How to improve rifle skills?

Rifle skills are not well designed. We have seen multiple posts discussing about this topic, they are mostly focused on: Kneel, ini cost and damage.

There are some changes I want to see. Main goal is to improve auto attack damage, creating two relatively different fight style between kneeled skills and regular skills. And Make rifle feels more unique.

Rifle 1: when kneeled, auto attacks could be slower but gain a even bigger damage bonus. So it hits harder, does more damage overall. Also makes it feel different from a " longer-range" pistol pew pew pew.

Rifle 2: it is OK. Keep it as it is now.

Rifle 3: biggest problem here. Three round burst and double tap are both very similar to pistols unload, pew pew pew damage + might stacks.

Double tap is fine, just a damage tool you can use when you can't kneel. The problem is three round burst, it is basically more damage more might stacks, a rifle version of unload, or even worse.

I would move the deaths judgement from Rifle 4 to here replacing Three Round Burst. And DJ grants might stacks if it deals damage.

Beat thing about this change is we don't need two skills for the same purpose which is do damage( three round burst when you are low on malice and might, DJ when high on malice and might, This type of skills should be in WoW instead of an action based game like GW2... )

Rifle 4: since DJ is moved to kneeled rifle 3, we can simply put an upgraded version of Death's retreat here. Something like: stealth you and roll back or gives a short 1/2 second evasion maybe and roll back.

The stealth will free up the talent choice in spvp and wvw. And one disengage tool will help a lot in both pvp and pve.

Rifle 5 is good. Kneel should be a style changer, when you sit yourself in a place, your attacks are slower but deadlier. When you stand up, attacks are less powerful but you can move. Like most of the snipers in other games, slow long range attacks and relatively faster short range attacks.

Your thoughts? :P

Not too bad. I would add your character faces the target when you are attacking one like all the other weapons in the game. I would lower kneel to two ini instead of the 5 it is now.

I love this. I think the basic attacks while kneeling should stay at 3/4s, but deal even more damage based on total malice on your target. I really think the standing auto needs the firing time to be decreased from 3/4s to 1/2s. It just feels too clunky in it's current state for the lackluster damage. The standing 2 is fine as it is, but the kneeling 2 is could use its durations buffed slightly. The standing 3 could change to something more in line with the malice gain, like [initiative cost: 4] "Fire a three round burst at your target, if that target is marked regenerate 1 initiative." The standing 4 is fine, and kneel is fine. I'd like a less clunky way to leave kneel in a split second situation, though. Removing three round burst is a fantastic idea, but I don't think kneeling should have any movement at all. The 4 is definitely your damage, so more crowd control would be helpful while you're building your Malice. "Fire around your target, knocking up sand and blinding them while applying weakness. Leaves behind a dust cloud for 2 seconds, applying blinding and bleeding to those that remain in it." The size of the cloud would need to be smaller than Black Powder, maybe 100 units. And lastly, the stealth skill is awful. I use the trait that puts you in stealth when you kneel, and honestly I nearly always use my 2 to break stealth as waiting the full second to fire off the slowest attack in history, only to have it do too little damage and have a random chance to strip boons (honestly with its speed, how can anyone ever time boon stripping? I just have to guess, or hope they pop an important one right as it lands). This skill needs a rework... I really don't think Rifle needs any boon strip. What it does need is some form of (not spammable) AOE. "Stealth Attack: Fire a timed explosive onto your target. After 3 seconds, it will detonate, dealing damage to the foe and those around them (indicated by a red circle)."

Rifle 1: i like your idea a lot, makes sense to hit something hard with more precision.Rifle 2: agreed, that one is fine tooRifle 3: here i kinda disagree. yes Unload and DT/TRB share similarities through rapidfire might generation, but thats it. Unload is Mobile, refunds Initiative, and deals more damage. TRB just needs a way to compete with that, it needs an advantage for all its disadvantages.Also i disagree with replacing them TRB with DJ, DE was basically meant to weaken the enemy with 1, stack might with 3 and finally deliver a fatal blow with 4.Your idea for Rifle 4 doesnt fit the theme at all, you are not supposed to be mobile as DE. Not to mention that you can allready do that by standing up, rolling back and using our new elite.

I said this in another thread but I may as well post it here also. I think DJ should have a 33% chance on crit on a marked target (10% against players) to make your next TRB free and do 20% more damage. It would increase our sustained damage, follow the design philosophy of prioritizing DJ as well as give us a dynamic rotation in combat.

@Zalavaaris.5329 said:I said this in another thread but I may as well post it here also. I think DJ should have a 33% chance on crit on a marked target (10% against players) to make your next TRB free and do 20% more damage. It would increase our sustained damage, follow the design philosophy of prioritizing DJ as well as give us a dynamic rotation in combat.

personally im not a friend of "chance" skills, neither does it fit for the "prepare for combat" theme. unload isnt a chance either, when all your shots hit, you gain back initiative. and thats the case most of the time unless the enemy blocks or evades, no "chance" involved.how about an integration of malice instead? for each point of malice you get back 1 point of initiative, so the first few bursts would still cost initiative, but at the end of the mark you can spam it freely, increasing your damage output just as DE should work

@LazerusKI.7485 said:

@Zalavaaris.5329 said:I said this in another thread but I may as well post it here also. I think DJ should have a 33% chance on crit on a marked target (10% against players) to make your next TRB free and do 20% more damage. It would increase our sustained damage, follow the design philosophy of prioritizing DJ as well as give us a dynamic rotation in combat.

It would not be complete rng. There's something a lot of games use called procs per minute. They are guaranteed to happen a certain amount of times. You just won't know when. I think proc mechanics could add a lot to gw2 gameplay as a whole.

@Zalavaaris.5329 said:

@LazerusKI.7485 said:

@Zalavaaris.5329 said:I said this in another thread but I may as well post it here also. I think DJ should have a 33% chance on crit on a marked target (10% against players) to make your next TRB free and do 20% more damage. It would increase our sustained damage, follow the design philosophy of prioritizing DJ as well as give us a dynamic rotation in combat.

No proc mechanics please. I had to deal with enough of that on my MCH in FF14. Leave proc mechanics out of GW2. I hate them.

Right now, I would change double tap and triple shot to cost only 3 initiative. I don't want to buff it any more than that, since this increases the overall damage output and might stacking by about 25%.

Add pierce to DJ (lower damage coefficient on off targets). Nothing else really feel like it needs to be touched.

@Doctor Hide.6345 said:No proc mechanics please. I had to deal with enough of that on my MCH in FF14. Leave proc mechanics out of GW2. I hate them.

Seconding that as well, procs aren't fun : Source until 2 months ago i mained a Marksmanship Hunter in WoW, a spec designed entirely around procs as of Legion, frustrating at times is putting things mildly.

@Griever.8150 said:Add pierce to DJ (lower damage coefficient on off targets). Nothing else really feel like it needs to be touched.

@Doctor Hide.6345 said:No proc mechanics please. I had to deal with enough of that on my MCH in FF14. Leave proc mechanics out of GW2. I hate them.

Tripling that. Problem with procs is quite literally, you're praying to RNGesus for it, and it's very possible over teh course of 3 minutes to either get them constantly, or never get them at all. I've had that problem in FF14 on MNK, I don't want it to be here too.