So after running around with Ranger maces I feel there is something that might be an issue, that is adding what would probably have been part of an elite spec, but it's only tied now to specific weapons, in this case the Ranger maces but I noticed the same thing when running Ele pistol.
I kept having the feeling that the Natures Strength part of the maces was missing actual traits to augment and adjust this, I'm aware we are going away from getting elite specs and I understand the reasons, but then adding what would have been part of an elite spec but locking it to specific weapons I see a problem arise.
This is mostly coming from a WvW player tbf so I will not speak for PvE CM's and such where the thought might be different. So the problem in question: having this unique mechanic is ofc fitting into the balancing aspect of the maces and in general I found the skills quite nice, but when I then choose to run just offhand mace because I might wanna do axe, sword or dagger mainhand, the Natures Strength mechanic becomes basically none functional, since with the cd's on skill 4 and 5 it takes almost a minute camping that weapon set just to get the actual buff. And then what if I have to do a weapon swap at a bad time in terms of the buff upkeep but the correct decision in the moment of the fight, well then the stacks might run out and I now have to start over trying to actually get the stacks once again.
If this was part of an elite spec there would surely be traits to change up different aspects of Natures Strength and let you build it up in different ways even when using other weapons that just maces, but since we don't get this it just feels like one half of a thing, a half that just don't feel good but instead very strict and locked in terms of how to play it if you actually wanna get proper use out of the mechanic.
I got the same feeling with Ele pistol, on paper they looked really cool, but in practice they were actually just really annoying to try play around, simply because it again felt like there were suppose to be a trait line that fed into the mechanic.
This is all personal after playing around with the weapons in the beta and I might be wrong and if that's the case so be it.
I just wanna put forward this for the Devs to consider. It's lovely and creative work as always but if you don't intend on giving trait lines to us anymore then I think it's a mistake adding unique mechanics to a specific weapon. If you do wanna play around with this in the future, I think you have to consider doing "elite spec" trait lines that feed into this mechanics making them more well rounded to use in practice. You don't even have to call them elite specs, or give them extra features like Harbinger Shroud, Soul Beast merge or Weaver dual attunements, just a trait line that actually feed into the mechanics you add making them more versatile and not feel like a tagged on gimmick.
Long post I know, which is why I can't do Twitter.
Have a nice day!
