Guild Wars 2

I think resistance would also be acceptable. Protection kind of steals Jalis’s elite’s thunder.

Hey, are you also planning on releasing the trident for the Revenant as an underwater option that supports tanky and/or healer builds? Please say yes.

Energy regen is lowered to a crawl and make your weapon skills build energy. The amount of energy generated is influenced by the recharge of the skill. AAs would generate a very small amount. Then there’d be some play with you wanting to use some legend skills before using your weapon skills or wanting to blow your high recharge skills after your elite to bring your energy back up. Alternatively you would want to space out skills when you have an upkeep skill going.

The facet of nature is the profession mechanic change given to us by equipping the Herald trait line. Glint is just a legend we CAN equip if we want to. The Chronomancer doesn’t have to equip shield to get access to Continuum Split/Shift so I see no reason you can’t have your facet of nature and without Glint too!

Lonewolf Kai.3682:

Quite the opposite for me. I’m super sold!! I can’t believe you’re not. Passive effects along with great sounding actives! What more did you want!?

@Roy, what’s wrong with you man!? I’m already overboard hyped for the Revy and now you go and do this?!!? I’m having to dailing 9-1-1 as I type this! My mind has been blown clear off my body! I’m actually scared to watch the POI tomorrow.

I am hyped man, I am! Especially after Roy appeased my worries. I was still hyped when I was concerned that using the shield and this spec would result in me being a tickle monster. I just want to be able to take Glint and Ventari into PvE and still be successful by myself.

Roy Cronacher.1576:

Treetoptrickster.4205:

Azure.8670:

Obviously there’s nothing to see until tmrw, but as of now it sounds very meh to me. Maybe I’m misreading the information but it sounds so much like the tempest with limited access

The passive effects of the facets that sound to be only boons aren’t the coolest to me, but I’m really loving what I’ve heard about the active effects. The shield is OK to me, I’ll have to see if it works well and if it has any means of helping with offence. I’m really looking forward to making a Bard Type character though. If the auras are cool enough and if the spec doesn’t make me completely unable to kill things I think I’ll love it!

Glint active skills for the facets have a lot of offense.

OMG. OMG. OMG. Roy replied again! fans self

Azure.8670:

Obviously there’s nothing to see until tmrw, but as of now it sounds very meh to me. Maybe I’m misreading the information but it sounds so much like the tempest with limited access

The passive effects of the facets that sound to be only boons aren’t the coolest to me, but I’m really loving what I’ve heard about the active effects. The shield is OK to me, I’ll have to see if it works well and if it has any means of helping with offence. I’m really looking forward to making a Bard Type character though. If the auras are cool enough and if the spec doesn’t make me completely unable to kill things I think I’ll love it!

Hey there! Thanks for taking an interest. I’ve owned this game since year one, yet I’ve never been able to get a Warrior past level 20. After trying a few paths and skill sets I decided that maybe this class just wasn’t for me. When the specializations patch was released it gave me reason again to look at the Warrior and rediscover its potential. I think I’ve finally crafted a build that I find interesting enough to wait till 80 for, and I’m confident that this Warrior will go the distance! That being said, I would like to hear some seasoned Warriors’ opinions on it. This build is primarily what I’ll be using in PvE and Dungeons, but I can easily adjust it for other modes. What I want critique on is the base of it. Yes, I know, it doesn’t use Zerker gear, and that was a conscious decision I made to sacrifice a lot of potential crit damage for the ability to take A LOT of punishment. I was leaning towards more of a tanky/supportive role anyways. Enjoy! Or something…

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQNAR8ej8cQlH2FCuhAdIGKCKbAegAIDi+OJwVvFSBA-ThSBwAGV+hT9nOPAgU6GAdQAou/gElgaOCAsN/B4CAAA-e

Kidel.2057:

Yeah but I won’t forgive him if we’re unable to use Shiro+Glint because of lack of condi cleanse

There were six facets that were largely themed around the gods as WP said in his video about yesterday’s post. I’d imagine that whatever the ‘facet of Kormir’ skill might have condi cleanse. If not then I’m willing to bet the heal skill will at least, as the active or the upkeep.

Kidel.2057:

We should probably wait for Roy’s post on saturday before. He said he’s changing something on Jalis.

I’m dying of anticipation! Thank Kormir that we were lucky enough to get Roy!

I get that one will have a recharge when you shetter the facet, but it just doesn’t feel right that Glint has aoe protection and an active knockdowns and superspeed when all Jalis has for his elite is just stronger than usual aoe protection. Maybe Jalis’s could be changed to also immobilize enemies or maybe Facet of chaos could grants something other than protection?

Omg omg omg fans self

ROY REPLIED

1: Do either of the shield skills have any effects on enemies or are they entirely for
defense & support?

2: Are all of the upkeep benefits for facets boons or are there other effects?

3: Is there any way of ending a facet aura without using the chain skill and putting the
facet on cooldown?

4: Why are the VFX so amazing?

Bearhugger.4326:

I’ll wait for the PoI for final judgement, but my guts tell me that this thing is going to be ridiculously O/P in PvE because I highly doubt the AI will be smart enough to burst defiant bars when it sees them, so revs are essentially getting an endure pain on short cooldown in PvE.

Normally I wouldn’t care because this PvE is already plagued to the core by the bum rush zerker lolmeta, but we’re supposed to get hard group content so it’s time to make the balance at least remotely fair in PvE too.

Did they mention the cooldown?

So this skill seems pretty powerful and has a very neat design of having a drawback if shattered. I imagine that its recharge is dragon sized. I just have one suggestion though: can you give it some use for offence? From what I’ve read on Dulfy I have reason to believe that the shield will be the first weapon in the game to not offer a single offensive ability. I mean it is a shield, so I don’t think too much is necessary, but so far this fits with Ventari more than the staff does! Maybe it should have a payoff for channeling the skill for the entire duration. Something like a few seconds of Retaliation or an AOE Blind and damage would work alright. Then instead of people just wanting to shatter it to make you an easy target and stop your healing it would be a little bit more about killing it before it lays eggs.

Anyone have any idea for a cool build that could utilize some of this stuff? Staff obviously has major synergy, but what would your choices for your other two specs be? I wanna know what ideas you guys have on how to use this!

Shouldn’t you call the build… clockdown? I’m sorry.

Time to wave goodbye to the chronomancer for now. I hope you all made good use of your time! What’s your favourite memory from this weekend? I loved fake cliff jumping with CS, stacking wells on top of each other and watching things go crazy, my insane interrupts, and stunning all the things with shield 5! Sorry to see you go, chronomancer. It’s been sWELL. ;D

Here’s a trick I’ve discovered with ToT that’s very useful for skipping trash mobs if you can’t just stealth through them…

When you launch your wall, FOLLOW IT. Keep running in its wake and continue running forwards even when it stops to swap trajectories. If you were fast enough you’ll be in front of it and it’ll swap to continue in the same direction it was cast in, following you.

This means that you can stun A LOT of mobs and almost always still get the recharge bonus while skipping. Stun people in front of you, and then stun people chasing you.

Have Fun!

Just a small suggestion to rename Illusionary Leap to Illusionary Lunge. I mean, if you’re going with the fencer motif for the sword you may as well.

Yeah, I noticed that. Really love that feature.

CptCuddles.8912:

My vote is to drop ‘Improved Alacrity’ and create some type of shield augmenting trait (really disappointing this even needs to be suggested).

Make ’All’s Well That Ends Well’ into something more interesting, this trait and wells in general are pretty underwhelming.

I agree about how this trait could use some improvement, but I’m really liking the wells as they are.

Xenon.4537:

savacli.8172:

Treetoptrickster.4205:

savacli.8172:

Xenon.4537:

Every build will be Devastation + Invocation + Who cares. Just look where all the damage % modifiers are. Look where the Fury traits are. Look where the stunbreaks are. Etc, etc.

The only exception is for those rare situations where you want to tank or something…

Agreed, well for PvE at least. Corruption looks to be the contender for DPS (ironically works better in a Power build than condi build). Retribution would be used for tanking-esque, and Salvation offers recovery support.

How is Corruption better than Devastation for power builds? Last time I checked there was just the sure fire crit trait there.

I consider Devastation and Invocation to be mandatory in a Power build. Corruption would be the third Spec of the remaining three.

And as I learned today, Mallyx gives you (supposedly) 30% more damage due to stat increase while using Embrace the Darkness. You could probably just run the Mallyx legend with a different traitline in that case.

Ah, right.

CptnDrunk.8361:

Brilliant Concept. I really like the synergy it would have with our lesser used builds.

Thanks a lot!

Mikkel.8427:

Thank you for taking the time to post this very imaginative and fun concept.

Thank you for taking the time to read it all

The V.8759:

Seems really cool imo! Altho I can only imagine the horror of constantly hearing a trumpet while fighting >.<

Idea is if you were to be using every weapon skill and the shouts it would sound more like a one man band with your trumpet, your background trumpeters playing serenade, and your shouts providing some string and woodwind sounds. Even with the AA on the warhorn I was going over the possibility of there being multiple sequences and short little 6 note tunes in it alone. You’ve got four separate ticks of damage with Ear-splitter and one on Diminuendo and Serenade. I think if they were to ever do something like this they would either have it so that if you were to use the chain over and over again it would eventually all link together to become one out of a set of songs. Or it could just play random sequences of notes. I would just want it to actually sound musical. Anyways, thanks so much for the feedback!

keenlam.4753:

I really like the idea of a stunbreak on heal skill.
Also, warhorn + OH pistol interrupt build with 2 stuns on demand… yummy.

Maybe Crescendo should be a skill shot like the new lightning orb. That way you can’t wouldn’t be able to have two certain stuns.

Traits:

I decided to take the Reaper approach and chose three separate themes as the Bard’s focus: healing, control, and boons out the wazoo. I did my best to include some synergies with shatter builds, interrupt builds, phantasm builds and support ones especially. The only play-style or weapon this trait line doesn’t have any means to enhance are condi builds with scepter. I think some of these traits are a little crazy because of how much I tried to tie existing mechanics in with the Bard’s areas of expertise. It almost feels like there isn’t really a downside to taking this line over another which is a problem. Feel free to provide feedback as to how I could change anything here to make it better!

Minors:

Virtuoso – gain access to Bard mechanics. When you stun an enemy, they dance for
the stun’s duration! Just a flavor thing. No real impact.

Perfect Harmony – gain 2% increased outgoing healing per unique boon on you.

Lasting Impressions – boon strips only reduce the duration of boons applied by you
by 33% instead of removing them immediately.

Adepts:

In Tune – Interrupting a foe casts “Staccato!”

Tempo – Warhorn skills recharge 20% faster and grant 3s of Swiftness to allies that
don’t already have it. 8s recharge per individual ally.

Amorous Volume – 15% increased outgoing healing. Increased to 20% towards
allies with Regeneration.

Masters:

Acoustic Aggression – Critically hitting a foe marks them with
Reverb which will strike adjacent foes and spawn
a clone after 2 seconds. 12s ICD

Belt It Out – Shouts recharge 20% faster and the boons they apply have 33%
increased durations.

Resonance – 33% chance when gaining a boon to create a note that can be picked
up by you or an ally that restores health and copies one of your boons
over to them.

Grandmasters:

Capriccioso – Grants illusions retaliation when you shatter them with “Captivate.”
“Captivate” heals allies near your illusions whenever a taunted foe
strikes them.

Illusionary Ensemble – Phantasms take 10% reduced damage per every phantasm
alive. Summoned phantasms’ first attacks inflict 3s of cripple
and blind.

Stolen Masterpieces – Removing boons from enemies deals damage per boon
as well as randomly granting you and up to 3 nearby allies
one of the stripped boons. 3s ICD.

New Utility Type: Shouts

Bard shouts would ideally be sung and have instrumental backgrounds and impressive visual effects. Mechanically they also all grant boons. Some of them even grant two!

Heal – “From the Top!” 25s recharge
Hum a soothing tune that breaks stuns, heals you, and grants allies 3s
of Regeneration. Heal for more and grant that bonus healing
to surrounding allies if you do break stun.

1 – “Allegrissimo!” 30s recharge
Sing a swiftening song that grants yourself and surrounding allies Swiftness
and Quickness for 5s.

2 – “Brioso!” 30s recharge
Whistle an energetic ditty that cleanses up to 3 conditions from yourself and
nearby allies, granting 1.5s of Vigor per condition removed.

3 – “Ostinato!” kitten recharge
Chant a centring aria that grants allies Aegis and 2x Stability for 2s.

4 – “Staccato!” 20s recharge
Perform a strengthening chanty that grants allies 3s of fury and 7% bonus damage
on their next attack.

Elite – “Face the Music!” 90s recharge
Belt a moving chorus that knocks back foes and projectiles around you while
granting allies within earshot 5s of Retaliation.
Blast finisher.

New Weapon: Mainhand Warhorn (new sounds would be closer to a trumpet)

The goal here is to give Mesmers another mainhand option that also specializes on mid – close range aoe damage, soft control, and healing with potentially excellent clone generation and self boon application. Mesmers don’t really have a weapon designed for support. Nor do they have all that much aoe. Hopefully this can fill that role.

Auto – Ear-splitter > Diminuendo > Serenade (chain can be cast while moving)

1: 1/2s – Damage up to 3 foes in a 90 degree cone with a booming tune.
Damage – 4 mini-instances
Range: 600

2: 1/4s – Blast 3 foes in a 90 degree cone in front of you with a demoralizing
melody, dealing damage and inflicting 1.5s of Weakness.
Range: 600

3: 1/4s – Play a soothing hymn that damages 3 enemies in a cone in front of you
and heals up to 5 allies.
Range: 700

Arcane Echo – 18s recharge Cone range/radius: 600/90 degrees

Damage and mark up to three enemies in front of you with Reverb for 2 seconds. When the timer’s up the mark will burst and hit them and up to 2 adjacent enemies. This skill summons a clone that casts Serenade for each mark that damages an enemy besides the first. Gain 1s of Retaliation for each clone created.

Crescendo – 10s recharge Projectile range: 700 Pop radius: 120

Send out a bolt of sound in a straight line that stuns its mark for 1s and detonates to damage up to five foes in the area. Gain 4s of Might per enemy hit by the sound wave.

Bard’s are a special breed of Mesmer who use both musical and magical talent to sway the minds and hearts of allies and foes alike with their hypnotic melodies. Visually I would expect the Bard to have a lot of effects similar to Trident one, but on land and mor cone shaped. Waves of sound would also be very present with aoe effects such as the shouts or the detonation of a unique mark applied by warhorn and one trait called “Reverb.”

New Shatter: Captivate 60s recharge

Illusions run into about 300 range of their targets and root themselves, dancing and taunting them for 1/2/3s (scaling with illusions) after which they dissipate.

It just makes sense. Good for support. Good thematically.

savacli.8172:

Xenon.4537:

Every build will be Devastation + Invocation + Who cares. Just look where all the damage % modifiers are. Look where the Fury traits are. Look where the stunbreaks are. Etc, etc.

The only exception is for those rare situations where you want to tank or something…

Agreed, well for PvE at least. Corruption looks to be the contender for DPS (ironically works better in a Power build than condi build). Retribution would be used for tanking-esque, and Salvation offers recovery support.

How is Corruption better than Devastation for power builds? Last time I checked there was just the sure fire crit trait there.

1. Reaper: love reaper’s shroud – love the weapon – like the shouts – fun traits > 8/10
A clear example of the goal of an elite spec. Lots of interesting traits with strong combos.
Can’t wait to try it.

2. Chrono: love new shatter – love the weapon – love the wells – like the traits > 7/10
A kitten fine specimen. Could have changed the playstyle a bit more and had more innovative traits. Still love it and I really wanna get my hands on it.

3. DH: like new virtues – love the weapon – like the traps – alright traits > 6/10
Brings ranged combat to the Guardian and I’m very happy with the new skills. The traits just have a few too many dull old damage modifiers and a few other random boon ones.
Gonna try it out, probably gonna love it.

4. Tempest: meh overloads – like the weapon – lukewarm to shouts – meh traits > 4/10
Overloads feel a bit underwhelming. Doesn’t feel as unfamiliar as I would’ve liked. Warhorn skills and new visuals are mostly really cool! Shouts seem pretty standard and what you’d expect. The traits seem a bit messy and strange. I feel like my Tempest has to be an auramancer to get the most put of the new line. Hoping for some improvements.

All the rest: I want you in my life.

coglin.1867:

Engineers shun magic. They refuse matras, signets, and the like. It is well defined in the lore, so those certainly won’t happen.

Mantra is just the mechanic. Build (channel) and deploy (charges). Signet’s aren’t all that magical; warriors and thieves use signets.

Toolbox.9375:

I’d definitely enjoy a Mantra approach to the drones; One of my favorite concepts among Mesmer abilities are their Mantras, even if they aren’t necessarily the most useful abilities available. X)

But, then, I’d also definitely enjoy a Minion approach to the drones, which I’m sure everyone is hoping won’t happen. XD It’s mostly because of the various traits pertaining to them, but I love my Minions on my Necromancer. Lots of very good passive effects. Plus, it’d be fun to join in on the Superzergs in WvW comprised of Minion Necromancers.

Whatever it ends up being, I hope that SOMETHING in the Elite Specialization ends up giving some nice healing abilities. With Elixir-Infused Bombs killed off, I can’t play doctor to my friends near as well. ;-;

Well there is going to be a healing drone if they are the utility skills engi’s will be getting. Hoping Druid or Forge is next.

DresdenAllblack.1249:

Treetoptrickster.4205
I’ve owned and played this game since I got it for Christmas 2012. I’ve unfortunately never been able to get an engi past level 30 or so. I think the main reason is the weapons and utility skills. I think the pistol is a little too Batman for me, Rifle is… K, and I just don’t like shield all that much

Pistol is too Batman? Not sure what that means but nothing is TOO Batman.

I mean it just does so much. It’s like a utility belt in itself! Explosive bullets, poison unloads, electrified bullets, flame vent, and glue pellets. It’s just a tad too crazy. XD

Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365:

What if the drones doesn’t have anything to do with the elite spec at all?

Maybe it’s just a full revamp of the turrets?

If that was the case I’d imagine they would’ve announced it separately. They’ve already portrayed the hammer welding mask engi with the drones twice now so I’m pretty sure it’s something to do with the elite spec. What a turret revamp it’d be, though.

I wonder if we’re going to get the Reaper’s chill treatment, but with burning.

What’s up with these guys? Are they gonna be signet passives? Minions? One thought I had is juuuussst maybe Mantras. Highly unlikely, but hear me out. Perhaps you charge up the spell and create x number of drones (2-3) that symbolize the charges left on the mantra. You then get access to some instant cast targeted spells that could sick a drone on an enemy or have one help out an ally.

What do you think these things will do? I’m interested to see what traits come out of this. I think I’ll name mine either Wheatley an Skeets. I wonder if anyone here knows who Skeets is…

I really hope you can name the Drones. :/
That’s the dream ~

Heimdallr.7021:

I really think this week we won’t see anything at all (ranger or not).

Seems that way. Maybe next week? ~please?~ )8

Genesis.8572:

It could use a rename that makes it sound like a proper heroic e-spec and not just a furnace.

First thing: Lol.

Second thing: Forge sounds pretty heroic. Wouldn’t mind at all if that really does turn out to be the name. Other acceptable names are Tony Stark and Eggman.

Time for the OP’s opinion of how this thread turned out…

The chaos, yeeeesssssss… >:)

Tim.6450:

It’s still a (slow) projectile so if reflected it transfer conditions from the reflecter to you.

Ty Ty. Wow, thanks for damaging my master of corruption condi transfer boon corrupt necro’s self esteem. XD

Should Alacrity just refund a percentage of the max recharge of the skill each second instead of just making it just recharge faster? That way it could be balanced so as not to feel insignificant with enormous cooldowns while overwhelming with short ones. It sort of breaks the time motif as it wouldn’t be making the seconds go faster, but it might help with making it feel better and easier to balance.

Ty Ty. Wow, dagger 4 seems a lot stronger now…

How does the duration of transferred conditions work? Does it copy the exact duration of the condi currently on you at that moment to them? Is there some static duration for transferred conditions? Does it refresh the duration of whatever condi was applied to you on to them? What goes on? While we’re at it, can I get a description of how Deathly Swarm (dagger 4) works? Does it transfer one condi to all three hits, transfer 3 to only the first enemy, or transfer 3 on each bounce 0__0?

NeuroMuse.1763:

Considering the recent datamines I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the Forge or Berserker next.

The background for Druid was apparently released quite a while ago! Don’t lose hope yet!

http://i.imgur.com/mxeqJcc.png

I’ve owned and played this game since I got it for Christmas 2012. I’ve unfortunately never been able to get an engi past level 30 or so. I think the main reason is the weapons and utility skills. I think the pistol is a little too Batman for me, Rifle is… K, and I just don’t like shield all that much. When I tried rolling an engineer I was expecting a mechanical boss and only really got that feel from turrets and a few kits. Essentially, engineer just wasn’t what I was looking for, which is a shame because I frikkin love them traits! I’m really looking forward to the flavour of engi hammer and Drones sound PERFECT; I can’t wait to see if Forge will bring me back for another go at engi!

Tomorrow is on its way. We’ll see soon whether or not next week is going to be big.

Was it said anywhere that you’ll only be able to have one elite spec equipped at once or will I say be able to eventually go say, Reaper/Banshee/Death Magic on a necro?