Guild Wars 2

Frequently when I add someone to my party who was previously queueing solo, and they didn’t leave queue before joining the party, they’ll end up being pulled into a match as if they were still queued by themselves. It’s kind of inexplicable, I only picked up on it after it happened multiple times. But it’s frequent in my experience and I’ve heard from a lot of people that it’s a common issue.

Shadowstep.6049:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Special_Forces_Training_Area

Oh that, yeah you need to have a raid squad, that’s why I didn’t know what you were talking about. Thanks for the suggestion though.

If you add some styling (bolding, italics, bullet points for things like “900 range, ground targeted”) I promise I’ll read it.

/P yeah, but not necessarily D/P. S/P actually has more synergy with Pulmonary since Pistol Whip also interrupts (with the stun). But yeah it would make Pistol a more common offhand than it already is.

Just went there, what training NPCs?

Idk if other people have the same issue, but when I try to test a new build in HotM, there are too many players. Take 5 seconds to set up, somebody is already attacking the NPC, whether it’s a beast or profession NPC. It’s not a conduct issue, there are just too many players in one instance. It wouldn’t take much resources to make 2 more instances, I think that would be enough to resolve the issue I’m having. But maybe it’s just me.

starlinvf.1358:

and if I could make any sense of what Archemorus and Viktor’s fighting styles were, I could find a build that fits them as well.

If we’re going with Viktor then you could have an urn, and your F1 skills is “Throw Ashes.” People get super grossed out so they get Feared. That’s the best I’ve got.

You don’t have to play Rev… in order to what? You do have to play Rev to actually have a working knowledge of how the class works, its limitations in specific matchups and situations and so on. But in order to click the “Post Reply” button, no, you don’t have to play Rev. If you don’t feel comfortable competing on Rev then isn’t that an indicator you haven’t played it very much?

Iain Ross.6903:

I don’t play rev

Then why are you on this forum? Don’t get me wrong you have the right to be here, but… why? You seem to be here to express your opinion instead of listening to others, yet you have emphasized more than once now that you don’t really play Rev, so at this point nobody expects you to have an informed opinion about what it’s like to play as Rev. Anybody can look at GW2 wiki, and I hope you have, but that doesn’t translate to a working knowledge of what it’s like to play Rev in 1v1, 2v2, chasing, being chased, defending a node, etc. Too many situations and variables to intuit from just reading wiki articles.

As for the NA-EU thing, understandable, that’s too bad.

Iain Ross.6903:

Huskyboy.1053:

Iain Ross.6903:

Huskyboy.1053:

Silv.9207:

If you’re killed 0-100 in seconds, you must be really bad.
Even a trait grant you the shield skill 5 to save your a*s when in troubles, or if you need more stability there’s the trait that grant you two stacks instead of one.
Yes, you can’t chose when to active your stability but 2 stability (traited) for 3 sec (or more, depending on your build) every 5 sec when you dodge is not a lack of stability.
You have a Lot of evades and blocks with sword/shield and staff, too many of them.
Your damage is one of the best of the game, you can burst down a large amount of class in 1v1 easy and fast.
Conditions can be a problem but if you use mallyx you can be all right. Also the staff clean conditions with skill 4. But yes, the main build don’t have so much condi clean. the point is that frequently the enemy is dead before he’s able to stack enough conditions to kill you.

The revenant is still the best class in both offence and defence. Just make more practice.

It’s now every 8 seconds after the new patch, please read the build notes before commenting. You’re exaggerating a bit about some parts, but mostly correct, if a condi reaper is below 50% LF when you start dueling then the power Rev should win. Not against mes or a good condi warr though.

Rev kills condi warr.

Wanna bet? I’d have fun disproving that.

Go ahead

I didn’t mean with words, I have no plans for tonight, let’s duel. Add me, I’ll be on after 6pm EDT. But what Jay pointed out is correct, Warr has enough CCs to get past Rev’s multiple stunbreaks, and condi Warr plays on Rev’s ultimate weakness, condis. Add in shield 5 for complete protection against UA and Rev’s damage potential is pretty much halved.

Iain Ross.6903:

Huskyboy.1053:

Silv.9207:

If you’re killed 0-100 in seconds, you must be really bad.
Even a trait grant you the shield skill 5 to save your a*s when in troubles, or if you need more stability there’s the trait that grant you two stacks instead of one.
Yes, you can’t chose when to active your stability but 2 stability (traited) for 3 sec (or more, depending on your build) every 5 sec when you dodge is not a lack of stability.
You have a Lot of evades and blocks with sword/shield and staff, too many of them.
Your damage is one of the best of the game, you can burst down a large amount of class in 1v1 easy and fast.
Conditions can be a problem but if you use mallyx you can be all right. Also the staff clean conditions with skill 4. But yes, the main build don’t have so much condi clean. the point is that frequently the enemy is dead before he’s able to stack enough conditions to kill you.

The revenant is still the best class in both offence and defence. Just make more practice.

It’s now every 8 seconds after the new patch, please read the build notes before commenting. You’re exaggerating a bit about some parts, but mostly correct, if a condi reaper is below 50% LF when you start dueling then the power Rev should win. Not against mes or a good condi warr though.

Rev kills condi warr.

Wanna bet? I’d have fun disproving that.

I mean the effect of banners is far better (individually) than Facets. But the CD is insane, I’d much prefer to see that cut in half. Ofc the duration would need to be shorter, 90s is far too long for sPvP anyways.

Pomdepin.7068:

I agree on the reduction of sword AA aftercast, its damage output is really underperforming compared to rev sword AA or even main hand dagger AA.

As for infiltrator’s strike, I’d rather have the ability to cancel the return than making it 900 range.

I’d reduce the cost of CnD as it is pretty risky, but also buff stealth attacks, which would make CnD indirectly more useful. Sword stealth attack is kinda trash, and with other weaponsets, backstab not nearly as good as it was after the 1sec ICD on stealth attacks, and all the blocks and evades. The sword stealth attack has to be changed to something actually useful and powerful, otherwise, stealth from CnD is pointless, and so is the whole skill for S/D. My opinion.

Dancing daggers is actually quite useful to kite I think, with ok damage, but could be revised a bit I guess.

Why not both? Extending the range even to 750 would be good, and I definitely think you should be able to cancel it. Now I think that should be the case with all 2-step skills, like Shadowstep, they shouldn’t just change IS, they should change all of them to be cancel-able.

Silv.9207:

If you’re killed 0-100 in seconds, you must be really bad.
Even a trait grant you the shield skill 5 to save your a*s when in troubles, or if you need more stability there’s the trait that grant you two stacks instead of one.
Yes, you can’t chose when to active your stability but 2 stability (traited) for 3 sec (or more, depending on your build) every 5 sec when you dodge is not a lack of stability.
You have a Lot of evades and blocks with sword/shield and staff, too many of them.
Your damage is one of the best of the game, you can burst down a large amount of class in 1v1 easy and fast.
Conditions can be a problem but if you use mallyx you can be all right. Also the staff clean conditions with skill 4. But yes, the main build don’t have so much condi clean. the point is that frequently the enemy is dead before he’s able to stack enough conditions to kill you.

The revenant is still the best class in both offence and defence. Just make more practice.

It’s now every 8 seconds after the new patch, please read the build notes before commenting. You’re exaggerating a bit about some parts, but mostly correct, if a condi reaper is below 50% LF when you start dueling then the power Rev should win. Not against mes or a good condi warr though.

Nighthawk.4687:

Yeah this class is total kitten, lets give it permanent stability and resistance, give it 30k hp, and buff the dps so you can crit for 16k autos. Having counter play in this game is dumb. The true master race should have no counter play at all.

Nobody can take you seriously when you comment stuff like this, Rev has some of the worst stability access after Thief. Idk where you got the 16k crit autos point from, I main thief and my crits are higher than my Invocation Rev. The common link between Thief and Rev is that they have obvious counterplay: Thief loses to heavy blocks, AoE, any 2 CCs whatsoever (only 1 stunbreak on the average Thief build), and really just sustain in general. Power Rev loses to any condi build except an less-skilled condi Warr.

As for Rev’s resistance, if you run Mallyx then yeah you do have almost perfect resistance… and lackluster damage. Don’t forget that you can just corrupt the resistance, there’s at least a 7-second delay between a condi Rev’s resistance application, as opposed to Berserker Stance’s 3-second application. Condi rev does not have good damage whatsoever and Rev still lacks a good condi weaponset. If you’re having trouble against power Rev, play condi mes/reaper/warr and I guarantee you will win. Even condi guard/ele if you’re feeling adventurous. If you’re having trouble against condi Rev, L2P. It’s not a strong build, you should be able to win.

DeceiverX.8361:

Admittedly, being instant cast was a little over the top. Although a neat approach to this might be simply allowing it to be instant-cast but increasing the cost of IR by 2 when stunned.

For Flanking/Larcenous initiative swaps, I will say this unfortunately can’t happen, and its split to make Flanking the expensive ability is definitely intentional. Flanking doesn’t turn until Larcenous unless the attack hits. It has a fairly small hitbox, so if cast without a target, it’d be very easy to chain near-permanent evasion, especially on Acrobatics + Daredevil, which would regenerate one of those initiative points with every evade and allow for more general-evasion, too.

The real problem with S/D is OH dagger. CnD is an under-performing ability game-wide at the moment, Dancing Dagger is never going to be any good until reworked entirely since it’s impossible to balance and make useful at the same time, and Tac Strike, while good, doesn’t justify using and likely wasting initiative on CnD which could be better-spent on evades and unblockable attacks.

900 range iStrike is definitely curious, especially since they removed the jump-cast iReturn cancellation which made the weapon be able to apply much more pressure; I’d have to play test it I think, as I can definitely see there being a valid argument about sword having too much disengage pressure.

It would be fun to test. And tbh I don’t think the disengage thing is a huge problem, D/P trades off the shadowsteps on the weapons for easy stealth, which also makes disengaging very easy. And ofc SB is the king of disengage weapons. I doubt S/D will ever become OP in that respect, though that won’t stop the QQ brigade.

duster.7013:

Huskyboy.1053:

I mean firstly you should be running Marauder’s or Destroyer’s, zerker is not a ranked amulet in the first place unless you’re a robot. Could you clarify what str/gs is? I know gs, not familiar with str. GS is a difficult weapon to use due to predictability and lack of defense, tbh I wouldn’t recommend it in Ruby+. It’s an AoE weapon and Warr is best used when singling out a target and shutting it down, it’s why smart people don’t 1v1 a decent Warrior. That is just my opinion. Warr does have good AoE options for power, I’d suggest mace/shield GS if you want to participate in node fights. GS 3 and its bursts are great, and remember that Skull Grinder is a blast finisher. That means it has excellent synergy with Eles and Necros. Rifle is also a power option though you’re not going to do good damage with it without Fury, it’s more of an attrition weapon than a burst weapon.

I mean berzerker, I use demolisher. Power and condi war 1v1 are 100% matchup based. You lose some without a choice, others are a stomp. Condi war can kill elementalist/druid, but is meh against other classes, can not kill necro. Power war can destroy necro and beat a guard if you suprise them, but not against good ones. Something like mes/theif should never be dying to a warrior ever. Just save blink for condi mace and deny power war adrenaline. As far as I know rev is a tough matchup in 1v1, but you can pressure them in teamfights. Gs is required for power builds, then its either dual axe or axe/shield. You can drop discipline for strength if you take rune of the traveler with power.

Ah yeah I wasn’t being condescending, I knew you were referring to Berzerker’s, I was saying that it’s not an amulet you take into ranked unless you’re absolutely perfect ( a robot). It’s just too glassy.

As to your comments about matchups, of course. That’s true of all professions, but Warr is much harder to take down for any build than others, its weaknesses just aren’t as glaring as its fellow melee classes, Thief, Rev, and Guard. Thief can’t take a hit or condi bomb, Rev can’t take any condis, Guard has good bursts and AoE, but poor sustain. In all seriousness, wanna duel? I think it would be fun and I’ve got a hybrid build I want to test. I’m positive I can 1v1 your necro or thief. Mesmer, idk, DH I find myself evenly matched, I beat DH if I play smart.

As I mentioned in a completely different Thief-related thread, Warrior has a lot of versatility, especially in terms of weapons you can use. It might contradict the theme of Warriors being brutish damage-absorbers, but you can trick people by bringing a different but viable weaponset than what they’re expecting. And people are mostly accustomed to condi warr so you have the element of surprise already.

duster.7013:

Serious Thought.5394:

Turns out if I want to one shot people I use Warrior/Berserker now. =/

Is there something i’m missing? My zerker with str/gs can’t do over 15k dmg in the first burst of swiftness even with might ammy, and then you’re kinda deadweight.

It really doesn’t work in ranked, and war gets soloed by a lot of classes when you go power.

I mean firstly you should be running Marauder’s or Destroyer’s, zerker is not a ranked amulet in the first place unless you’re a robot. Could you clarify what str/gs is? I know gs, not familiar with str.

GS is a difficult weapon to use due to predictability and lack of defense, tbh I wouldn’t recommend it in Ruby+. It’s an AoE weapon and Warr is best used when singling out a target and shutting it down, it’s why smart people don’t 1v1 a decent Warrior. That is just my opinion. Warr does have good AoE options for power, I’d suggest mace/shield GS if you want to participate in node fights. GS 3 and its bursts are great, and remember that Skull Grinder is a blast finisher. That means it has excellent synergy with Eles and Necros. Rifle is also a power option though you’re not going to do good damage with it without Fury, it’s more of an attrition weapon than a burst weapon.

Serious Thought.5394:

Turns out if I want to one shot people I use Warrior/Berserker now. =/

Lol not exactly, come duel me.

thaniretouni.4762:

Huskyboy.1053:

D/P is not confusing, I think you’re revealing why you need more experience to be offering an educated opinion. Most stealth during a duel (D/P 5+2) will last 3s, so you know when the Backstab is coming. Shadow Shot is highly telegraphed. Heartseeker, when it’s used offensively, is also telegraphed. Headshot and Steal are probably the only unpredictable parts of the build. As for D/P hard countering, or even countering Warr at all, idk about that. I’d be happy to duel you on my Warr gimmick build, I beat End Orphan yesterday in a 1v1 with the same build. Dueling thieves is difficult but they have a very limited number of skills, especially considering that they’ll rarely switch weapon sets, unlike every other profession with weapon swap. So you should be able to predict what they’re gonna do, the issue is whether your reflexes are fast enough.

I know all these mate, but can be confusing to new players or the less skilled ones. Other classes are far more predictable and easier to fight against compared to thief. Even when something is telegraphed like Shadow shot it does not mean that you have the endurance or whatever to avoid it (think of small GvG where people always target thief as much as possible).

Huskyboy.1053:

This is what should happen. I don’t mean that from a morality standpoint, just that if there’s no skill floor then why will people keep coming back to the game? New players should die easily, if they don’t that means the game is laughably uncomplicated and easy. Rather, I think that Anet should make an incentives-based mentoring system for new players. I do it for free whenever I come across a thief that clearly needs help, teaching combos and directing them to Sindrener vids, but this would be more commonplace if people had an incentive to help others. I strongly resist making the class easier for noobs, they need to L2P, and they should get help in doing so.

Ofc this should happen for new players, but they shouldn’t be punished so much more
when playing thief compared to other classes. For example, even a rly new player who had like 10 hours of playing the game can take a necro and at least have a reasonable ability to help the team or at least feel that he can do something. Whereas, with thief is much harder imo (I had some friends (as well as other new guild members) who joined the game recently and I saw this clearly).

I’m sorry, you’re right, that was a bit harsh. I think we’ll have to disagree about the skill floor disparity, I’m comfortable with having varying skill floors between classes. Like I said, having actual mentors (or at least some instructional videos on sPvP and maybe on individual classes) would help people move above the skill floor. People who can’t handle the cowardly, squishy nature of Thief should start with DH and move up from there. Making Thief more durable without removing damage would make it OP, making it more durable and nerfing damage (such as slowing attack speed) would make it a Warrior. The difficulty comes from Thief’s distinguishing factors and gameplay. I agree it’s comparatively difficult, I don’t agree it should be made easier.

As for other stuff, Thief really is more predictable than other classes. I know you don’t believe it but Thief has fewer options and combos than, for example, DH, Warrior, or Mesmer. DH has multiple viable meta builds right now so you have to know what they are to know what to expect, and Mesmer… I mean it’s obvious what makes it hard to fight a Mesmer. Healbot ele is most common but high-level players use Fresh Air effectively. Both power Warr and condi Warr are very viable in this meta, OH axe even got buffed to make the class more versatile. Do you know all Warriors’ attack skills? Because right now longbow, mace, GS, shield, OH axe, and even MH sword (for mobility) are part of the meta. Warrior might be slow but you never know what they’re bringing to the table.

In contrast, any thief in ranked will be running D/P, which has one combo (5+2 for stealth, then backstab in 1.5-2s) or Staff, which is infinitely predictable. D/P play is fast-paced, but it’s not actually tricky. Steal, backstab, run away, hit, run away, stealth, backstab, interrupt, interrupt, hit, run away. Rinse and repeat. If you CC them twice then you’ve won. High-level thieves can make Staff less predictable, but they’re all busy running D/P because it has more party utility.

This is not to say Thief is the most predictable class, after recent nerfs Rev is 100% power rev except for masochists. But it is to say that if you want to learn how to fight Thief, it’s not as bad as you think. Learn the combos, count to 2 after they stealth, and win.

I also think that Infiltrator’s Return should be a breakstun or at least be usable while CCed like Steal, but that it should consume 3 initiative as a result. Not really sure why it should be unusuable while stunned.

Are you referring to D/D power or condi? Sounds like power. I think D/D is mainly being treated as a condi build, so no. But Dagger’s AA got buffed so there’s that. Also this belongs in the Thief forum, unless you’re looking for QQ from people who don’t like Thief.

I definitely think the biggest issue is the AA chain’s slowness. Like I mentioned Rev has access to Quickness, and also there’s the fact that they have an overall better sword AA chain, 3 guaranteed stacks of vulnerability per chain (which goes well with Focused Siphoning and Targeted Destruction, both of which are minor traits). With the vulnerability, traits (don’t forget Vicious Lacerations), and quickness Rev has a far superior synergy resulting in much bigger damage output. Part of the issue is Crippling Strike’s lame conditions, they could at least extend the condi duration to be longer than the length of the AA chain. So like 4s+. 2s is pretty insulting. Note that I’m not calling for Rev nerfs, like Thief they’re extra-reliant on AA due to their energy system (similar to Thief’s Initiative). In fact more so since Rev’s utilities rely on energy too. But Thief’s Sword AA is just not in a good place right now.

Sword 2 doesn’t need to be changed, that’s a suggestion that would make my life easier. Still I wouldn’t push for it, getting into/staying in 600 range is a L2P issue.

I’m serious about Sword 3 chain though, 4 initiative up front is too much.

Lexander.4579:

scorpion wire has its uses and it isnt as bad as it is commonly believed

of course its not DH pull but then again all DH virtues are completely b/s anyway

I mean every skill has its uses. I’ve successfully used SW before, but it just isn’t a high-percentage play. It’s high-risk but not high-reward. I think it should be like a less-effective version of Spear of Justice, maybe it should pierce but the pull should only affect the target, it shouldn’t apply a damaging condition, it shouldn’t be unblockable, and the auto-pull (rather than SoJ’s pull-on-demand) is fine by me, it forces you to be more tactical. But it should have the 1/4 cast time and the same projectile speed. Without those buffs it’s not worth taking, the low CD isn’t worth it.

My opinion: it’s too slow for Thief. Looking at the damage values for the AA skill chains, only the 3rd part of the S/D AA chain is significantly better than D/P AA. And just barely, D/P 3rd AA skill gets 6s poison, compared to S/D 3rd AA skill getting 2s of weakness and cripple, which is nothing. And looking at activation times, not accounting for aftercast, D/P AA is twice as fast as Sword.

That being said, Sword 2 is better than D/P 3 (condi cleanse and disengage instead of blind is preferable), although it’s shorter-range. S/D 3, assuming you land the first skill, is actually amazing, it makes fighting DH possible. Of course getting that first hit is quite difficult.

My changes:

1. Remove aftercast on Crippling Strike and buff Sword AA damage. If they want it to be slower than Dagger, fine, but right now it’s too slow for a Thief. Rev at least has easy access to quickness to shorten the sword AA chain.
2. Switch Initiative cost for S/D 3, make the initial (blockable) attack cost 2 initiative and the second attack (unblockable boon-steal) cost 4. It’s clearly the better part of the chain so it should be the expensive one.
3. Extend Sword 2 to 900 range. It’s actually quite difficult to land it right now, 600 is not all that far.

thaniretouni.4762:

Alright I picked out a couple of things:

I understand and support some minor nerfs to the d/p set to reduce how hard it counters other classes like warriors or how confusing can it be to play against.

D/P is not confusing, I think you’re revealing why you need more experience to be offering an educated opinion. Most stealth during a duel (D/P 5+2) will last 3s, so you know when the Backstab is coming. Shadow Shot is highly telegraphed. Heartseeker, when it’s used offensively, is also telegraphed. Headshot and Steal are probably the only unpredictable parts of the build. As for D/P hard countering, or even countering Warr at all, idk about that. I’d be happy to duel you on my Warr gimmick build, I beat End Orphan yesterday in a 1v1 with the same build. Dueling thieves is difficult but they have a very limited number of skills, especially considering that they’ll rarely switch weapon sets, unlike every other profession with weapon swap. So you should be able to predict what they’re gonna do, the issue is whether your reflexes are fast enough.

To accept a more serious nerf on stealth I would like to see a lot of thinks fixed or changed, such as scorpion wire’s clunkiness or some improvements on long animations on AAs for sword or staff or increase the velocity of the AA of short bow.

These need to happen anyways, aside from SB velocity buff. Idk why you tie buffing Scorpion Wire to nerfing Stealth, Scorpion Wire is not useful rn and should be buffed regardless. And not that I wouldn’t like a SB buff, but SB is useful without it. People that can’t use it offensively are either fatfingering or don’t have good enough timing.

Even in pvp, where tbh I dont have great experience in, new thieves do not know what their role is and the only thing they are trying to do is to brawl (because they think its PvP) and die from scrappers, dh or necros like nothing

This is what should happen. I don’t mean that from a morality standpoint, just that if there’s no skill floor then why will people keep coming back to the game? New players should die easily, if they don’t that means the game is laughably uncomplicated and easy. Rather, I think that Anet should make an incentives-based mentoring system for new players. I do it for free whenever I come across a thief that clearly needs help, teaching combos and directing them to Sindrener vids, but this would be more commonplace if people had an incentive to help others. I strongly resist making the class easier for noobs, they need to L2P, and they should get help in doing so.

What did we get for pve content (I am talking mainly for bosses)? We got some extra dazes to break bars, but our blinds are useless anymore and our stealth is irrelevant

Completely agree. Vault is useful for PvE mobs, but we didn’t get much. Thieves are too squishy to fight champs, but that’s where the rewards are at. Anet is not fair to thieves when it comes to PvE.

Mordeus.1234:

This is an oddball suggestion but I’d love to have the next be Razah. The stance would be called something like Legendary Mystic Stance and be rather ‘meta’. The concept behind the specialization would be about what happens when a Revenant summons a being from the Mists made of the Mists. Sure he may not be in the Tyrian history books right now but he’s an iconic face of GW1 and his introduction as a Revenant Legend could give the opportunity to explain what he ‘grew’ into. There could be a whole mysticism aspect to him where he never died but ascended to the Mists like some sort of enlightened prophet.

Razah in GW1 was highly malleable in that you could customize his profession, while his personality was a blank slate that grew with the player. So his role as a Legend would be to help bolster the other player selected Legend whilst learning from allies and enemies.

Yeah this is pretty cool, thanks for writing all that out. Razah is an interesting choice, I have no idea who came up with him in the first place but I felt like Razah’s story could use more expansion.

Lonami.2987:

Yannir.4132:

Fine.
1st: Your own suggestion, the Amazon.
2nd: Stalker. MH dagger. Stealth. Borrows thief-mechanics but comes with it’s own flavor.
3rd: Warden. Shield. Defense that doesn’t rely on evading. Makes the ranger a frontliner, instead of the different forms of avoiding confrontation rangers currently have.
I’ll throw in a 4th one since I got the first one a bit easy: Istari Gamekeeper. Rifle. In the dangerous wilds of the Istari archipelago, carrying lighter ammunition could save your life.

You could say that ranger doesn’t even have space for a dark archer type spec. The archer’s weapons are already there, and they are not dark. You can’t go changing weapon skills around for specs either.

The problem with that is that you’re just writing weapon combinations. You need to think about the theme, and also the mechanics connected to it. In my amazon idea, it’s a swamp stalker, heavily inspired by wild tribes and jungle poisons, and with an in-lore connection to the hylek.

Just “guy with x weapon” doesn’t work. You need a context. Also, said theme/darkness won’t usually come from the weapon skills, but the mechanic and the utilities. Chronomancer theme doesn’t come from the shield, and druid theme doesn’t come from the staff. The weapon could change to pretty much anything, and the theme wouldn’t be affected.

For example, a ranger elite spec could be about the “wild side” of nature, and use carnivorous plants, brain-parasites, and toxic pollen. This ranger would use magic to accelerate the growth of seeds he’s carrying, to then throw them at enemies. It’s a perversion of nature, but it’s still nature, thus why it’s “dark”. The special mechanic could be a toxin-induced rage state, similar to the berserker’s, where vines grow around the body of the ranger, stealing life when in melee combat. Just some wild idea, didn’t think too much about it.

Not saying ArenaNet has to follow this model in any way, or that revenant will never get another nature theme. I just think there’s many other possibilities, which are actually unique, and that focusing on the legendary character instead of the theme is a mistake, and a big part of why I don’t like they used legends instead of magic schools or something like that.

Yannir.4132:

I disagree. In truth, many of them could be given dark themes but that doesn’t mean they should. Guardian is on the top of that list. Dark themes would pretty much go against everything the guardian is. If you make a guardian dark, the end result is a revenant. That goes for warrior as well.

A guardian elite specialization with a 4th virtue called “revenge” or something like that would work just fine. Many games with paladin classes have customization options to turn them into the dark side, so instead of serving the light or whatever they enslave it to purge anyone they deem heretic.

Yeah I think what we’re running into is different perspectives here, it’s seems like Yannir has a more pvp perspective and you’re clearly more lore-oriented. Both are important I’d say, I’m most concerned that Revenant continues to have a unique niche in combat but I wouldn’t say that the lore aspect should be ignored either.

Also at this point we should probably settle on what “dark” means, right now we have “evil” and “kinda angry” which are quite separate definitions.

Lonami.2987:

Let’s word it in another way: Give ideas for 3 new ranger elite specializations.

You’ll run out of themes soon, so you can’t just sacrifice “dark nature” for another profession without making sure ranger has enough themes to keep going.

This is a great thread idea, because you’re right, Ranger of course needs a new specialization. I think it would make sense to have something that still falls in line with what Melandru does/controls, wouldn’t make sense for a player to use 2 core specializations lined up with Melandru, then have a “dark nature” specialization which contradicts Melandru’s powers/influence. If you make a thread in the Ranger forum, I’ll add some ideas.

Can you define “too volatile?” I wouldn’t like losing to pro-league players, but wouldn’t I learn more from being forced to play them via volatile MMR? High volatility isn’t inherently bad, just different. And for those who don’t play often, they are but one stakeholder. Their opinion matters,, but so do the opinions of those who play frequently.

Lol yeah I hope not, that would be sad. There’s already Lich form for necromancer so that would be even more redundant

BlackBeard.2873:

Huskyboy.1053:

• When I activate ED, initial healing is 1640.
• It’s realistic to expect 4 of the 6 charges to hit, so that’s 3232 health. I’m assuming that the 3432 life siphon damage didn’t kill the Ele.
• Right now I have gained 4872 in healing.
• After around 5-6 seconds my Legend swap will be ready, so now I switch over to Glint and activate FoL then Infuse Light immediately.
• Initial heal is 1853, bringing me up to 6725 healing over about 7 seconds
• From there, let’s say the Ele does 1500 damage before realizing that I’m absorbing damage. That brings me up to 8225 health gain total over the course of 10 seconds.
• I now have 20s left on my Shiro heal, 25s on Glint heal.

Alright, show me 5 realistic of other classes’ healing being worse. Please don’t forget extra effects like Daze and Blind on Purification or 2 extra dodges from Channeled Vigor.

Now do the math, but instead of panicking and mashing infuse light ASAP, you use it mid burning-speed and heal for at least 3k + residual burns or overload and just about full-heal, and this should be doable b/c EVERY SINGLE SKILL on ele has a nice long windup. Not only have you invulned through their most dangerous damage, you also healed from it too.

See, infuse light is a skill test. If they can stop damaging (which only applies in a 1v1, in a teamfight you basically ALWAYS full heal), then you are in a bad position, but if you invert a lot of damage, you can almost ensure you win. The advantage on when to use this is almost always in your favor (except vs. thief or fresh-air ele with nearly instant burst), because infuse light is instant and their damage isn’t. Therefore, its entirely up to you to wait and use it at the right time, not just when you are almost dead.

The point is, infuse light would be terrible IF IT WERE YOUR ONLY HEAL (that is why warriors don’t run the same thing that they have). However, when you have another heal (even if it is “only” 5k healing from shiro), you have so many more options for when to infuse. For that reason, nerfing ED isn’t going to kill rev by a long shot.

See, this guy knows what he’s talking about. Blaque, take notes. As he’s pointed out, you don’t use both of the heals back to back if your goal is to get significant heals. I don’t use IL immediately when switching to Glint, but this was what Blaque implied would be a way Revs would use IL, hence the example.

There’s some stuff I disagree with here, specifically that allowing burning and other condis to hit you during IL is going to result in health gain, but he’s overall right: if you wait for the right moment, and are up against an opponent which deals a significant amount of damage through power attacks, you will heal greatly. In other situations, absolutely not, “in a teamfight you basically ALWAYS full heal” say hello to necromancer or condi mes or condi warr. It’s a real toss-up in teamfights, “basically ALWAYS” is far too strong a phrase.

So as we now agree, Rev has two individually terrible heals, and realistically can’t/shouldn’t access them back to back. Rev does have a tremendous healing potential through its heals, assuming they’re deployed strategically in relation to the opponent, and realistically will need 15s total in order to make use of them. Good luck finding another class with a more fickle and drawn-out way of healing themselves, please share if you come across one. BlackBeard if you’d like to add more, please do.

If you played Rev at all you’d know that Legend swap is rarely off CD at the moment you need it, you’re forced into it b/c important skills are on CD, need more energy b/c you’ve used it on evade skills, need a condi cleansed, etc. Like a weapon swap you have to switch during a fight, Legend swapping is more than just switching to your second heal. In fact a player who didn’t Legend swap just to keep their 2nd heal in reserve would be at a huge disadvantage. You’re forgetting that Revs don’t have to just deal with CDs, they also have to manage energy, it’s part of what makes the class more complex than Guard or Warr.

I’m noticing that you still don’t have an example of why Rev’s healing is so good/better than the majority of classes’ healing. I’ll give you a head start, in this 1v1 example my opponent is an Ele, and I switched to Shiro just before engaging. A Rev would target an Ele because they have medium dmg, no blocks and little invuln:

• When I activate ED, initial healing is 1640.
• It’s realistic to expect 4 of the 6 charges to hit, so that’s 3232 health. I’m assuming that the 3432 life siphon damage didn’t kill the Ele.
• Right now I have gained 4872 in healing.
• After around 5-6 seconds my Legend swap will be ready, so now I switch over to Glint and activate FoL then Infuse Light immediately.
• Initial heal is 1853, bringing me up to 6725 healing over about 7 seconds
• From there, let’s say the Ele does 1500 damage before realizing that I’m absorbing damage. That brings me up to 8225 health gain total over the course of 10 seconds.
• I now have 20s left on my Shiro heal, 25s on Glint heal.

Alright, show me 5 realistic of other classes’ healing being worse. Please don’t forget extra effects like Daze and Blind on Purification or 2 extra dodges from Channeled Vigor.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Huskyboy.1053:

Simonoly.4352:

Well you pretty much worked it out on your own with your flipside comment at the end. ED does indeed have more damage and does not need to be traited to do damage. Even when traited, SV does significantly less damage than BD and that damage difference increases even more when you factor in Devastation traits. However, although SV has no damage baseline, it does heal more overall both traited and untraited. So they’re pretty well balanced when you take all those things into consideration.

But the recent change is good for the game overall though. In fact anything that is applied to an attack (even from sigils) that is blocked, blinded, evaded etc should be removed. If someone has a Doom sigil proc ready for you and you dodge the attack that would apply it to you, that Doom proc should be lost until the next weapon swap (unless this is already the case and I’m just mad?).

My point isn’t that the change was wrong, it’s that it leaves Shiro with a laughable heal. My suggestion was and is to remove the 1/2s trigger interval (SV doesn’t have this) so that ED can be used in bursts. People who disagree throw around the “2 heals” point as if those 2 heals actually add up to something significant, whereas in most cases they don’t. More heal > more damage in this case, Revs don’t need the extra damage from ED but do need more healing.

Having both heals is an advantage though you are just looking at the skill in a vacuum it is balanced around the whole class not just the one skill.

Blaque nobody has any reason to believe you unless you provide proof and numbers. You think it’s balanced? Ok, taking CDs, traiting, cast time, armor, dodge access, condi cleansing potential, and any other relevant factors into account, show me that Rev’s heals are generally better than 5 other classes. That would put Rev’s heals in the top 50%. Note that Revs can’t use the 2 heals back-to-back, legend swap has a 10s cooldown. And use real examples like Channeled Vigor on thief, I used Skelk Venom as an example precisely because it’s bad enough that people don’t use it.

This is what you have to do to show people that you actually know what you’re talking about, anybody can claim that a meta is balanced or imbalanced, it doesn’t mean anything unless you prove it.

You have a point, I wouldn’t mind it. It would just result in high-skill players getting legendary very quickly though since they’d be less likely to be placed against people of their skill level.

BlackBeard.2873:

Huskyboy.1053:

My point isn’t that the change was wrong, it’s that it leaves Shiro with a laughable heal. My suggestion was and is to remove the 1/2s trigger interval (SV doesn’t have this) so that ED can be used in bursts. People who disagree throw around the “2 heals” point as if those 2 heals actually add up to something significant, whereas in most cases they don’t. More heal > more damage in this case, Revs don’t need the extra damage from ED but do need more healing.

1. Heals shouldn’t lead to burst damage WHILE ALSO healing you
2. Revs don’t need any more burst damage through procs anyway. Properly bursting can already 1-shot (or nearly) many common builds.

1. You’re right, healing should neither be connected to damage nor dependent on it
2. Also true, it’s almost like you quoted me saying Revs don’t need more damage.

While the 1/2s restriction on hits is weird and has no heal skill equivalent, I would also support just reducing the life siphon and moving that over to healing. That way more healing and less damage.

Simonoly.4352:

Well you pretty much worked it out on your own with your flipside comment at the end. ED does indeed have more damage and does not need to be traited to do damage. Even when traited, SV does significantly less damage than BD and that damage difference increases even more when you factor in Devastation traits. However, although SV has no damage baseline, it does heal more overall both traited and untraited. So they’re pretty well balanced when you take all those things into consideration.

But the recent change is good for the game overall though. In fact anything that is applied to an attack (even from sigils) that is blocked, blinded, evaded etc should be removed. If someone has a Doom sigil proc ready for you and you dodge the attack that would apply it to you, that Doom proc should be lost until the next weapon swap (unless this is already the case and I’m just mad?).

My point isn’t that the change was wrong, it’s that it leaves Shiro with a laughable heal. My suggestion was and is to remove the 1/2s trigger interval (SV doesn’t have this) so that ED can be used in bursts. People who disagree throw around the “2 heals” point as if those 2 heals actually add up to something significant, whereas in most cases they don’t. More heal > more damage in this case, Revs don’t need the extra damage from ED but do need more healing.

I brought up Melandru because in GW1 lore Rangers are supposed to get their powers thanks to Melandru, like Necromancers get theirs from Grenth.

Lonami.2987:

I don’t think it’s just about some legendary status, but an unique legendary power as well, which doesn’t belong in any of the other professions.

I agree with this general sentiment. A character’s uniquity and how they stand apart from others is important. Ventari has always been a strange Legend choice since he’s not really remarkable other than being a peaceable (unusual) centaur who planted a tree.

I’m not sure I fully understand your objection to Urgoz’ uniquity; while Rangers deal with nature, so do Elementalists. The difference there is that Ranger deals with living things like non-sentient animals and plants, and elementalist deals with the non-living classical elements. Necromancers and Rangers both deal with “life,” but while Rangers deal with things that are currently alive (like vines) and nature spirits, Necromancers bring things back to life (which may be construed as forcing spirits into dead bodies, who knows how minions become animated). And of course both Ranger and Necromancer have auxiliary things like marks, traps, etc. But the underlying theme of “nature manipulation” is shared between Eles and Rangers, and the theme of “manipulation of life” is shared between Necros and Rangers.

Obviously I’m being generous in my comparisons, but really uniquity is just about how you look at things. It seems to me that Eles and Rangers and Necros are distinct professions because, even though there could be thematic overlap, Anet has made sure to separate them by what makes them different. I don’t see why an Ele couldn’t control vines, plants are full of water right? And why is it that Rangers can control both animals (has a brain somewhat similar to humans) but also can control plants, which don’t even have brains? It’s just a design choice, there are certainly facets of Rangers that are just soldered together and could easily be separated. Why not have Beastmaster and Gardener? Because Gardener isn’t cool enough tbh.

Urgoz’ corrupted nature is certainly outside of Melandru’s ability or desire to control, and is in fact the result of the Jade Winds, Shiro’s corruption of Dwayna’s power which she gave to the Canthan Imperial line. In my biased view, that separates him pretty clearly from Rangers, though they both control plants and monsters.

Caedmon.6798:

Huskyboy.1053:

To add on to what I was saying earlier, if a Thief uses the combo I mentioned, you can just back away and he/she won’t be able to hurt you. You might get hit by one blinding bolt, that’s it. So many people will try to CC or double CC me and it’s just sad to watch while I do 6k crit damage to them.

I’m not saying i have issues with thieves using it.My point was actually,that axe 5 need to be buffed similar to the thief steal.

I’m gonna have to disagree, warrs don’t need the reflect to use it effectively. This is devastating in a node fight inside a combo field, a thief can’t use it that way because they’ll get destroyed immediately by any necro or ele’s aoe attacks, and they don’t have nice things like heavy armor, OP passive healing, and resistance to offset the incoming damage. Not that thieves should, but by virtue of the class they already can’t use the skill as effectively as a warr can, which is why they have the reflect. I really don’t see why we need this weapon skill to get even more special effects, it’s already a channeled skill where you can actually move, and now you have +movement speed. If you use Dual Strike right before, with a little luck you’ll be doing a ton of crit AoE damage.

That being said, I would support buffing the speed increase up to Superspeed levels, warrs don’t have enough chase abilities and it’s unfair for people to just be able to walk away from a losing fight against a warr b/c they have swiftness. Also it’s a pretty cool way to kill someone.

Aenaos.8160:

Huskyboy.1053:

It’s pretty sick. The things they updated open up quite a few new possibilities, I’m looking forward to it even though I don’t play ele. They’ve gotten boring to fight this past meta.

I can’t think of a class that is less useful and potent than elementalist right now.
The possibilities you have with this class are still the same.
a.If your team is half descent maybe they can carry you.
b.If you want to carry you’ll play another class
c.Thief fodder
d.Mesmer fodder
e.Delete your ele.

P.S f.Revenant fodder

A. Ele carries mid fight with area condi cleanses and healing.
B. Ok
C. Good thief fodder, some thieves will try to interrupt while ele has stacks of stability or magnetic aura and waste their initiative.
D. Really? Condi mes can’t touch ele, and illusions die to overloads after 2 hits.
E. Not even marginally constructive.

F. 100% correct, that’s the rock-paper-scissors combat model we have rn. Not an issue specific to ele, condi mes owns power rev any day.

xKratos.4758:

All of you randoms who said Power rev is bad because of shiro heal nerf are all boosted apes. Power rev is still the best power specs in the game. The must have of every team comp. In fact, they can even remove shiro heal and rev will still be use.

If you have a problem with what I said. Come and 1v1 me for 500g. I’ll stream that and you better pay after I whoop you. Don’t ditch like that one dude who challenged me and didn’t pay.

Exceptions are people who I know are not boosted apes ofc.

Let’s see…

> Posted 5 minutes ago
> Has been challenged, gone to a hotjoin, dueled, come back to forums and edited post in those 5 minutes

Yeah that checks out.

Burtnik.5218:

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Burtnik.5218:

JayAction.9056:

BlaqueFyre.5678:

You can…. run different Legends………

Shadowstep.6049:

They don’t know definition of trade off – don’t bother.

The other legends are 100% non-viable. Getting stunned in mallyx is a guaranteed 100-0 if your opponent is playing a damaging amulet. Jalis, is 100% useless in pvp. Ventari also does not work.

They are not aware of it

I don’t understand why you guys are all up in arms over ED, it’s has always been the worst thing to have.

Backed off already? You make me sad. I complained about Shiro heal back at his reveal, during beta i wanted to get it changed. Idc if it will deal damage or not, i want reliable heal ability in a healing skill slot. I wouldnt give a kitten if it was an utility skill, but its healing one and i would like to have reliable healing. When i played guardian i was farting off healing no matter what i pressed, i didnt had to worry about hitting someone/taking hits on purpose. When i played warrior i was healing for 900hp/s while being afk at the same time.

No healing skill has so many counters like ED and the worst thing is we cant even swap it away for something else without losing other utility skills unlike all 8 classes for whatever reason. This heal is on par with water spirit – they are the worst healing abilities in the game, even thief skelk is better and you dont see it being picked by anyone cus its trash ability. ED the olny heal in game which has “interval”, can be reflected to heal your enemy instead, deflected, blinded and now also “daggers” are lost on block/evade.

I want them to delete this ability already and give Shiro a new healing ability https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Meditation_of_the_Reaper
or
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Battle_Scars

In general, revenant is a class which is up to a overhaul, he wasnt even supposed to have wep swap in the first place but the designer responsible for this class kittened up and we ended up with what we have now. A bugged beta class where most of the abilities are simply unviable and something like number changes wont fix anything.

I sitll wonder why they ever touched sword mh in the first place when it was good where it was. Now we have a skill that aims into houses and other bullkitten and they dont even bother to fix the mess they created. So basically we are with sword that is kittened OP in 1v1 but useless in 1vX. The sword desing is really off in general, autoattack want you to group as many enemeis in one place as possible while 2 and 3 are doing the opposite. Anet logic is too stronk for me really.

Burt they’re just baiting you tbh, no real arguments have been made that ED is actually good or that its cons outweigh its pros. This thread is full of thief trolls who are mad that their class can’t take a hit.

Lexander.4579:

you forgot to mention that skelk venom has double the cast time of ED,

1 sec to cast a heal skill in the middle of pvp is basically a suicide especially for thief, while ED is only 1/2 sec cast time and rev can soak about 70% more damage than thief

Where exactly is “the middle of pvp” I’m trying to find it rn.

cptn skyz.8706:

Dude Abaddon Would be sick

Yeah I pretty much addressed that via Varesh Ossa, see the second comment on the thread. But yeah I mean we could cut to the chase and just make Abaddon be the Legend.

Burtnik.5218:

JayAction.9056:

BlaqueFyre.5678:

You can…. run different Legends………

Shadowstep.6049:

They don’t know definition of trade off – don’t bother.

The other legends are 100% non-viable. Getting stunned in mallyx is a guaranteed 100-0 if your opponent is playing a damaging amulet. Jalis, is 100% useless in pvp. Ventari also does not work.

They are not aware of it

WE KNOW

Obindo.6802:

CutesySylveon.8290:

Obindo.6802:

CutesySylveon.8290:

Obindo.6802:

CutesySylveon.8290:

Obindo.6802:

CutesySylveon.8290:

Nobody, exactly.

The conversation can go back to being productive now.

Quote me saying nobody, you can go back to being a no name

“Quote me saying nobody, you can go back to being a no name.”— Nobody

But I don’t in that quote, you seem as bad at this as your accomplishments

“But I don’t in that quote, you seem as bad at this as your accomplishments.” — Nobody, the Keyboard Warrior (( get it? ))

Correction: Your superior who will actually accomplishes something meanwhile you QQ on forum to compensate for no success, talk about keyboard warrior.

Coming from the person trying to validate themselves over a game, likely because you have no real accomplishments. Seriously, is your self esteem this easy to shake just by poking it?

Should have taken Retaliatory Evasion, because you take hits like a necro

Estimated IQ of 150-180, Eidetic memory, all A’s in the most demanding/“difficult” alignment in sweden, skipped a grade ahead of my age (17) and my self esteem is good thank you, it’s not shaken because a random no name on the internet gets seemingly triggered.

The real question: are you euphoric?

vaxjani.9073:

When you compare it with Skelk Venom don’t forget that revs have another healing skill on the other legend, while thief only has SV.

Thief has one heal slot but 5 options, and nobody takes SV because it’s not competitive. At this point rev has 2 heal slots and 2 options with 30s recharge each, neither of which are effective against experienced players. Honestly I would be happy with one heal if it were as good as channeled vigor (20s recharge), Signet of Malice (15s recharge) or even Withdraw (18s recharge). All of those are traitable for further recharge reduction btw, Rev doesn’t have that option. Looking at SoM, at this point its active heal is similar to what you’re gonna from ED, and with a 15s recharge I can use it just as frequently as my 2 Rev heals if not more often. And its passive effect is actually very good, I’d be happy with 1k passive health regen every 7.5 attacks with no need for activation.

So yes, while Rev has more heal quantity, it’s not higher quality. Clownmug summed it up:

Clownmug.8357:

Revenant does have two healing skills, one dependent on hitting your opponent and the other one dependent on being hit by an opponent. A brilliant design that lets the opponent determine whether you can heal or not. That’s why Skelk Venom and Defiant Stance are so widely used right?

If you want to show me how Mallyx, Jalis, or Ventari (our other amazing choices) builds play in sPvP feel free to stream some matches, I’ll grab my popcorn. And don’t listen to the haters, the Retribution line they just nerfed is still totally viable.

Ardid.7203:

If you want to “balance” an strategic element by sharing it along all classes in the same way, you can’t stop at CC. You should do it for rezzing power and damage spikes too, and also for defense access, disengage ability, and party boons…
CC is not different from DPS or Sustain. Why should CC be equal for everyone, when DPS and Sustain are not? Aren’t part of the same strategic pool of tools?

Ardid I’m not asking for a balance that changes combat, adding a launch doesn’t affect a person’s effectiveness in combat if they already have access to knockbacks/pushes. You brought up a ton of mechanics that are in no way relevant to the topic matter, I’m perplexed as to why party boons or whatever “defense access” is made its way into this discussion. Your argument is that discussing access to a particular strategic element should expand to a conversation about access to all strategic elements. If you’d like to do that, please make a separate thread, as that is a different and more complex discussion.

Getting back on topic, pushes could just be changed to launches since in every other way they’re the same type of CC (i.e. forces the victim away from the user). Launch just allows the user to knock a downed player off the point. The alternative of course would be to just not allow downed people to affect point captures, which would make more sense. After all, if someone’s been downed then they’ve lost the fight, so why are they still affecting point capture?

RyuDragnier.9476:

Sadly he did not have a bonus mission, but considering how Charr are often taught skills other than their profession depending on their Legion, I figure they could pull together something with old Blood Legion techniques, though I admit that’s a stretch.

Eh I mean it’s cool to think outside the box, if you look at my “Other Ideas” you’re gonna see some stretches too. What’s important is whether the Legend is cool and adds something new.