Guild Wars 2

Just wanted to add my two cents as a greatsword hammer warrior:

Since we’re stuck with having three full traitlines, and with the way traits were divided in the livestream, it is not really “recommended” as a hammer build user to get Leg specialist (as you would have to go full out in Tactics instead of just the start), which is a must have trait in order to land earthshaker hammer stun-gap closer. The stun-leap is slow and easy to dodge from range, and without being able to user hammer 3# snare to apply root, this will have a significant impact as your target will most likely be out of range for hammer 4# and 5# follow up chains.

Another thing that had a negative impact on QoL hammer build is having the hammer reduction skills trait and burst mastery in the same tier trait, not being able to use both, as it helped with the upkeep of adrenaline and to stay on target.

Maybe I missed it or did they remove the stance trait?

Who care about hammer.. Physical hype incoming along with i win buttom – rampage with +150% damage lol. Ofc these numbers are subject to change.

Shout+banner regens? Yes please, make me even moar tanky..

War is back in the game. Sadly rifle will become obsolete as they simply dont care anymore. I want refund for my predator.

Did anyone see where Fast Hands went?

Wanze.8410:

Maybe I missed it or did they remove the stance trait?

Which trait? Sure Footed? Wasn’t addressed however there was a version of Last Stand is still there and I think does more.

Trajan.4953:

Did anyone see where Fast Hands went?

Stayed as 2nd minor.

Trajan.4953:

Did anyone see where Fast Hands went?

Hasn’t moved.

One thing that sucks is that we won’t be able use shield mastery and dogged march because they’re in the same line, or whatever it’s called.

Comprehensive guide to winning every game mode:

1) Find a team of warriors.
2) Find a pack of stray cats and some very durable keyboards.
3) ???
4) Profit.

Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

nicknamenick.2437:

AND i am not sure about healing signet chance.. they are going to reduce the passive!

So now i HAVE to get signet mastery or something? because the active is still a TERRIBLE amount of healing.

Lower passive, higher when activated plus you can’t get conditioned for a duration of time.

Scooba, do you even have any clue what you are saying?
Warrior will just be a boring-to-play, non-skillful class to play shoutbow on.
My proposed changes:

-make fast hands baseline ( EVERY warrior uses it, like really, every one of them)
- Dont put merci hammer and burst mastery in same trait…
- So many useless traits, which will just force you to pick one you dont even like
F.E.:
-Why would you put leg specialist the only possible pick in the discipline line if you play hambow. while it only even has 1 movement skill, and we cant properly use it because adrenaline managment problems.
-Death from above( in pvp ,this is just useless)
-restorative strenght( useless, and even if we use our healing signet, we’ll get resistance)
-sweet revenge ( are we traiting for downstate now? )

I am very dissapointed because i want to see the skillful meta of hambow coming back instead of this shoutbow-build whom everyone who plays on high lvl pvp is forced to play because hambow cant handle well enough anymore.

TLDR; Shoutbow should be nerfed. Hambow should be buffed instead of nerfed.

warriors are the same +10-20% damage, shoutheal slightly better, condi sword moderately better.

healing signet was “nerfed” by trading 10 heal/sec for resistance on use. (their tooltip said 362/s, and its 372/s now)

cocowoushi.7150:

Wanze.8410:

Maybe I missed it or did they remove the stance trait?

Which trait? Sure Footed? Wasn’t addressed however there was a version of Last Stand is still there and I think does more.

Yeah, that would be a big nerf to my build, as i run balanced stance, double endure pain and use defiant stance as healing skill.

I run a very tanky sentinel build in wvw, that focusses on high mobility and condi removal. If sure footed is really removed, that would be a mayor nerf to my build but as they mentioned, the 2 additional minor traits and the extra master and grandmaster trait will allow me to add either some more healing or damage to my build.
I will lose some boon duration as well but im not sure, how huge that will affect me.

Ash ketchum.2051:

Scooba, do you even have any clue what you are saying?
Warrior will just be a boring-to-play, non-skillful class to play shoutbow on.

Olny if youre going to run lol shoutbow. I go for physical gs+axe/shield day one when these changes get live. Overall there are many possibilites now how you build up so i dont see a reason to complain. Some builds will have to give up fast hands tho. Engi, thief and war are winners in this poi either way.

the warrior changes look for me just insane and a bit over the top tbh. Just a quick think about the old interrupt mace sword lb build with bruning on lb aa, weakness and 3 bleeds on dazes and 5 might + 4 confusion on interrupts…holy kitten
10k+ rampage hits enough said and the signet trait to finish guards and engis is awesome as well

what did the warrior ama say?

dulfy’s notes is complete yet.

I can’t believe you guys are finding reasons to complain. They buffed the kitten out of pretty much every aspect of our class. I’m hyped as hell. We got the 3rd best changes behind Thief and Guardian. Just be happy we’re not Elementalists or Necromancers.

Wanze.8410:

Maybe I missed it or did they remove the stance trait?

All the stance traits got combined (Last Stand, Cooldown Reduction, and Vigor on Stance). The new trait is a Major Master trait in the Defense line. They also said it looked too strong so they were probably going to remove the Vigor portion.

It all sounded like good news to me. My only gripe was leaving the 2 minor tactics traits in place that were pretty useless always except for being a res bot.

Also really disappointed that the 1st minor defense trait think skin received no love since its pretty bad.

kitten y Kshot War still looks great to me : D

ST AR DI – Rifle Sword/WH

ST = Restorative Strength – Body Blow – Berzerker’s Power
AR = Signit Mastery – Rending Strikes – Burst Precision
DI = Crack Shot – DoeT or Brawler’s Recovery – Burst Mastery

Good Times – STARDI

Donut.6914:

I can’t believe you guys are finding reasons to complain. They buffed the kitten out of pretty much every aspect of our class. I’m hyped as hell. We got the 3rd best changes behind Thief and Guardian. Just be happy we’re not Elementalists or Necromancers.

I don’t think anyone is complaining so far really. They told us during the livestream to give them feedback and it seems like that’s what going on here.

Ross Biddle.2367:

kitten y Kshot War still looks great to me : D

ST AR DI – Rifle Sword/WH

ST = Restorative Strength – Body Blow – Berzerker’s Power
AR = Signit Mastery – Rending Strikes – Burst Precision
DI = Crack Shot – DoeT or Brawler’s Recovery – Burst Mastery

Good Times – STARDI

The problem is, PvP Warriors are simply not viable without Cleansing Ire.

runeblade.7514:

Ross Biddle.2367:

kitten y Kshot War still looks great to me : D

ST AR DI – Rifle Sword/WH

ST = Restorative Strength – Body Blow – Berzerker’s Power
AR = Signit Mastery – Rending Strikes – Burst Precision
DI = Crack Shot – DoeT or Brawler’s Recovery – Burst Mastery

Good Times – STARDI

The problem is, PvP Warriors are simply not viable without Cleansing Ire.

If you’re talking Tornament play, fair call. Anything else, eh. I found myself playing Kshot war like a roaming dps thief/mes. That’s what the sw/wh are for, full mobility/disengage. If you don’t want to be dumped with conditions, don’t be there. That said, if you want to bunk on a point, take a better build :p

runeblade.7514:

Ross Biddle.2367:

kitten y Kshot War still looks great to me : D

ST AR DI – Rifle Sword/WH

ST = Restorative Strength – Body Blow – Berzerker’s Power
AR = Signit Mastery – Rending Strikes – Burst Precision
DI = Crack Shot – DoeT or Brawler’s Recovery – Burst Mastery

Good Times – STARDI

The problem is, PvP Warriors are simply not viable without Cleansing Ire.

Yea, sadly CI with LB is about the only thing that allows anything outside of shoutbow to even stand a chance against conditions and it doesn’t look like there’s any other viable option to handling conditions with these new traits…

Dahkeus.8243:

runeblade.7514:

Ross Biddle.2367:

kitten y Kshot War still looks great to me : D

ST AR DI – Rifle Sword/WH

ST = Restorative Strength – Body Blow – Berzerker’s Power
AR = Signit Mastery – Rending Strikes – Burst Precision
DI = Crack Shot – DoeT or Brawler’s Recovery – Burst Mastery

Good Times – STARDI

The problem is, PvP Warriors are simply not viable without Cleansing Ire.

Yea, sadly CI with LB is about the only thing that allows anything outside of shoutbow to even stand a chance against conditions and it doesn’t look like there’s any other viable option to handling conditions with these new traits…

War has high hp, plus the signit cleanse, plus the condi immunity- which on a high burst, high mobility build allows you to get in, do your business, and get out. It doesn’t suite all situations but certainly can be utilized for others.

Incoming personal 2 cents

PvE:

- Great buffs to phalanx strength builds. 6,6,0,6,0 gs camping looks like like a healthy dps increase.
- Rampage being a physical skill with the new physical training trait: +150% dmg looks … good lol. Perhaps it will work its way into phalanx builds, 150% dmg + 25 might stacks with stun on auto attack.
- The changes for condition damage traits looks very interesting and opens up several options for weapon choices and styles. You can chose to go down the sword route or interrupts to apply condi.

PvP :

- Shoutbow looks a bit crazy … if running 0,0,6,6,6
– gaining spiked armor in defense line + endure pain
– warhorn + shrug it off + …
– Inspiring Presence which in team fights is a HUGE healing increase.
(think of stronghold with all those npc’s around)
– ANNNND another shout with healing surge.
– In the discipline line you can also take warriors sprint now because the adrenaline gain is moved to the shout trait. So you can also leap out of immobilize now.
– You can also now take healing banners, which if also affected by Inspiring Presence is another HUGE healing buff.

… As much as i love warrior this seems to be a bit silly.

Overall

Pro: buuffs … buffs everywhere …
Con: No mention of adrenaline decay being looked at. F2 burst skill? Specialization reveal next week pls
Special request: Since healing surge is going to be a shout, please change the name to something awesome. Perhaps “Never Give Up” or “Never Surrender”, characters shouting “healing surge” is just goofy.

Chrisco.5732:

No mention of adrenaline decay being looked at. F2 burst skill?

They may have briefly passed over it but f2 something to do with taunt.

I’m not entirely sure but from what I could tell the revive speed trait from tactics wasn’t there.. making mercy warrior less effective?

Chrisco.5732:

Incoming personal 2 cents
Special request: Since healing surge is going to be a shout, please change the name to something awesome. Perhaps “Never Give Up” or “Never Surrender”, characters shouting “healing surge” is just goofy.

“Warrior OP’eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” ?

;D

Scoobaniec.9561:

Who care about hammer..

This is just a silly reply, everyone should care and not be limited builds wise, thats why devs also did the revamp as they wanted to open up more options, while also wanting to hear if their proposed changes were for the worse. We the warriors are on the same team here. Not having leg specialist as a hammer user is game breaking in pvp, i cannot stress this enough, competent players will dodge your earthshaker and you will be just that close to follow up with hammer rotations since the target will be kiting you around. It may not be that big of a deal if ur other wepset doesnt relay on hammer setting up burst, but often a good chain is ended with hammer 5 into 100b, but goodluck with that when u couldnt even earthshaker cuz no root on hammer 3 from leg specialist. As a melee you wanna stay on target, not slapped around, especially after healing signet reduction.

Theres little incentive going full in tactis with said background, only other workaround would be to kncrease the animation speed on earthshaker, but idk if thats for the better. And having merciless hammer and burst mastery on same grandmaster is also a step back for using hammer as a utility weapon to set up burst and kills as a pure melee user. This is a setback.

TPenny.5071:

Chrisco.5732:

No mention of adrenaline decay being looked at. F2 burst skill?

They may have briefly passed over it but f2 something to do with taunt.

If that’s true and our new adrenaline mechanic is gonna be a taunt then we need access to protection. Maybe the first warrior specialization will finally give us access to it?

The bad players get to have their wish. That’s all I have to say.

BlackTruth.6813:

The bad players get to have their wish. That’s all I have to say.

What is that even supposed to mean? You have supplied literally no context.

Proven.2854:

Wanze.8410:

Maybe I missed it or did they remove the stance trait?

All the stance traits got combined (Last Stand, Cooldown Reduction, and Vigor on Stance). The new trait is a Major Master trait in the Defense line. They also said it looked too strong so they were probably going to remove the Vigor portion.

Yeah, i saw that when i double checked on dulfy. I dont care much about the vigor though. What i definately seem to loose is signet mastery but that isnt too bad for me.
What seems a bit lackluster to me are the tactics grandmaster traits if you plan on traiting for solo play. Vigorous Shouts is a great trait, of course, if you use shouts and have allies to heal but becomes less viable, if you solo play or dont use shouts.
Powerful Synergy needs combo fields, which you wont have with a solo warrior and Phalanx Strength is totally useless in solo play.

But yeah, i think overall, like most other builds, my one will get a good buff.
Gonna be interesting to see how they plan on balancing out the lost condi and boon duration from the trait lines. They said they will partly make up for it by buffing stats on equipment but both have very limited availability (only givers) in stat combos ofr gear.

While lost Boon duration might affect me negatively a bit, it will be a good buff for my condi removal, if condi duration is harder to stack for all the cancer builds.

Looks amazing, really pleased with most of the proposed changes. As well as some specific (and obvious) PvE beast builds, it looks like our overall utility will be improved. Not to mention our mobility (oh hai Savage Leap + new Blademaster trait).

However, we probably shouldn’t tell ANet that. Yes. Warrior changes are mediocre, oh how we’ll suffer in PvE/WvW/PvP, nothing to see here.

fellyn.5083:

BlackTruth.6813:

The bad players get to have their wish. That’s all I have to say.

What is that even supposed to mean? You have supplied literally no context.

Don’t put any thoughts into what he says.

So, saw the stream, essentially every profession got completely tweaked and buffed meaning the meta will be adrift for a time. Some of these traits are insane and we get to go down three full lines? Color me impressed.

Before I even go into traits, Mending and Healing Surge are actually seeing some love, with Mending being a physical skill and coupling it with the ‘Physical Skills are more effective when you are at 50% or higher Endurance’ are we going to see some actual depth with healing at times? How much more effective will Mending be? If it turns into an actually decent heal we will start seeing builds that do not take Cleansing Ire anymore and actually be viable! I actually think I recall some of these healing changes being discussed months ago as well by us, so I want to believe they listened! Healing Surge being a shout I believe puts it as the ‘go-to’ in shout builds, as that 20% reduction is huge for its HPS over the course of a minute! Healing Signet changes I am still pondering. Oh and naturally Defiant Stance users now have to take Last Stand and go into Defense Tree with that automatic Spiked Armor, mmhmm.

So, Berserker’s Power was made to give its effect for a duration while you continue to use a burst skill, I will be dancing in place for a moment as this trait prior completely reduced our options in combat for active gameplay. Heck, 20% increase in damage for 10 seconds? That’s going to be used in some PvP builds too (Condition ones have Improved Distracting Strikes, lololol)!

Honestly, I could spend all day coming up with potentially viable builds that work in all circumstances.

I will say that PvE builds for Warrior as a whole probably won’t see too much of a shift until we know the specifics for how HoT PvE encounters work. Ultimately, all the changes we see for these trees will revolutionize the PvP/WvW metas, I am so completely pumped.

Strength minors choices look poor:
Death from above – only generally useful for JP stuff.
Restorative strength – remove conditions when activating a heal. This is probably useful in PvP, but for PvE you don’t need it at all.
Physical training – I can’t remember the last time I equipped a physical skill, and it was even longer ago that I found one marginally useful at all. These tend to be rather useless in PvE.
Meanwhile, dual wielding is gone? Yikes! And they bumped Great Fortitude to a Major? Why?

Strength Master / Grandmaster
They moved axe mastery to grandmaster (and merged it with sharpened axes which was previously a discipline major)! The merge may seem well-intended, but it probably just killed off axe builds. You can’t take it and Berserker’s Power, which is a 20% dmg nerf for axe builds.

Tactics
- They moved Quick Breathing to adept, which is a good thing actually. This is the only warrior change I see that I like. Previously there were too many good options all crowded into the master tier. With this change, it now means a warrior can take both Quick Breathing and Empower Allies (two good ally boosting traits), and still take a tactics grandmaster too.
- They moved all the banner traits out of tactics.

Discipline
- Inspiring Battle Standard (previously Tactics Grandmaster) is now a Displine Master. The problem is that it doesn’t fit well with this line of traits. Discipline tends to be self-reliance and personal dmg boosts which is very unlike the battle standard boost. Seems like the battle standard would have fit better in tactics (where it was) or defense.
- Sharpened axes is gone! As described above, they merged its abilities into the GM strength trait for axes. This means that a player is forced to take strength gm for axes to get what this offered previously as a master in discipline. Previously, a player could skip strength and take this plus arms traits for example for some pretty solid axe dmg. That type of build will no longer be an option.

Overall, it looks like their attempt to streamline axe into one trait has gutted much of the trait versatility that was previously available for axe builds, and simultaneously nerfed the overall DPS potential by about 20% due to the inability to run both axe mastery and berserker’s power. As if the warrior GS meta wasn’t big enough already, this pretty much forces warriors to use it now. Prior to this, GS and axe builds were close to on par for damage output, but without Bererker’s Power, GS will be dealing at vastly more dps than an axe build can.

You guys got Spiked Armour as a minor trait… Absurd.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

You guys got Spiked Armour as a minor trait… Absurd.

Yeah, defense line got very strong, at least for wvw.

I have found some time to watch the Ready-Up on specialization today. I have to say my overall impression concerning the warrior is the same as was before the AMA that is neutral. Remains to be seen what impact those changes will have on the warrior meta.

As an Hammer-Axe/Shield warrior on physical training since beta, its nice to see that the Strength line gets a bit updated.

Things that i like on strength line:

• Physical Training as adept and more damage depending on Level of Adrenalin. Plus the Physical skills have a new thing where if your endurance is above 50%, they are more effective (Stomp further, kick further for example). Rampage and Mending are now physical skills.
  Remains to be seen how this will work with adrenalin gain. If the adrenalin gain remains the same as currently is, then its a 50% less damage, since “Physical training” deals 100% flat-out damage without any conditions attached to it.

• Body Blow
  It has a nice synergy with Hammer, Physical skills and physical training.

• Berserker’s Power

I like the 10s duration on it as a compensation for instantly adrenalin loss.

• Axe Mastery
  The only positive is that it was moved from “Master” to “Grandmaster” thus giving the option to take “Body-Blow”.

Slowly is moving to the right direction since strength apparently, is a trait line for the warrior that focuses on dodging, physical utility skills and brute force.

Things that i like on Arms :

• Unsuspecting Foe replacing “Critical Burst”.

• Signet Mastery
  Its nice to see the added buff on precision attached to it as precision favors “Critical-Chance”. Remains to be seen if those changes actually promote the active usage of it.

Things that i like on Defense line :

• Shield Mastery
  I like the changes on “Shield-Mastery”. This is something that i wanted long ago the combining of “Shield – Traits”.

Maybe i missed it. But what happened to “Sure-Footed” trait?

It seems that the tactics line gets new “grandmaster” called “Inspiring Presence”.

• Inspiring Presence
  Boon duration and outgoing heal increased 10%/Target with 10 Sec duration.

Honestly that is more of a “Guardian Trait” than a warrior. It would work wonders on “Heal-Guardian” builds. But i see a Boost on “Shout Heal-Warrior”. Unless i am mistaken.

*Powerful Synergy

Does that mean i can leap twice with “Savage Leap” ? Sw/Warhorn Grasshopper warrior.

Discipline line.

Nice to see that “Fast Hands” is still there. But “Merciless – Hammer” as Grandmaster on Discipline ? I would have founded more useful on Strength line as a “Grandmaster” instead of “Axe-mastery”.

*Heightened Focus

Why the change to 4sec quickness on 15sec ICD. ?

All in all remains to be seen how this will pen out since its still WIP.

Regards

Seed

Seed.5467:

Maybe i missed it. But what happened to “Sure-Footed” trait?

Sure-Footed’s effects were merged into Last Stand, along with Vigorous Focus from the Discipline line. Meaning Last Stand gives us Balanced Stance auto-activation, +25% stance duration, and 6s Vigor on stance activation.

What about a change to the Leg Specialist trait. As it is at the moment it is very lackluster. If youre fighting anything with a pet or summon (hell even a rock dog) your leg specialist usually ends up hitting them instead of the actual person.

Is it possible to change Leg Specialist into a internal CD per target. So, hammer shock has 5, could all 5 of them get affected by hammer shock instead of just 1 out of the 5 that you hit. This would actually enable me to chase down rangers instead of their pets. This nerf for it to be on kitten internal cd has crippled leg specialist forever because we can no longer immobilize more than 1 target with our multi target cripples.

Seed.5467:

• Axe Mastery
  The only positive is that it was moved from “Master” to “Grandmaster” thus giving the option to take “Body-Blow”.

I hardly see moving Axe Mastery from a master to a grandmaster as a positive. Also, Body Blow seems to be mostly useless outside of Hammer builds. So the Strength master traits effectively boil down to a Hammer trait (Body Blow), a GS trait (Forceful Greatsword), and rather weak general trait (Great Fortitude) for non-Hammer/GS builds. Previously, Great Fortitude was a minor, and even there it was weak.

The new strength minors appear very weak. The majors are useful for Hammer and GS, and not very useful for other weapon builds. But if you want to use an axe, for example, you art stuck with fairly useless minor and major in Strength just to reach the GM. And if you take the Axe Master GM, it prevents access to Berserker’s Power.

Wanze.8410:

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

You guys got Spiked Armour as a minor trait… Absurd.

Yeah, defense line got very strong, at least for wvw.

Honestly, Spike Armor and Cleansing Ire should be swapped. Basically, no Warrior will take anything but Cleansing Ire in Master line for Toughness. It’s core to the function of PvP Warriors.

Overall, talk about Pigeon-holing Warriors even further.

Hello, new Shoutbow (Healing Surge + Quick Breathing becoming Adept + new improved Vigorous Shouts). “Shrug it Off!” trait cooldown is still mucked up (this is such a minor trait, just combine Determined Revival and Reviver’s Might already – and where did Fast Healer go?). Why not rework Desperate Power and stick it in Master trait spot opened up by Shrug It Off (and make the new Desperate Power like the new Ranger’s Most Dangerous Game trait – just something better solo-wise than Empowered Allies).

Phalanx Strength build got stronger for PvE >.< You no longer need to allocate points between Greatsword options, especially since Precision becomes gear based so yeah, you no longer have to worry about losing Warrior’s Sprint, and you gain Heightened Focus (Quickness) for even more rapid Might stacking :P Holy brain-dead cheeze

Besides Axe (Axe Mastery), why is Merciless Hammer and Sundering Mace in a Grandmaster position as well? It make -0- sense compared to other options. IMO, if anything, all of these Warrior Weapon traits should all be baseline (not even minor traits and just be added to core function as that’s where they are balanced around anyways).

Overall, so much design work to do to open up more Warrior build options

Kalendraf.9521:

I hardly see moving Axe Mastery from a master to a grandmaster as a positive.

Well yes its good that we have different opinions, in that way we can have a good discussion.

Also, Body Blow seems to be mostly useless outside of Hammer builds.

It has good synergy with physical-skills and shield also, beside Hammer. So it will be useful also on physical builds.

But if you want to use an axe, for example, you art stuck with fairly useless minor and major in Strength just to reach the GM. And if you take the Axe Master GM, it prevents access to Berserker’s Power.

Allow me to disagree. I am playing an Axe/shield-hammer warrior since beta, and have always invested full on strength line.

The problem that i have currently is that i have to choose between “Phyical-Trainning” and “Axe-mastery” since both are “master-traits” on Strength line. And because my build benefits on physical i have chosen “Physical-trainning” trait instead of “Axe-mastery” and used “Berserkers Power” which i changed it to “Burst Precision” currently.

So, all in all, currently i am loosing the benefit of “Axe-Mastery” but i am gaining the 100% damage from physical. And since “Axe mastery” wasn´t an option before will be in the future.

But i am hoping “Axe-mastery” will get changed a bit as it goes from “master” to “Grandmaster” trait. So yes, i am finding good that axe is getting moved and makes place for “Body Blow”.

Regards

Seed

Could you elaborate on which area(s) of gameplay that you use this build?

I’ve played since the early release, and have played PvE almost exclusively. I have yet to find much point in using a shield or Physical skills in PvE. I also don’t play the ultra-common meta builds like GS or Hambow. Instead I’ve mostly used axe builds with varying off-hands like axe, mace or warhorn and longbow for ranged combat. I’ve usually taken 6 points in strength to get Axe Mastery and Berserker’s Power.

I realize they are changing up the Berserker’s Power trait quite a bit, but the new incarnation would be a perfect fit for boosting the Axe Burst attack damage. As a result, also putting Axe Mastery into the Strength GM trait slot doesn’t make sense…aside from supporting the viewpoint that ANet has some kind of vendetta against warrior axe users which might be entirely true.

The changes look nice for GS warriors, and I suspect for hammer warriors too. But axe warriors seem to be getting left behind by these changes.

Hmmm… I somewhat miss “Inspiring banners” to get somewhat 99% uptime. Did I just overlook it? Do banners get a flat duration increase in return? Can anyone give some clarification?

Kalendraf.9521:

Could you elaborate on which area(s) of gameplay that you use this build? I’ve played since the early release, and have played PvE almost exclusively. I have yet to find much point in using a shield or Physical skills in PvE.

Personally i am using it on all areas. For example, WvW, usually forming a small group and go capping and other stuff. On sPvP with friends i am using it to call “spikes” as i have good deal of CC and mediocre damage. On PvE also but i am going mostly in range with bow, because the anti-CC immunity some enemies are having.
Of course i am changing my build when its needed accordingly. But most of the time is not needed as i am playing with a small group.

I also don’t play the ultra-common meta builds like GS or Hambow. Instead I’ve mostly used axe builds with varying off-hands like axe, mace or warhorn and longbow for ranged combat. I’ve usually taken 6 points in strength to get Axe Mastery and Berserker’s Power.

Yeah, we are somehow similar. The only difference is that as i mentioned on my previous post, is that i have choose between “Axe-Mastery” and “Physical-Training” , since both are Master Traits on strength line.

I realize they are changing up the Berserker’s Power trait quite a bit, but the new incarnation would be a perfect fit for boosting the Axe Burst attack damage.

Yes especially, the 10 sec duration of the effect, to compensate for the instant adrenalin loss.

As a result, also putting Axe Mastery into the Strength GM trait slot doesn’t make sense…aside from supporting the viewpoint that ANet has some kind of vendetta against warrior axe users which might be entirely true.

As an axe-shield warriors we have two traits that affect the usage of main hand axe and both were in the wrong trait lines in my opinion. It would have been better if the new “Axe-mastery” moved to “Arms” line as its the line for Critical. The same can be said for “merciless – hammer”. The new changes placing it GM on Discipline line although Hammer is pure brute Force and should be on Strength line instead of Discipline.

The changes look nice for GS warriors, and I suspect for hammer warriors too. But axe warriors seem to be getting left behind by these changes.

Some changes looks good at the moment. But as i said before i keep a “Neutral” stance since still is WIP. So it remains to be seen how those changes will pen out.

Regards

Seed

Changes are pretty good in general, but I’m a bit disappointed that cleansing Ire and fast hands didn’t change one bit. We’ll still have to run both these traits for any PvP build which hurts build diversity quite a bit.

I really don’t understand why they’re keeping adrenaline on getting hit on cleansing Ire. To me, this should be a mechanic of the class, and it’s purely logical I think. Without CI your adrenaline building sucks, and this is why i’ll always take it, even thought warriors now have good anti condi options besides CI.

Fast hands is just too good not to take it.

I like how they changer berserker’s power though, really good change.

Nash.2681:

Hmmm… I somewhat miss “Inspiring banners” to get somewhat 99% uptime. Did I just overlook it? Do banners get a flat duration increase in return? Can anyone give some clarification?

Actually, the range increase is just as important to me from Inspiring Banners as well in PvE. My hope is it was just forgotten on the announcement side and this was made baseline with all banners. It’s also possible that Inspiring Battle Standard (now Mastery trait in Discipline will be a 2-for-1 going forward) making it a really good trait to have.

IMO though, Banners still need a rework. Banners should be an alternative option playstyle for support with slightly less (but comparable) autoattack DPS to fully traited weapon options (each Stab autoattack adds vulnerability would help as well). The problem is Stab is just way too slow attack speed for its damage. And remove the root on cast for all Banner abilities already. And have banners summon in the Warrior’s hands (with Powerful Banners baseline).

If ANet missed (has taken out) Inspiring Banners altogether, well … Banners become much weaker. Bad form.