Guild Wars 2

First into the fight, Vanguards excel at entering the fray and breaking the enemy’s front line. They thrive in the midst of combat and have the tools and discipline needed to fight against impossible odds. Although they focus their power on themselves, they have not abandoned the motives of Guardians – they have merely changed their mindset. What better way to protect their allies than the disruption and cleaving of their enemies?

Let me know what you think, and if you’ve got any questions!

New weapon: Axe (main hand)

Weapon 1 (chain) – Front Cleave > Throat Slice > Shield Rip

Front Cleave: cleave foes in front of you, damaging enemies and getting ready for a follow-up attack. (Medium damage. 1/2 sec. Up to 3 targets. Refreshes Back Cleave on hit.)

Throat Slice: slice back with an accurate cut to the target’s throat. (Low damage, applies damaging bleed. 1/4 sec. 1 target.)

Shield Rip: use your axe to rip away the target’s shield, as well as any magical protections. (Very low damage. 1 sec. 1 target. Unblockable. Interrupts and removes blocking effects. Removes Protection and Resistance boons from the target.)

Weapon 2 – Back Cleave
Cleave your foes, damaging enemies and preserving your momentum for future strikes. (Medium damage. 1/2 sec. 5 sec cooldown. 3 targets. Grants Cleaving for 5 seconds, which increases Front Cleave and Back Cleave damage by 10% and allows them to hit up to 5 targets.)

Weapon 3 – Weapon Blind
Shine brilliant light off your weapon, stunning and dazing nearby foes and dazing foes further away.
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Duration: 1 second
Stun and daze range: within 450 range
Daze range: within 1200 range
Max targets: 5

Traits

Minor Adept/Master/Grandmaster
1) Honorable Onus – activated Virtues can no longer affect allies. Instead, they have greatly reduced recharge and repeatedly affect you over time for each enemy nearby.
Reduced recharge: 40%
Reapplication interval per enemy: 1 second

2) Into the Fray – movement speed increased by 25%. Gain swiftness when Aegis is broken.
Swiftness duration: 10 seconds
Cooldown: 15 seconds

3) Front-line Defender – gain damage reduction for each enemy near you, up to 5 enemies.
Damage reduction per nearby enemy: 5%
Range: 600

Major Adept
1) Shock trooper – crowd control effects you inflict have increased duration per nearby enemy, up to 5 enemies.
Duration increase per nearby enemy: 10%
Range: 600

2) Always Honorable – Honorable Onus always provides 1 additional interval application.

3) Bathed in Blood – conditions and crowd control effects you inflict have a chance to inflict bleeding.
Chance: 33%

Major Master
1) Great Cleave – doubles the duration and damage bonus of Cleaving. Axe skills have reduced recharge.
Recharge reduced: 20%

2) Second Wind – your virtues are recharged when you fall below the health threshold.
Health threshold: 50%
Cooldown: 50 seconds

3) Zealous Attacks – Physical skills inflict bleeding and have reduced recharge.
Reduced recharge: 20%

Major Grandmaster
1) Vanguard Charger – gain Might when you gain Swiftness. Gain Swiftness when you critically hit.
Might: 3 stacks, 12 seconds
Swiftness: 3 seconds
Cooldown: 1 second

2) Reflective Purpose – activating a virtue causes you to reflect projectiles near you for a time.
Duration: 3 seconds
Radius: 450 range

3) Burning Blood – burning foes take increased damage from bleeding you inflict. Bleeding foes take increased damage from burning you inflict.
Damage Increase: 20%

New skills – Physical skills

Healing) Honor Before Death – pump yourself up for a short time, readying to keep fighting when others couldn’t. If you take fatal damage within 5 seconds of using Honor Before Death, regain half of your health, break stuns, and gain stability. If Honor Before Death expires, only heal for a small amount.
Stability: 3 stacks, 8 seconds
Cooldown: 30 seconds

1) Shield Charge – charge forward in a direction, moving quickly, blocking attacks from the front, and damaging enemies you hit. Deal additional damage for each attack blocked during the charge, up to 10 attacks. (Low damage)
Additional damage per blocked attack: 10%
Range: 900
Max targets: 5
Duration: 0.5 seconds
Cooldown: 15 seconds

2) Blazing Sweep – leap forward, turn your leg ablaze, and unleash a kick on enemies, burning and knocking them down. (Low damage, high burning damage)
Range: 900
Radius: 450
Knockdown: 1 second
Max targets: 5
Cooldown: 20 seconds
Finisher: Leap

3) Smashed Ground – smash your weapon/fists into the ground, knocking down and crippling nearby enemies. (Low damage)
Radius: 600
Knockdown: 3 seconds
Cripple: 6 seconds
Max targets: 5
Cooldown: 25 seconds
Finisher: Blast

4) Haymaker – wind up for a powerful punch that stuns your target. Activate while charging up to cancel the punch for a much shorter recharge. (High damage)
Wind-up: 1.25 seconds
Stun: 2 seconds
Max targets: 1
Cooldown: 30 seconds
Canceled cooldown: 5 seconds

Elite) Dragoon’s Jump – jump high in a flash of light and then brutally land with a pillar of light, damaging and dazing nearby enemies. Has a reduced cooldown if it hits an enemy upon landing. (Medium damage)
Radius: 450
Range: 1500
Daze: 3 seconds
Max targets: 5
Cooldown: 90 seconds
Reduced cooldown: 45 seconds

While looking over the document again I noticed that Bolo is kind of strange right now.

I assume it immobilizes when it hits and pulls when you hit the button again, but there’s no mention of the immobilize. And if all it did was pull, it seems strange that you’d need to activate it again to pull anyways.

Regardless of all that, I think it doesn’t currently justify its higher cooldown at the moment. How about the following change: if it hits, you can activate it to pull the enemy towards you, but if it misses then you can activate it to be pulled to the enemy’s previous location (where the enemy was when you threw the Bolo). Should be more helpful vs kiting.

Edit: I think Stomp could use some love too. If Kick breaks stun, then Stomp is left in the dust – especially with no Stability. You could make it so Stomp finishes off wounded foes (so Stomp would actually stomp enemies). Be pretty useless in pve, but I think Stomp is probably meant more for pvp anyways.

I saw awhile back someone had mentioned an idea about a condi Rifle.

I thought it was perfect, and I’ve wanted it ever since.

No idea what legend could represent it though.

emkelly.2371:

As for Inspire, that was just wording. i certainly did not mean to make it a shout. LOLZ

While that’s also a concern, I was referring to how that description mentions it grants Fury. I thought it was only supposed to grant Swiftness & Stability (and possibly Might as well, not sure).

emkelly.2371:

Rally creates combo fields allowing the warrior to blast the field to grant boons. Now, here there is a major distinction between “boons” and “Warrior Buffs” Boons are indeed buffs but they can be stripped and have stacking applications. (either through time like swiftness, power like might, or number of uses stability) Warrior buffs are warrior specific buffs that the warrior applies. they cannot be stripped and generally do not stack. Powerful Synergy only effects warrior buffs, not boons. So a warrior buff that applies 125 toughness and 125 vitality would apply +50% or 200 toughness and 200 vitality. There are a couple of reasons this should exist on the warrior.
The warrior does not have any way to stack boons, asside from might through the longbow and now through the torch.

Although, having just typed all that i just realized what you meant . HAHAHAHA. by making warrior able to apply boons have just overpowered the warrior. I will be changing that. Thanks.

I’m very confused; I don’t know exactly you’re saying on what you plan on changing. Could you shed some light on what you’ve changed (or what changes you’re planning)?

emkelly.2371:

I love your idea for leadership, though i think we should apply it to something other than shouts. we should probably apply it to warhorn. this way people will not be able to complain about warriors having too many taunts.

I don’t know about that – giving warhorn buff generation + condi cleanse + taunts could bit a bit much. However, thinking on it now Shouts definitely aren’t the right way to go either – if nothing else, ‘FEAR ME!’ would be silly if it made the enemies run towards you. XD

I don’t think that complaint would be very valid, though. I think that if any class should have access to a lot of Taunts, it should be the Warrior. It makes sense thematically, and since it’d help against kiting it’d help out gameplay-wise as well. This makes it kind of a shame how pathetic our ability to taunt is – perhaps it’s something that could be improved upon in this rework.

emkelly.2371:

Peak performance has not changed because i have changed the physical skills. When i get some more feedback from physical skills i will likelly change it based on what people say. i did not want to change too much at once.

Fair enough. I’d like to hear other people’s feedback on the proposed physical skill changes as well.

Looking over the changes, had a few thoughts:

- I think the Banner Stab should also inflict Bleeding. This would help in the damage department for condition damage builds. If there’s only one attack, it should be able to cater to both power and condi builds.

- I agree with the idea of Inspire granting Swiftness and Stability, although I’m not sure why it’s listed as “Shout, granting allies might, fury, and stability”. Might be a typo.

- I’m a bit confused as to how Rally would actually create a combo field using a banner. I’m also thinking that it might be too overpowered in conjunction with (the improved) Powerful Synergy. Instead, I think it’d make more sense to give aoe boon(s) based on the banner rather than a combo field. For example, Banner of Defense could give Protection (or Protection + Regeneration).

- while I like the idea of Warrior getting Taunts, getting them on Banners seems a bit strange to me. That – in addition to the strange state Leadership (in Tactics) is in – makes me think that we could give Taunt to Leadership, and use the Stampede alternative for the Banner.
Leadership – using a Shout taunts nearby foes. 300 range, 2 sec duration, 5 sec ICD.

- I’ve seen suggestions in other threads of having Peak Performance give the Warrior Quickness for a very short duration upon using a Physical skill, and I have to agree. It makes sense gameplay-wise, as Physical skills are often hard to land and speeding them up will make them harder to react to. It also makes sense thematically; if you’re in better shape, you can do physical feats faster.

Amethyst Lure.5624:

I don’t think glint is too strong; I think other specs are either too weak (Jalis), or too specialized (Ventari).

This is pretty much how I feel.

Shiro and Glint are great and versatile enough to be used in many specs, and Mallyx is (or was) good enough to be powerful in its own right.

I think other stances need to be brought up to Shiro’s and Glint’s level. If they’re specialized, make them good in their own right; if they’re too weak, buff them.

emkelly.2371:

Well, first. banners have longer cool downs than they have duration.

Actually, I was thinking that this relocation would be independent from the cooldown. I apologize if I didn’t get that point across very well in my initial post.

I just had an idea – what if we made it so ‘using’ a banner after it’s already out relocates the banner?

For example, you bring down a banner with 8, go to the next battle, and then bring down that same banner with 8 again.

I don’t think this should affect its cooldown or anything, but it would make it easier to run multiple banners (and not rely on having to carry them around).

Some interesting changes. However, I’d like to offer the following suggestions:

1. revert Body Blow so it inflicts Bleeding again
2. change Distracting Strikes so stuns also inflict Confusion
3. swap Body Blow with Unsuspecting Foe
4. swap the locations of a few grandmasters: move Distracting Strikes to Arms, Burst Precision to Discipline, and Merciless Hammer to Strength

The reason I’d like to see those changes is because they make sense in my mind. Before, if you wanted condi mace/hammer, you’d go Strength, and for critting/power mace/hammer you’d go Arms. With the above changes, it’d be reverse – you’d go Strength for power/crit mace/hammer, and Arms for condi mace/hammer.

I’ve always viewed Strength as a physical (power) line and Arms as a condi line, so these changes would bring things more in line with that. In addition, condi mace/hammer would benefit from Arm’s minor traits far more than power/crit mace/hammer would.

As for Merciless Hammer (which screams Strength, but is in Discipline) and Burst Precision (which screams Discipline, but is in Arms), these would have better placement with my suggested changes (imo).

Also, aside from the listed changes above I’d also like to see Burst Precision changed back. Warriors do need some ways to deal with blocks, evades, blinds, etc, but I don’t think changing Burst Precision would accomplish much on its own in that regard. Plus, 100% crit chance with burst skills can be very useful for several weapons (and it can even be the cornerstone of some builds).

So every time I try and think of a way to address the problems of the Warrior, it ends up looking like an overhaul, so I’m going to try something different this time. I’m just going to list off a bunch of traits that I think would help out the Warrior. They vary in power and effects, but I’m not going to specify which specialization or tier they should belong to. If people want to use them or build off of them, then by all means please do so. Hopefully if we have a bunch of good ideas here, Anet might use some of them.

Invigorating Blow – using a burst skill gives you Regeneration and Vigor.

Heavy Blows – your blocked attacks deal half-damage and retain their additional effects (stuns, dazes, etc).

Wide Cleaves – your cleaving attacks ignore evades and Blindness.

Quick on Your Feet – you gain Superspeed after a dodge.

Reflective Armor – you have a chance of reflecting incoming projectiles, spells, and conditions.

Arm’s Reach – any attack that has a range less than 300 is brought up to 300.

Unstoppable Rage – you gain pulsing Might and Stability while you are afflicted with a condition.

Berserker’s Focus – using a Rage skill gives you Resistance for a short time.

Clear Shot – using a burst skill gives you Resistance for a short time.

Battle Momentum – critically hitting an enemy steals some of that enemy’s endurance and gives it to you.

Concussive Blows – stuns, dazes, pushes, pulls, and launches also inflict Slow.

Piercing Burst – burst skills ignore Stability and Weakness.

Blind Fighter – Blindness now guarantees your next attack will hit, instead of causing it to miss.

Blind Burst – Blindness now guarantees your next burst skill will hit, instead of causing your next attack to miss. Only burst skills can consume Blindness.

Momentum Shift – critically hitting with a burst skill steals boons from the enemy and transfers your current conditions onto the enemy.

Evasive Momentum – evade all attacks for a short time after a dodge.

I may add more if I think of them. Feel free to post your own ideas! I’m interested to see what people can come up with.

My goals for this rework:
- move traits to better places, combining traits when appropriate
- make the warrior stronger
- increase build diversity

I wanted to make the warrior less reliant on specific specializations for certain things (i.e. you don’t NEED Defense to have good sustain, you don’t NEED Strength to deal great damage, etc) so that we could see a lot more build diversity. I also wanted to make the warrior less reliant on particular weapons or combinations (such as Forceful Greatsword + Phalanx Strength), instead making each weapon usable in more situations and making them each great in their own right.

Base Warrior
Make the warrior less kite-able, and increasingly dangerous as a battle goes on. Address adrenaline decay. Increase the ‘reward’ part of Vengeance’s risk-reward nature.

Warrior’s Sprint buffed & baseline – Warriors move 25% faster by default. Weapon skills, utility skills, bursts, and primal bursts which removed immobilized with the previous Warrior’s Sprint now remove immobilized by default.

Battle Momentum – spending adrenaline gives you 1 stack of Battle Momentum per bar of adrenaline spent. Each stack reduces weapon swap speed by 1.25 seconds, up to a maximum of 5 second reduction total (this cannot stack with Fast Hands). Battle Momentum can also have other effects based on traits. Maximum of 20 stacks.

Adrenaline decay – adrenaline doesn’t begin decaying until all stacks of Battle Momentum are gone. Battle Momentum decays at a rate of 1 stack per second once the warrior is out of combat.

Vengeful Return buffed & baseline – getting a down or kill while in Vengeance makes you rally with increased endurance and health.

Specializations / Traits

Strength
Increase number of effective weaponry (decrease Greatsword favoritism). Increase effectiveness of interrupt-based builds. Swapped some traits around: Body Blow was buffed and swapped with Distracting Strikes; Forceful Greatsword was replaced with Forceful Weaponry and swapped with Axe Mastery. Merciless Hammer effects moved from Discipline to here (Forceful Weaponry). Might generation moved to Tactics.

Minors:
Reckless Dodge – no changes
Building Momentum – endurance gain increased to 25
Stick and Move – no changes

Major Adepts:
Death from Above – no changes
Peak Performance – damage boost is now based on stacks of Battle Momentum, instead of bars of adrenaline. 10% damage increase for each stack of Battle Momentum, up to 100%
Restorative Strength – now also gives you a small heal whenever you gain Might

Major Master:
Distracting Strikes – no changes (other than it was moved to Major Master)
Axe Mastery – no changes (other than it was moved to Major Master)
Great Fortitude – no changes

Major Grandmaster:
Forceful Weaponry – 2-handed melee weapons deal 10% increased damage, and have their skill recharge reduced by 20%. This damage bonus is increased to 20% when attacking a dazed, knocked down, launched, or stunned enemy
Body Blow – stuns, dazes, knockbacks, pulls, pushes, and launches inflict bleeding, weakness, and confusion. When you successfully inflict conditions due to Body Blow, the attack that inflicted the conditions has its recharge reduced (20%)
Berserker’s Power – now also increases all critical damage done by 1% per stack of Battle Momentum

Arms
Added the effects of Leg Specialist to Deep Strike. Buffed some weaker traits. Replaced Dual Wielding with Blood Breaker, giving a new option for power builds.

Minors:
Precise Strikes – no change
Rending Strikes – no change
Bloodlust – no change

Major Adepts:
Berserker’s Fury – increase the health threshold to 50%
Opportunist – no change
Signet Mastery – no change

Major Master:
Blademaster – no changes
Deep Strike – now also inflicts Immobilize whenever you inflict Cripple (5 sec ICD)
Unsuspecting Foe – no change

Major Grandmaster:
Burst Precision – no change
Furious – now also increases your condition damage by +10 per stack of Battle Momentum
Blood Breaker – Bleeding damage scales from power instead of condition damage. Bleeding damage and duration increased by 33%

Defense
Made weaker traits more powerful, and made Defy Pain a minor to allow for more variety in the Major Master tier. Also increased the sustain (over time) offered by Adrenal Health and Cleansing Ire.

Minors:
Thick Skin – reduces incoming damage and condition damage by 10% while your health is above the threshold, and by 5% while your health is below the threshold (75%)
Adrenal Health – now provides healing based off Battle Momentum, instead of current adrenaline
Defy Pain – no change (except moved to Minor Grandmaster)

Major Adepts:
Cull the Weak – health activation threshold increased to 50%
Dogged March – ICD lowered to 5 seconds
Shield Master – no change

Major Master:
Armored Attack – no change
Spiked Armor – ICD lowered to 10 seconds; moved to Major Master
Sundering Mace – now also inflicts the vulnerability with mace attacks that daze or stun

Major Grandmaster:
Cleansing Ire – hitting with a burst skill removes 1 condition. For every 2 stacks of Battle Momentum you have, 1 additional condition is removed whenever you remove a condition. Still gives you adrenaline when you are hit
Last Stand – no change
Rousing Resilience – no change

Tactics
Is now filled to the brim with useful traits, following 3 general paths – empowering allies, shouts/warhorn usage, and defensive traits (to give an alternative to Defense). Weaker traits were buffed. Empowered, Leg Specialist, and Burning Arrows have been removed to make way for new defensive traits. Leg Specialist and Burning Arrows have had their effects move to traits in other lines.

Minors:
Determined Revival – also gives you the toughness when you are downed or in Vengeance.
Reviver’s Might – also gives you 2 stacks of Battle Momentum whenever you revive an ally or rally.
Inspiring Presence – the bonus given by Inspiring Presence is increased for each stack of Battle Momentum you have.

Major Adepts:
Inspiring Battle Standard – now also reduces banner cooldowns (20%)
Quick Breathing – now also causes Shouts to recharge faster (akin to Alacrity) for a few seconds upon using a warhorn skill
Reactive Parry – after attacking with a burst skill, block the next incoming attack against you

Major Master:
Empower Allies – no changes
Shrug it Off – now also reduces effectiveness of incoming conditions on affected allies (20%) for a few seconds (6)
Evasive Momentum – after evading an attack, evade all attacks for 1 second. Duration is increased by 0.1 seconds per stack of Battle Momentum

Major Grandmaster:
Phalanx Strength – grant yourself might whenever you critically hit. When you grant yourself might, grant might to up to 5 allies within range (600)
Vigorous Shouts – increase healing by 50% and adrenaline gain by 5; now also causes Warhorn skills to recharge faster (akin to Alacrity) for a few seconds upon using a shout
Powerful Synergy – grants you a powerful effect whenever you complete a power combo, based on the combo finisher. Each effect has its own ICD.
Leap: power combo activates twice; 1 second ICD.
Blast: you cannot have conditions applied to you; 5 second duration; 30 sec ICD.
Whirl: invulnerable to direct damage; 5 second duration; 30 second ICD.
Projectile: heal yourself for a large amount; 30 second ICD.

Discipline
More movement and defensive options were added. Also added traits to optimize the use of ranged weapons, making Discipline the go-to line for ranged combat.

Minors:
Versatile Rage – no changes
Fast Hands – no changes
Versatile Power – no changes

Major Adepts:
Brawler’s Recovery – no changes (other than being moved to Major Adept)
Crack Shot – now grants pierce to the attacks of all ranged weapons (harpoon gun, rifle, longbow). No longer offers reduced recharge of any kind
Warrior’s Sprint – while wielding a melee weapon, grant yourself swiftness (1 sec duration, 1 sec interval)

Major Master:
Burst Mastery – no changes (other than being moved to Major Master)
Clear Shot – activating a burst skill gives you Resistance (1.25 seconds)
Warrior’s Advance – when you are attacked from a distance (600+), gain superspeed (3 seconds) and clear movement-impairing conditions. ICD 15 seconds

Major Grandmaster:
Brawler’s Mastery – you break stuns on weapon swap
Power Shot – ranged weapons (Harpoon Gun, Longbow, Rifle) have reduced recharge (20%). Burst skills of ranged weapons are unblockable.
Heightened Focus – ICD decreased to 10 seconds.

Berserker
Overall boosts which provide a more effective Berserker, as well as offering some synergy with other trait lines. Burning Arrows (the burning portion) was significantly expanded and put into King of Fires.

Minors:
Primal Rage – no change
Always Angry – now also makes stacks of Battle Momentum take twice as long to decay outside of combat
Fatal Frenzy – now also gives Resistance alongside the other boons it gives

Major Adepts:
Last Blaze – double the adrenaline gained and burning stacks inflicted (from this trait) when you use a Rage skill
Savage Instinct – remove 1 condition when you break a stun. Activating Berserk mode breaks stuns
Smash Brawler – no changes

Major Master:
Blood Reaction – no changes
Dead or Alive – double the healing; now also makes Vengeance available as soon as you are downed
Heat the Soul – now applies the condition damage bonus whenever you are wielding a weapon that can apply burning

Major Grandmaster:
Bloody Roar – range increased to 900. Once while Berserk is active, you can hit F2 to roar again
Eternal Champion – now also increases Berserk by 3 seconds for each bar of adrenaline spent in Berserk
King of Fires – now also applies 1 stack of burning on all weapon attacks

Weapon Skills
Weapon changes mostly consist of adding combo finishers to weapon skills and adjusting attack ranges.

Greatsword
Arcing Slice & Arc Divider – are now whirl finishers
Hundred Blades – now does a blast finisher on the last hit
Rush – is now a leap finisher. Significantly increase speed to make it more reliable.

Hammer
Earthshaker & Rupturing Smash – the ‘leap’ portion of the animation is now a leap finisher
Hammer Shock – now a projectile finisher

Longbow
no changes

Rifle
Increase range on all attacks to 1500, offering a range advantage over Longbow.
Gun Flame – the explosion is a blast finisher

Axe
Eviscerate – normalized damage values, so it deals high damage consistently

Mace
Skull Crack – is now a blast finisher
Skull Grinder – the ‘leap’ portion of the animation is now a leap finisher

Sword
Flurry – dazes the opponent at the start of the flurry for 0.25 seconds
Flaming Flurry – is now a projectile finisher

Shield
no changes

Torch
Blaze Breaker – increase number of targets to 5

Warhorn
no changes

Final Notes

I’ll end my rework here. Although more work needs done (Bull Rush could use the same treatment as Rush above, healing skills could get looked at, etc.) I feel the above changes would be a good enough starting point to put the warrior in a good spot, and that these are the more important changes.

“Warriors are masters of weaponry who rely on speed, strength, toughness, and heavy armor to survive in battle. Adrenaline fuels their offensive power – the longer warriors stay in a fight, the more dangerous they become.” (https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/warrior/)

While re-reading the description, I realized that warriors don’t really fit their description. They’re users of many weapons, but don’t really have anything stand-out that would make them ‘masters’. Also, their adrenaline doesn’t really make them more dangerous the longer they’re in a fight – rather than them constantly getting more dangerous (a steady increase in power), it’s more like a sine wave (as warriors get more powerful, then weak, then more powerful, then weak, and so on).

Since the Warrior could certainly use some attention, I thought maybe a good way to do so would be to go back and actually have the Warrior fit its description. Here’s what I’m thinking:

Battle Momentum – a Warrior gains X stacks of Battle Momentum for each bar of Adrenaline spent, whenever he spends Adrenaline. Maximum Y stacks.

This buff could have various effects tied to it. It could offer increased movement speed, increased damage dealt, decreased damage taken, increased healing received, give a little healing, or any number of things that could improve or help the Warrior. I’m not sure exactly what effect(s) Battle Momentum should have, but I do have one that I like in particular: reducing weapon swap time.

For example, if you have the Warrior gain 1 stack of it per Adrenaline bar spent, then you could cap the stacks at 5 and have each stack reduce weapon swap time by 1 second. In other words, spending 5 bars of adrenaline would give you the equivalent of Fast Hands.
(It would also be possible to have something like gaining 4 stacks of Battle Momentum per bar of Adrenaline spent, and each stack reduces weapon swap recharge by 0.25 seconds. The cap would then be 20 stacks. This would be equivalent to the above, but more stacks means you can play around with more effects and their magnitudes.)

I think this could be a great change. Since there’d be more than one way to get a major reduction in weapon swap time, Fast Hands would go from ‘needed’ to simply ‘powerful’. Some builds would still greatly prefer Fast Hands, whereas other Warrior builds could rely on Battle Momentum alone for their weapon swap needs.

Battle Momentum could also help make traits based upon Adrenline to be a bit more consistent. For example, you could have traits like Cleansing Ire, Peak Performance, and Adrenal Health based upon Battle Momentum instead of Adrenaline. Since Battle Momentum won’t rise and fall like Adrenaline does, it offers a way to make Warriors more powerful consistently.

While I don’t think the above changes (adding Battle Momentum and having it decrease Weapon Swap time) would fix the Warrior entirely, I do think they would help bring the Warrior closer to how it is advertised. Battle Momentum represents the Warrior getting more powerful as a battle goes on, it allows the Warrior to keep that increase in power over the course of the battle, and it allows the Warrior to show its mastery over weaponry via faster swapping between them (something already attributed to Warriors in GW2).

So…what do you all think? Is Battle Momentum a good idea? If it is, what sorts of bonuses should it give the Warrior?

Before I begin, please note that I’m not making this comparison to see ‘which is better’. I’m making it because I think comparing specializations and traits of both classes could not only help us understand each class better, but also for what it means for a class to be healthy or unhealthy in GW2 when it comes to traits / specializations.

To begin, let’s look at the Revenant.

The traits for the Revenant are about perfect for GW2 – they’re useful without being necessary. Stability on dodge and Rite of the Great Dwarf also reducing condition damage are both great, but the Revenant can work without them. Devastation is great for increasing your damage, but there’s not anything in the specialization that’s a ‘must-have’ for Revenants. Condition removal on roll in Salvation is great, but you can also find 10-second condition removal in Invocation as well. You’ve got many options and you aren’t forced to take any of them (aside from Herald if you want to use Shield/Legendary Dragon Stance, but a similar restriction is there for all elite specializations).

The traits for the Warrior are flawed – they’re incredibly powerful on a class overly reliant on them. You need to use your weapons in tandem, so you need Discipline; you need offense, so you take Strength; you need sustain, so you take Defense; you need group support, you take Tactics. What you want out of your Warrior determines what Specializations you’re forced to take. Trying to avoid this often leads to significant sacrifices.

When you start comparing the two, you start to see why they’re so different. A Revenant is improved by their traits; a Warrior is made or broken by theirs.

With a Revenant, every line is unnecessary but useful, so choosing specializations/traits becomes a matter if ‘what bonuses can I get? What do I want to improve or specialize in?’ In other words, Specializations are exactly that – ways to specialize your Revenant.

With a Warrior, you have too many seemingly necessary traits, so choosing specializations/traits becomes a matter of ‘what am I willing to go without? What can I afford to lose?’ In other words, Specializations are necessary tools – ways to determine the limit of what your Warrior can do.

This difference, I think, is a key difference between a healthy and unhealthy class in GW2. A class that cannot stand on its own uses traits to carry it; a class that can uses traits to improve it.

In my eyes, this means that the Revenant is healthy – it can stand on its own and can take traits to improve itself further in certain aspects. It is by no means perfect, and some some builds are certainly better than others. However, there are no ‘necessary’ traits – there is no one trait (or multiple traits) that the Revenant is forced to take.

Conversely, this also means that the Warrior is unhealthy – it cannot stand on its own, so it is forced into taking certain, powerful specializations/traits to make up for its shortcomings.

Ironically, both healthy and unhealthy classes lead to build variety. The devil is in the details though – one of these reasons is acceptable, whereas the other is not.

For the Revenant, build variety is possible because they have freedom – they aren’t tied down to a particular specialization or forced to take a particular trait. This kind of build variety is good.

For the Warrior, build variety is possible because people simply give up – if they are forced to take too many specializations and traits, builds become impossible or unfun, which can lead to simply throwing up one’s hands and hoping the build you like is bearable. This kind of build variety is bad.

Conclusion / Summary / tl;dr

Healthy classes in GW2 are those who are effective from the start and can specialize through Specializations. Unhealthy classes in GW2 are those who are less effective from the start and try to shore up their shortcomings through Specializations. While both lead to build variety, only the kind brought about by healthy classes should be deemed acceptable.

It is my hope that Anet makes an effort to improve the health of its classes. I do not think a wealth of traits and specializations can truly make up for an impoverished class.

I feel the Berserker is an ‘offensive’ specialization akin to Strength and Arms. Since the Warrior has some mandatory specializations (Tactics for dungeons, Discipline for everything) this means that the Berserker often competes for a spot with Strength. However, right now it feels like trading Strength for Berserker is a downgrade in damage, and Berserker isn’t nearly as useful as Strength is.

Strength:
1) is effective for both power and condition builds.
2) combines wonderfully with Tactics for support in dungeons/raids
3) offers cooldown reduction one of the warrior’s best weapons (greatsword)
4) makes the warrior much more powerful, even on its own

The Berserker simply can’t compare. Whether you want damage or support, you’re probably better of taking Strength – especially if you’re doing pve.

To help make Berserker more competitive, I think that the Berserker should grant might (or have a chance to grant might) on critical hits while in Berserk mode. This would give it a much-needed boost in damage, have more synergy with Tactics, make it a viable option in pve builds, and ultimately promote more build and weapon diversity (since you wouldn’t be tied to Strength and greatsword).

Although I don’t want to go in-depth on everything, I wanted to offer my thoughts on the Revenant.

Specializations / Traits

Devastation: Overall, I feel Devastation is in a good spot and only requires minor tweaks. The minor traits are fantastic. The Adept traits are fine except for Vicious Lascerations, which feels extremely underwhelming; it could use a buff or different effect. The Master traits are fine except for Nefarious Momentum, which feels wholly underwhelming compared to Assassin’s Presence; I recommend Nefarious Moment increasing might on any stance skill, not just assassin stance skills. The Grandmaster traits are fine except for Assassin’s Annihilation, which doesn’t proc as much as it should, needs to be more visible, or both.

Salvation: there are very few things I like about this specialization. Condition removal on dodge roll and access to blinds are great for any Revenant. Aside from that, though, I think this specialization is terrible. You have multiple traits competing for one another for the same role (such as Nourishing Roots and Tranquil Balance competing for healing), only 1 minor trait that works for multiple specializations, a grandmaster that has practically zero synergy with Shiro’s elite skill, and the specialization itself is very boring. Even if you made it on the level of Druid, it still wouldn’t be interesting – almost all of the traits are variations on ‘increasing healing done to allies’. There are numerous ways to support one’s allies, so there’s no need for Salvation to be such a one-trick pony. I’d like to see a lot more variety and creativity in this specialization, because as it is right now I don’t think I’d touch it (or enjoy using it, if I had to use it).

Corruption: an interesting specialization. It has some neat stuff, but nearly all of it seems situational or questionable. I must admit, I like this specialization without fully knowing whether or not it’s extremely good or incredibly underwhelming. I’d need more time with it before I feel I could make an accurate assessment. I will say this, though: the changes made from the previous BWE were very welcome.

Retribution: this specialization almost rivals the Dwarf stance. What I mean is that it is more defensive and it has a lot of great stuff, but it still manages to seem a bit underwhelming. You gain endurance when struck!…but only a small amount, and only once every 10 seconds. You gain stability on a dodge!….but it barely lasts any time at all. You can choose to be healed when struck!….but the healing is insignificant. About the only trait that feels ‘right’ is Redeeming Protection – every other trait is either underwhelming (needs a buff), has too long of a ICD, or just isn’t interesting. This specialization could use some work before HoT.

Invocation: this specialization has me very conflicted. One the one hand, it has some really neat stuff in it – the bonuses concerning fury, stun-break and condition removal on legend swap, healing on skill use, and different effects based on energy remaining all sound great on paper. However, in practice a lot of these are either underwhelming, tricky to use, or have large negatives attached to them. Swapping to your other legend is a very serious decision, so using it purely for a stun break seems like a bad idea, even though a 10 second stun break seems really good on paper. The healing on skill use is underwhelming, even for its low ICD. The different effects based on energy level seem like a good idea, but they’re both tricky to use and underwhelming when you do use them. Lastly, I find it strange that legend swap doesn’t get the 15% cooldown reduction anywhere, although considering you can attach powerful effects to it I suppose I could understand it. Ultimately, I don’t know what quite needs done for this specialization, but I do think it could use another look-over before HoT.

Herald: undoubtedly my favorite specialization, and quite possibly one of the Revenant’s best. It has amazing synergy not only within itself, but also with the other specializations. It’s got great traits, and its F2 (Facet of Nature) is not only useful but it can be used in both legends (which is not only useful and effective, but also kind of brings home the idea that your elite specialization permeates the experience, just as it should). About the only complaint I have about it is Bolster Fortifications (protection on healing skill). This actually has anti-synergy with Glint’s healing skill, and it’s very underwhelming considering the elite Facet constantly grants protection. I’d recommend changing it to something more useful.

Weapons

Overall, the weapons felt much better. Staff #5 is still a bit awkward at times, but overall most of the weapons feel like they’re in a good spot (to me, at least).

My only real complaint when it comes to weapons is that there isn’t a ranged option for condition builds (outside of water combat). Adding a trait that adds conditions to hammer skills could be a solution (and a worthy grandmaster for the Corruption line).

Stances

Assassin: overall, a very solid stance. Mobility, damage, an elite stun – they all work and fit well. Probably one of the best stances available to the Revenant right now. I don’t have any recommendations for changes for this stance.

Centaur: in my eyes, this is easily the Revenant’s worst stance. It’s slow, clunky, gimmicky, and just not fun to play. I’d start by auto-summoning the tablet as soon as you enter the stance, alter the way the tablet moves (speed up its movement or have it teleport), and…well, just make it more satisfying to use. As of right now, this is the absolute last stance I would take for either pvp or pve.

Demon: admittedly, I didn’t play this stance all this much last BWE. However, I still consider it better than Centaur due to one key difference: it deals with conditions. Revenants have a real weakness for conditions, so even if I don’t have a condi build (or even take any points in Corruption) this stance still might find its way on my bar. This is both a positive point for the stance, and a worrisome point for the class as a whole. If the Revenant’s weakness to conditions is so strong that you’d be willing to give up one of your two stances just to deal with them, perhaps that’s not a good sign.

Dwarf: a good stance, but I feel it doesn’t quite match up to Assassin or Dragon. Weakness, stability, taunts, slows, damage reduction, a heal that cures conditions – they all sound great. But somehow it just seems underwhelming compared the Revenant’s two best stances. Whether you want defense or support, Dragon seems to have it beat, and its offense doesn’t come close to touching Assassin’s. This leaves Dwarf stance as a good stance without a niche to fill. As a result, I didn’t find much use for it in the BWE. I’ll probably use it as a Herald replacement until I hit 80, and then drop it for good. I don’t quite know what it needs to stand out, but I definitely think it needs something.

Dragon: in my eyes, the Revenant’s best stance and easily my favorite one. In essence, it’s kind of like a jack of all trades – it offers some offense, but not to the level of Assassin; it offers some defense, but not as directly as Dwarf; it offers support, without the clunkiness of Centaur. As a result, it’s a great compliment to any other stance, it works well in any game mode, it’s got a lot of depth to it, and it comes with great visuals (I LOVE that magic circle on the ground showing which facets are active). Energy management was a tad difficult, but that’s only because I haven’t had more than a few days playing the class (and everything’s so good I want to use it all). Its biggest weakness is a weakness to conditions – just like the Revenant itself. As a result, I’d say it’s powerful without being too much so. This is easily my favorite elite specialization in the entire game, and I have no recommendations to offer for it.

I greatly enjoyed the Berserker this weekend. The traits were much improved, with less ‘obvious’ choices for traits to pick, and I felt like it’s a great addition to the Warrior.

Things done right for Berserker:
- the new Smash Brawler trait is amazing; it makes the Berserker feel a lot more smooth/fast if you’re using Berserker primarily for the primal bursts
- the traits overall are much improved; I can see use for pretty much all of them
- the Torch feels much better overall. The increased distance on Torch 4, for example, felt like it ended too early last BWE, so this time around it felt just right
- primal bursts (except for Hammer’s) feel much better, especially greatsword’s and axe’s

Remaining issues of the Berserker:
- Hammer’s primal burst is bad. A knockdown would make more sense, be more effective, and would have more synergy with the hammer trait (as well as traits that knockdown / knock-back). Since knockdown is a bit stronger than immobilize, some other things about the primal burst may need to be changed to take this into account.
- the Dead or Alive trait doesn’t seem to do enough for the ICD it has. I recommend either lowering (or possibly eliminating) its ICD, or greatly increase its healing
- the healing skill is still underwhelming; it could be good, but too many factors hold it back. There are many changes you could do – have it pulse bleeding to nearby foes, making the user immune to blinds, making your attacks unblockable, etc. As I don’t want to make it too powerful, though, I think it should have a cast time decrease and a small second heal when the effect ends. These changes make it easier to use and less punishing if you can’t get enough healing through damage alone. Hopefully, this will make it more reliable against foes who can easily cheese the ability in pvp and it shouldn’t have too much of an impact in pve.
- without Smash Brawler, the Berserker doesn’t feel quite right to me. This may be personal preference, but I need both Discipline (decreased burst cooldown) and Smash Brawler to feel like I am using my primal bursts enough. Because of this, Smash Brawler is the obvious choice for me for Berserker, even though I love using multiple Rage skills in a condi build. I’m not quite sure what needs to be done here, as I don’t want Smash Brawler to go away, but I feel the other skills should be more competition. I think if the burning was increased on the Rage skills, that’d probably be a good start, but I’m not quite sure what should be done beyond that.

And that’s it for me. The only negatives I really see for the Berserker is one bad primal burst, a trait that needs a little boost, a heal that needs a little help, and an issue that very well may be my personal preference.

But the conversation can’t just end like that, because the Berserker is still having issues beyond that. If you look in this thread, you’ll see things such as “Discipline is mandatory”, “I can’t give up Defense because I don’t have sustain”, and “I can’t give up Strength because I want to do damage”. The reason I haven’t addressed these before is because I was only addressing problems with the Berserker before. These are problems with the Warrior.

(Some) Remaining issues of the Warrior:
1. little sustain without taking Defense
2. greatly decreased damage without taking Strength
3. Discipline is almost mandatory to take for Fast Hands
4. Tactics is almost mandatory for dungeons
5. Greatsword greatly overshadows other weapons in dungeons, due to Phalanx Strength & Forceful Greatsword

With these issues, you can start to see why people are complaining about such things as a Berserker. When you add the Berserker specialization, you only have 2 specializations to work with. Since Discipline is mandatory for most (and especially important for Berserkers), that leaves you with 1 specialization to work with. You want sustain? Give up damage and grab Defense. You want damage? Grab Strength and give up something else. You want to help out in dungeons? Grab Strength and Tactics, and drop Berserker, because it really can’t compete damage-wise or support-wise.

Right now, the Berserker can really only choose 1 specialization because right now the Warrior can really only choose 2. If you truly want the Berserker to be in a better spot, then you need to put the warrior in a better spot.

Here are some recommendations that could help with these issues:
- make Fast Hands baseline for the Warrior. Since this Minor Trait is the reason why this Discipline is practically mandatory, it makes sense to just take it out and give it to Warriors. The build diversity for an entire class shouldn’t be so terribly crippled by single trait, let alone a minor one. This recommendation would help fix #3, as Discipline would no longer become mandatory (but instead just be a really good specialization that synergizes incredibly well with Berserker).
- let critical hits in Berserk mode grant Might, or have a chance to grant Might. This change would reduce the Berserker’s reliance on Strength for pure damage (#2) and Strength+Tactics for dungeon runs (#4 & #5) without overshadowing/replacing those choices entirely.
- upon entering Berserk mode, have a ‘Berserker Stance’-like effect for a few seconds (maybe ~2?). This makes sense, gives Berserkers a little more sustain versus conditions, and can easily be fitted in given that Berserk mode already gives the Berserker a few buffs upon entering the mode. This recommendation, in addition to buffing the Dead or Alive trait, should help reduce the Berserker’s reliance on Defense (#1).

tl;dr
The Berserker is much-improved, but still needs work. It still has a few issues itself, in addition to some issues caused by it being tied to the Warrior. I recommend the following to fix these issues:
- change Hammer’s primal burst to a knockdown
- increase the healing of the Dead or Alive trait, or either decrease or eliminate its ICD
- change Blood Reckoning so it gives a second (small) heal when the effect expires and has a lower cast time
- (possibly) increase burn damage on the Last Blaze trait
- let critical hits in Berserk mode either grant might or have a chance to grant might
- give a Berserker Stance effect for a couple seconds upon entering Berserk mode
- make Fast Hands baseline for Warrior

Setting yourself on fire to become more powerful?

That’s an idea I can get behind…especially considering who I main’d in Borderlands 2.

I just wanted to pop in and say thanks for all the changes! They look great, and seem to address a lot of the issues that myself and many others were seeing with the Reaper.

Also, the transparency is very, very refreshing. Even if the changes are subject to change, knowing what you guys are working on (or aren’t) and why is incredibly nice.

Keep up the great work!

No ‘play-your-way’ – Although you get experience for everything, nothing seems to be enough. Pvp doesn’t offer enough to be a true replacement for leveling, and experience you get from any one source doesn’t seem like it’s enough to level up at a good pace. Although you can ‘choose’ how to level up, if you want to level up at any decent rate you’ll need to do several things at once (which sort of defeats the purpose of being able to level up how you want).
No Dungeons till 30 – Dungeons are great for many reasons, as I listed in the pros. So why, then, don’t we unlock them till 30? They’d be great for gearing and leveling up lower-level characters, as well as introducing them to group play much earlier. I’ve seen mmo’s with much earlier dungeons available, so I don’t see why GW2 has to falter in this regard.
Unbalanced – In pvp at least, things do not seem balanced at all. Guardians either pose no threat or are incredibly squishy and Rangers are a joke. Meanwhile, you have Elementalists, which seem to barely take damage and can heal themselves from any damage you do manage to deal them. Other classes seem to vary wildly. I know Balance is an ongoing thing, but for how long GW2 has been out, I really thought this would’ve been a bit better by now.

The Ugly

No mounts / slow speed – Out of all the things wrong with GW2, there is only one thing that has ever made me go “Really? Are you kittening kidding me?”; that is this point. Who on earth thought that having a large world to explore and then not giving any good means to explore it was a good idea? Instead of a standard solution to this – mounts, which would go incredibly well with the in-game store (mount customization and the like) – we get all these strange work-arounds that inconvenience everyone. You can eat up one of your utilities for a signet that makes you run faster, alter your build to accommodate a trait that increases your speed, use up one of your weapon choices so you can supply yourself with swiftness, or be a Guardian running around yelling “Retreat!” all the time (which, even worse, is pretty much their only option). It’s ridiculous, and with such a standard solution in place that so many other mmo’s have had for years, it’s simply inexcusable. The fact that things are like this in GW2 is just incomprehensible to me.
Armor does nothing vs conditions – The potential downfall of having simplified stats is that you might miss something. In GW2, this is defense vs conditions. To be blunt, it’s completely black & white: either you have the means to cleanse the conditions put on you, or they eat you alive with you having no idea what happened. Toughness – the stat that’s supposed to mitigate damage – does nothing. You can build the mightiest tank, but all that health and armor means nothing because there’s a kind of damage you simply can’t mitigate – and that just doesn’t seem right.
Guardian’s Shield is horrible – I was glad to see the Warrior’s shield to be as effective as it is, and both surprised and pleased to see the shield options (plural) for Engineers. So Guardians – the defensive class, the class that poses with a shield – should have mastered the shield and have the best abilities with it, right? It seems so obvious. Well, I guess it wasn’t too obvious. The Guardian’s shield isn’t just the most underwhelming, ineffective, annoying, and non-fun shield in the entire game, it’s also probably the worst off-hand in the entire game. As someone who was actually looking forward to playing a Guardian with a shield, you can only imagine my complete and utter disappointment.
(Future) Weapons from Elite Specializations are 80-only – Perhaps this one is unfair to comment on now, as Heart of Thorns isn’t out yet, but as a new player who heard about this I thought I should speak up. This is terrible for new players. If I want to play a Reaper – a melee death-bringer – I don’t want to play 79 levels of caster before I can swing around a greatsword. If I want to play a Dragonhunter, I don’t want to wave around a scepter or twirl around a staff for 79 levels before I can use a bow. You learn things about your character, your build, and so on as you level up; I’ve no idea why you’d want to take that learning experience away from players as they level up their class (not to mention all the fun you have of leveling up). For an mmo that seems to prize itself on giving players choice and freedom, being locked out of something rather integral – something that completely changes the way you play the class – for 79 levels seems absurd.

WvW – A unique and fun game mode that I haven’t begun to scratch the surface of, despite me playing several matches. I can tell this mode has a ton of depth to be discovered and fun to be had, so I’m definitely glad GW2 has it.
XP for basically everything – I love how you can choose how you want to level up. Want to go exploring? Do it. Want to just kill a bunch of stuff? You can do that too. And the events that pop up are rewarding and interesting as well (at least, the first couple times you do them).
Dungeons – Dungeons are great in GW2. They’ve got great rewards, you get tons of loot, they’re tied to the story, and they’re challenging (when going down paths). Although the last point may fade as I get better at GW2, I feel dungeons will be something I continue to do as I play GW2.
Teleporting / Waypoints – Before GW2, I never realized that MMO’s had accustomed me to such slow travel. Now that I’ve experienced GW2, I’m not sure I can go back. Being able to get nearly anywhere you need to go (or close to it) in seconds, given that you’ve been there before, is huge. It saves time. It lets me spend more time playing the game, rather than watching my character take transportation. I could gush about this for awhile, but I think you guys get the picture already.
Lack of Open-world pvp (also con) – Being able to level up how you want without fear of ganking or spending several hours with some high-level-with-nothing-better-to-do standing over your corpse or killing all your important NPCs is quite nice. It’s also nice how it doesn’t split up the servers into pve/pvp like you normally see in mmo’s. However, there is a downside to this…which I’ll be covering in the next section.

The Bad

Lack of Open-world pvp (also pro) – As nice as a lack of open-world pvp is, it feels as if there’s something missing without it. The excitement of seeing that enemy player, not yet knowing what he’ll do or if you could take him in a fight. The excitement of hunting an enemy player, or the restlessness of not knowing whether or not you’re being hunted. There are exciting times and moments to be had with open-world pvp, and GW2 doesn’t have any.
No Respecs / Variety till high-level – Level 71 is really brutal for having 3 specializations active. In addition to that, the fact that you can’t respec if you’ve gone down a wrong path means that any mistakes you make with a character are permanent until they’re a very high level (where you’ll be swimming in Hero Points). This makes it so you can only really switch roles/playstyles when leveled up, meaning all that variety and fun is locked away until you’re high enough.
Weapon swap is too slow for most classes – Barring the [Discipline] Warrior, Engineer, and Elementalist, weapon swap is just too slow. Swapping between weapons is fun and effective, and putting such a long cooldown on it seems excessive and restrictive. Each time you weapon swap makes it seem more like you’re locking yourself into a set of options, rather than giving yourself more options to use.
….Living Story 2? – Living Story 2 for $20? What is that? And why is GW2 locking away content behind a paywall? I thought the in-game store was for convenience items & services, so I’m not sure what ‘Living Story 2’ is doing there or why it costs so much. The only reason why this point is in The Bad rather than The Ugly is because I feel like there’s some history or information that I’m simply missing here – and unfortunately, GW2 itself doesn’t really do any explaining in that regard. Speaking of which….
Lack of a tutorial & useful descriptions – GW2 doesn’t seem to explain a whole lot. Not in the in-game store, not as you level up, not even in the Personal Story. It seems to expect its players to just….know. While that may be fine for veterans, that’s needlessly intimidating and confusing for newcomers.
Inventory management – Managing your inventory can be a huge pain. While there are a couple bags that try to help you out, they’re either imperfect or irrelevant. Junk and materials bags are useless, since it’s so easy to deposit all materials & sell all junk regardless of where it is in your inventory. Equipment bags seem like they’d be good for equipping different weapons from your inventory, but they only work so long as you don’t pick up other weapons as loot (so they don’t really work well at all). Invisible bags are nice, and do their job, but only having 1 bag type that works well is rather bleak for inventory management. Honestly, I’d like to see something like soul-bound bags (bags where only soul-bound items can go in), but I don’t think there’s a perfect solution no matter what kind of bag is introduced.

I’ve been playing for a little over a month now, so I should hopefully be able to offer my experiences and views on things as a newer player as useful feedback. I may not get to everything, but I’ve tried to give feedback on everything I can think of. Note that I started around June 23rd, so practically all of my GW2 experience has been from then on.

To make it more organized (and hopefully more interesting), I’ll be splitting my feedback into 3 sections:
The Good (feedback on what GW2 does well)
The Bad (feedback on what GW2 doesn’t do well)
The Ugly (issues I simply can’t believe are in GW2)

The Good

Weapons matter – I absolutely love how weapons completely change what abilities you get and how you play. Mixing and matching weapons, trying out various 2-handed ones, and finding out which weapons work for you is a great joy and very refreshing after coming from other mmo’s (where weapons are usually little more than another way to get stats).
Weapon swap is awesome – Weapons matter, so having the ability to swap them in combat is even more so. Even on classes where there are no weapon swap (Engineer, Elementalist), the ‘mechanic’ is still there, and for good reason – it’s fun and offers great variety.
No having tons of action bars – Having everything on one bar (plus a little one for profession-specific stuff) is pretty sweet, and makes it so I don’t have to worry about using a mouse with 18 buttons on its side.
Classes are unique, or are great takes on ‘standard’ classes – The classes of GW2 are among the best I’ve seen in an mmo, either being unique themselves (like Engineers and Mesmers) or stellar takes on old favorites (like Warriors & Elementalists).
Classes can have many roles – Each class is so versatile, and it’s nice to see so many build options. Support Warrior? Melee Elementalist? There are lots of fun options out there.
Classes can switch out builds, utilities, etc on the fly out of combat – Further making classes versatile is the ability to change things on the fly. The fact that you can do this not only with weapons and utilities, but also your elite and your entire build is impressive and very welcome.
No ‘Tank-Healer-DPS’ Trinity – The lack of the trinity is fantastic, as it makes getting people for dungeons easier and certain classes aren’t discriminated against (or at least, not to the level I’ve seen in other mmo’s). It also makes it so PVP isn’t simply a matter of ‘who has more healers’, which is very, very nice to see.
‘Simplified’ Stats – I love how the stats work in GW2. The best example of this is Power; I love how it increases damage regardless of whether it’s being dealt with blade or spell. In fact, it’s probably this that makes magic/melee classes (like Guardian and Elementalist) viable in GW2…I can’t imagine how bad it’d be trying to get good stats if they were split up physically & magically like a lot of mmo’s do.
Art style / designs are great – Designs for characters, monsters, areas, etc are great and have a lot of variety.
Personal Story – MMO’s aren’t known for their story, so to see one that’s actually interesting – let alone pretty good – is a very nice change, especially since it’s one where your character actually plays a role in.
Trading Post is awesome – I love pretty much everything about the Trading Post – how you can make money in it, how you can get most stuff for relatively cheap, how easy it is to sell items to it, etc.
Inventory goes a long way – Depositing materials directly into your bank & selling stuff anywhere (via trading post) is great, and goes a long way to alleviating the inventory issues you often see in MMO’s. Plus it’s just incredibly convenient, which is always a plus.
No Subscription – I must admit, this is probably the main reason why I risked my money on an MMO I’ve never played before. Subscriptions are pricey and F2P is deceptively so (even when done well), so an MMO that relies on neither model is ideal to me. Aside from this being the reason why I risked my money, this will also be one of the key reasons why I plan on playing for a long time.
Pvp right away – being able to access pvp so early on is amazing for so many reasons – it allows you to see how the class performs in pvp, it allows you to play around with all the builds you want, and it allows you to start having fun in pvp right away. While doing pvp so early on was an intimidating prospect as a newer player, having played some more I can see this was definitely the right decision. (The pvp tutorial, while short, is also nice for easing new players into pvp. I’m glad I wasn’t thrown into a match right away with absolutely no idea what to do.)

I agree completely – I’m all for making FH baseline.

It’d make Warriors both more fun and more effective, and I don’t think that’d be a bad thing.

starlinvf.1358:

- snip -

Thank you for the well thought-out and lengthy response. It was very helpful in making my decision and trying out both classes with several builds. I hope you’ll forgive my late response – I wanted a chance to try out both classes a decent amount before making my decision.

I ultimately decided on Warrior, as it was closer to what I was looking for and I had a bit more fun with the class overall.

Hey all, I’m fairly new to Guild Wars 2 and I’m trying to decide which class to main – Guardian or Warrior. I’ve tried out each class for a bit and I’m still undecided as to which class I want to focus on. Ultimately, I’m looking for a class/build that will work for pve & pvp without changing much (constantly switching out weapons, utilities, & traits), and I want to be capable of the following:
- providing allies with offensive support
- providing allies with defensive support
- providing allies with some healing
- dealing good damage
- having great sustain/durability/defense
- having both melee and ranged options

My playstyle is to primarily stay in melee, but have the option to attack foes from afar so I can wade in and out of melee as I please (as well as adapt to whatever my opponent is doing). I’m not expecting to be fantastic or amazing in any one respect (since I do want to do a bit of everything), but I’d like to be effective enough overall to be an asset to the team, as well as be able to handle some things solo.

To an extent, I think both classes can do this and fulfill the above.

For my Guardian, I’m using Mace/Shield & Scepter/Torch, and I think my future build would be Radiance/Honor/V (where V would be either Valor or Virtue – not sure which one). I go for crits (for damage & support), and I often find myself using Signets and Shouts. I use my Mace/Shield for fantastic durability, some regen, and to take the heat off my allies when I need to; I use my Scepter/Torch for pretty much everything else. In melee, I can freely swap weapon sets due to how good Scepter/Torch is even in melee.

For my Warrior, I’m using Mace/Shield & Rifle, and I think my future build would be Arms/Defense/Discipline. I use the Rifle to pull enemies and damage groups (with pierce), and I switch to the Mace/Shield when enemies make it to melee range (where I’ve got more defensive options and deadly stuns). I switch between both weapons frequently as the situation demands. I’m a big fan of both banners and shouts, but I like banners slightly better (so I’m aiming for a banner warrior).

The issue I’m having is that even after playing both of them for a bit, I haven’t found the right fit yet.

My Guardian is pretty close to what I want, but ranged combat is very unsatisfying (slow orbs aren’t terribly fun or exciting, and I didn’t like Staff). In addition, the lack of a speed boost is not fun at all, and I’m still undecided on what build would be best for my playstyle / what I want. While the second issue is somewhat mitigated by spamming Retreat! all the time, I don’t know if I want that shout on my utility bar all the time. I’m also worried that the first issue (unsatisfying ranged combat) isn’t something that’s going to change as a Guardian, even as I level up. [I know of Dragonhunter, but the traits look terrible, I’m not a fan of bows at all, and I don’t think it’s even out yet, so I don’t really consider that an option.]

My Warrior is pretty much exactly what I’m looking for for melee & ranged combat, but I’m not sure if the Warrior has as much durability and defensive support as I’d like. At lower levels at least, my Guardian is far, far, far more durable than my Warrior (although to be fair, my Warrior doesn’t have any points in Defense yet). I also don’t know if a single defensive banner is enough to really be considered ‘defensive support’ – especially since I don’t know if I’d have enough durability to go Mace/Shield and take some heat off of allies when the situation calls for it. Lastly, I’m not a fan of how I have to switch between Warrior’s Sprint and Crack Shot while moving around maps (this may also be a bigger concern in pvp), and how I can’t carry multiple multiple banners at a time.

So, does Guardian ranged combat get any better? Do they have ranged attacks/options I’m not aware of? Can warriors get a lot of durability? Can they offer enough defensive support? Does the lack of Warrior’s Sprint in melee really hurt in pvp if you can switch between ranged and melee easily?

Any help or insight into this matter would be appreciated. I’ve been wracking my brain for awhile trying to decide between these two classes, and I just can’t figure out which one to focus on.