Spirit Weapon Overhaul

An Idea just popped into my mind and i want your opinion:

What if Spirit weapons would be completely different. It is hard to describe in few words so here is how it would work:

The weapon would be Floating around your Body. For the sword you can imagine it like a moving trap. It would pretty much look like the Greatsword Trap but you are the Center of it and it is moving with you. (Like an Aura. But not really).

Examples:Greatsword: 4 Greatswords popping up and rotating around you also while you are moving dealing decent dmg.Hammer: 4 Hammers Popping up and rotating around you applying stund every X seconds (and of course some dmg)Shield: 4 Schilds rotating around you ( a bit farther away) and an dome is moving with you blocking everything (lame but hey thats how it always has been)Bow: 4 Bows rotating around you pulsing damage in every direction every x seconds. Maybe make this condi focused.

No charges. Just a cd. Mastery will prolong the ability and reduce cd or make it uninteruptable.

Pro:-You will now actively rewarded for sticking Close to your Opponent.

• Huge offensive Team fight potential
• Other classes can adapt this System easily.
• Really pumping up offensiv core Guardian, Edit: Especially in tight Group fights.

Con:

• Shield is super lame.
• Too strong maybe?
• a lot of animations going on

The more i think about this idea the more i acutally like it.

Your idea reminds me of a shooting game I played long ago (R-type or Gradius). All the air crafts have weapon orbs surrounding them doing different kind of functions. A good idea though spirit weapon only guardian has it, so I wonder if it's efficient to make changes just for 1 class...

I remember an old suggestion I made... were was it...

Before the changes I want done to Spirit Weapons, first we'd need two new mechanics. Life Sheath and Overheal:

• Some skills, traits, upgrades, etc would give temporary extra hit points that are taken before your own. (Since most names that could fit this like "absoprtion", "bulkwark", "protection", "guard", "shield", "shelter", and "aegis" are taken, let's call this "Life Sheath", using a GW1 skill name".
• Some traits, skills, etc would make regeneration and healing on players at 100% HP give Life Sheath for the amount of health over the 100%, with a cap of 25% of one's max health. Let's call this "Overheal".
• Like with bonus moment speed, Individual skills that grant Life Sheath could go past the 25% cap, but overheal and stacked effects won't.
• Life Sheath would appear in health bars as a white section.
• Necromancers will not have the effects of Life Sheath active while in Death Shroud, as they are added to their normal health bar. But if the temporary hit points received are still active when they leave death shroud, they will be there, waiting.
• This new mechanic could be used to change some existing skills or traits. For example, Invigorated Bulwark could make Symbol of Faith overheal, Ventari's Tablet could also overheal if Nourishing Roots is selected. Some skills that currently make someone invulnerable to damage but not CC could give a large Life Sheath instead, etc.

---

Then, the changes to spirit weapons I want could be done:

Spirit weapon skills no longer summon creatures, instead, they invoke the weapons to attach themselves to the guardian and other 4 allies, intercept damage towards them, and attack when they attack with weapon skills (including bundles).

• Every certain number of weapon skills that hit an enemy would cause the attached weapons to 'attack', adding hits with effects to the player's weapon attacks. The counter varies from spirit weapon to spirit weapon. Each weapon skill would only count once for each time they recharge, though, so skills that deal multiple hits will reduce the counter just once each time they are used. Hits from weapon Symbols will not reduce the counters either.
• Each attached weapon will give a temporary 'Life Sheath' while they are attached to a player. Life Sheath from Spirit weapons stack with each other past the 25% cap, but as a downside, they are each tied to the Life Sheath they provide, and when the Life Sheath they provide is lost, the spirit weapon is also lost.
• The Life Sheath hitpoints from spirit weapons are lost after other Life Sheaths, starting with the ones invoked first.
• Spirit weapons will still have command skills. When used, they remove the weapon from players to cause a final effect.
• When the weapon's effect is lost or when the weapon is removed, the Life Sheath linked to it is also removed.

Then, the Spirit weapon skill set would be completed:

• Mace of Faith: Healing skill. When invoked, it heals self for not too little nor too much, and also heals other affected allies for less. Has the second highest Life Sheath.
  • Attack effect: Every 5 attacks. Deals very little damage, and heals the player, and restores a bit of the Life Sheath of each spirit weapon attached to the player. Mace healing always overheals.
  • Command: Deal regeneration and remove conditions.
• Sword of Justice : Still about damage and vulnerability.
  • Attack effect: Every 3 attacks. Considerable Damage and a stack of vulnerability to up to 3 targets.
  • Command: Deal damage and a good number of stacks of vulnerability in an area around the player.
• Shield of the Avenger : Has the highest Life Sheath of all.
  • Attack effect: Every 3 attack. Deals little damage and weakness and recover a good part of the its own Life Sheath for each enemy hit.
  • Give Aegis to the player and Turn into a 2 second Shield of Absorption that blocks projectiles.
• Bow of Truth : As the condition removal is moved to mace, this one is now tied to fire and 'truth'.
  • Attack effect: Every 5 attacks. Causes 3 stacks of burning for 3 seconds.
  • Command: Reveal the target enemy and enemies in an area around the player.
• Hammer of Wisdom
  • Attack effect: Every 5 attacks. Deals about 1/3 of the damage done by Sword of Justice, but also dazes for 0.75 seconds.
  • Command: Cause a massive blow for more damage than the sword's command on a single target, also dealing 3s knockdown
• Staff of Command : Elite. Has the third largest Life Sheath, a duration shorter than the other spirit weapons, and a rather long cooldown.
  • Attack effect: Every 2 attacks. Hits with a cleave attack similar to Wave of Wrath, dealing some damage and blindness. If it hits at least 1 enemy, it adds 1 second to one's boons, then 1 more second up to 5 for each boon on each enemy hit.
  • Command: Recharges all 3 utility skills.

 

• Spirit weapons now appear floating around the players that have them attached as in the original design, each taking always a specific spot:
  • The Mace appears on the front by the player's feet as if a tiny invisible skritt was holding it.
  • The Shield always appears to the left and a bit to the front, a bit away from where an actual shield would be.
  • The Sword appears to the right and towards the front, away from the hand.
  • The Hammer appears behind the right shoulder.
  • The Bow appears behind the left should.
  • The Staff appears behind the character.

 

• Expeditious Spirit still reduces spirit weapon recharges, but no longer causes burning. Now instead reduces the number of attacks to trigger Spirit Weapon attacks by 1.

--

TL;DR: Spirit weapons would be attached to the player, attach when they attack, take damage when the player takes damage, and look considerably cooler.

So basically it replaced the actual weapon entities with effects an visuals attached to the player, and their HP was replaced with Barrier that instead decaying instantly lasted until damage removed it or until the duration of the weapon was over.

Now that we finally have barrier, if barrier was changed barrier so its decay can be delayed instead starting right away, and it could actually be possible.

But after playing with the current spirit weapons for a while, I think I prefer the skill ammo mechanic for them. But I still want the skill set to be completed with the missing healing and elite skills. For example, the healing skill would be a mace that initially heals the guardian and then pulses healing in an area several times, the bow would be changed to remove conditions but heal less since the healing would be in the healing skill, and the elite could be a staff that would burst-aid buff that hits 5 enemies with the old version of Wave of Wrath that had 600 range, and gives 2 quickness for each enemy hit to allies who were in the same cone of attack.

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:I remember an old suggestion I made... were was it...

Before the changes I want done to Spirit Weapons, first we'd need two new mechanics. Life Sheath and Overheal:

• Some skills, traits, upgrades, etc would give temporary extra hit points that are taken before your own. (Since most names that could fit this like "absoprtion", "bulkwark", "protection", "guard", "shield", "shelter", and "aegis" are taken, let's call this "Life Sheath", using a GW1 skill name".
• Some traits, skills, etc would make regeneration and healing on players at 100% HP give Life Sheath for the amount of health over the 100%, with a cap of 25% of one's max health. Let's call this "Overheal".

Aren*t you pretty much talking about the new Scourge shielding mechanic? It is pretty much the same... Just saying.

All in all your idea is also interesting. Though i like mine more.

@BBMouse.6510 said:Your idea reminds me of a shooting game I played long ago (R-type or Gradius). All the air crafts have weapon orbs surrounding them doing different kind of functions. A good idea though spirit weapon only guardian has it, so I wonder if it's efficient to make changes just for 1 class...

That is why i stated, that it is pretty easy to adapt this mechanic for other classes.

I can use the spirit weapons (well, not all, blow is super weak) as they are now, but they are still inferior to other options so I do not. As WVW player, I would like to add one trait that would make them also larger (bigger radius) and make them ground targettable, not direct target, cause the way they are now, you are pretty sure to miss your target wit the sword for example when he is moving. Alternatively keep the targetting as it is, but make them "stick" to the enemy you cast it on.

@Seffen.2875 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:I remember an old suggestion I made... were was it...

Before the changes I want done to Spirit Weapons, first we'd need two new mechanics. Life Sheath and Overheal:

• Some skills, traits, upgrades, etc would give
  temporary
  extra hit points that are taken before your own. (Since most names that could fit this like "absoprtion", "bulkwark", "protection", "guard", "shield", "shelter", and "aegis" are taken, let's call this "Life Sheath", using a GW1 skill name".
• Some traits, skills, etc would make regeneration and healing on players at 100% HP give Life Sheath for the amount of health over the 100%, with a cap of 25% of one's max health. Let's call this "Overheal".

Yeah. When I wrote that it was way before we knew about barrier. Barrier and the skill ammo system where two things I've been wanting for ages way before they were even considered, but it's funny how I wanted barrier for the spirit weapons and ammo for thief venoms, and neither got them.

remove cleaves from autos :cold_sweat:

make SPirit weapons based on:

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Splinter_Weapon and https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Weapon_spell

Profit with next expantion and people need to play in a ateam to actually cleave spam liek the old noob spam days, but with more effort.

Meanwhile there will be less lag...

Meanhile staff would be the elite spec weapon, improved to work with the new spec, to work similiar as a Restoration RT.

Staff should not be an elite. We need another baseline ranged weapon, not just a weapon repackaged for another xpac. Why would you even suggest that?

@Opopanax.1803 said:Staff should not be an elite. We need another baseline ranged weapon, not just a weapon repackaged for another xpac. Why would you even suggest that?

remove staff but they could add something else, like ability to use hammer+offhand for a more defensive stance,thatcould be mixed wih the new gimmicks.Capability to gain barrier when hited, symbols with a little of barrier pulse, etc...more amor :X since Anet gave guardian low health cause toughness while being a useless stat on a game where players get easilly carried with damage output.

Anet was searching for ways to add barrier for guardian, and why we need another range weapon?Why im i sugesting it?Well first cause it's ANet, they are not good on class design nor decent on class iterations for balance aspects, staff and SW will never be decently nor working, like other classes have their utilites and weapons, remmind u that SW are still bugged and sometimes skill wont cast but take full CD, while staff is a 1skill weapon for empower, another thing is with the recent spam based expec and awfull class design, boons, well u areforced to buy Spambrand elite trait, to even use stability, due the massive unbalance Full counter is and the massive boon removal and condi bursts as the spamming CC game has.

Why staff needs to go in trade of other combination?Mainly it is because, Imo we need a decent weapon design for barrier guardian(due low mobility and useless toughness guard needs barrier, also block on guardian was an excuse to low health, well that and stability i dont recall the last time they worked with some many unblockables and boon denial trough them), something that works well with whatever elite spec is, now and later, the removal of staff would not imply one less weapon, ANet could actually give another set with the current weapons, if they gave guardian the change to equip hammer+offhand with more toughness and gain small ticks of barrier when hited and symbols, imo guardian would not loose a weapon, andthey could make barrier guard work.Anet could, add less 10% damage on hammer when paired with offhand as well as in trade of the barrier andtoughness.

Anet design is not about balance skills, but create more power creep to counter smothing that is counterable but needs to become low effort(reason the massive boon hate vs boon spam bots).The same aplyes with conditions VS resistance, so why not sacrifice a weapon for a gimmick that actually make sense for guardian to get its low health pool?

I dont think u know the real potention and lameness of the current PoF gimmicks Opopanax.1803, they are stupidly awfull ment to carry w/o effort its users, due how some skills are overperforming and some classes cant get balance due the existend mechanics within condi damage that was made for pve to stack on healthsponges over time.

oh.. and sorry for the bad english :astonished: