Im rank 54 having over 1500 hrs and I play a thief, ranger and warrior.
I tried a few different builds since the patch hit us hard:
- condition S/A, S/S + longbow
- bunker M/S + Hammer
- dps longbow + rifle
None of these were viable to me. The warrior relies on whatever burst they have and the element of surprise to maximize damage output, kill or be killed. We have no ‘get out of jail for free’ card like a bubble, mist, stealth, etc. The survivability and escapability is perhaps one of the worst of all classes. When we go into a fight, we’re pretty much ‘all in’. Sure I was able to kill a few unsuspecting foes here and there but the way I look at it, this nerf affects all classes that may use haste, but none more than the warrior.
For all the people out there who never played a warrior, it was never having kitten or being a ‘noob’ that made most warriors use 100B + bull + haste, it was the fact that as it’s been said over and over, IT WAS THE ONLY REAL VIABLE BUILD WE HAD.
The condition build was decent as a supportive role, but really terrible at 1V1. With only a single condition application with sword (bleed) and 2 conditions on the longbow (all pretty much on CD’s and which the rate of fire is so slow, dodging becomes elementary), I found that most classes were able to wipe any condies I placed pretty effectively rending this build fairly useless. It was decent when staying at ranged with LB at top of keep or in team fights but once I got focused, kited or played 1V1 against a skilled player with evades/dodges or just basic CC, I was pretty much dead.
The bunker build was ok, but if I wanted to bunker, I’d roll a guardian…nuf said.
The ranged rifle/LB build was pretty bad, again if I wanted to play a ranged class, I’d play my ranger.
I went into a server with my guildies trying out the new builds and where in the past I was able to win maybe 50-75% of the duels against their various classes, I literally won 1 out of 20 duels trying out all the above specs, including the ‘new’ 100B post-patch.
I have yet to try a banner build.
So this leaves me thinking this class is now officially and utterly broken and I will be playing my thief and ranger until it gets fixed.
I know it’s early but have any of you found viable builds post-patch?