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Massive Revenant Rework (Fan concept)


Arkham Creed.7358

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The revenant; a fun class, an interesting class, but not a perfect class. It has problems, and even now, so long after it was released, some of its core issues remain. We still have only one weapon for underwater combat (in spite of being able to weapon swap for no reason), we still have only two legends to swap between in the same environment, our land based weapons are still very narrowly focused on specific roles, and build diversity is still hardly a thing. To this end there has been rampant speculation and discussion of ways to improve the class, and it seems like people have been calling for this or that feature to be reworked since the class was in beta. I've had many ideas myself, but now after giving it proper thought I think I've finally come up with a solution. But to be clear; this isn't going to happen. For one it would be a MASSIVE amount of work on the development team, but beyond that the idea causes ever more troubling balance issues the more elite specs the class gets. Still, I'll outline my idea anyway.

I think this will get some positive feedback; it returns the class (a bit) to what Arena Net originally wanted for it, echoes back to something players had in the original Guild Wars, and gives current players something we've been asking for since literally the game's earliest days post-announcement. So without further delay....

Change number one; no more weapon swapping. That's right; ditch it. The feature was only added (after much fan complaint) as a bandaid solution the class' other problems. Problems I feel I've solved. As such this feature is no longer required, the class can go back to as Arena Net intended, and we no long have that annoying issue with our underwater weapon. This isn't really improving the class, just removing something that will no longer be needed. Not much to say beyond that.

Change number two, the BIG one; freely selectable WEAPON skills. Fans have been asking for this forever, and really the tech needed is already in the game. It can cause balance issues, and requires a bit of a change to how revenants unlock skills, but done right it can give the class the same build diversity as the others, as well as solves the problem of weapons being too strictly tied to specific roles and play styles. But anyone can just type that out, the real meat of the idea is how to go about doing this. And to that there are really two ways I can see. I dub these the "attunment method" and the "infusion method."

The attunment method: Following suit from the Elementalist, each weapon is now reworked to have at core five different skill sets. As with the ele these sets are all recognizable as suited to that weapon (a staff is a staff and it does staff things), but there are somewhat modified versions of these weapons suited to each legend. For example we've all seen how Jalis uses a hammer, but what about Shiro? I'll circle back to why we start with five skills sets when we have only four legends later, but for now the point is we unlock new versions of our weapon skills as we level, much like an elementalist unlocking attunments. Only where their skills come pre-packaged based on attunment, we get to mix and match them as we see fit.

The problem with his is obvious; too many skills in the long run. With each new elite we get not only a new weapon (needing five core skill sets for it), but also a new legend that would demand a new set for all core weapons AND the new one. You could mitigate this slightly by having the new legend barred from the core weapons, only effecting its own while the core legends can also effect it, but that is only slightly better. It is basically like giving elementalists an entirely new attunement they can use alongside their core ones. That might work once, but would get way too complicated way too fast.

The Infusion method: This one is a bit harder to explain, but also more doable in the long run. Also a bit less....impressive. In effect all our skills are reworked to include empty "effect slots" that are filled by infusing each skill with the power of a given legend. As an example our current mace 1, Misery Swipe, is a basic melee swing that causes torment. After this rework the skill would instead be a basic melee swing with an empty slot, no condition. Likewise mace 2, Searing Fissure, leaves a fire field to be exploited. Under this idea it would have a blank field slot. From here we fill these slots with the power of our legends. As each legend would have a defined set of effects that go into these slots. Every one having their own lore, role, or theme based effect, boon, condition, control, and combo field.

As an example let's build Jalis again. He's our melee warlord tank spec, so he would be tough and in-your-face. He's from the Shiverpeak mountains, and was the way Arena Net gave the game the taunt effect. Finally through traits this legend weakens foes. Thus we have his build; effect would be block, boon would stability, condition would be weaken, control would be taunt, and combo field would be ice. Using the skills above by "infusing" Misery Swipe with Jalis it would cause weakness, while Searing Fissure would drop an ice field. Sword 3's Unrelenting Assault would block instead of evade, and staff 2's Debilitating Slam would taunt instead of daze.

Now let's try Mallyx; effect would be condi transfer, boon would be resistance, condition would be torment, control would be cripple, and combo field would be poison or dark. Fill in the blanks and Misery Swipe causes torment, Searing Fissure would drop poison field, Unrelenting Assault would spread conditions around (great since sword 1 would now cause torment instead of vulnerability), and Debilitating Slam would cripple.

And the core of all this would be that we can feely infuse each skill with whatever legend we want. You could have Jalis on your auto attack, Mallyx on your 5 skill, couple of Shiro infused secondary weapon skills, and a Ventari infused skill in your back pocket as an emergency support skill. Elite specs are just as easy to do; go down the list and pick effects that suit them. Being elite you could even break some of the rules a bit and give revenants crazy stuff they couldn't normally get. Maybe Glint (whom I consider to be a bit mesmer like in the lore) gives us the clone effect, while Kalla allows us to use stealth. So many possibilities....

Of course now we come to how we unlock this stuff. I think the best way to go would be to have our legend locked utility skills unlock on their own as we level, rather than needing to be unlocked with hero points. Instead we use hero points to unlock "weapon mastery" within each legend. So instead of the unlocking Jalis' healing skill first off, we unlock his auto-attack mastery, and from then on can use his version of any weapon's auto attack. This is why I listed five core types under the attunment method; you need a basic version for players to use before they hit level 5 and start getting hero points. Likewise under the infusion method you need a basic skill to actually infuse these legends into.

Another benefit to this would be the ability to use any legend under water, even if you can't use it under water. For example; you might not be able to channel Ventari under water, but you could still infuse skills with his properties or use his versions of them on your spear.

Well that about covers it. Feedback is welcomed, but please try to keep it civil.

Addendum: This is MY story.

So we're all on the same page here I want to make it clear this extra idea is assuming that this idea is taken with the Infusion method.

WHile thinking about the core skills, I realized Revs might be at a bit of a disadvantage if our weapons didn't have any kind of default effects. Obviously this made me think perhaps the core revanent itself should have a suite of abilities to fill in those blanks. From there I realized that depending on the ability some players might like the uninfused versions, or maybe they would be more useful in certain situations, so we would need a way to toggle back to them...this led to another idea; what if we could channel OURSELVES as a fifth core legend? That is to say, thematically NOT channel a legend, and use our own default skills for weapons and utilities. Mechanically this would be another starting legend, even THE starting legend (no more starting pre-attuned to Jalis and with his healing skill), and later have the ability to keep using that set if we like.

And it is all already in the game. Racial skills. A type we revenants can't currently use because it wouldn't do to mix them in with our legend skills, and that were intended to be early game starting skills anyway. Maybe this core "I am using my own abilities" legend gives us our full set of racial skills. We even already have a trait line for it; Invocation. I've long felt that line could use a rework, so make it about our core weapon skills and possibly even racial skills. Imagine that; a class based trait line specifically for improving racial skills, wouldn't that be wild?

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Nice post, but (at the risk of sounding cynical) have Devs EVER incorporated any ideas from the forums into rev balance? I believe the only ideas they ever pulled from here were people wanting shortbow and one idiot wanting kalla for a legend. Both turned out to be dismal failures of implementation for those that are keeping score.

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@Exalted Quality.8534 said:Nice post, but (at the risk of sounding cynical) have Devs EVER incorporated any ideas from the forums into rev balance? I believe the only ideas they ever pulled from here were people wanting shortbow and one idiot wanting kalla for a legend. Both turned out to be dismal failures of implementation for those that are keeping score.

Heh, well because I don't want to aggravate anyone I can't confirm or deny anything. But someone who may or may not be me may or may not have suggested things that may or may not have become major selling points of the Heart of Thorns expansion shortly before the suggestions forum vanished and its archive may or may not have been locked behind a permanent error message that may or may not have buried all evidence of these major feature suggestions (that may or may not include the mastery system and elite specializations) that may or may not exist so such claims, if they were ever to actually be made, could never be proven.(Seriously mods, I'm just poking fun. Please don't ban me again.)

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@Exalted Quality.8534 said:Nice post, but (at the risk of sounding cynical) have Devs EVER incorporated any ideas from the forums into rev balance? I believe the only ideas they ever pulled from here were people wanting shortbow and one idiot wanting kalla for a legend. Both turned out to be dismal failures of implementation for those that are keeping score.

The impossible odds change was something I actually suggested a bit ago to boost the heavily lacking power raid DPS while not breaking pvp balance. Unfortunately the extra strikes currently give less single target dps than quickness used to and they don't cleave making the change a straight nerf in pvp. Plus new impossible odds does feel anti climatic and sluggish without the quickness so all the pure pvpers here kind of hate me now. And pve raid dps is still bottom tier because new impossible odds is undertuned so yay.

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I would like to see actually all classes with 1 weapon set only... not only rev :), this could make Anet and the awfull balance team to focus on true gameplays rather than gimmicks rotations to carry the bad players.

One thing that i would like in rev would be jalis offer more damage and condi reduction, since rev has poor condi cleanse at least one "summon" should focus hard on it

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@"Aeolus.3615" said:One thing that i would like in rev would be jalis offer more damage and condi reduction, since rev has poor condi cleanse at least one "summon" should focus hard on it

I believe that is the point where balance gets tricky. You have to consider not only what these skills themselves do, but also how they can be altered by gear. For example did you know that Jalis' conjured hammers can proc on-hit and on-crit effects, including sigils? They can, and if you slot your "defense" weapon option with a sigil of generosity and turn the hammers on you get one condi removed very nine seconds without having to actually do anything. That is actually better than the guardian's signet of resolve and strength of the fallen trait.

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@Arkham Creed.7358 said:

@"Aeolus.3615" said:One thing that i would like in rev would be jalis offer more damage and condi reduction, since rev has poor condi cleanse at least one "summon" should focus hard on it

I believe that is the point where balance gets tricky. You have to consider not only what these skills themselves do, but also how they can be altered by gear. For example did you know that Jalis' conjured hammers can proc on-hit and on-crit effects, including sigils? They can, and if you slot your "defense" weapon option with a sigil of generosity and turn the hammers on you get one condi removed very nine seconds without having to actually do anything. That is actually better than the guardian's signet of resolve and strength of the fallen trait.

if u want to compare an almost passive cleanse compare with the guardian passive condi on block that can clean 1 condi per block within a 1sec ICD.

9sec for 1 condi, how many classes can cleanse way more than 1 condi per each 10 sec?That is where Anet fails on balance some classes can do alot within those 10 sec cause they dont sacrifice much and others get kept stucked into 1 thing while cant do much.

So making jalis reduce damage and condi damage as passive arorund 20-30% would be balanced since theres classes that are a huge gap to what they can do and a rev jalis can do, and would create more another gameplay option for players, besices go full damage or full condi

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