Guild Wars 2

LegACy.1296:

So “damage modification” doesn’t necessarily just “add more damage”, it could be “buff that helps team deal more damage” =D Imagine if Guardian gives 1 might each time he’kitten by an enemy, he’ll be a tank people could want.

Of course the end-goal in mind is damage. It’s always damage for every game mode. But how Anet has gone about “balancing” is terrible. E.g. blanket buffs to AA damage for theif or blanket nerfs to alacrity without any amount of nuance. Why did they only move the damage from rev-sword AA to 1 or 2 other skills? Why not nerf the sword entirely and float some more damage to another spec and add some more utility to another and round out the class as a whole? Instead they just kept it in the same pigeon-whole as before—> a boring AA machine that now uses 1 or 2 other weapon skills, sometimes. Same thing with the thief. We’ve needed more party utility from the class for years but the only change we get with this “major” patch is a flat dps buff? Be a little more creative and add some dps while buffing more of its utility skills and traits. This way you’re still buffing the dps output but it’s more nuanced and might take a little more thought to accomplish the best dps than “spam 1,” which seems to be the way Anet wants us to play.

randomguy.1283:

I was doubtful that anet would actually balance around PvE but I have to admit this update addressed nearly every issue except for guardian and slick shoes.

What about the 3 or 4 other specs a revenant can play? Power-rev is still the only viable spec for PvE(raids). What about giving the thief utility so they’re actually desired to take instead them being an “acceptable replacement”?

A true PvE balance patch isn’t simply damage modification. It takes the various things a class is supposedly good at and compares how they fair to the other classes that do the same thing. For example, Mesmers are really good at being dodge-tanks(don’t play a Mesmer so I don’t know how accurate that statement is. Just go with it for the sake of the example, though.). Another class that has a lot of dodging and evade-fields is the theif. If these classes were truly balanced, the thief would be just as desired to take along for that role(they’d also need a buff to their party utility but that’s another topic). Note how I didn’t say the thief would be better. That would be stupid. One class is always going to outshine the others for a particular skill or role. The trick is by how much that class outshines the others. A balanced PvE system has it sitting only slightly better, not insanely better.

Pandabro.8743:

Uhh… what? I feel like a lot of this patch was directly targeting PVE.

Burnzerker nerf. Thief buffs.

Only thing that won’t have a decent build in raids now is Guardian.

That’s two things for PvE. Yes, a lot of these changes affected the PvE side of things, but if you read these notes, they’re all clearly aimed at PvP.

I really do want to know if we’re ever getting a balance patch for PvE or if they’re ever going to wise-up and split the specs(like they already are. e.g. when you enter HotM your build, gear, and almost your entire set-up is reset from Tyria).

So today’s patch was clearly meant for PvP, yet we have all these other aspects of the game that aren’t PvP. So my question is this:

Is ArenaNet’s intent to ever balance the game with respect to PvE(raids, fractals, etc.)?

Because as it stands now, unless you’re playing a desired class/spec for raids you’re not getting into a group. Either that or you’re going to have an unreasonably hard time beating a boss if you are let in.

Kyousho.2698:

guys….the op was asking about pve only .

Yep… the simple fact that this thread was originally about PvE and just naturally gravitated towards PvP just goes to show you how badly things need to be balanced. If Mallyx had enough merit on its own in PvE, this conversation never would have left the realm of PvE.

It’s a lot of fun, but not even remotely comparable to other condition focused classes. For example, the highest burning I’ve been able to get on my rev is about 7k per tick and that was the peak. I’ve been hearing about 30k burns from engi’s and 20-30k bleeds from necros(I think). This makes me think that the conditions are either completely and utterly imbalanced or the revenant condi ability needs a massive buff to be viable. I’d personally LOVE to see some REAL class balancing, especially now that raids are out and they’re trying to gravitate away from the glass-cannon meta. And not just balancing initiated by PvP needs. High-end PvE content needs just as much balancing as any PvP.

For open-world, though, who cares. You can play a tank druid if that really appeases you. Anything works in Open-World if you have half a brain.

Darknicrofia.2604:

vs diamond skin eles

If you read what I finished with, I told him that was for PvE only. I don’t claim to know kitten about PvP and, franky, I like it that way.

Don’t care too much about the weapon, tbh, but the next legend I’d like to see is Snaff. Haven’t really thought about any specific skill sets or traits to better flesh it out. But some kind of minion spec and/or gundam suites. Lots of control aspects too.

I’ve been running a condi build on my revenant since the BWE3 changes(clearly I loved it). I don’t use Shiro because it really doesn’t offer much in the way of conditions. So, I run herald for the extra burning skill as well as the might stacking. Other than those two things(and the strong knockback from Glint’s elite for breakbars) I primarily stay in Mallyx as that is where most of my damage comes from and, like you mentioned, the elite skill is a toggle so I can keep Diabolic Inferno on cooldown. Here’s my rotation, for the most part:

Start the fight in Glint stacking as much might as possible using Mace/Axe; Initiate with Elemental Blast(Facet of Elements active); toggle and activate One With Nature; swap to Mallyx; toggle Embrace the Darkness; cast Unyielding Anguish; cast Searing Fissure; cast Echoing Eruption; if EtD hasn’t depleted your energy by now to turn itself off, toggle it off yourself; cast Temporal Rift; cast Searing Fissure; toggle Embrace the Darkness on; cast Echoing Eruption; cast Searing Fissure; if EtD hasn’t depleted your energy by now to turn itself off, toggle it off yourself; etc. etc.

At some point you’ll want to make sure you swap back to Glint to re-stack some might and cast Elemental Blast, but, as I said, I pretty much stay in Mallyx. So, based on my rotation, I would prioritize as follows:

1. Diabolic Inferno – You can’t forget to keep toggling Embrace the Darkness to proc this. Since we don’t have a visible cd for this, it’s just going to take some practice.

2. Searing Fissure – This skill has an extremely short cooldown. In fact, it’s short enough to where you can keep the fire field up with maybe a half-second of downtime between fields. But aside from not forgetting EtD for Diabolic Inferno, this skill is what allows you to maintain any semblance of burning stacks. If the boss is moving and not staying in the field to stack the burning, that’s ok because the torment you’ve been stacking is now dealing double damage.

3. Echoing Eruption/Temporal Rift – Aside from your AA, the Corruption spec line(Rampant Vex – first minor slot), and EtD, these two skills are your primary source of maintaining stacks of torment. Both skills need to be kept on cooldown, so energy management is going to be key if you want to consistently cast Temporal Rift(it’s a 5 skill and those typically have longer cooldowns).

4. Elemental Blast – This is just another source of burning. You may think that Mallyx is all about the torment, and you’re not completely wrong, but a HUGE part of your damage comes from burning. You can’t forget to switch to Glint for this skill and the might.

5. Unyielding Anguish – This skill is only this low on the list due to its energy cost. It’s incredibly strong and should be used if you’re ever around or above 50% energy. Before I started focusing on maintaining my burning stacks, I was solely focused on my torment stacks. Using this skill I’ve actually been able to maintain a higher average of torment stacks than EtD. At one point I think I was hitting close to 5k dmg per tick while the boss was stationary. But I was hardly stacking burning and my damage was suffering.

That’s what I’ve found the most successful for condi-rev. It’s important to note, though, that this is for PvE only. I don’t claim to know about PvP, sorry. But, for what I use it for, this spec is fun as kitten, and I can pump out some pretty awesome damage if I’m focused. The only problem with condi-rev, though, is if you compare it to any other condi-friendly class(engis, rangers, necros, etc.) it’s utterly dwarfed. Honestly the traits(and the heal, frankly) that pertain to conditions you have on yourself need to be updated so they’re more appropriate for the current state of the specialization.

Hopefully this was helpful!

-Tea Maker Iroh

I literally just posted something about those three traits being remnants of the pre-release Mallyx earlier this morning. :P All of the skills are totally fine the way they are in-game, with the exception of maybe the heal(the “more healing for each condition you have on you” seems like another remnant of beta-Mallyx).

This is entirely in regards to PvE: The condition application ability of the revenants is lacking. Yes, we can apply enough torment to kill a cow, but other classes have enough condition application to kill a dinosaur. My point being this: Condition revenant isn’t completely weak, but when compared to other classes that fill a similar function, the revenant is sub-par.

Solution? Tweak the Corruption specialization and leave the skills alone. In my mind, all it would really need is more emphasis on the burning and poison ability of the revenant. Maybe even give them more ability to do so in the first place, with the spec tree modifying what conditions are applied by the skills? Make it so UA applies poison in addition to the chill/torment? Make it so a critical hit on a torment tick applies a stack of burning, but give the trait a long cd to balance it? I really don’t know enough about the game as a whole to provide solid suggestions, but something needs to be done about this spec. It just doesn’t seem fully polished after the changes from it’s original design.

Just read through a reddit post and it reminded me that these 3 traits never got reworked after the Mallyx skills got reworked for BWE3. I understand this has some application in PvP, but in PvE those three traits are useless except for niche situations. I posted these ideas as a reply to that post but I honestly think my ideas are kind of weak.

Replenishing Despair: Change the name(I don’t know what to) and make it so when the enemy has torment, your burning does more damage or lasts longer or something. Burning is the strongest condition and there’s that awesome elite skill Diabolic Inferno, yet we don’t have anything else in the tree that talks about burning or anything that bolsters it to encourage its use.

Bolstered Anguish: Honestly I like the idea of just flipping the mechanic. Enemies with your conditions applied to them will take more damage from you.

Pulsating Pestilence: Again, entirely change the mechanic. This time make it skill specific. E.g. “Unyielding Anguish now additionally pulses poison”. It’s simple but could be strong.

Anyone else have any thoughts or suggestions to make condition revenant more viable for high-end PvE content(raids) through changing these three traits? If a dev happens to see this and has a moment to respond, was it planned to leave those traits the same even though the spec, as a whole, no longer functioned in the way those traits were designed around? (I think that question makes sense :P)

Also, this is my first time posting on the forums so be nice

The description of the skill:

Send your blade outward damaging foes and inflicting vulnerability. When it reaches its end point the blade will return to you.

What you see in the animation:

Around 10 min. in

My question:

Can you update the animation so it reflects the description or update the description so it reflects the animation?

The “blade” you send out isn’t your sword. It’s a little bolt of, what I would assume is, Mists energy. If they could make the animation a bit more literal to match the description, that would look flashy as hell! Thoughts?

Here’s my original post to reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3n0j6q/revenant_brutal_blade/