior Longbow #1) to cause considerably less damage but to cause a bleed? This would synergize with the burn caused by Fan Of Fire (Warrior Longbow #2) and Combustive Shot (Warrior Longbow Burst) and the heavy bleed on Pin Down (Warrior Longbow #5).

In a normal rotation you will spend most of your time on the rifle using volley and brutal shot. These do not apply bleeding.

The #5 skill on longbow alone, applies roughly 40% of the bleeding that spamming rifle auto-attack would.

The longbow is great for bleeding due to it’s high attack rate (auto-attack has 2 hits), giving it a very strong synergy with precise strikes and sigil of earth.

The changes will make the rifle more useful for group PvE. The typical scenario is a dungeon with multiple berserker warriors applying unwanted bleed stacks to bosses. It makes condition builds more viable.

vonBoomslang.8296:

2) While the proposed 20% damage increase sounds tasty, let me look at the numbers right quick: Right now, my warrior with 1 566 power and 828 condition damage, lists Bleeding Shot as dealing 264 damage… followed by a 756 bleed. Changing that to just 317 damage is a 69% damage reduction. That’s massive. Now, yes, I realize this is in large part due to the brilliant synergy with Deep Cuts (Warrior Arms III, +50% bleed duration), but that trait is in the same tree as the Rifle buffing trait Crack Shot (Warrior Arms IV, 20% rifle and harpoon gun reduction + piercing). Again, that’s massive.

With rifle you would typically roll with a berserker build (at least after the changes), whereas you have a mixed build. When you combine higher power, crit chance, crit damage, vulnerability, +% dmg modifiers, possible condition removal, and capping of bleed stacks, the changes won’t seem so bad.

Naturally this will be a damage decrease for condition or mixed builds, but for direct-damage builds it won’t change much, and it will be more useful in group settings due to no maxing out bleed stacks as easily.

Yeah, I made a Rampager rifle and the total loss of Bleeding does cut into my overall damage output.

If any devs are reading this, what about moving the Bleeding from the auto-attack to Volley? With the changes to Fierce Shot, Volley becomes kind of redundant as our main heavy hitter skill on Rifle.

They have serious problems balancing ranged weapons in this game, largely because they insist on them having weak autoattacks, which doesn’t work because of how much it guts sustained DPS. It’s a problem on numerous weapons in the game – and actually Warrior’s Rifle was better with the bleed.

Make no mistake, this was a nerf, not a buff, and a nonsensical one, too – now the AA is redundant with both Volley and Kill Shot. Now both Longbow and Rifle have god-awful autoattacks that make them nigh unusable outside of very brief ranged skirmishes.

They need to look at retuning ranged weapons across the board – most ranged options simply offer too little in the way of sustained DPS, making them highly utilitarian and/or too situational.

As an aside – Fierce Shot is now identical to Engi’s Hip Shot except the latter fires faster, does about 20% more damage, and has innate piercing. Is that intended, I wonder?

Einlanzer.1627:

As an aside – Fierce Shot is now identical to Engi’s Hip Shot except the latter fires faster, does about 20% more damage, and has innate piercing. Is that intended, I wonder?

I already made this comparison before the patch. Engineer’s rifle is better in every way then a warriors, except for the base range.

It’s too bad, really. I really like the ‘feel’ of rifle in this game.

Cygnus.6903:

Einlanzer.1627:

As an aside – Fierce Shot is now identical to Engi’s Hip Shot except the latter fires faster, does about 20% more damage, and has innate piercing. Is that intended, I wonder?

I already made this comparison before the patch. Engineer’s rifle is better in every way then a warriors, except for the base range.

It’s too bad, really. I really like the ‘feel’ of rifle in this game.

It could be that it’s intentional, since warriors are more of a melee class (and can switch weapons) and engis are more of a ranged class (and cannot) – similar to the LB buffs Rangers got).

I’m just not sure how I feel about it. There’s not a lot of purpose to making a weapon so situational that it very rarely has opportunities to shine.