PoF PvP Impression and Class Feedback

PoF has been out now for almost 2 weeks and the crying in some threads is just unbearable.If people instead would give constructive feedback (and there are a few that do), maybe Anet would have some insight on what the core issues are with some of the new specs.Although im hardly an authority when it comes to most classes, these are the first impressions I got from the first ~10 days of PoF PvP.

Weaver:Definitely a damage spec by design. PvP relevant traits from the weaver line, seem to be focus on offering a lot of mobility, chasing/kiting potential and generally aim to be in the enemies face at all times, dealing massive damage to them while avoiding to take too much damage themselves. In reality however, I don't really feel any relevant form of pressure or impact when im up against a weaver. They just seem to "dance" around you without really accomplishing much. Tbh the main issue seems like they lack the damage to be a threat at all. As it is right now, I mostly tend to just ignore them and give them the occasional "love-tap" to make them back off....more like a nuisance than something to bother myself with.

Mirage:Cool design and actually pretty annoying to deal with if left uncontested. They can certainly do some pretty good (condi)burst-combos but seem to be better in smaller skirmishes than big teamfights, which is fair I pressume. Altho not even close to the Chrono when it comes to 1v1s, they seem to have better engage and disengage capabilities which lets them apply hit-and-run tactics. All in all I feel like they are in a pretty good spot although some additional ways to deal with condies would be nice, since you cant handle any form of condi pressure at all, which hinders them to stay relevant in bigger fights as they are quickly forced to disengage.

Scourge:Seems...strong. Although not as dramatically as some people suggest. Having no second lifebar - although very good access to barrier to compensate - makes them even better focus targets than before. My main issue with the class is, that you dont really know what they are doing or rather that it's hard to keep track of what cooldowns they have used already. The F-skills need to be better telegraphed imo and the F2 (the corrupt/convert thingy) could either need a higher cooldown or a higher lifeforce cost to prevent it from just being spammed off CD. Maybe just adding a distinct icon over the sand-shades/the scourge when a F-skill is being used would already help players to know when it's save to engage and when to keep their distance.

Deadeye:Seems to perform pretty well. With good positioning they are pretty effective at zoning and therefore controlling a fight rather well. If their target doesn't LoS or starts to kite rather quickly they will soon be very irrelevant. Against certain setups (where there are no things that can chase you down) they seem to be insanely strong. Projectile hate screws them over however, which I think is fair. My only concern with them is, that when they are NOT kneeling, they hit like a wet paper towel. Maybe some number adjustments for non-kneeling rifle skills would make them able to fight back when someone is up in their face....since that seems to be the best way to deal with them however, maybe thats a good thing tho.

Soulbeast:I really dont know about soulbeast. Haven't really played it myself, so my insight is rather limited. From what I have seen however, they can do some pretty significant burst combos but ...somehow they just dont seem to be able to finish the job. Moa stance is pretty hillarious though. permanent protection and an insane uptime of offensive boons makes them good for 1v1's altho I still think that druid is far superior in that regard. As said, really dont know about soulbeast. Maybe someone with more insight could offer better feedback.

Holosmith:Very fun to play with and against them. Far more aggressive playstyle than the scrapper, where some form of "risk management" is involved. However, they only seem to really be a threat when they are in Photon Forge mode. Engi weaponskills have always been a bit lackluster, so simply kiting them while they are in PF mode seems to be the best way to deal with them. IN PF however, their damage potential is insane. Maybe "redistributing" some of their damage; meaning to buff their weaponskill and "nerf" PF skills would make them less predicable With the right utilities they are quite slippery as well, which doesn't necessarily give them scrapper like "sustain" but at least makes them avoid these "sitting duck" situations. All in all, pretty balanced imo.

Firebrand:Although I haven't yet encountered anything of the sort myself yet, I have been told, that FB support is actually comparable to tempest support. Not much more I can say about them tbh, since I have encountered them only a (suspiciously) few times. Maybe, again, someone with more insight could pitch in here.

Renegade:Definitely - at least from my PoV - the most underwhelming new spec. I guess the renegade stance itself has more pve-applications, but that isn't the only lackluster thing about Renegade.Shortbow, although clearly being a damage weapon, is simply lacking in all regards. The trailine itself as well as the F-skills also feel very lackluster and doesn't offer any trait synergy at all. Tbh, I feel like Renegade just tries to do much at the same time. Condition damage, Ferocity, Fury, buffing, defensive AND offensive support at the same time is not something any spec can handle. Righteous Rebel for instance clearly is a pvp trait, but what is up with that linking to the ( imo more than useless) F3 skill? Maybe it's just not supposed to be a damage spec for pvp though and is intended to be used together with ventari, I honestly dont know anymore.

Spellbreaker:Saved the best (by all means) for last. Spellbreaker is, hands down, THE best pvp spec atm. Damage, mobility, CC, sustain, utility, teamfight, 1v1.... Spellbreaker has it all. At this point, I cant really say if SB or warrior in general is responsible for this class' prowess, but SB is just too good at everything. While I generally enjoy the "sandboxy" traitline design, where you can essentially customize your F2-skill, it makes the skill just too stacked. I'm not sure if increasing the CD on FC, like it has already been suggested, is the way to go though. One of the main issues imo however, is it's damage. Imo either its base damage should be decreased (drastically) OR not be able to crit at all. Revenge Counter (trait) also need some adjusting imo. It either should be given an ICD or reduce/rework its condi copy. I dont want to rant too much about warrior, since this wasn't supposed to be a whine thread, but maybe the issues to this class run much deeper than just the SB-traitline alone (I mean they are literally the only class where running a berserker amulet is not mere suicide).

Anyhow, this is my first impression of the new PoF specs. As already mentioned in the beginning, I want this to be a discussion (im biased as well on some classes) and want to gather some insight on the addressed matters ....Possibly without people telling me (or eachother) thats its a "l2p" or "git gud" issue.

nice sum

from my point of view i see anet trying to shift the meta not with builds rather with roles

deadeye turn to be more team player and less 1v1 roamer. sitting far sniping turning 3v3 or 4v4 into fast uneven fights. as in 1v1 you let the enemy team to cap the point while they can kite. los and reflect or blocked till +1 arrive. like LB ranger

soulbeast combination of team player and 1v1. nothing much here.

FB - turn from dmg dealer to support

weaver - try to shift to dmg instead of support but atm sword needs dmg buff

mirage making a shift to roamer rolebut due to targeting skills still DD is fastest on the rotation. good 1v1 hard to catch as you say hit and run

holosmith took the place of dh with aoe and high burst dmg.

spellbreaker bit necro with its abilities to rip boons. while scourge still the aoe condi as reaper was. both strong class with small changes.

renegade - pve or pvnothing . low support, low dmg, low sustain low everything BIG DISAPPOINTMENT . seem they want to push it as dmg buffer but fail harshly.

I started reading and stop quickly when I disagreed so much with some of your points.

Good Weavers are actually pretty strong and are quite out of the meta (in a good way) as they don't rely on condis and have good niche uses. Super high burst damage weavers or very defensive/bunker weavers are both very annoying and not to be underestimated.

Mirages are not worse than Chronomancers, they are a lot stronger offensively but just way harder to play and very few players manage to make any use out of it. Mirage also can take very good use out of weapons that are considered as bad for Mesmers such as Scepter/Focus or Scepter/Torch (my favorite pvp sets) with the addition of ambushes and the Deception skills it can work like a charm.

Both Mirage and Weaver are really complex to master and I think that's why there is very few threatening weavers or mirages out there. But as a Mirage only PvP player I very often kill people 1vs2 and I found some Weavers that were really big threats. (I have to agree on the lack of big fight capabilities for the Mirage though, it's very good defensively in big fights but in terms of damage a Chronomancer with his skills is better, skirmish Mirage is way stronger).

I have not seen any decent Soulbeast so far (very few people even dare playing it), Druids look a lot more threatening but it's mostly due to the overtuning of PoF pets (hello gazelle doing absurdly high damage for no reason at all) combined with super tanky Druids making a strong but impossible to kill mix.

Scourge and Spellbreakers are way overpowered in particular in Conquest because of the "I can completely deny you from an area" playstyle they both can apply on top of having way too high damage output and completely ignoring any conditions (Spellbreaker can deny power damage entirely at the same time so yeah there's that). I have seen a few hilarious situations where 2 Scourge on each team would nuke the whole point and we would end up being 4 on each side downed at the same time because of the crazy high damage output from conditions. Also there's a reason why more than 50% of players (specially in higher tiers) are Scourge or Spellbreakers, it's not random.

Holosmith feel a lot stronger than people give credit for, I saw a few doing really high burst of damage and they tend to have a very unpredcitable gameplay making them quite potent. I haven't seen many good ones but the ones that were good were really big threats and impossible to counter by predicting them.

Deadeyes can excel in both damage and evasion but are really bad if they try too hard to do both at the same time. I think they can be good to counter some niche builds but overall they feel quite weak against any build that has decent defensive options (because they die so quickly). They are a big threat if ignored but since they are such an easy target it's a bit silly to ignore them so in the end they are quite below the average (unless you play a very glass cannon build and let the Deadeye setup and target you but that's you doing wrong not the Deadeye being too strong).

I have not seen a single one Revenant elite spec so far which is quite mind blowing so I can't say anything about it but the fact of not seeing any says a lot about the class in general (I really wish the whole legend terrible design was changed).

Firebrands seem decent, I saw some really impossible to take down ones and some with very strong fire damage nuke. It's always the same story with every guardian spec, don't stay in the light or you will burn to death, don't forget a cleanse or you will burn to death. So yeah, I don't feel any difference. Dragonslayer is very one dimensional as it has super strong stationary traps that if you get inside you can possibly die in no time while Firebrands feel quite close to core Guardian (which can be a good thing for some).

But really all this is severely overshadowed by Full Counter and many many flaws of the Necro/Scourge (way too much condi rebounce, the F abilities of the Scourge are way too strong and on top of that it doesn't require any skill at all, I litterally had players telling me I have no idea what I'm doing but I keep killing everyone, that is never ok in a pvp game)

for mirage it depends how you set it up. if you set it with illusion and inspiration as chrono it is really strong against condi burst .... it lose a bit of damage not having dueling line but the remove on shatter coupled with signet of illusion can make you really strong against condi bomber . quite often , if i can not take a scourge down i can easily run away and goback with mobility and condi remove. Without inspiration i find really hard in this condi hell to play. you have more damage but the survivability is far less

@Sombrero.9204 said:I started reading and stop quickly when I disagreed so much with some of your points.

Good Weavers are actually pretty strong and are quite out of the meta (in a good way) as they don't rely on condis and have good niche uses. Super high burst damage weavers or very defensive/bunker weavers are both very annoying and not to be underestimated.

Mirages are not worse than Chronomancers, they are a lot stronger offensively but just way harder to play and very few players manage to make any use out of it. Mirage also can take very good use out of weapons that are considered as bad for Mesmers such as Scepter/Focus or Scepter/Torch (my favorite pvp sets) with the addition of ambushes and the Deception skills it can work like a charm.

Both Mirage and Weaver are really complex to master and I think that's why there is very few threatening weavers or mirages out there. But as a Mirage only PvP player I very often kill people 1vs2 and I found some Weavers that were really big threats. (I have to agree on the lack of big fight capabilities for the Mirage though, it's very good defensively in big fights but in terms of damage a Chronomancer with his skills is better, skirmish Mirage is way stronger).

Oh I think you are misunderstanding my mirage feedback. I like mirage (actually have played it the most since PoF). I wasn't meaning that it is worse than Chrono, just that it is less good in 1v1s. And yes, It is definitely higher dmg than chrono, but chrono just offers more sustain and team-utility (CCs, Heals, Distort and Moa). Both specs have different roles, I agree with that.

On the topic of weaver .....I guess there are some good ones out there, but personally I haven't had the pleasure of encountering a good one yet. Even if they have good damage potential (which requires a lot of CDs tho), they are just too easy to force to disengage imo. I have only tried the spec a few times and by no standards a good ele....nevertheless it was really fun to play, only .... a little unrewarding imo.

Renegade is pvnothing. I mean, of course it has more condi dps than Herand (that can only have half condi spec), but even on condi builds you basically only use Renegade for the traits. And that's just in PvE, where it doesn't bring much since the bleed ghost got nerfed. Its dps is even lower than Tempest, not to mention all the new elite specs.

@BikeIsGone.8675 said:Scourge:Seems...strong. Although not as dramatically as some people suggest. Having no second lifebar - although very good access to barrier to compensate - makes them even better focus targets than before. My main issue with the class is, that you dont really know what they are doing or rather that it's hard to keep track of what cooldowns they have used already. The F-skills need to be better telegraphed imo and the F2 (the corrupt/convert thingy) could either need a higher cooldown or a higher lifeforce cost to prevent it from just being spammed off CD. Maybe just adding a distinct icon over the sand-shades/the scourge when a F-skill is being used would already help players to know when it's save to engage and when to keep their distance.

Same. i feel kinda "all u need do is spam" with scourge. i run from being ganked or focused and hit all condis possible. end of game.

Renegade doesnt even register lol.

Renegade has been invisible to me except on one dungeon run. I kept having to peal them off the floor.