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Reaper BWE2 Feedback

in Necromancer

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

I couldn’t find a central feedback thread, so I’ll just leave this here and trust a mod to merge it if a central feedback thread turns up

Specialisation: Reaper
Overall:

  • Was it fun: Yes, very much so.
  • Did it change how I play necromancer in a meaningful way: Yes. Necromancer has alway felt like a medium-range class, and Reaper really puts the necro right up in their enemy’s face, and the dogged pursuit aspect is an interesting playstyle.
  • Reaper Shroud is a fun.

Mechanic (Reaper Shroud):

  • Reaper Shroud is a great mechanic – very much in the style of reaper shroud, but different enough to feel new. the melee focus works with the reaper’s theme, and all of the skills are useful at one time or another. also, a kitten scythe – what more can you ask for?
  • Life Rend -> Life Slash -> Life Reap : a really nice basic attack chain, with a good number of targets.
  • Death’s Charge: the reaper is a slow moving spec, so having this long-range dash is really nice. also the animation is really well done.
  • Infusing Terror: this skill really helps with the whole unstoppable feel of the reaper, and the pulsing stability makes it hard to slow the reaper down.
  • Soul Spiral: a nice AoE attack, with decently high damage. the high cooldown means you won’t use it more than once per shroud, which is probably fair.
  • Executioner’s Scythe a really nice finishing blow – high damage, a short stun, and it does more damage against weaker enemies, making it a perfect last-hit move. the ice field is also a nice addition.

Weapon (Greatsword):

  • Overall: The greatsword is a nice heavy hitting melee weapon, which gives the necromancer a decent high-damage close-combat weapon.
  • Dusk Strike -> Fading Twilight -> Chilling Scythe: a nice, slow-moving auto attack chain, but the damage buff from the last beta has really brought the DPS back into line.
  • Gravedigger: another slow-moving attack, justified by the high damage and awesome animation. another of the better against weak enemy moves.
  • Death Spiral: a good set-up skill which does decent damage and applies a nice chunk of vulnerability to an enemy. makes a good opening move.
  • Nightfall: a nice change to the rest of the greatsword, this skill helps with defending, providing some damage mitigation on an otherwise all-in offensive weapon.
  • Grasping Darkness: an interesting gap closer, which keeps the slow moving theme going by pulling the enemy to you, and not the other way round. fits well with the theme and works well with the specialisation.

Skills (Shouts):

  • “Your soul is mine!”: the heal itself is nothing special, but the damage is nice, as is the life force generation.
  • “Nothing can save you!”: a really nice counter against a defensively-buffed enemy, and the unblockable is really nice.
  • “Suffer!”: the chill and condition transfer are nice, but it really shines when combined with the deathly chill trait.
  • “You are all weaklings!”: a good self-buffing skill, and the weakness is just a nice bonus. really helps the reaper shine in solo play.
  • “Rise!”: this is another good shout, covering both defence and offense, and works really well against multiple enemies. the shambling horrors make good distractions too.
  • “Chilled to the bone!”: an AoE stun is never something to sniff at, but this works really well with the reaper.

Traits:
Adept:

  • Minor – Shroud Knight: gives all the Reaper stuff, not much else to say.
  • Major – Augury of Death: an interesting take on the X skills recharge faster the better you are with the shouts, the more you can use them.
  • Major – Chilling Nova: helps to spread chill, which is a nice touch.
  • Major – Relentless Pursuit: takes the unstoppable horror idea and turns it into resistance to movement-imparing conditions. simple enough in theory, but it fits really well.
    Master:
  • Minor – Shivers of Dread: more chill. lots of chill kicking about. still, getting one condition from another is a nice idea.
  • Major – Soul Eater: a little lifesteal on each greatsword hit. the numbers a kind low though – and even though it is on every greatsword hit, it’s let down a little by the fact that the greatsword is a very slow weapon – it could handle some more lifesteal-per-hit without becoming too strong.
  • Major – Chilling Victory: this is a nice might-stacking skill, and really does shine when up against several opponents. the life force generation is also nice.
  • Major – Decimate Defences: I like the idea of this, but the tooltip seems to be lacking some info – is there a limit to how high this can stack? how long does it last? also, testing this in game I don’t see any change to my critical chance when hitting an enemy who is suffering from vulnerability. bugged possibly?
    Grandmaster:
  • Minor – Cold Shoulder Longer chill – and we’re now seeing a bunch of extra effects on chill which synergises really well with some of the other skills/traits reaper has.
  • Major – Blighter’s Boon: rewarding the reaper for having boons is an interesting move, as we’ve not seen necromancer being this boon-focused before. rewarding that playstyle gives reaper a different feel, which is nice.
  • Major – Deathly Chill: makes chill do damage. normally, this wouldn’t be such a big thing, but with all the chill Reaper gets, this is actually quite big. also makes chill quite a bit more useful in PvE, which is nice.
  • Major – Reaper’s Onslaught: this one’s gonna provide some incredibly satisfying videos. this trait means that all those once-per-shroud skills have suddenly become once-per-kill skills, and that means killstreaks. It benefits a reaper who is doing well, which is nice, and really helps in outnumbered situations.

Overall, the Reaper feels like a really nice Elite Specialisation. it turns the necromancer from a more distant class into an upfront in-your-face kind of enemy, and give it some quite capable melee options. the skills work well mechanically and thematically, and I’m really looking forward to playing more after launch.

[BW2] Feedback Thread

in Elementalist

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

here’s my feedback – a little long, and probably not all correct (I’m only one person after all), but it’s what I’ve seen (also, note this was mostly PvE, both in and out of the maguuma jungle)

Specialisation: Tempest
Overall:

  • Was it fun: sorta? I think the most fun I had was overcharging earth in safe areas.
  • Did it change how I play elementalist in a meaningful way: sort of? it’s a little more focused on support, but elementalist’s versatile enough that it’s always had access to support. perhaps not as much, perhaps not on all attunements, but this feels like a very slight augmentation, not a new playstyle.
  • The warhorn skills are okay, nothing exceptional.
  • The shouts are hit and miss, with rebound still being in its previous iteration.

Mechanic (Overloads):

  • The overloads are okay, and the ability to move (and to trait to prevent movement impairment) is a nice touch, fixing the whole sitting duck issue they previously had. .
  • Overload Fire: it’s a pretty useful overload. the might’s good, the burning’s nice, and the animation seems to have been toned down a fair bit (perhaps too much? barely looks like fire anymore? I dunno)
  • Overload Water: this is a pretty strong healing skill, and the AoE condition cleansing is quite impressive. no complaints about the animation.
  • Overload Air: this is actually quite nice. the strikes do decent damage, the vulnerability is nice, and the combo field doesn’t hurt.
  • Overload Earth: a decent support option – both disabling enemies and protecting friends. the damage is decent and the (de)buffs are quite useful. also looks kittening awesome.

Weapon (Warhorn):

  • Overall: The warhorn provides a good support weapon for the elementalist, but doesn’t bring anything groundbreaking.
  • Heat Sync: a decent buff-stacking support skill.
  • Wildfire: a reasonable ranged burn/damage skill.
  • Tidal Surge: a nice mix of supports, with a heal and a knockback.
  • Water Globe: an odd skill, and one that would be very situational, but an interesting one nonetheless. decent healing too.
  • Cyclone: the pull doesn’t seem to be working for me (that or it’s just a negligible pull. nice idea though.
  • Lightning Orb: feels like a cluster grenade, but has decent (if unconventional) AoE potential.
  • Sand Squall: a decent buff, protection helps with damage mitigation and the increase in boon duration has some nice potential.
  • Dust Storm: a reasonable utility, helps reduce enemy damage while setting them up to take more.

Skills (Shouts):

  • “Wash the Pain Away”: Decent heal, the AoE part helps with team support.
  • “Feel the Burn”: some burning damage on enemies, and fire shields for allies. a nice defensive shout.
  • “Shock and Aftershock”: disables enemies and grants magnetic aura to allies. a slightly more controll-based defensive shout.
  • “Eye of the Storm”: good area utility. mobility out of combat, stunbreak in combat. a nice skill.
  • “Flash-Freeze”: another defensive shout, but this one chills.
  • “Rebound!”: in its current state, not really worthy of being an elite. the new version we’ve been told about seems a lot more fitting – both in terms of scale and effect.

Traits: In general, I’m pretty happy with the herald traits. none are negligible, and many can be quite powerful in the right circumstances. there also don’t appear to be any that are too strong to the exclusion of the alternatives, which is nice.
Adept:

  • Minor – Singularity: gives all the Herald stuff, not much else to say.
  • Major – Gale Song: a pretty standard use a stunbreak skill on stun kinda trait. works well, nothing much to say.
  • Major – Latent Stamina: hands out vigor in an area when switching to water. helpful for those situations where dodging is important.
  • Major – Unstable Conduit: gives a little bonus to incentivise overloading. simple enough, and I like the idea.
    Master:
  • Minor – Speedy Conduit: gives swiftness on overload. a nice little bonus.
  • Major – Tempestuous Arua: really hammers home the support angle of shouts, shifting the damage ratios in favour of the tempest’s side.
  • Major – Earthen Proxy: gives earth attunement more defence. could be quite powerful, but is reliant on protection.
  • Major – Harmonious Continuity: a recharge reduction for overloaded attunements – takes some of the sting out of overload, but nothing to write home about
    Grandmaster:
  • Minor – Hardy Conduit Protection on overload. gives a little defence after overload draws attention.
  • Major – Imbued Melodies: a somewhat restricted AoE stunbreak for all warhorn skills. used right, this could be incredibly strong. the 20% cooldown reduction just makes it better.
  • Major – Lucid Singularity: basically makes you unstoppable movement wise when overloading. helps with the not getting locked down during overload, which is nice.
  • Major – Elemental Bastion: this really helps with the support angle. turns auras into healing sources, and gives you a little extra survivability. not a bad trait at all

Overall, the Tempest feels a little more solid compared to the previous beta, and I’m really getting the whole support vibe from it. unfortunately, the DPS elementalist is one of if not the best DPS builds in-game, while support elementalist falls short of some of its competition, meaning that tempest isn’t really an optimal choice for the class.

Furthermore, Support isn’t really anything new to elementalist. the entire water attunement is basically healing and chill, with other elements of support found in air and earth too. for the most part, I’m failing to see much of anything new.

Herald holds too much of the Rev's power

in Revenant

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

I’ve been finding that I’m actually preferring revenant without herald. S/S Staff Shiro/Jalis Desolation/Retribution/Invocation feels better to me than herald does, and I find I do more damage. for group support, Herald is clearly better, but that’s the point – it’s a different role.

How do you counter sword 3?

in Revenant

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

I’d say, based on my experience so far, that there are a number of counters:

  • range – the range is pretty short. kite the revenant and they’ll never get to use it
  • block
  • dodge roll
  • evade
  • protection/retaliation
  • apparently walls?
  • be near allies. sure, it doesn’t change the damage, but it shares it out a bit.

and remember, it’s got a cooldown. once they use it, go for them.

Undirectable Skills (feedback)

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

thief heal roll backwards (aimed by Charater facing)
Ranger Gs swoop(aimed by charater facing)
Ranger sword 2 (aimed by Charater facing)

i’d say its fine , just a learning issue.

The last two are diredted to and from the targeted enemy, not by character facing, unless you have a target selected.

this, and the withdraw (the heal skill) is less about going somewhere particular (as attacks should be) and more about being anywhere but here

Central Herald/Revenant Feedback Thread?

in Revenant

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

Just wondering, is there a central thread for beta feedback? and if so, is it all in one place or split between herald and base revenant? thanks.

Daredevil Staff Skin Acquire bug

in Thief

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

as far as I’ve seen, only Berserkers get their class skin in this beta. not sure why.

Undirectable Skills (feedback)

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

over the two BWEs I’ve been in so far, I’ve noticed that a couple of skills have behavior I find quite odd. specifically, Surge of the Mists (Revenant Staff 5) and Weakening Charge (Daredevil Staff 2).

in short, these are nigh impossible to aim. both carry the user forward relative to where the character is facing, which is often hard to determine mid-fight, and both go a fair distance. both skills are difficult to aim properly, and can often plunge the user off a cliff.

I don’t understand why these skills work this way – most other similar skills have either been targetable, so that they are directed at an enemy (such as Rush, Warrior Greatsword 5) or go in a straight line but are directable (such as Whirlwind Attack, Warrior Greatsword 3)

I feel the current implementation for both skills is let down by the difficulty of aiming them, and forces the users to manage not only their resources (Energy/cooldowns or Initiative/endurance), their placement, but also the direction they’re facing, which feels a little overwhelming.

I’d suggest applying either of the directing strategies mentioned above, as either would greatly improve the utility of these skills.

[Feedback - Berserker]

in Warrior

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

Okay, Berserker feedback, here we go.
(note: I’ve not covered the burst skills yet, as I’m doing my best to go through all the new specs over this weekend, so assume I’m neither for nor against them)

Specialisation: Berserker

Overall:

  • Was it fun: not particularly, but I feel this is because it doesn’t suit my playstyle – not because the specialisation itself is lacking
  • Did it change how I play warrior in a meaningful way: No. this specialisation doesn’t seem to change so much as it augments the existing ways to play. various skills and traits allow for more damage, more condition damage/application, or more survivability.
  • I didn’t click with the torch at all, so I can’t really comment here.
  • the placement of the berserk skills are a little strange, making them difficult to click and giving no visual indication that F2 would activate them.

Weapon (Torch):

  • Overall: I didn’t really feel it with the torch, and it doesn’t really work with my style of play. that said, this is more me than the torch, and due to this I don’t feel I can give meaningful feedback for this weapon

Skills (Rage):

  • Blood Reckoning: this seems like a nice skill, though leans more towards burst damage than sustained damage. the conversion isn’t bad, neither too low to be useful nor too high to be dominant. as it is, this seems – like a number of other warrior heals – to be incredibly powerful in the right situation, but not to the point where it’s overpowered.
  • Wild Blow: a nice control skill with potentially hilarious results. the guaranteed crit is nice, and balances the relatively low damage, while the launch and knockbacks are a nice control aspect. I don’t know how useful this skill will be though, as the launch is short enough that it might not see full usage outside of a few specific events.
  • Shattering Blow: I enjoy this skill, it’s got a nice animation and some pretty strong condition potential (and not burn either, which is a nice change) the base damage is low, so I see this mostly being a condi skill, but the bleeds are pretty powerful and can hit a fair few targets, which is nice. the reflect missiles is a nice addition too.
  • Sundering Leap: This a fairly simple skill, but also quite useful. it’s got a mobility aspect with the leap, and a support aspect with the vulnerability, both of which complement most builds quite well.
  • Outrage: this is the least interesting rage skill for me. the adrenaline gain is nice, but other than that, we’re just seeing the 7th stun break for the warrior – this doesn’t really add anything new.
  • Headbutt: Headbutt is a decent elite, and can generally be used to set up any number of combos on berserker – it’s pretty useful for all builds, though not too over the top on any.

Traits: In general, I’m pretty impressed with the design of the berserker’s traitline. there are always 3 clear options, split into raw damage, condition damage, and survivability, providing options for all kinds of builds. to be honest, I’d love to see this sort of design more in the game – across elite and core specialisations.
Adept:

  • Minor – Primal Rage: gives all the berserker stuff, not much else to say.
  • Major – Smash Brawler: This is a nice offensive trait, which helps increase the frequency of burst skills, and therefore damage. pretty straight forward, not much else to say.
  • Major – Last Blaze: This is the condition trait of the tier, and gives a decent AoE burn on rage skill. I feel like this might suffer from the tendency of traited conditions to be quite low duration, but the AoE nature of the effect coupled with the bursty nature of burning kinda justifies the short duration here.
  • Major – Savage Instinct: Combo stun break and condi cleanse on berserk is a pretty strong survival trait, though the warrior’s always been pretty high on survivability.
    Master:
  • Minor – Always Angry: not much to say, a sensible trait with a reasonable implementation. no complaints.
  • Major – Blood Reaction: this is a pretty strong offensive trait, but also gives enemies a reason to keep away from warriors when they go berserk.
  • Major – Heat the Soul: This is another pretty standard trait, leaning a little towards condition builds. the cooldowns are standard and the increased condition damage is nice.
  • Major – Dead or Alive: While this skill fits with the warrior, it adds a pretty strong death-cheating mechanic to a class that is already unquestionably king of survival. this is a skill that would benefit a glassier class more, instead of adding a few inches to the concrete wall that is warrior. that said, it’s good for what it is on a mechanical level, even if I disagree conceptually. (note: no internal cooldown is listed, and if this is accurate, it could make this an incredibly strong trait)
    Grandmaster:
  • Minor – Fatal Frenzy: Another simple minor – brief swiftness on going berserk. fits thematically, not too strong or weak, it’s in a good spot.
  • Major – Bloody Roar: This is somewhat unusual for berserker in that it covers raw, condition and tank builds, being useful for all three, without being too good for any one.
  • Major – King of Fires: This trait is quite a powerful condition trait, and feels like the strongest GM trait – though this is more due to the current state of burning as a condition, and less to do with this trait. nonetheless, without some fix to burning, this trait will be pretty powerful.
  • Major – Eternal Champion: A pretty simple trait, reinforces the berserker is unstoppable idea, and gives a pretty reliable stability.

Overall, the berserker seems to add more of what the warrior already has, with the only notable change being an increase in the profession’s damaging condition capabilities.

Daredevil testing

in Thief

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

Quickness reduces total time of the evade effects and distance moved during the GM dodges.

this isn’t a thief specific thing.

[Daredevil] - Feedback

in Thief

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

gonna leave mine here, since this seems to be the combined thread.

also, apologies for the length, I did try to cover… everything.

Specialisation: Daredevil

Overall:

  • Was it fun: yes, though it could be improved
  • Did it change how I play thief in a meaningful way: Yes – it provided a reasonable front-line fighter with passable sustain, as well as allowing the thief to play without relying on stealth
  • Dodges are fun and useful, but feel a little underwhelming as a combination of class mechanic and grandmaster trait.
  • Conditions are pretty bad with this. Thief’s not great with conditions at the best of times, but daredevil has almost no room for a condition build. Lotus training and imparing daggers are the only parts of the entire spec that work with a Condition Damage built – the staff has no damaging conditions, none of the traits have any damaging conditions – barring lotus training – and only one of the physicals uses condition damage.

Weapon (Staff):

  • Overall: a fun weapon, with nice skills.
  • Staff Strike -> Staff Bash -> Punishing Strikes: a good basic attack chain, with damage that’s reasonable but not exceptional. The animations don’t fit too well; the first two feel kind of stuttery – they’re less flowing like a staff and more sharp stiff hits one might expect from a hammer. the punishing strikes animation feels like something off a mesmer – with the weapon spinning in front of us without being held.
  • Hook Strike: a good stealth skill, and more fitting for a more control-based class.
  • Weakening Charge: a good skill in theory, I feel the mechanics would benefit from a slight mechanic change – the skill currently charges in the direction your character is facing, which isn’t always what you’d want. instead, the skill should either focus on a target, like the Warrior’s Rush skill, or be direction targeted, like their Whirlwind Attack skill.
  • Debilitating Arc: not much to say, it’s a backward roll that cripples enemies – it’s a good way to get away from enemies, and it all seems to work. only suggestions might be to increase the range a bit or remove cripple as well as immobilise, but these are more personal preference than something the skill needs.
  • Dust Strike: I like this skill conceptually, but it doesn’t really feel like it fits in with the whole engaging multiple enemies thing. having the shot fire in a line that can hit up to 3 enemies is nice, but it would work better as either a cone or fan, or as a field (not necessarily a smoke field – could be a dark field…) which enemies can pass over and be blinded in. as it stands, it’s only going to be single target 90% of the time.
  • Vault: I am a big fan of vault. the damage is nice (and it’s nice to have a thief weapon on which the sneak skill isn’t the big damager) the range is reasonable, and while I would personally like an evade (because every game needs a troll pole), I can understand why it doesn’t have one.

Skills (Physical):

  • Channeled Vigor: I like this as a skill, it’s got a nice heal, reasonable cooldown and you’re not rooted by it, as some suggested. that said, the increased healing on full endurance seems counterproductive to the daredevil, who seems to be all about using endurance. it’s a skill that seems to be at its best when you’re using the Elite Spec wrong, which is a little confusing.
  • Bandit’s Defense: I really wanted to like this skill, but I found it very difficult to use – the low duration makes it tricky to actually block anything with it, relegating it to a glorified stunbreak – albeit one with a reasonably low cooldown. I think an increase to the duration would improve the usefulness of the block section of this skill.
  • Fist Flurry -> Palm Strike: I enjoy this skill, and being able to leave a target with a whole bunch of damage about to land is a nice feeling, but it’s quite easy to not hit all of them. it feels like the area hit by the fist flurry is quite narrow, which can be irritating. (especially when you use it when facing away from an enemy, instant fail right there.)Edit: as someone suggested below, switching these around (palm strike with a stun first, then fist flurry with the PI on landing all 5 blows) would make this skill a lot better, while still leaving room for counterplay.
  • Distracting Daggers: this is a nice skill, the function is pretty obvious, and it works pretty well.
  • Imparing Daggers: this is actually a really nice condition skill, but it’s let down by the fact that daredevil really doesn’t work with conditions.
  • Impact Strike -> Uppercut -> Finishing Blow: I found this skill to be disappointingly underwhelming. the damage on the entire chain is usually on par with a single vault, and the animation on finishing blow feels waaay off. I get that a finisher makes sense in PvP/WvW, but in PvE it looks ridiculous. it doesn’t look like a physical skill, it doesn’t look like a blow, and I’m left wondering what my thief is doing. I’d suggest replacing the animation with something like the warrior’s Stomp, which has a similarly timed but much more appropriate animation – a large, physical blow which could feasibly finish off a downed enemy. that all said, the first two animations are nice and the control skills are pretty good.

Traits:
Adept:

  • Minor – Enforcer Training: well, not much to talk about here. it gives us access to the staff, physicals, and an extra dodge. the lack of changes to the F bar is a little abnormal.
  • Major – Evasive Empowerment: I do like this trait – it encourages the daredevil to make use of their dodges much like backstab encourages stealth or Berserker’s power encourages use of burst skills.
  • Major – Weakening Strikes: Another nice trait – gives damage reduction through weakness.
  • Major – Brawler’s Tenacity: This trait feels a little lackluster. the 20% cooldown reduction on physicals is nice, but the 10 endurance on use is negligible. as is, you’d have to use all 5 slot skills to get one dodge roll, which makes this borderline useless. an increase to 20/25 endurance would at least make this worth considering.

Master: the traits here are nice, but I feel the choice of minor could be better.

  • Minor – Driven Fortitude: the health on evade is nice, but ultimately not a massive factor. add on to that the fact that we already have half-decent healing, and this trait feels like something that would be best left optional.
  • Major – Staff Training: this is a nice traits, and both components work well. the endurance back on staff allows for more use of the Daredevil’s dodging, while the damage increase incentivises the use of endurance. the only downside is that this means no other weapons work quite as well with the daredevil, but that makes sense.
  • Major – Escapist’s Absolution: this is a pretty big thing for thief – a decent condi clear. I’ve heard suggestions that it’s overpowered, but there’s a big difference between on dodge (spammable) and on evade (much more skill-based). that said, it’s necessary to the point of making the other two traits irrelevant, and might be better as a minor – swapping this with Driven Fortitude would put both traits in a better position.
  • Major – Impacting Disruption: this gives daredevil more access to Pulmonary Impact, which is always a good thing, and synergises really well with Distracting Daggers.

Grandmaster: Daredevil’s Major Grandmaster traits are the 3 dodges, which feel like something we’d expect to see on the F bar. the placement of these (which seem to be on par with other profession mechanics, such as berserker’s new burst skills) in the grandmaster traits means we lose out on a set of potentially powerful traits which would make a big difference to the class. (suggestion – give thief a sort of F3 box which can be changed out of combat between dash, bound, lotus jump and normal dodge, much like the revenant legend slots)

  • Minor – Endurance Thief: this is decent I guess, feels a little like it’s trying to remind us steal exists, but it’s actually quite good – gives a free dodge roll on steal, which ties in with daredevil nicely. a deceptively useful skill.
  • Major – Lotus Training: this is a nice skill on paper, but the lack of any real condition synergy in this line makes it less appealing. (note, daggers don’t seem to hit neutral mobs, so you can dodge without aggroing, a nice touch.)
  • Major – Unhindered Combatant: this is perhaps the simplest of the dodges, with a simple speed and range increase. the lack of finisher makes this feel a little weaker than the others, and I’ve seen rubberbanding on repeated use. the animation appears to be recycled from warrior’s dash, which doesn’t feel quite right (especially the greatsword-holding pose…) and this could use some improvement.
  • Major – Bounding Dodger: this is an interesting dodge – you might not feel the dodge, but enemies near the end of it will. that said, despite the appearance of a thief trapped in a minefield, this is a really nicely done dodge. animations are nice, the damage is good enough to turn dodging into an offensive component of your playstyle, and the leap finisher is nice (though a blast finisher would feel more appropriate)

For the most part, daredevil is a nicely made elite specialisation, which provides an interesting new playstyle for the thief. however, it can be let down by the almost complete lack of condition damage synergy and some seriously immersion-breaking animations.

(edited by Gray.9041)

Can beta server run early without staff?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

as an EU player, I don’t see an issue. we start later, but we end later. on the last day, US folk only get ‘til midday, we get almost the whole day. the time we get’s the same, just slightly shifted.

Regarding Daredevil

in Thief

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

this is actually a very interesting point – they wanted Elite specs to be on par with existing specs, and in many cases they’ve managed this.

so with daredevil, we have to ask – is daredevil too good, or is it (as has been said many times) a case that the existing specs are not good enough?

Instanced Raids Confirmed [merged]

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Gray.9041

Gray.9041

Thieves aren’t good for PvE? Whaaaa? Thief will def have a place in raids. We don’t know what kind of chain events raids will have, but I bet SR will come in handy taking aggro off those trying to fill specific roles. In fact I’m sure SR and blast finishers on Smoke Screen will see a use for something different than mob skipping.

so… stealth then? which mesmers can do just as well (and engis can do passably)

that’s it?

Lets be honest thieves are far from the best class when it comes to PVE . Yeah we can stealth a group to pass trash mobs, pump out blast finishers with short bow and provide OK dps but that’s not enough to legitimize us for raiding. I guess my point is why should I play my thief, which is in fact my favorite class, over my warrior or elementalist both of which can outplay my thief with little to no effort in the pve scene.

“Ok” dps? wasn’t thief highest single target dps post patch? Don’t know about now but we couldn’t have fallen that far.

DPS doesn’t matter. the DPS/Survivability ratio matters far more, and thief is near bottom-tier for this. take a look at PvP – thief can’t reliably 1v1 anyone.

(edited by Gray.9041)

Preparing for BWE

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Gray.9041

^^^ With this shock we got from Daredevil, there is now a clear need to legitimate the need to overhaul the Acrobatics line. No need for a 1.0 Acro when 2.0 is out.

I am willing to accept a complete scraping of Acro to give birth to something entirely new. But I am going to remain humble and realistic and ask for a proper fixing.

maybe a condition line? (lets be honest, raw damage traits like executioner more or less dominate DA)

Senpai Noticed Me

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Gray.9041

We’re obviously doing something right, keep it up boys…. and girls.

They are on this Forum because of the dare devil, it’s not because we did something right.

So this would be a good time to leave constructive feedback and intuitive posts.

this is what worries me. Daredevil is pretty good, and probably only needs a few tweaks here and there. but the thief base class is in much poorer condition, requires more work, and doesn’t appear to be getting any attention.

I mean skritt, they don’t have to give us a roadmap of all the fixes they have planned for the next 5 years, but just acknowledging that certain issues have been raised would be nice.

(for example, if someone did a post about shortbow being, well… skritt…, and we get a red post saying “okay, we know a lot of you think that the shortbow needs work”, that’d be a great start. it doesn’t mean it’s going to be fixed, it doesn’t promise anything, but it means that we don’t have to raise the issue every day because we don’t know if they know about it.)

Why no finisher on Dash?

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Gray.9041

it has limited condi removal and increased range. it’s not a combat dodge, it’s a mobility dodge.

Where to put Beta Feedback

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Gray.9041

with the beta coming up, I wanted to ask – should be post feedback (in the fashion of the form stickied above) all in one post, or should specilisation feedback be posted in the relevant class forums? on the one hand, having a single thread might be a good thing, but with 7 elite specialisations now available, each post will likely be rather long.

DA -> More aviability for Condi Builds?

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Gray.9041

I was running Crucible of Eternity yesterday with the goal of assembling a set of Dire gear. After I completed the 3 paths with a pug group, I asked the warrior a few questions regarding PvE condition viability. He has ascended gear / legendary wep and he was pretty good (playing and helping with hints / suggestions).
He said that the only decent Condi option for Pve would be a Condi Engineer, and only for Long fights (fractals I guess?).
He was convinced that Condi Thief is not a wise choice for PvE since it lacks sustained damage.

Now you should also know that I’m not a very knowledgeable gw2 player and I’m learning new things daily.

So.

Conditions for pve… can they rival the zerk dmg output? What about group support and survability / mobility?

IMO Pistol Whip is a really good defensive skill, and a condi build will not have that.

certain condi builds can nearly rival ‘zerk damage. Engi’s the big one, ranger and guard can do well-ish. thief’s near the bottom of the barrel (general rule – no burn, no viable condition build)

Suggestion for a P/P rework.

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One question: Why?

well, while I’m not sure pistol should do what the OP suggested, it’d be nice if it did something.

it’s kinda useless atm.

D/D thief in GW2

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Gray.9041

We have 3 D/D thieves on Gunnars, I think.

you called?

a more positive note.

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Gray.9041

this post seems to indicate that the devs are working on a bunch of balance changes, even if they don’t say so – and it mentions that they’re doing other classes, and buffing as well as nerfing – fixing some of thief’s issues could well be part of this

so even if we’re not getting responses, it seems entirely possible that the feedback we’re giving on the forums is being listened to, and acted on.

hey, silver linings.

(also, whatever work it may or may not need (depending on your opinions) Daredevil looks pretty awesome)

Does Pulmonary Impact stack?

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Gray.9041

It would be really OP if it did.

you only stack 4 of them and boom boom boom boom.

perhaps, but it’s stacking them that’s the trick

Describe the Daredevil in 3 Words.

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Gray.9041

Dodge Duck Dip
Dive and Dodge

Dodge a Wrench
Dodge a Ball.

Thief POI

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Gray.9041

Question for Karl or anyone else you might have an answer: Does Pulmonary Impact stack?

I never thought about this. this is a good question – maybe make a new thread about it?

A Daredevil Rant

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To the OP, to be ‘FAIR’ you probably couldn’t keep f1 and f2. You would have to replace them with the dodges. Then it would be ‘FAIR’. Elite specs are meant to be different, not stronger. The mechanic isn’t the same, but if its balanced and useful so what? How many useless or bad trait lines are in this game between all the professions? If the devs can make it work, by all means let it work!

firstly, I’d be pretty happy with that tbh – except it’d invalidate all the traits which operate on steal.

secondly, Chronomancer gets Continuum split without losing the other shatter skills. and Herald gets Facet of Nature without losing a legend. several elite specs get straight upgrades to the F skills

DA -> More aviability for Condi Builds?

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dagger training feels kinda useless to me. Poison isn’t bursty like burning – it’s a DoT condition, so having only 2s is more or less irrelevant (I usually put down 15-20s duration poison stacks, and even those are meh).

potent poison is nice, but it’s never in a million years gonna compare to executioner. maybe, if we could drop 20-30 stacks on an enemy, or if we had much more access to poison, but it’s just not a real choice.

Is a Death Blossom Daredevil Viable?

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I currently run a D/D condi Thief, with Death Blossom being one of my main sources of damage. the answer is yes – it’s relatively viable in most of PvE (some areas are a no – high up places like dry top, or when stacking), and can work sometimes in PvP, but is generally not as good as a power build, as far as I can tell.

also, you will die a lot. even building some defensive stats. if you can deal with that, then go ahead, it’s still kinda fun.

Describe the Daredevil in 3 Words.

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please no nerf.

[PvE] Venom share: does it work?

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I think venoms need a rethink.

  • Venomous Aura – hard to balance. it’s either too strong in a group or too weak on it’s own.
  • Condition types – are we going for damaging conditions or control conditions? because they’re very different and it feels like venoms don’t really know what they’re doing right now
  • Specialisation – why is VA in Shadow Arts? it’s not a defensive trait, I’d expect to see it in Deadly Arts – the (supposedly) condition tree.

Elite Spec this Beta Weekend

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Gray.9041

Daredevil, no contest.

that said, I’ll probably try and make sure to give all the others at least a quick go, just so there’s slightly more testing.

Day and Night (important)

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Gray.9041

1) Remove the timer.
2) Make night significantly darker.
-Near pitch-black when off the beaten path would be ideal.
—Night-vision mastery to compensate.
3) Make ambushes possible at night, but defined paths relatively safe.
4) Make night events more diverse (Enemies spread and attack multiple points one night, enemies don’t attack at all others, enemies mass and march by the hundreds on a large outpost with diverse defenses sometimes, and enemies lead feints on other nights)*
5) Have some events (some playable, some ambient) that occur at certain times/nights that are unrelated to the Mordrem assaults.

This is how night should be handled, IMO.

*While I’d prefer the dragon minions were mindless and didn’t use any real ‘tactics’, that ship has already sailed. :-\

+1 all day every day.

Number of Armor Sets

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Gray.9041

There is always the gem store.

gem store is outfits which can’t be mixed/matched. not as good.

also, it’s 2 open world sets (per weight) 2 guild sets, legendary armour, possibly precursor armour, and individual skins (chrono shoulders, reaper hood, etc). it’s a little more than 2 sets.

I Heard People Were Boycotting this?

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Gray.9041

  • Only 4 new PvE maps. This is almost nothing.

with the biome system, it could be worth a lot more – especially if there’s a lot of events/missions/etc (also, would non-combat areas (like cities, guild halls) even count toward this number? if not, that’s quite a few more maps)

  • Only 2 new armor skins per weight, plus legendary armor. This is less than the number of outfits they have released in the Gem Store since they announced HoT.

Only 2 new armour sets per weight from the open world. we know we’re also getting 2 guild-hall based armour sets, and legendary armour – that’s 5 sets off the bat, and a number of individual armour skins from other sources

  • Only 5 new weapon skins. Again, they have released more skins in the Gem Store than this.

5 new weapon skin sets, plus a bunch of individual skins. not as high as I’d like, but not so bad as you make out.

  • Only 3 new legendary weapons. Because ArenaNet says they will add more “soon” (last time they said that, it was more than 2 years ago and we’re still waiting)

This is sucky, and you have a point regarding their track record – but with the masteries, I have a chance of actually getting one of these 3 legends, which is more than can be said for the existing ones.

  • Only part of a single raid. They will release more “soon” (current bets say in 2017)

While I hope you’re wrong on the speed of release, nothing you’ve said here is incorrect, sadly.

overall, I think your wording and assumptions make this look worse than it is, but it’s still a point worth considering.

Change the third attack animation on DD

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I’m seconding (or thirding, or whatevering) this. the concept is nice, but it comes across far too magicky.

Thief Concern Following PoI

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Thief sucks at both applying damaging conditions and removing them. Not sure how this is still under dispute… thieves are good at applying control conditions so I suppose people mistake that for thieves having an actual condition build.

this is true, I’m just worried that these things may get ignored/forgotten with all the (probably justified) hype over daredevil

staff skin

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Every profession will have a weapon skin and some amount of armor skins (helm at least) tied to their elite specialization in HoT. For Thief, it’s that Staff and the datamined Daredevil headpiece.

it’s either helm or shoulder peice

Helms: Reaper, Berserker, Daredevil, Engi Spec (forge?)
Shoulders: Chronomancer, Tempest, Druid (suspected), Herald
DH is unknown as far as I know.

Staff holding animation

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Gray.9041

I would love to see some new animations for DD, but let’s be honest… the expansion is less than two months away. Unless it’s a good preexisting animation, you shouldn’t expect any animation changes.

If we have to have recycled animations, though, I’d like to see more Monkey King elixir ones. Those generally look cooler than most profession’s staff animations.

for me, I’d like to see finishing blow use the animation from warrior’s Stomp skill. they’re both physicals with similar casts, but stomp is a physical-looking, hard-hitting stomp, which fits the description of Finishing Blow perfectly.

Only three BWEs are planned

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Gray.9041

I think that certain classes (ranger, engineer) will get significantly less testing for their elite specs than others (Reaper, Chrono, Tempest, DH). hopefully, this won’t be a big issue, but depending on the quality of both the initial specs and the dev response, it could be a serious problem. I hope they’ve got stuff in place to deal with that.

Good news for staff lovers...

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There might be some PvE content that has downed state creatures like in those Toxic Alliance events.

even then, it doesn’t feel like a finishing blow – it feels like a finisher. and those always felt incredibly immersion-breaking to me.

Good news for staff lovers...

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Gray.9041

I thought this was supposed to end the fighting…

In any case, I’m super excited for staff. It looks as though it was designed for PvE, which is precisely what I play, so it totaly works for me. I couldn’t be happier (well, the animations could be better tbh, but it still looks good).

I’d agree there, but I wish the Elite Skill’s animation wasn’t so PvP-centric.

Thief Concern Following PoI

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Gray.9041

No mention of confusion on steal?

It seems to me like the issue is bleeds. Pre-berserker warriors had the same problem when trying to go full condi. The bleeds take to long to dish out decent damage and end up getting cleansed long before they cause any pain.

I think that the new spec line adds enough sustain to warrant a full condi build, but is held back by near-useless bleeds. Hopefully the increased torment will make it viable.

I forgot about the traited conditions (even though I use them), because it’s a pretty high-CD application which requires us to jump directly on the enemy’s face – not so good with out low health.

I agree with your assessment of bleeds, and would say the same more or less applies to poisons too.

as for the torment, it’s nice – but I don’t think it’s enough to make a difference.

I’m worried that cleanses’ availability will be balanced against burning, leaving other higher-duration lower-damage conditions much less useful, and those conditions are all we have.

Staff holding animation

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Gray.9041

+1, I’d love to see this.

So, what about the jungle?

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Obviously, Thieves went with staff to best deal with all the quicksand in the jungle

lol…perhaps, but my problem isn’t really the staff. Love the staff(I think?) What I’m trying to figure out its where do I learn the “one inch punch”?

To what someone said earlier, I do think these elite specs will get some clarification on the PS or open world. The only one feel really says “I learned this kitten in the jungle”, is Guardian picking up a bow and trying to shoot it. And that’s a stretch. I guess bezerker, chrono,reaper, and tempest just seem more like results of extra training. DD tho? tyria just learned how to punch and we’ve already mastered kiss of the dragon. Lol idk. Just scratching my head(as I loom for a staff for my thief) #keeyamotherkitten

I like to think of it as being because of all the enemies.

in central tyria, we’re used to large open spaces where we can sneak around, deceiving and hiding from enemies until we’re ready to strike.

in the Maguuma jungle, however, there are enemies everywhere, using senses we haven’t encountered to detect us. at such short range, where even our weapons might fail, the thief has learned to train their body to be their last line of offense and defence.
not enough room to swing a sword? enough room to throw a punch.
facing off against something that can sense your heat signature, or follow your tracks through the undergrowth? they can find you, but they can’t hit you.

as for the staff, I think it’s a case of we’ve felt totally overwhelmed since we got in here – like we’ve got no control over anything. well, now we’re taking control.

(something like that perhaps? (also, I always saw DD as a wild, roguish style, not a disciplined monkish style))

A Daredevil Rant

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Gray.9041

Maybe go for an F3 you can switch out of combat – like revenant legends?

Daredevil First Impressions

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for brawler’s tenacity, it’s confirmed at 10 per skill – no matter how many parts. this means we have to blow a full bar of phyisicals to get a single dodge, which is pretty lackluster.

staff master does make sense – it’s wanting you to constantly use endurance, so it makes sure you don’t run out, but also disincentivises you from stockpiling.

Escapist’s Absolution is strong, but it’s much like executioner for me – I want to run potent poisons, but executioner is just plain better. I get the same feeling with staff master and EA – the trait I want and the trait I sort of need.

for weakening charge – is it an evade? that could be a big decided in whether it’s good or not.

I agree on dust strike.

vault is one evasion frame away from being a nightmare troll-pole. I love it.

I think all the physicals are pretty good, but I think finishing strike would benefit from a change of animation – the current one screams PvP, and really doesn’t feel like a physical skill.

[Suggestion] Change Finishing Blow Animation

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even then, between the inexplicable banner and the not-being-in-physical-contact, it still doesn’t look right.

[Suggestion] Change Finishing Blow Animation

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so, seeing the animation for finishing blow really left me disappointed. between the effects and the animation, it feels like a skill really made for PvP, and it’s hard to think of it as a physical skill.

so, I would like to suggest alternatives.

for my part, I think the animation from Stomp – a warrior physical – would work much better. the animation time is similar, it’s clearly a physical animation, and it makes sense as a finishing blow. (also doesn’t summon a banner out of nowhere…?)

plus, it’d only be a copy-paste scenario*, so it wouldn’t be too hard to pull off

(* I know there’s more to it than this, but it’s significantly easier than doing a new animation from scratch, no?)

Thief POI

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Gray.9041

The heal skill is fine, thief unlike most classes has the ability to protect it (using it while sitting in stealth, after disengaging with Infiltrator’s Return). It’s power level when used in that way is quite good. If you want a heal to use without disengaging, use Withdraw like you always have.

so you need a specific weapon (sword) and a specific utility skill (some kind of stealth) to get a single heal skill to work passingly? that seems like a bad skill.

Sinister or Dire?

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I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Helpful
/15chars

That was code language for complete viability…. Just takes a flexible playstyle, and plenty of cover conditions…. Knowing how to stay alive without stealth is a skill most folks never care to proficient themselves with, unfortunately, hence the dated dogma

it’s less dated dogma and more personal experience – despite all the issues I’ve listed, I’ve been running a D/D condi thief more or less since launch.