What does Revenants need moved from Heralds to make future especs better fitting?

We all know that Revenants never had core revenant, and that the proffession was designed with the Herald espec in mind right from the beginning.Which makes both core revenants and future e-specs stumble.

I think its in particular hardening persistence and vigorous persistence, as they are tied directly into our main proffession feature, upkeep skills. They shouldve been in invocation!

Idk why people use hardening persistence over swift gale or radiant revival.

Remove Infuse Light from the game so there's no excuse for core heal skills to be at half strength anymore.

@Clownmug.8357 said:Remove Infuse Light from the game so there's no excuse for core heal skills to be at half strength anymore.

Thats not the problem. We have 2 half strenght heal skills we can access with a legend swap. But yeah, its two casts vs one for other classes.

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Clownmug.8357 said:Remove Infuse Light from the game so there's no excuse for core heal skills to be at half strength anymore.

If Herald is treated as our baseline, don't you think the devs would consider it to be our main heal and all the others as secondary? And if this main heal has potentially infinite healing, wouldn't they factor that into how strong the secondary heals would be?

@Clownmug.8357 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Clownmug.8357 said:Remove Infuse Light from the game so there's no excuse for core heal skills to be at half strength anymore.

"Should", but aren't. The way Revenant is built, its very deliberate in limiting it any time a logical build synergy shows up. The designer clearly wants everything to be front loaded on the skills.... but the skills require every specific circumstances to reach reasonable performance, and have almost no overlap coverage to sustain either offense or defense against a dynamic target. I'm actually starting to question if Rev was intended to work for anything other then Raids, since its the one area where it does "Ok", yet is very precisely tuned to not be "too good" at the one thing is allowed to be good at.

What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible). I generally disagree with the premise that Revenant is held back due to Herald, but it's also impossible to talk about without knowing which game mode we're discussing. If we're talking about all three then I'm going to have to disagree on the PvE aspect as Herald as mentioned above is just worse than Renegade full stop. Additionally for the pvp aspect it's more of a "kalla/shortbow is bad design for pvp and Renegade is generally lacking a few important things" rather than a "Herald needs to be gutted and Herald things need to be given to the core class."

@"starlinvf.1358" said:I'm actually starting to question if Rev was intended to work for anything other then Raids, since its the one area where it does "Ok", yet is very precisely tuned to not be "too good" at the one thing is allowed to be good at.

No offense meant at all, but how long have you played GW2/Revenant or how long have you been paying attention to meta level gameplay? The reason I ask is that most players who have been playing since HoT know that it was a REALLY strong class on release and that it took years to become underpowered in certain areas. Revenant was meta in PvP pretty much up until HoT Launched. Additionally, Rev has been dominant in WvW with various builds (Condi, Support, Power Hammer) since its release. Even now after the Coalescence of Ruin nerf Hammer Revenant is still quite strong in WvW. Revenant being good at raids is relatively a new thing overall; it dropped out of the meta for organized content a year before PoF.

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible).

I'm going to call this claim into question. Because people kept saying this, I decided to do a couple of auto attack tests (realistic buffs, no food) on a small hitbox in order to see how the modifiers compared between power herald and power renegade. Power herald's auto attack sits at 15.2k DPS, and the Renegade sits at 14.3k DPS. So, thinking it might be due to different traits, I experimented with using charged mists + meteor, as well as song of the mists. Full rotation, glint + shiro, Power Herald sat at 24.3k, Power Renegade was at 22.8k for Song, and 23.1k with Charged.

First of all, holy hell at what point did we get such massive nerfs? Last time I did these rotations I was sitting at 28k DPS with no food. Where did all the damage go? Second of all, nothing I could do could pull power renegade ahead of power herald. They were close in performance, but overall the herald just did better and was easier to use.

Herald's traitline is rather garbo, but Dragon stance is like a swiss knife, it has everything. Not only boons, but also a lot of utility.

The biggest outlier is Infuse Light. To the point that if Jalis had Infuse Light instead of Glint, the meta would probably be Shiro/Jalis. It's our endure pain, main defensive and the only heal that we can truly resustain with. It's a fun heal to use, without a question, as you have to use it with brain, but power of it basically holds revenant together in pvp.

@Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

@"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible).

On small hitbox Shiro/Jalis Renegade is slightly worse than Herald Shiro/Jalis. This is also true for Kalla/Shiro, however the Kalla Shiro rotation utilizes Soulcleave's Summit which is a group dps gain that isn't represented by Arcdps and it brings 2k+ extra damage to the subgroup depending on what it's paired with.

Additionally, as soon as any Renegade build is on a bigger than small hitbox its damage begins to increase. On large+ targets all Power Renegade builds pull ahead of Herald builds due to Citadel Bombardment + Vindication. If running Kalla that's also an extra X amount (at least 2k) of dps that is currently mostly impossible to track. It should be noted that on GW2 Raidar actual raid performance between Herald and Power Renegade during pre-May 5th patches tend to favor the Renegade (granted there is a small sample size for both, so outliers can influence it to a much greater degree). Herald doesn't bring anything special to Power Revenant besides the Elder's Force modifiers since Glint is a dps loss over Shiro/Jalis. Renegade brings the Ferocity modifier and Citadel Bombardment and if running Kalla brings superior utility + damage with Soulcleave's Summit

Sources:(Note: all of the following are pre may 5th patch which was a slight nerf to all these builds/rotations due to group buff reductions)

Power Herald Shiro/Jalis 28.5k w/ 6 boons

Best Power Herald Benchmark Shiro/Jalis 30.2k w/ 9 boons

Power Renegade Shiro/Kalla 26.5k small hitbox (no ally Soulcleave damage)

Power Renegade Shiro/Kalla 28.6k large hitbox (no ally Soulcleave damage)

Power Renegade Shiro/Jalis 28.2k small hitbox

Power Renegade Shiro/Jalis 30.5k large hitbox

Most recent patch (post may 5th) Shiro/Jalis Power Renegade 31.1k Huge hitbox (I find this one semi unrealistic due to Inspiring Reinforcements interaction with Huge Hitbox)

Things to note about the above benchmarks: Herald requires high boon uptime from its Chronos (just like Weaver) to break 30k. If there is poor or moderate boon support it falls behind Renegade. Soulcleave damage isn't calculated for the other 4 allies so that's an additional 2+k for the Shiro/Kalla rotations plus a bunch of life siphon healing for the subgroup (better utility than Herald). If Herald wants to bring Facet of Nature to help its allies it suffers a 1.5k dps decrease.

Can also look at Gw2 Raidar and look at old logs for more in raid comparisons (though these also do not show Soulcleave's Summit damage if they were running Kalla as Arc does not track lifesteal).

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:

@Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible).

This does not mean that Herald is worse than Renegade, full stop. It means that Renegade matches Herald with a group, and only beats out Herald against a target large enough for all missiles from Citadel Bombardment to hit. I'm certain this is common in raids, but for fractals/overworld/random unorganized pugs, Herald is still going to be a good option.

@"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible). I generally disagree with the premise that Revenant is held back due to Herald, but it's also impossible to talk about without knowing which game mode we're discussing. If we're talking about all three then I'm going to have to disagree on the PvE aspect as Herald as mentioned above is just worse than Renegade full stop. Additionally for the pvp aspect it's more of a "kalla/shortbow is bad design for pvp and Renegade is generally lacking a few important things" rather than a "Herald needs to be gutted and Herald things need to be given to the core class."

@"starlinvf.1358" said:I'm actually starting to question if Rev was intended to work for anything other then Raids, since its the one area where it does "Ok", yet is very precisely tuned to not be "too good" at the one thing is allowed to be good at.

LOL Revenant launched with HoT... So yeah... It wasn't really meta in PvP, ever... In Early days people used bunker herald builds a lot, but it was never that great, it was "meta" because it was doubly new. And people liked sword 2...I never had any problem dismantling Heralds or Revenants with any other profession in PvP.It was a promissing profession, but it was never a very strong profession. The only reason it was ever considered PvE meta for Raids was because of the extra boon duration we'd get from then, back in the time when the meta was also having a single guard spamming hammer 1 for the protection...As everything evolved, and they nerfed the only reason to bring it into Raids, Revenant was entirely dismissed from PvE, and was never a very strong pick in PvP.

So, idk what you mean by it being meta...

@ReaverKane.7598 said:

@"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible). I generally disagree with the premise that Revenant is held back due to Herald, but it's also impossible to talk about without knowing which game mode we're discussing. If we're talking about all three then I'm going to have to disagree on the PvE aspect as Herald as mentioned above is just worse than Renegade full stop. Additionally for the pvp aspect it's more of a "kalla/shortbow is bad design for pvp and Renegade is generally lacking a few important things" rather than a "Herald needs to be gutted and Herald things need to be given to the core class."

@"starlinvf.1358" said:I'm actually starting to question if Rev was intended to work for anything other then Raids, since its the one area where it does "Ok", yet is very precisely tuned to not be "too good" at the one thing is allowed to be good at.

Obviously I meant “up until POF launch.” And yes it WAS meta in pvp for that long. It was absolutely deadly at top level pvp/if you knew what you were doing with it. This is why it was on 99% of top level team compositions for two years, including the world tournament events. If it “wasn’t ever a very good pick in pvp” people wouldn’t have been taking it at the top level. Hell, thief fell out of meta BECAUSE of the Revenant. The only reason rev dropped out of pvp meta right around POF launch was the release of scourge and the cumulative 2years of straight nerfs.

You can say “I never had a problem fighting revenant” and while that may be true it’s largely because the class is a high skill cap class in pvp scenarios meaning only the best players will be able to make full use of its potential. Most revenant players aren’t great and most of the complaints about revenant being bad back then (and now) come from players that fail to use the class optimally. Even Anet acknowledged in a patch note the differential in player skill making it harder for them to balance the class due to how vast the difference in performance is for the class at top tier vs. average tier.

Power Herald actually did a lot of damage in pve on release but was gutted after damage nerfs hit it intended for pvp since they didn’t skill split. Yes the boon duration was the reason it was in the meta AFTER the many raw damage nerfs, but it wasn’t entirely the reason before that.

Additionally you haven’t mentioned anything about WvW, where variations of revenant have been meta defining or top picks for years.

So yes, it was meta in multiple game modes for a long time. Going back again to your comment that “it was never a good pick for pvp” and general lack of knowledge regarding its usefulness for WvW blatantly shows that you don’t have a good working knowledge of how impactful the class used to be and WHY it was given all the nerfs it received.

@Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:

@Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:>This does not mean that Herald is worse than Renegade, full stop. It means that Renegade matches Herald with a group, and only beats out Herald against a target large enough for all missiles from Citadel Bombardment to hit. I'm certain this is common in raids, but for fractals/overworld/random unorganized pugs, Herald is still going to be a good option.

I'm not saying it's not a viable option, but I think that at best Herald is equivalent to Power Renegade and at worst definitely lacking in comparison. I mostly think this from a Raids/Fractals perspective since I don't really think Herald brings anything significant to the party besides damage and if it does bring those things it ends up losing 1.5k+ damage. If for some reason the Power Herald needs to take Glint for boon support they lose about 1.5k and then if the Herald also needs to keep Facet of Nature up they lose nearly another 2kish, putting it somewhere around 26k with both. Looking at Renegade they have better boon access (alacrity and burst might) if needed for the party (1-2k loss as well) while also being able to do really good healing with Soulcleave as part of its rotation. Again, i'm not saying it's not viable (we all know anything is viable for the most part) it's just that I feel it's outclassed in group content. However, I do think that Glint/Shiro is the best option for both dps and utility for a solo power open world pve build.

Fellow Lucian, what traits are the builds in the videos using?

I'm assuming this is a PvP thread, because Herald isn't required or really even better than Renegade in PvE, so we'll talk to that...

To me Herald is basically required in PvP for the following reasons:

• Infused Light lets you make a mistake or blanket yourself when diving for a kill in a team fight.
• Gaze of Darkness let's you actually secure kills on Thief/Holo/Mirage cheesers... Without it you're at an extreme disadvantage in the decapping/+1 game.
• Gaze of Darkness is also the most reliable stun break that you have (outside of invo+legend swap) as it requires no energy and doesn't leave you in some stupid aftercast that can get you interupted/locked out by any good thief/mirage if you don't stow weapon fast enough (which is sometimes actually impossible if they are chain spamming like sword mirages and d/p thieves will do to Rev's.)
• Double tapping Natural Resonance + Elder's Focus is an easy and controllable way to pad your opening bursts outside of Glint.
• All it's utilities cost no energy allowing you to chain weapon skill combos and/or keep pressure up after burning all your energy with facet releases.
• Chaotic Release is great at interrupting power rez's from stability spammers since it pushes the downed person away.
• And last, but probably most important, is how ridiculously strong Facet of Darkness + Incensed Response is when you're +1'ing or facing a team fight with lots of boon strip (i.e. all of them.)

Some of those are just really strong luxuries that the other stances don't have, but the three that I think are like REQUIRED, required are the Invulnerability, the Stun-break, and the Insta/Permanent 25 might from FoD+IR. If they could work that into the other legends or the core, Herald wouldn't be as mandatory... Although, a lot of us would probably still take it because of how good it feels to kill cheese masters by slipping GoD's Reveal into your combos.

One thing for sure that they need to stop doing in the future is to stop putting the stunbreak as an added feature onto what is already an expensive and strong skill. This is especially true with Kalla and Jalis... It's just dumb to have to spend that much energy on a stunbreak... And also, in the case of Kalla, it pretty much kills any opportunity to use Darkrazor offensively, and offensive Darkrazor is probably the best/only good part of using Kalla in pvp. I get that it fits the half-kittened and barely implemented renegade theme of "cc-reversals," but still... I mean, this wouldn't fix Renegade, but it'd be nice if they thought about these types of things in the future. I know originally the stunbreak was tied to the heal spirit, and we all complained, but it was probably better that way than how it is now. Maybe they should move it to f4 and reduce the energy cost in PvP only... :bleep_bloop:

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:

@ReaverKane.7598 said:

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:What game mode are you talking about? This is important because both Power Renegade AND Condi Renegade are superior to Herald for ALL of PvE (except maybe solo open world, but even then the difference is still negligible). I generally disagree with the premise that Revenant is held back due to Herald, but it's also impossible to talk about without knowing which game mode we're discussing. If we're talking about all three then I'm going to have to disagree on the PvE aspect as Herald as mentioned above is just worse than Renegade full stop. Additionally for the pvp aspect it's more of a "kalla/shortbow is bad design for pvp and Renegade is generally lacking a few important things" rather than a "Herald needs to be gutted and Herald things need to be given to the core class."

@"starlinvf.1358" said:I'm actually starting to question if Rev was intended to work for anything other then Raids, since its the one area where it does "Ok", yet is very precisely tuned to not be "too good" at the one thing is allowed to be good at.

Meta in PvP until PoF? Really? That explains why i rarely saw them, i guess in PvP meta means not played. And even when i saw them, the only thing they got going for them was automated Soothing Bastion... Which just meant that one would have to wait a couple of seconds before just ripping the Herald a new one, again.

Sure it was strong in the early days, suffering from the "new Elite" syndrome where every new Elite they release is woefully overpowered. After they tamed their overeagerness in delivery, the the profession's deficiencies became apparent.

Yeah i can say i had no trouble fighting a Revenant, and you can say "skill cap"... But then i'll compare you with actual meta professions and builds, and no one can say they never had any problem killing a Chronomancer or a Tempest during the unkilalble bunker days, or a Reaper before it was nerfed to the ground, or Druids, Scourges, and other actual "you can't join a PvP match without having at least one of these in it" meta builds.That's what meta is...Not what's the only decent usable build for a profession... If that's what meta means to you, then yeah Herald was Revenant Meta, because it was pretty much the only alternative, just like the meta for all professions is one Elite or another.

And i know how useful it was for WvW, it's conjugation with Mesmers for the massive boon fest that was (is) WvW was the reason it was nerfed to trash tier in PvE. That doesn't mean the class was good overal, but that one synergy was strong, that's why it was meta in Raids as well, because of that synergy, so much so that as soon as it was nerfed and the synergy terminated, people pretty much quit Revenants. Again the hyperbole, it was Meta for EXACTLY a year. Until they nerfed the boon duration on F2.Meta defining for years would not even be possible since Revenant hasn't even existed for the bare minimum time to achieve plural on that word before PoF came out (HoT -and Revenant - came out October 2015, PoF released September 2017, so 1 year 11 months after HoT, less than 2 years).You can try to sound as superior as you want, but facts and history will always beat braggadocio.

Revenant, like a lot of stuff related to HoT was rushed, and poorly finished, to the point that just now, 2 and a half years after it's release did they remember it really should have a second underwater weapon, and that maybe having just 2 legends working underwater (and to this day none of the Elites) was kinda weird.It's still not even close to a complete class, it's still wonky, and at best decent in any aspect of the game. The energy mechanic should have a bit more interaction, the half bar out of combat is weird. It was entirely built upon the Nostalgia of GW1 players, but without the extra energy management afforded by GW1, and without synergy between most it's Legends, it'll always be a poor, gimmicky pick compared to the other 8 classes in the game.

I bought PoF hmm, 2 days ago now, although I've been here since beta, hmm, 6 years ago now or whatever. Mainly overworld and WvW. I like characters that are quite well balanced and are highly versatile for solo or ad-hoc co-op situations. Core guardian is currently stunning for example. Both core revenant and the herald felt good in some regards, like cc and combo potential, but it wasn't blowing me away. I tried the renegade in PoF beta and two stress tests but didn't get very far with it.

Now that I actually own PoF and have renegade on with my current gear, it's an open world juggernaut—sustain for days in Shiro, Jalis is rarely used but it's there, and my trait lines are the Shiro, Jalis and Kalla ones. Weapons are twin swords and shortbow, and I'm mainly using the shortbow. I'm finding the shortbow decent even in melee range (plus I just unlocked the pinnacle skin for it by hitting 29K AP, haha).

My stats are a bit odd, selected for build versatility: keeper's weapons and armour, celestial trinkets, traveler runes, WvW power infusions in every available slot, superior/major air sigils. That's enough versatility to do all sorts of things decently and not carry 1,001 gear sets. In open world this is crushing tough looking fights without breaking a sweat—I'm surprised, and pleasantly so.

So I wanted to know why it was all being so easy. Looking across the lines I'm seeing synergy I've not noticed before. I'll pick out a few:

• I'm using Assassin's Annihilation for my Shiro Grandmaster, which synergises with Ambush Commander and attacks like Bloodbane Path, which naturally shoots enemies in the flank and rear. Flanking mobs naturally is trivial anyway, just another reason to melee with a shortbow.
• Lifesteals are my main sustain and it's also damage. Shooting though Dome of the Mists is yet more lifesteal—for allies too. Enchanted Daggers is the best way to set that up, just Sevenshot at the ideal range through the dome (Riposting Shadows can set this up if distance is required).
• Wrought-Iron Will and Unwavering Avoidance are feeding me regen, retal and stability on evade. Decent active defence procs no doubt.
• Riposting Shadows, which grants endurance and fury, is also triggering Brutal Momentum, which grants vigor-on-fury. Coupled with Enduring Recovery it means I have a significant endurance engine and get to sit on the +33% critical chance boost a lot.
• Speaking of which, with fury I'm looking at 98% crit chance before food/utility and 200% critical damage at 5 stacks of Kalla. Food would get that crit over 100% easy with either added power or another lifesteal. With swords I'm occasionally self-buffing to 25 stacks of might. Alacrity is available on F4. Ideal for a celestial-ish gear set.

So obviously all that isn't a min-maxed damage raid build, nor is it meant to be. It's a robust open world setup and it feels like a beast. I could probably throw a hammer on it and roll into WvW without any changes, I'd just drop the swords and be 100% pew pew pew. I've played every class for at least 1,000 hours, so I know what the renegade is up against fun wise to keep my attention, and right now I have to say it's in a good spot if you spec it just right.

Reminds me of my engie, I made a few tweaks to it just recently and it felt way better—a lot of peeps struggle with that class too, at least the core one. It made me realise how a couple of build changes on the player's end is sometimes all you need to go from poop-tier to hero-tier.

~my 2c.

@LucianDK.8615 said:Fellow Lucian, what traits are the builds in the videos using?

Would be devastation 2-3-1, invocation 2-3-3, herald 2-2-1 for the herald builds...For the renegade builds the same for devastation and invocation but I think I read in one of his descriptions that he took vindication over lasting legacy because it was actually a dps gain even on small hitbox? Not sure. Vindication most definitely on large and higher hitbox tho

@"narcx.3570" said:I'm assuming this is a PvP thread, because Herald isn't required or really even better than Renegade in PvE, so we'll talk to that...

To me Herald is basically required in PvP for the following reasons:

• Infused Light lets you make a mistake or blanket yourself when diving for a kill in a team fight.
• Embrace the Darkness let's you actually secure kills on Thief/Holo/Mirage cheesers... Without it you're at an extreme disadvantage in the decapping/+1 game.
• Embrace the Darkness is also the most reliable stun break that you have (outside of invo+legend swap) as it requires no energy and doesn't leave you in some stupid aftercast that can get you interupted/locked out by any good thief/mirage if you don't stow weapon fast enough (which is sometimes actually impossible if they are chain spamming like sword mirages and d/p thieves will do to Rev's.)
• Double tapping Natural Resonance + Elder's Focus is an easy and controllable way to pad your opening bursts outside of Glint.
• All it's utilities cost no energy allowing you to chain weapon skill combos and/or keep pressure up after burning all your energy with facet releases.
• Chaotic Release is great at interrupting power rez's from stability spammers since it pushes the downed person away.
• And last, but probably most importan,t is how ridiculously strong Facet of Darkness + Incensed Response is when you're +1'ing or facing a team fight with lots of boon strip (i.e. all of them.)

Some of those are just really strong luxuries that the other stances don't have, but the three that I think are like REQUIRED, required are the Invulnerability, the Stun-break, and the Insta/Permanent 25 might from FoD+IR. If they could work that into the other legends or the core, Herald wouldn't be as mandatory... Although, a lot of us would probably still take it because of how good it feels to kill cheese masters by slipping EtD's Reveal into your combos.

One thing for sure that they need to stop doing in the future is to stop putting the stunbreak as an added feature onto what is already an expensive and strong skill. This is especially true with Kalla and Jalis... It's just dumb to have to spend that much energy on a stunbreak... And also, in the case of Kalla, it pretty much kills any opportunity to use Darkrazor offensively, and offensive Darkrazor is probably the best/only good part of using Kalla in pvp. I get that it fits the half-kittened and barely implemented renegade theme of "cc-reversals," but still... I mean, this wouldn't fix Renegade, but it'd be nice if they thought about these types of things in the future. I know originally the stunbreak has tied to the heal spirit, and we all complained, but it was probably better that way than how it is now. Maybe they should move it to f4 and reduce the energy cost in PvP only... :bleep_bloop:

*Gaze of Darkness

Burst of Strength pretty good too.

@Justine.6351 said:

@"narcx.3570" said:I'm assuming this is a PvP thread, because Herald isn't required or really even better than Renegade in PvE, so we'll talk to that...

To me Herald is basically required in PvP for the following reasons:

• Infused Light lets you make a mistake or blanket yourself when diving for a kill in a team fight.
• Embrace the Darkness let's you actually secure kills on Thief/Holo/Mirage cheesers... Without it you're at an extreme disadvantage in the decapping/+1 game.
• Embrace the Darkness is also the most reliable stun break that you have (outside of invo+legend swap) as it requires no energy and doesn't leave you in some stupid aftercast that can get you interupted/locked out by any good thief/mirage if you don't stow weapon fast enough (which is sometimes actually impossible if they are chain spamming like sword mirages and d/p thieves will do to Rev's.)
• Double tapping Natural Resonance + Elder's Focus is an easy and controllable way to pad your opening bursts outside of Glint.
• All it's utilities cost no energy allowing you to chain weapon skill combos and/or keep pressure up after burning all your energy with facet releases.
• Chaotic Release is great at interrupting power rez's from stability spammers since it pushes the downed person away.
• And last, but probably most importan,t is how ridiculously strong Facet of Darkness + Incensed Response is when you're +1'ing or facing a team fight with lots of boon strip (i.e. all of them.)

Some of those are just really strong luxuries that the other stances don't have, but the three that I think are like REQUIRED, required are the Invulnerability, the Stun-break, and the Insta/Permanent 25 might from FoD+IR. If they could work that into the other legends or the core, Herald wouldn't be as mandatory... Although, a lot of us would probably still take it because of how good it feels to kill cheese masters by slipping EtD's Reveal into your combos.

One thing for sure that they need to stop doing in the future is to stop putting the stunbreak as an added feature onto what is already an expensive and strong skill. This is especially true with Kalla and Jalis... It's just dumb to have to spend that much energy on a stunbreak... And also, in the case of Kalla, it pretty much kills any opportunity to use Darkrazor offensively, and offensive Darkrazor is probably the best/only good part of using Kalla in pvp. I get that it fits the half-kittened and barely implemented renegade theme of "cc-reversals," but still... I mean, this wouldn't fix Renegade, but it'd be nice if they thought about these types of things in the future. I know originally the stunbreak has tied to the heal spirit, and we all complained, but it was probably better that way than how it is now. Maybe they should move it to f4 and reduce the energy cost in PvP only... :bleep_bloop:

Yes, thank you... Cuz f embrace in a post PoF-pvp world, lol.

@"ReaverKane.7598" said:Meta in PvP until PoF? Really? That explains why i rarely saw them, i guess in PvP meta means not played. And even when i saw them, the only thing they got going for them was automated Soothing Bastion... Which just meant that one would have to wait a couple of seconds before just ripping the Herald a new one, again.

Sure it was strong in the early days, suffering from the "new Elite" syndrome where every new Elite they release is woefully overpowered. After they tamed their overeagerness in delivery, the the profession's deficiencies became apparent.

And i know how useful it was for WvW, it's conjugation with Mesmers for the massive boon fest that was (is) WvW was the reason it was nerfed to trash tier in PvE. That doesn't mean the class was good overal, but that one synergy was strong, that's why it was meta in Raids as well, because of that synergy, so much so that as soon as it was nerfed and the synergy terminated, people pretty much quit Revenants. Again the hyperbole, it was Meta for EXACTLY a year. Until they nerfed the boon duration on F2.Meta defining for years would not even be possible since Revenant hasn't even existed for the bare minimum time to achieve plural on that word before PoF came out (HoT -and Revenant - came out October 2015, PoF released September 2017, so 1 year 11 months after HoT, less than 2 years).You can try to sound as superior as you want, but facts and history will always beat braggadocio.

Revenant, like a lot of stuff related to HoT was rushed, and poorly finished, to the point that just now, 2 and a half years after it's release did they remember it really should have a second underwater weapon, and that maybe having just 2 legends working underwater (and to this day none of the Elites) was kinda weird.It's still not even close to a complete class, it's still wonky, and at best decent in any aspect of the game. The energy mechanic should have a bit more interaction, the half bar out of combat is weird. It was entirely built upon the Nostalgia of GW1 players, but without the extra energy management afforded by GW1, and without synergy between most it's Legends, it'll always be a poor, gimmicky pick compared to the other 8 classes in the game.

First I just want to address WvW since it doesn't make up the majority of the rest of my post. Yes, Revenant actually was a meta pick in WvW even outside of the Facet of Nature + Mesmer SOI comps. Hammer Revenant has existed as a meta pick in all Pirate Ship metas and Condi Frontline Revenant was a meta pick and total monster during the Push Metas. Even now Hammer Revenant is still considered meta and has been since PoF launch.

Also I said they are and have been "meta defining OR top picks for years" therefore what I said was not wrong, but misinterpreted.

As for pvp, once again, how you personally fair against Revenants or your personal experience of not seeing many Revenants in PvP is not indicative of the class as a whole or its impact on the meta. For example, I personally have never really had a problem with Scourge, but to say that it hasn't had a huge impact on the PoF meta is to ignore the meta game as a whole. You should also note that although Dragonhunter was a VERY popular pick for regular PvP queues in almost all divisions from Season 1 on, it had ALMOST ZERO representation in high tier play during all of the 2 years of HoT meta. Does that mean that Dragonhunter was meta? For PUG stomping, perhaps, but at high level most certainly not. While you might not feel that Revenant was a common choice or an actual threat, it is without question that it was a major part of spvp meta from HoT launch on and only started to taper off a few months before PoF. Even in those few months before PoF, though, it was still seen in organized play as a common choice and also chosen frequently by high tier players.

The following is proof of Revenant's place in the 2 years of HoT spvp metagame:

4 Revenants (2 per team in the finals) were used in the March 7th, 2016 ESL Season 1 Finals: h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_Ry6w_6ph8

Revenant was on every single team in the June 27, 2016 Season 2 Finals: h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6I8J8n3YZg

Revenant was the ONLY CLASS in the September 2016 World Championships to be used on every single team (nearly one year after HoT launch), beating out even Tempest Support and Necro for most used:https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_2_World_Championship_2016h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xXJovG2Vsw

Tournament of Legends 4 on November 5th & 6th 2016 saw Revenants on all teams in the finals in both EU & NAEU: h ttps://www.twitch.tv/videos/99502738NA: h ttps://www.twitch.tv/videos/99321996

After the last Tournament of Legends 4 and the death of the World Championships most of the organized play moved to UGO and eventually Automated Tournaments. Revenant was still present despite over a year of nerfs and it was still useful for many teams during the 10 months between TOL4 and PoF launch. Additionally, in Platinum 2+ several of the best players like Jeff, Toker, Kat, etc. utilized Thief + Revenant DuoQs to easily carry matches and place in the Top 50+ up until PoF. I personally fought against them many times across those few seasons and they were deadly; Revenant was still in a good place if you knew what you were doing.

Fast forward to June 25th, 2017 (which was 2.5 months before PoF launched) and you have the last pre-PoF UGO. Revenant was still seen on many of the teams in the tournament including teams that made it into the semi and grand finals. Granted, the team that won did not use one, but this was due to the fact that Thief had been making a comeback and organized teams were either choosing to keep their Revenants or switch them out to Thieves.

Grandfinals: h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KabVfJvqcrESemi-Final 1: h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YAqtDaAWBM

Yeah i can say i had no trouble fighting a Revenant, and you can say "skill cap"... But then i'll compare you with actual meta professions and builds, and no one can say they never had any problem killing a Chronomancer or a Tempest during the unkilalble bunker days, or a Reaper before it was nerfed to the ground, or Druids, Scourges, and other actual "you can't join a PvP match without having at least one of these in it" meta builds.That's what meta is...Not what's the only decent usable build for a profession... If that's what meta means to you, then yeah Herald was Revenant Meta, because it was pretty much the only alternative, just like the meta for all professions is one Elite or another.

Meta isn't "just what's popular in yolo queue." Meta takes into account all levels of the game, but more specifically it takes into account the highest level of play. Dragonhunter was definitely not considered meta for most of HoT, yet it was popular. Revenant on the otherhand became less and less popular as the skill cap increased due to nerfs, but it was still a top choice in the highest levels of play. Even in solo/duo as mentioned it was one of the best classes at the highest levels. So yes, the skill cap claim is true and has to be evaluated when looking at Revenant as a whole. I'm not basing my "Revenant/Herald was meta" claim off "only one decent usable build for the profession," but by its actual performance in game.

So to recap:PvE: Herald was meta for 1 year (50% of HoT)PvP: Herald was a meta pick all the way up until PoF, but required a high skill level to be fully used effectivelyWvW: Revenant has been a meta pick since its inception

Your claims that Revenant was never meta or never a strong profession are completely unfounded. While my analysis only focuses on the HoT years, as mentioned above it's still a strong choice in WvW and has been varying levels of meta for Raids since PoF as well. I"m sorry that you have an axe to grind with revenant or don't like it's mechanics or something, however vastly exaggerating claims that the class isn't/hasn't been good doesn't do the class any favors in the long run as it obscures its true performance. Revenant still has a large stigma as to what it can and can't do and a lot of that isn't based on facts or actual research, but on people's personal experiences. Balance has to take into account the high end of play first and foremost and then the low end. It's also okay to have a class that has a higher skill cap than others. And it's also okay to have a class that has mechanics that you don't like which is why there are 9 classes and 18 elite specs in the game.

As can be seen in all the above videos, I'm not making my own history or my own facts. Granted some of my analysis is from personal experience (as is yours), but the above videos and Revenant's top tier performance in spvp and other areas does not lie. I think I've said enough on this topic and have made my points so this will likely be my last post in regards to "The Viability of Revenant Over the Years." The evidence is above; you're free to do with it as you wish.

@"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:Wall of TextI'll note that most of your "evidence" is based on either pre-nerf data (actual World Championships), which only validates my claim. The rest is sketchy at best... Some "used" Revenant for a tournament or other... Sure condi rev was strong a few times during the whole run, that doesn't make it a meta pick.Revenant can easily be supplanted in all categories by a different class.The fact that a few people use it, doesn't mean it's good, it means a few people have been using it for a while, and they are good at it. And if those same people used a different profession they'd probably do even better.If you look at League of Legends the 3rd best player in NA mains 2 champions which one is in the middle of the champs leader board and the other is at the bottom, yet he's 3rd best in NA, and has 60+% win rate... Does that make those champions meta?Rekkles, one of the best pro-players in LoL has mained the current bottom ranked ADC, does that make that champion meta?

You confuse niche plays, and strategic picks with actual meta status.

@ReaverKane.7598 said:

@"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:Wall of TextI'll note that most of your "evidence" is based on either pre-nerf data (actual World Championships), which only validates my claim. The rest is sketchy at best... Some "used" Revenant for a tournament or other... Sure condi rev was strong a few times during the whole run, that doesn't make it a meta pick.Revenant can easily be supplanted in all categories by a different class.The fact that a few people use it, doesn't mean it's good, it means a few people have been using it for a while, and they are good at it. And if those same people used a different profession they'd probably do even better.If you look at League of Legends the 3rd best player in NA mains 2 champions which one is in the middle of the champs leader board and the other is at the bottom, yet he's 3rd best in NA, and has 60+% win rate... Does that make those champions meta?Rekkles, one of the best pro-players in LoL has mained the current bottom ranked ADC, does that make that champion meta?

LMAO, I don't think Herald being on EVERY SINGLE TEAM for a year+ and then being an extremely common pick in competitive group play up until PoF constitutes a niche....Thief fell out of the meta for a reason....but whatever, you're free to think it's a niche and think the class has been underpowered since launch, I won't stop you

Edit: Condi rev was also only good during the first season and a half...

at the risk of sounding all broken record:

the boonbot stuff should have been part of the Ventari skills, when used, to buff the tablet's effects.Glint skills should have been much more Mesmery, instead of boring upkeep ---> damage