burn guard is a great team fighter, but it has the same problem as necro. probably worse actually. burn guard can’t 1v1 and if the enemy team makes the wise decision of focusing the burn guard first, then it’s gg unless the burn guard has a dotting tempest with him.
The idea behind the new icons was that we weren’t pleased with the readability of the old ones. As others have noted, you had to already know what the rank art looked like to know whether someone had achieved a higher or lower rank.
That being said, considering the feedback, we’ll revert them.
Thank you!
Consider a stronger color for the readability but keep the intricate design.
I find that hammer and sword work best when you stay at range and team fight rather than 1v1. if a person isn’t paying attention, it’s really easy to land the spirit weapon on them, especially since they seem to track.
using spirit sword with virtues, radiance and zeal is super hilarious though. it feels like you’re dropping nukes on a teamfight. but what’s best is you don’t have to get close to do it like with judge’s intervention + whirling wrath.
I think that before we decide that hammer and sword need to be on instant cast, we should probably ask what people who main other classes think.
I only agree with making the shield instacast since it’s a defensive skill. The sword and hammer should not be instacast, they do a lot of damage and having them be instant makes it very hard to avoid getting hit. especially the hanmer.
It’s the same skin as the ascended one. It’s just that it lets you statswipe and rune and infusion change without destroying the rune or infusion.
is there any way to reverse the spirit weapons as they use to be?
No, they are actually good now in pvp.
Can pvp league seasons start sooner now? I’m itching to finish this set!
not a single mention of holosmith/scrapper? :p scrapper has only been one of the most dominant builds in this meta but okay
haven’t been able to speculate what holosmith will be best at. I see a bit of burn, bleed, and a bit of utility in it. Is it gonna make p/p engi viable as p/p holosmith?
What are your personal predictions for the solo q and competitive team metas after the new elite specs launch?
Mine are:
1. spellbreaker becomes top dog as far as 1v1s are concerned. good for comp teams and solo q.
2. firebrand/scourge replaces tempest/reaper
3. mirage can compete with d/p thf as decapper and +1 due to mirage’s elite jaunt
4. deadeye counters trap dh
5. most popular 1v1 skirmisher builds will be: spellbreaker, mirage, weaver, and potentially soulbeast depending on how much customization it allows.
I wouldn’t say replace aegis, but giving guardian access to giving barriers would be nice.
What’s the targeting range on jaunt, btw?
In particular, in pvp. it might even replace tempest + reaper.
Firebrand lacks consistent damage immunity beyond aegis. Scourge lacks stunbreaks and stability. But both elite specs have skills that benefit eachother greatly. A firebrand can provide a scourge with stability while a Scourge provides the firebrand with barriers to sustain spike dps. A scourge corrupts away resistance that blocks firebrand burns and bleeds, while a firebrand heals a scourge’s hp behind their barriers.
They could also just give firebrand, tempest and ventari their own special buffs. Maybe give firebrand a physical damage reduction buff, limit grace of the land to physical dps, give tempest condi dps buff, and give ventari some condi damage reduction buff.
I wouldnt be surprised if they nerf glyph of empowerment or grace of the land in some way.
I somehow feel that while necros and guards are dissatisfied with the new elite specs, i can see a lot of synergy in pvp between two condi specs where firebrands put down healing, condi cleanse, stabilty and stunbreak but is vulnerable to phys dps burst, while the scourge covers this weakness by providing barriers whilst having its own weakness, a lack of stability and not enough healing, covered by the firebrand. Meanwhile, both are putting down torment, bleeds, burning, and poison with the added bonus that the scourge corrupts away resistance and the firebrand can allow the scourge to not worry about bringing condi transfers and cleanses.
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I thought i was in the guardian forum for a second there. Anyway, I’m super pumped for spellbreaker. It seems to be a very well rounded duelist build. I liked power zerk and i feel I’m gonna love this. I bet they nerf the power traits in the zerk line to keep it as the condition elite spec
Could you at least for a moment take a minute to realize I’m talking about zerg vs zerg or gvg play in wvw and you’re talking about roaming?
It’s not the same thing. If you want to roam just use dh.
I think you can run pretty much anything in a zerg. Especially if it’s tanky.
Doesn’t mean you’re useful.
Ok. Cool.
We’re not talking about running a spirit weapon build in wvw. We’re talking about the meta core stability and stunbreak frontlinner build for guardians and how firebrand is an upgrade in every way to that.
Plus axe is loaded with bleeds so condi guard no longer relies on burns as it’s only dps condi. additionally, one of the mantras spams cover condis.
And some of them, particularly tome of justice are a combination of targeted and aoe and cc offensive skills with emphasis on burning. As far as i know, we have no shouts that do damage, are targeted, or cc.
It’s amusing to me that for like 2 years nobody thought guard was bad because it lacked channeled blocks, then all of a sudden hot hits and the entire guard forum loses it collective mind because the new elite spec isn’t a carbon copy of dh but just with hot sauce
Dude it’s not about the channel it’s about the numbers of attacks that can be blocked with one aegis. Aegis doesn’t need to be like DH f3, it just needs to be like dodges to combat the powercreep in this game that also happened to enemy’s attacks (and aegis was already problematic in vanilla as well, but it didn’t matter because back then we had as much health as a Warrior).
They should fix/buff core Guard to bring it to HoT standards. Since I know they don’t touch core traits because that does not print money I said at least Firebrand should have these changes. It has absolutely nothing to do with DH being a prime example and therefore somewhat revealed as a good spec. It’s just that they didn’t fix core Guard because that does not print money. Also DH did not fix aegis just because of f3 since f3 was not about aegis for DH.
Wasn’t replying to your suggestion.
The mantra heal probably has such a low heal precisely because the devs noticed that the mantra would proc pure of heart and with healing gear that’s 2k healing x3 on top of the heal from the mantra without taking into account the smiter’s boon trait which adds an additional 2k aprox. Not sure if that’s x3 or just once though.
smiter’s boon+pure of heart+plus base mantra heal x3 would be ridic.
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Do the tomes have a duration until you run out? It seems like the cd is only an issue if you use up the 5-8 pages and then have to stow it to get back the pages since as far as i know, the pages do not regen. Your only other option is renewed focus at that point.
I can definitely see this messing up guardians real hard.
You kept playing for two years because you were expecting to see tome skills come back in the specific way you wanted them to?
Guys, really?
“Hurr durr you’re crazy, tomes were obviously going to become shouts!”. Please don’t pretend that assuming tomes were going to be tomes was an unreasonable assumption. I know most of the community are clowns and white knights but come on.
I am not saying that it was obvious tomes were going to become shouts.
I am saying that waiting for two years for them to bring back tomes into the game and then quitting when it doesn’t look like how you wanted them to is the craziest thing I’ve heard today.
Could you at least for a moment take a minute to realize I’m talking about zerg vs zerg or gvg play in wvw and you’re talking about roaming?
It’s not the same thing. If you want to roam just use dh.
They might work in PvP as a condition build, but any real support guardian build in PvP that isn’t tanky will never work in close range. The DH is more tanky just with shield of courage and support builds for DH still don’t pop up frequently.
It is ridiculous that people here are requesting the new tomes act as kits when these tomes can give area wide stunbreak, stability, projectile reflect, condi removal, healing, burning, and resistance. Engi kits come nowhere near the power that these tomes have and being able to switch back and forth between defense, healing and dps with tomes would not be balanced. A more reasonable request is to lower the cooldown on tome of courage to at least 40-50 sec.
I don’t personally care about them having cooldowns, but I’m not remotely satisfied with the
shoutsskills that they offer. Tomes went from the reason I played this game to the reason I’m likely going to quit. Can’t believe I waited two years just to see my favourite skills get butchered.
You kept playing for two years because you were expecting to see tome skills come back in the specific way you wanted them to?
Guys, really?
Honestly last time karl listened to this sub forum’s raging we got a dh that was so overpowered that it has been nerfed every patch since. I still remember the dh nuke memes. Hopefully the devs get very selective this time with who they listen to lest we get more powercreep.
It is ridiculous that people here are requesting the new tomes act as kits when these tomes can give area wide stunbreak, stability, projectile reflect, condi removal, healing, burning, and resistance. Engi kits come nowhere near the power that these tomes have and being able to switch back and forth between defense, healing and dps with tomes would not be balanced. A more reasonable request is to lower the cooldown on tome of courage to at least 40-50 sec.
Did you ever see or played DH pre hot? It was pure garbage, ppl were raging with a reason. Than it was buffed but traps were OP for casuals so they nerfed it every patch.
Saddly Firebrand is even worse than prehot DH, you will see it in 2 weeks when ppl try to test it in pvp and wvw.
Engie kits are very good, did you played it, they give block, heal, condi dmg and its quite usefull. Firebrand kits are 90 sec cd which is abysmal cd. Dont forget mantras are 300 range also and almost all skills are 3/4 cast time. Very bad if you actually want to support someone in big fights cause of so many movements and interrupts.
ppl are saying its fun, well hell yeah it would be fun to farm Firebrands when the expansion starts, pls dont be salty then and cry for a buffs it will be too late then.
What I would to see is like engie kits with skills on big cd’s rather than big cd tomes with skills on 6-15sec cd.
Man, if 90 sec cd makes you so salty just take virtues, jesus.
And no, it won’t be too late if firebrand sucks on release. you know because they do balance patches more than once a year. please stop with the hysteria.
I disagree completely. Firebrand will definitely be used in wvw since guard is used for stunbreaks, condition clears and stability there and the new elite has them by the truckloads. The wvw meta doesn’t even use dh so this whining about channeled blocks makes no sense.
I am less certain about pvp, but if you were running core burn guard before you will definitely upgrade to firebrand due to the elite’s higher access to condis and higher access to blocks than core guard.
I doubt firebrand will be meta in raid pve, but channeled blocks doesn’t matter there so your initial complaint is null here too.
The only thing firebrand cannot do as well as dh is be a bruiser/ 1v1 spec.
Also, if you take indomitable courage you will get a stunbreak on cast and stability on completion. you don’t have to worry about a thf when it comes to tome of courage if you take indom. You should worry about tome of resolve, but you don’t need to have focus equiped to protect the cast. simply use focus 5 and then f2.
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Honestly last time karl listened to this sub forum’s raging we got a dh that was so overpowered that it has been nerfed every patch since. I still remember the dh nuke memes. Hopefully the devs get very selective this time with who they listen to lest we get more powercreep.
It is ridiculous that people here are requesting the new tomes act as kits when these tomes can give area wide stunbreak, stability, projectile reflect, condi removal, healing, burning, and resistance. Engi kits come nowhere near the power that these tomes have and being able to switch back and forth between defense, healing and dps with tomes would not be balanced. A more reasonable request is to lower the cooldown on tome of courage to at least 40-50 sec.
It’s amusing to me that for like 2 years nobody thought guard was bad because it lacked channeled blocks, then all of a sudden hot hits and the entire guard forum loses it collective mind because the new elite spec isn’t a carbon copy of dh but just with hot sauce
In pvp i would always go indomitable. even a dh f3 is useless if you get hit by an unblockable cc. in pve if going condi dps perm wrath is the obvious choice since mantra elite and tome of courage already offer sufficient team stun breakers
Stacks of burn is great and all, but it’s the ONLY condition you have as a guardian and the whole stack can be easily cleansed, in wvw or pvp. Will the way conditions work change.
axe is full of bleeding. one mantra gives multiple non damaging conditions that you can use as cover.
Sounds like a good view of the future.
Fight starts, try to open tome.. Instantly in dire straits so hit RF. Try to open tome again, everyone else already dead because stupid firebrand stood there useless for 14 seconds.
tome of courage can be cast with stability and stunbreak if traited. you can cover your tome of resolve cast with shield of wrath.
Considering that you can trait tome of courage to give aegis on every cast of f3, heal mantra gives up to 3 aegis and you can use mace, shield and focud to block, i really don’t see how you can say that firebrand has no blocks.
Hell, firebrand has more stunbreaks and stability than guard or dh.
The reason I’m excited about it after the reveal is because i feel firebrand is going to increase the skill ceiling on guardian. Unlike base guard and dh where spamming all your cds was a common strategy, firebrand requires you to judge whether you want to pace your mantras or if you are in an emergency and need the final charge. People who buttom spam get punished more. Additionally, mantras require that you judge what engagement you’re about to get into and charge your mantra beforehand.
Another aspect is the tomes, with limited page charges and a high cd, you have to make good judgements on whether you need to dps, heal or support your allies rather than just rolling your hands all over the keyboard to activate your virtues all at once. I also noticed higher cds and cast times on many of the new specializations. I presume this was in response to the spam fest that HoT specs were. This is a good thing because longer cast times means that you actually need to think about protecting your casts or ccing the enemy before you use your key skills for a set up.
All in all, I’m seeing firebrand as the new meta in wvw for stability and condi removal and the meta for burn guard in pvp.
axe/torch is gonna be sick as kitten
the nice thing is that if f3 is a tome, we can comebine it with virtues traits to make it a stunbreak and have stability.
The most important pvp content from HoT was the elite specs. So it sounds to me like they learned from their mistakes and just saved their resources for what really sold the expansion.
if nos and zeromis can no longer do leagues that means they wont show up in my matches anymore!
most of these complaint threads would be resolved if people multiclassed more
Not really, condi chrono carries harder, but condi rev is easier to play.
Would be nice to get an answer from a dev about the mechanical or balance reason why that’s the case
But man does it feel good to carry a kittenty team as a thf. you notice the enemy can’t hold their caps and one of them explodes every time you show up at mid.
a thf that’s doing their job is usually the reason why a match will take longer than it should as the enemy is being deprived of points from caps and has to rely on actually winning their team fights to counter the thf ghosting the map. I just wish there was a counter to a good thf beyond having a better thf or just winning your team fights quickly.
1 minute seems a fair about of time count the match as deserted. Actually i could compromise with 1 minute and 30 seconds just to start.
How does s/d condi work? not sure I’ve run into one or if i have, i might have confused it for d/d.
You would think that if matching were tighter and if teams were actually MMR balanced with a real algorithm —while going into a match-- that this simply wouldn’t happen. .
This is false as hell. No system, no matter how sophisticated, will ever be able to avoid anomalies. And the billion dollar question is:
is the whinning on this forum representative of the way matchmaking is working or is this forum representative of the anomalies due to self selection bias (dissatisfied customers tend to express their opinions more than the satisfied ones)?