Guild Wars 2

I know you dont lose the effects of the trait ( sorry i couldn’t explain myself better) but you lose the range that comes with the default virtue active and the active themselves.
Spear of justice does not affect allies therefore the might only affects the guardian.
Wings of Resolve only affects a radius of 240.
Shield of Courage only affects a radius of 130 untraited.
PS IM loving that spear along with all the new mechanics which is why I suggested to let them stay but as a toggle available only to DH as opposed to a forced trait as soon as you pick the spec.

Holland.9351:

My problem with the Dragonhunter Longbow is that he has 3 mouse-targetted skills. I hate those. I can live with Barrage, but I wouldn’t want 2 more.

The condition damage he did was pretty crazy with only 6 stacks of burning (3000+ per second), so maybe power builds will be a thing of the past.

Best part about ground targeting is that they cant be reflected unless the effects come with a projectile, but even then they can be used in melee range to ignore the reflects.

Seeing how chronomancer doesnt lose any of the baseline shatters just for choosing chronomancer, how about doing something similar for the DH? Right now as soon as you pick the spec we are losing the ability to grant might, regeneration, protection, aegis, stability and break stuns, in a 1200 radius in exchange for more interesting mechanics within a ~240 radius. My idea is to scrap the minor trait that is baseline for Dragon Hunters and make it into an f4 skill that toggles between the baseline vitues and the new ones so DH can be just as supportive as a guardian if they choose.

Mr Vivi Ornitier.4271:

its not just the heal that makes this book amazing the daze from Pacifism “Pacify foes, dazing them for three seconds.” 1200 radius is a amazing way to calm the battle field giving you enough time to heal up your allys or to cast your full heal also with my build i can give a power mancer over 1 min of protection with good skill rotation this turns a bunker guard into the true supporter

Ah then I see your point in wanting to keep courage. I myself dont play bunker so the changes seem fine to me as an offensively oriented guard. If only there was some way to reach a compromise making the quickness and fury from tome of wrath more accessible without killing your play style it’d be great.

The cooldown needs to be reduced like the f1 that is only 16 secs, 60 secs for a 600 range leap with a mediocre heal is too much. heck I dont mind if they nerf the healing a bit as long as the CD is lower.

Mr Vivi Ornitier.4271:

i still like the summon weapon idea over the signet this would kill me to see the book go it would be and end to my bunker guard and my fractal piller guard

depending on the numbers the signet option might be better for your bunker guard as long as you are not poisoned if its combined with ABsolute precision. giving you a rough equivalent of healing signet without taking your shelter away and also having the Oh kitten factored in.
As for your fractal build idk what it does but I’m sure that running hammer with writ of persistence will carry any group through the roughest fractals.

Knighthonor.4061:

Vizardlorde.8243:

While this trait is amazing combined with heavy light guards dont have any other knockback other than the garbage 30second cd shield of absorption.

you confusing this with the grandmaster traits.

this cripples those that are knocked back.

I am not which is why I said combined. Without heavy light the trait doesnt work cause we have no knockback that would cripple with this trait.

ParagonPaladin.7516:

No. How about you leave tomes in as elites, and give us more tomes as part of specialization stuff later? Renewed Focus is useful but oh so boring. I appear to be in the minority here since I usually swap between both tomes depending on whether I think the party is gonna die or needs a hand with aoe cc/quickness.

Super disappointing that you’re thinking of replacing them :\

Whats the point of keeping the tomes if both skills that make you want to use the tomes are staying as independent skills without a 1 second precast?

While this trait is amazing combined with heavy light guards dont have any other knockback other than the garbage 30second cd shield of absorption.

Im hoping the elite spec will completelly change DS like it did with virtues so all those DS traits lying around wont be useless.

Charblaze.6958:

Bhawb.7408:

Why would it need a rework? Lich form as a spectral, Plague as a corruption, done.

Agree, though I can see why someone would want a plague well.

Dat lifesteal protection and 20% less cd …

Thetrait just died as a power option if this is true. maybe still viable for condi though.

We are probably getting quickness (new elite replacing tomes) which is becoming a boon, we are getting fury ( trait in radiance, we already have it SYS but the trait gives us 80% uptime) , slow, some of our utilities might get resistance and taunt. DH will get cripple, and bleed.

that little 600 range hop gives us ~50% of a sword/greatsword warrior distance making capability on a longer cooldown (hope they reduce the cd when its a leap to ~30 secs since 60 is too long) anyways it will make a huge difference when trying to escape combined with leap of faith as long as the person chasing us is not a warrior/thief or we have one of those nifty traps loaded up to leave them in the dust.

morrolan.9608:

So you want to get rid of 2 of the more unique aspects of guardians because they don’t fit in with your new world view about all abilities having to belong to a group of like abilities. Don’t approve of it at all.

How about you look to improve the tomes rather than replace them making the class less interesting? Tome of courage is used in WvW, tome of wrath needs work.

However that shout does look good, OP even.

RF is more useful in WvW for yourself and for the group as you can provide protection regeneration condition removal might aegis heals and burns twice in a row on half the cooldown. And the new signet would completely replace the function of the tome since people only use it for the #5
Furthermore tomes lock us out of our utilities virtues and heals which makes them more of a handicap than help.

No the proposed changes are fine cause spirit weapons need to die in a fire like every other dumb AI ( minions). Useless in pve mediocre to bad in pvp. The only spirit weapon that is worth a slot is the shield cause it usually protects itself from the ranged AoE that kill the others. An elite SW would basically be a permanent cooldown cause it dies to AoE before running its full duration.

The changes seem A-Okay as long as duration get tweaked around the new cooldown (obviously much longer than their current versions since we cant have 2 elites floating around less than 30 secs)

Axe AA is only useful to MMs to stack vulnerablity to increase brainless meatbag(minion) damage .

Where did you read that? cause as far as I know all traits will affect the transformed virtues the same way. If anything radiance is the mandatory traitline to make a condition DH with all the burn/crit traits

The leaked skillset was garbage if you wana play support play Honor/Virtues/X and youll have more than almost any other profession(ele excluded) cause base guard has support coming out of its kitten .

Sebrent.3625:

I can’t watch twitch from work, but looking at dulfy:

• http://dulfy.net/2015/05/08/gw2-dragonhunter-ready-up-livestream-notes/

Longbow skills

• http://dulfy.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/gw2-dragonhunter-longbow-skills1.jpg

Why is their longbow hitting for solid damage regardless of range, piercing without traits, applying cripple if it hits more than 1 target, and fire every 0.75s as opposed to our 1.00s (0.90s traited). That doesn’t look right. Is there some aftercast that at least makes it more than the 0.75s listed?

Trueshot #2 and Deflecting Shot #3 both look like they’d hurt … what is up with 4s cooldown. I’m hoping that is just a “still in development” issue. It has the same cast time as the auto-attack so that currently looks like skill that you simply cast every time it’s not on cooldown. Not very skillful but looks very effective … more effective low skill-floor crap for Guardians. Deflecting Shot is in a similar position with its fact cast time, still decent damage and affecting any attacks since it’s a blind and projectile destroyer.

Symbol of Energy … this seems okay. I’m just amazed that this weapon has so many hard-hitting skills with such low cooldowns.

Hunter’s Ward … I’ll need to see the video to see the damage on this, but that final damage looks painful. At least this isn’t on some less than 20s cooldown. Bit annoyed that it not only traps but cripples too. Stepping on our toes there a bit.

Traps

• http://dulfy.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/gw2-dragonhunter-trap-skills2.jpg

These all hit hard. We’ll have to see how our own traps stack up to these once they are done with the rework there. Hopefully we’ll be on par. Nothing too horrible here except a Zerk Guardian with 3 traps stacked could ruin someone’s day pretty darn quickly. If you’re full melee, you might cry given they can stack on their traps and pew pew you with their new longbow.

Traits:

• http://dulfy.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/gw2-dragonhunter-traits1.jpg

Minor Traits
Look fine. Nothing to write home about.

Adept Traits
Bleed on traps, looks lackluster, zealot’s aggression and soaring devastation could be sick if paired with other things. We’ll come back to Zealot’s Aggression.

Master Traits
Hunter’s Determination gives 3s stability per target hit by a skill that hits hard, casts quickly, and is on a 4s cooldown … so 3s of stability every 4.75s …. really?! I’m hoping that’s one of those “still in development” things that will be getting tweaked.

Bulwark looks fine.

Dulled senses isn’t too bad … until you look at the synergy with the grandmaster.

Grandmaster Traits
Hunter’s Fortification doesn’t look too bad given how long the virtues cooldowns currently are.

Heavy Light just looks ridiculous when you pair it with the other factors. First, now they want to be in melee with that Longbow because (1) it doesn’t do any less damage in melee (2) knockback is an interrupt … interrupt every 7s just from attacking (3) that knockback synergizes with dulled senses to cripple you (4) that cripple from dulled senses synergizes with zealot’s aggression for extra damage … now back to their minor that does +10% dmg at >= 600 range … or you can be crippled, constantly interrupted, and taking +10% dmg from them any time they get you within 300 range.

Big Game Hunter could hurt, but there are other traits in game that resemble it … I’m just curious about this stacking with other +% dmg traits … as that would get to pretty darn ridiculous levels.

• Big Game Hunter + Fiery Wrath + Zealous Blade + Symbolic Avenger = 15% + 10% + 5% + 20% = +50% damage … from two specializations

I think at the very least some numbers need to be tweaked here … math isn’t that hard.

If we open with UC and and SYS we are looking at a ~78% damage modifier Huehuehue, so 1 JI + WW might 1shot a baddy every now and then .

Can we do a mercy kill on the necros and take their WvW role of wall AoE now?

Sandzibar.5134:

it did look like Dragon Hunter takes everything a ranger can do.. but do it better and with more team utility (still a guardian after all at its core), and without the pet.

autoattack snare on 2 enemies? dmg comparable to power ranger. no pet limitation. just missing 1500 range and projectile velocity ranger gets.

I look forward to seeing how it gets balanced with ranger in mind.

Welcome to the guardian ranger brothers if you wana play a druid/ necro stay ranger if not come over to the blue team.

Obtena.7952:

At least 4 of the traps have desirable PVP effects, so I’m not sure how they will be useless for a Guardian PVP build. I can see that they might be hard to place and get to trigger consistently and it’s not clear to me they are ground targeted.

In all fairness, I also see some appealing effects that will change the way people think about PVP on a Guardian in the traits. I can already envision some form of LB/Hammer knockback/cripple lockdown builds.

Return of the HAMBOW Guardian edition :p

My only problem with traps is that they don’t trigger against structures (Tequatal, TT, etc) other than that they were amazing espeially since the guardians only had 3 utilities that dealt direct damage until now.

Pitman.9210:

http://i.imgur.com/uLEnDQA.jpg

This is a dealbreaker for me in pvp (and wvw?).

And I think I found a bug: You can’t use the “break stuns when you use F3” if there is a cast time on the skill.

good thing our stun breaks are instant >.>
any ways necros have stunbreaks with cast like the well that converst condis to boons.

Fashion Mage.3712:

So how exactly is this “backline support”? Mostly just looks like dps to me.

Vigor, Protection, Vulnerability, AOE BLOCK ( oh god now I know how will be taking SM) , Trap that pulls enemies into a neat little pile slows them and keeps them in place for 4 seconds. Pretty supportive just not as defensive as some people wanted (which I love btw)
I can safely say that bow will not be my main weapon but It will see some use in pvp and wvw. The traits on the other hand seem great, I might drop virtues or radiance from my build to use it.

Looks amazing so far !! Trap aoe are huge so complaints seem bogus atm.

nekretaal.6485:

I don’t see the expansion giving Guardians extra mobility.

But they got the range and condis that they always wanted. That projectile refecting projectile will make Dragonhunters the kings of pirate ship battles.

The chronomancer didn’t fix the mesmer’s lack of boon generation either.

But the new traits make the mesmer king of boon sharing with illusionary inspiration with an altrusim set a mesmer can replace a phalanx warrior or a fireblasting ele providing fury might quickness and alacrity.

EremiteAngel.9765:

I think from what the guards were given, its quite obvious what the necros will get.

guards lacked range, condi build and mobility
guards given LB (range), condi build (traps), some extra mobility

necros lack support, mobility, and shroud mechanic enhancement
necros will be given shouts (support), greatsword (mobility) and some new way to use lifeforce/deathshroud

and ranger druids will get staff marks to compete with necros
and mesmers given wells to compete with necros for a spot in WvW

in short we are getting partitioned off bit by bit to other classes so much so that other classes can all perform a part of what we do and we lose our identity

Um too early too be speculating that much look at mesmer excellent party support, what did they get? Even better party support. They were asking for a mainhand weapon since they only have 2 but they got another offhand bringing them up to 4 offhands.
As for guardians we dont know if the traps will have damaging conditions what we know is that there is a trait that adds bleeds to trap triggers.
And I highly doubt rangers will get marks since they are too similar to traps that they already have access to.

Go back to skyrim you…

sword has the highest auto attack damage, greatsword has wider cleave arc and its not as inconvenient as sword AA 3, WW is our strongest burst move in PVE i you can land all the hits, Leap of faith can be used without a target to approach retreat or jump over gaps, BB provides a weak yet useful crowd control and SoW is the strongest symbol we have if Im not mistaken. To obtain the best dps you will have tou use sword/focus and greatsword using Greatsword 2 and 4 and swapping to sword until they reset ( overly simplified description)

KrisHQ.4719:

Traps are one of the most dull skill-types you could ever implement.
You throw them on the ground, hoping that someone are going to run into them.
I don’t see how this allows for any kinds of interesting play. Furthermore, people who chooses to play guardian, do it because they usually dislike what Traps represent.
And they even want to push the trapper/condi guardian with traits?
Even more kittened random condi-pressure that makes absolutely no sense?
Objectively this is extremely bad for the game. Sure some might think traps are fine, but that’s not my point, and it’s okay to think that. But it’s definitely not going to help the meta/gameplay.

The new virtues however sound like an improvement, they allow for greater utility and different playstyles, rather than simply granting boons or heal.

I know Anet by now, and the specialization is at this point pretty much set in stone, and as they release them they just hope people are going to like it.
I’m almost a 100% sure it will NOT get changed.
And that will be a huge disaster.

or you know throw it under their feet like every other targeted aoe…

Name
I’m not a fan of dragon hunter but if the devs can come up with a bs explanation to justify it thats fine.

Traps
Necromancer wells are currently underwhelming and a burden outside of wvw look at chronomancer wells they left necro wells biting the dust. So while I understand that the playstyle of traps can be unpleasant calling the skills useless before seeing what they can do is irrational.

The class mechanic
Same as the traps we have not seen them in action yet. The F2 actually seems like the skill we’ve been asking for a long time to disengage from battles and there are people already critizing it because it will probably possibly may be easily interrupted and its not blink. Others are saying the F1 is garbage when we have yet to see how burning intensity compares to what we have now (to me constant application within an area seems better than 5 stacks for 5 seconds) . And the description of of the F3 seemed a bit ambiguous, we know it will block but we don’t know if it has a block limit if it moves with us or how big is the range.

misterdevious.6482:

They nerfed stability. They will eventually nerf all block and reflect barriers to be limited number of hits as well.

Im not sure if all reflects have a cap but feedback has a reflect cap that after a certain (large) amount of projectiles it stops reflecting them and destroys them instead

Something that would make blood magic less useless would be allowing lifesteal to heal you while in deathshroud (actual health not LF)

Vikkela.7261:

Is F3 shield a rooted block or will it move with you is my concern, F1 seems dodgeable and missable and F2 is probably easily interrupted

Gee I guess leap of faith savage leap swoop and monarch’s leap must also be easily interruptible.
And thinking about it now that burning will stack in intensity instead of duration the F1 does not seem bad at all since if you blow the regular f1 and fail to refresh it you pretty much lose most of your burns.

FYI traps will be getting a bleeding trait to officially give us a real condition build.

Well Im not sure bout how the spear will work but mechanically wings of resolve sound amazing especially since its something weve been asking for in pvp since forever. The shield of courage seems like mobile version of shelter something some people expressed jealousy of when revenant skills were revealed and while not amazing I’m sure it will prove useful with all the projectiles spammed by mordrem. Traps on the other hand seem like a letdown but well have to see before calling them completely useless.

Despite developing the skills the devs show a remarkable lack of knowledge about how skills work in the game sometimes.

I guess my shot in the dark was right bleeds seem like they are gona be part of the spec.

They have some sicklooking starting headgear, Lich form is kitten and I think thats it cause everything else like dark themed weapons can be used by any other class.

Shield only sees use in WvW zerging and some obscure bunker guard in pvp

If anything we can organize a necro protest in 1 or 2 queensdale maps by making necro’s sit there for hours doing nothing but writing messages to anet with our bodies and /sleep :p

Will you people cut it out already the thread is 2yrs old when burst skills were REALLY useless.

nekretaal.6485:

The more I think about it: Minions are the source of Most of Neromancer’s Problems

1. Minions get their own trait line, which kills non minion build diversity. Just adding minions as utilities doesn’t work because you need the minion traits. Adding death magic without full minions is a waste of traits.

2. Minion AI is horrible.

3. The minions stand in AoE and die very fast

4. Necromancer’s finishers are tied to minions, but because minions don’t work, neither do the finishers.

5. Shadow fiend is a very poor skill

6. Minion damage is part of the Necromancer’s “total power budget”. Weapons have to be balanced with minion damage (and utility, such as finishers) taken into effect, and thus get balanced weaker by themselves (this is also an issue for Mesmer and ranger)

7. Necromancer weapons have no synergy with minions. (anti synergy in the case of staff as tossing marks will not trigger minion attack AI)

8. Minions have nothing to do with death shroud (no synergy there) and get destroyed by lich form and plague.

9. Minions die when you get in the water.

Well if you go for blood magic and death magic you can heal your minions in deathshroud and give them protection when you exit. Also axe and staff do synegize with the minions by giving vulnerability and using poison field for minion blasts and the staff blast for minion poison fields. But outside soloing open world content minions are a joke like you said.

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Obtena.7952:

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Obtena.7952:

In the current gamestate, I’m a big sword fan. I consider some of the issues it has minor compared to the more general Guardian drawbacks. It was definitely in heavy rotation when I was rocking my burning spec, which was all about as many hits in as little time as possible. I don’t think it even contends with Mace, though I think it is on par with GS.

After thinking about it, I think Sword will have considerable, increased appeal when the new traits go live. Patience.

True it is great where it is good, but you have to admit it’s problems tend to be bad.

It really makes me worry however given how much several of the new builds (especially zeal line & burning) are tied to symbols.

Would be great if they changed “Zealots Defense” so that it dropped a symbol when activated.

As problematic as sword is, it’s STILL one of the best PVP weapons. Yes, it suffers from some weird effects. I don’t think it will suffer from lacking a symbol in PVP because people will avoid symbols anyways. In PVE, for SURE sword is going to take a big hit in popularity because of losing it’s 10% multiplier and missing out on symbol multiplier.

I do think some minor changes could benefit the sword but I don’t think it will have a significant impact on how it works or ranks unless those changes affect the concept of the weapon.

As far as zealots defense goes I think they should change it to the following.

Zealots Defense: Sear a symbol of wrath into the ground in front of you then block ALL attacks for the next 1 & 1/2 seconds.

This would maintain the damage output & defense while adding a symbol to it. The only thing you would lose is ranged which tends to miss anyway.

As for the last auto attack. They really should just make it a triple melee attack with some cleave like the warrior 1h axe.
Again you would lose the ranged, but it tends to miss anyway.

Miss is little compared to those point blank obstructed and reflects… the point of projectiles is to be used from a distance not while hugging the target, that’s why close combat and melee weapons exist…

I doubt well get stances that will affect all existing weapon skill like some people are implying, the stance leaked in the supposed guardian skills only affected bow. Adding new spell effects to 40 weapon skills on a class thats “in a good spot” seems like a lot of work when they have classes that need major reworks and are not getting them (necro).

Fashion Mage.3712:

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Guardian already has support flying out their butt.

Spec’s are supposed to add something new & what the class desperately lacks is

1: CC
2: Ranged damage potential
3: Conditions

If they want to toss some ranged support on fine, but it really needs those 3 things

If their support is so great, why is their meta build generally selfish? :p

I don’t believe guardians need any of those things (especially not conditions), but the ability to do things at a range sounds very fun. As such, I hope it allows one to support from a long range as well as deal damage from a long range.
Personally, I also hope it lets me further give up selfish defense for more support. I couldn’t care less about being tanky.

their meta while selfish can provide party might, burning, vulnerability, heals, aegis and fury. And the bunker guard while strong its boring as hell cause unless you are super skilled you cant kill crap unlike ele bunkers.

Mara.6782:

Wards would be nice. We only have 2 now. Maybe Ward guardian. GW1 wards like.

you mean a stability check? only necros with their elite on cooldown trip on wards