Buran.3796

A week ago. The simple reason due is happening less to me is becasue with 3 Rev characters instead of swapping builds across the same character in different game modes I'm runing essentially the same build for a given character in every game mode and when I want to swap the gameplay I just change to another character. But if I juggle with my main with 6 gear loadouts and 6 trait loadaouts and start to cross them and jump between different game modes starts to happen as oftenly as ever. Did you ever ride off from Unrelenting Assault teleporting you inside a wall or a random place? The game code is a truly spaghetti mess so far and Rev is full of unfixed bugs which have been with the class since HoT release. If ANet wasn't able to fix them with 450 workers you'll have hard time to convince me that they are improving having below 200... See how even when they have nice ideas (contrast cursor) they are actually unable to execute (the tip of the cursor doesn't match the tip of the icon).

Having played the Herald since was available and being aware of its former glory I'll REFUSE to wield it again as long as they don't revert the CoR mechanics to the old system. Is not about the damage (it can be easily corrected, they also increased the cd from 2 across all game modes to 4s in PvE, 8s in WvW and 10s in PvP) but about how inconsistent and bad they made the skill (Sevenshot came in the other way, tho). Also, I won't use a weapon with a 1.75s cast time which hits for 10 points... If you want to play a good Rev hammer (a power ranged weapon) just jump in the Mechanist wagon and run their rifle.

It could be top dps build and still won't be meta. Even if you buff the damage to levels unseen by other professions, what else has to offer? * Doesn't provide alacrity. *Doesn't provide quickness. *Doesn't provide aegis, boon rips/corruption. *Has no meaningful cc or team stability (can offer some from legacy weapons and legends but they are very situational). *Doesn't have means to deliver damage at range and lacks teleports which others have to help with some gameplay mechanics. *As a healer, its dps tanks from mediocre to terrible. If you've been aware of the race to complete Havest Temple in Challenge Mode you known that the team composition was more about which specs provided the tools to the group to fulfill the goals rather than just bruteforce the phases through massive dps. Mechanist, Firebrand and Virtuosos were the choices due their versatility. Vindi could deliver 50k dps and still wouldn't bring anything special to the table: every class can provide permafury, 25 stacks of migth and so on.... What the meta demands is builds with tools to perform well on several areas: being good at dps but also bringing up squad quicknes or alacrity; having instant access to team stability, protection, resolution; having team alacrity and good heals, reflects and tons of ccs; having consistent high dps at any range, boon stripping and AoE vigor... A few specs are like swiss knifes: they have a lot of those tools available, so even if they aren't the top dps or the top healers available they are extremely handful to deal with all kind of obstacles. Kurzik is the closest thing to being that which the Vindicator could offer, but pales against other support options and to be good at healing the blue has to give up its damage almost entirely. That's why nornalizing the boons across all professions won't change that some are intrinsically better than the rest: they lack the tools. Plus: a single dodge which costs 100 endurance is just asking a kick in the balls at the instanced hall entrance. SEALS won't pick crippled, no matter how good snipers they are.

The game is NOT balanced. The PvP is (not) balanced towards 5 vs 5. The game is totally unbalanced in 2 vs 2 and 3 vs 3, which is fine since those are only mini seasons which last 2-3 weeks at most. Being sid that, how Rev fares in the current 2 vs 2 mini season? Firts of all: the changes of the Contrast Cursor patch didn't affect too much to Vindi: the Planar Protection nerf from 20 to 30s cooldown is bad since Harbingers, Virtuosos, Rangers and now some Engies rely a lot in ranged attacks, but you won't would be able to survive alone just due the 4 seconds bubble. The Balance in Discord healing nerf represents at most losing a potential of ~35 HP x second every 10 seconds, which seems very minor. the Energy Meld from cd going from 20 to 30s hits harder, but will only affect mediocre players as me due at high level fights will be over (for good or bad) in less than 20 seconds. I think that the problem is that ANet expected from Vindis to have only a single evade, and they are confused about Vindis spamming evades. I think that inevitably will lead to the removal of the sigil of energy from PvP (and maybe some traits from Retribution) but overall makes sense due ANet game designers doesn't love Revenants and they hate specailly fighting vs Revenants at any game mode. But so far has been worse for Warriors, and Eles, so I wouldn't play the victim card too hard here... Now, for 2 vs 2 I think Rev has some decent builds, but Vindi isn't the best. Condi Herald is tankier and deals good damage while having much better cc, and some core Rev builds can do well. The thing is 2 vs 2 is worse than 3 vs 3 because a conformed team between a bruiser and a support healer can be unkillable, but that works in both directions: partner with a Guard or a Tempest and things will go better.

I would like to agree with you due the hard time I'm having with the last Rev spec, bud sadly the facts proves that you're wrong: 1) Last week in the June MAT (you can view it in the Mighty Teapot YT channel) there were at least 5 Vindicators and a Herald (all playing power builds) amongst the teams, and the two teams which reach the final (Team Copium and French Frauds) were each running a Vindicator. That means that the spec is fairly capable at high skill level. Other profession had way lower representation... 2) From Copium, I think that Skiekï didn't die a single time in the tournament (He was running greatsword + staff with Zerker amulet and Melandru runes) whereas Azurrs from Frenchs (was running greatsword + swords with Zerker amulet and Divinity runes) a couple of times in the whole tournament. You can check the builds at the video 8they were running the same traits with Retribution and Salvation 1,2,1. and Vindicator 1,3,2, with the Alliance and Shiro as legends). That means that even with zerker stats top players are able to stay alive even in the current meta with high burst specs (Harbingers, Willbenders, etc.). 3) Usually you have two break stuns available (one in each legend) which is in line to what most of the classes have at the moment. The base health is totally fine taking in consideration the high base armor value and the mobility. Condi Hearld also easily pushes from 23K to 27K HP. 4) Mobility is great in the most successful build played in the MAT: a 1200 range teleport, a spammable 600 range jump with a 3 seconds cd, two evades backwards and a 450 dash which reaches 900 if has a target, a shadowstep of 600 if you're running double swords... Is no as good as a in Thief, but they don't have 2.3K+ base armor... 5) I don't think support is the role is meant to be done for Rev in PvP, since currently both core Guardian and Tempest are way better at that. Instead the new spec moves from being focused on +1, roaming and having a strong cc game in teamfigths to being strong at AoE damage, tankier in duels but with lower cc and much harder to master. On other hand, the new condi meta power the game to run condition Rev builds which works much better now since the overload of condis from Harbingers, Specters and Virtuosos make way harder for enemies to clean our own condi burst. Ultimately, I think that it resumes on: old Rev buids are still playeble in the new meta but struggle vs the higher AoE pressure; Vindicator provides a new push at the cost of being very hard to play, but once mastered seems to have decent sustain and impactful pressence in teamfights.

The Elites of the Alliance are utter useless and the two heals amongst the worst in the entire game, plus Vindi has near 0 cc game. You can argue that Jalis provides a good heal and cc and staff can be used for the later, but once you swap from The Alliance and the greatsword you lose quickness and most of your damage. Vindi is as fine as hammer Guardian: you can make it work, but is as clunky and unfit that most of players just will run another thing...

Aside from the atrocious two elites (easily amongst the worst in the whole game) and the recycled gs animations which i depise (not new, Rev is full of "borrowed" ones, including cloning himself from Chilling Isolation to Burst of Strength, etc...) another thing that I hate is how swapping from orange to blue doesn't reset the energy: that alone essentailly encourages the player to never change the stance. I don't but the "but they aren't two legends, that's why the energy cost of the skills are low": that could been true at the betas or the release, but we are now barely 4 months into EoD and we ALREADY got nerfs in the cooldowns of the skillset and ENERGY COSTS increases. This will end as Shiro, with energy cost which you can't spent even with the bar maxed, but worse beacuse the x2 number of skills...

I'm running condi Herald, not a popular choice but the "burstiest" specs can't one shoot me even if I AFK a few seconds: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmABkex7lxQKsO6ixRYMPyiRSiMCqgjqUX7F-zZxsQisCyMB6NE8aA Power Rev is too squishy to the current condi meta: embrace the celestial Herald (is better at WvW but works fairly well adapted at PvP).

1) Are healers used in Fractals (public games)? Is Heal Quickness Firebrand demanded/good at it? 2) Which is more demanded at Fractals, Condition Firebrand, Condition Quckness Firebrand or Heal Quickness Firebrand? 3) Same question but applied at Raids and Strike Missions: which one to run, pure dps, dps + quickness, quickness + heal support? Gear is not a handicap (11 of the 14 slots are already legendary, I'm just trying to figure how could I be more useful if I chose to go back to instanced content).

If a class is fun and also works, why would be the other classes to aspirate to lower the bar and make everyone dull, grey and boring? When making people leaving the game became the main goal of the developers? With EoD we have a ton of recycled animations, rehused or incongruent mechanics, strike missions capped by week and poorly rewarded, empty maps with low replayability, a fishing skill which almost no one asked for, plus a new mount which not only isn't great, but was also put behind some achievements which most of people just did chose to ditch. Yeah, instead of buffing forlorn professions just gut Guardian, Engineer and Necro... That for sure will help with the population.

Is a solid 3 of 9 (pun intended). Implements the TRINITY (Guardian + Engineer + Necro) as the main tool to maximize success in PvE (specially instanced PvE). Theorycrafting for other classes are no longer needed: they are mostly chockers. They also work for PvP (albeit Thief can have a place if a team isn't triple stacking the same class) and even in zergs at WvW. The game is now completed and sealed in a full circle: reroll your non-trinity simps into the triunvirate of giga-chads or just asign your pleb professions to parking an muling. Turns out that the paid verstion of the game has at least 2 character slots in excess for the complexity of the game...

Condi Herald and Firebrand. Care 0 about the ranks.

Power is even worse after the patch, but I'll try to recap a few tips to run a Vindi in OW PvE in a way that is less terrible: 1) Runes. Fireworks is mostly the only way, otherwise the spec feels slow and unresposive (Herald has swiftness and Renegade hits at range). Fireworks also provides power, migth, fury, vigor and a bit of boon duration (which is important), so hard to find a better choice. 2) Weapon choices: your main weapon would be greatsword most of the time; staff as backup weapon provides sustain, utility and breakbars at the cost of having a large drop in dps, whereas two swords keep the dps (against single target) and provide more mobility. 3) Sigils: for the backup probably cleansing and energy, but you want to be there the least amount of time. for the greatsword there's some choices thar are largely circumstantial; against low level mobs stamina and energy works well, force, accuracy, battle/strength and vision are decent options vs bosses. 4) Stats: instead of full zerker I think that dragon should be at least 50% of the gear. Base health should be around 20K, not 17K, and 4 stats gear deliver way more points compated to old fashioned options (some diviner pieces can be great, just the weapons + runes alones will push boons ~30%). 5) Legends: I wouldn't run Jalis. Was my choice along Shiro while I played the spec but the nerfs in Forced Engagement, Planar Protection and the slowness of the greatsword makes it very ineffective. Yes, you have protection, stability and sustain, but only gets you killed slower while dealing low damage. Instead I'll run the Alliance camping Archemorous as much as possible: has stab, furyand quickness (which is crucial) and for protection you can swap to Kurzick and cast Awakening. The gameplan would be precast Awakening and enter in combat swaping to orange with Reaver's Rage + Scavenger Burst. Shiro doesn't heal as much as Jalis but Impossible Odds and Jade Daggers are great aditions to the Eternity's Requiem burst and Riposting Shadows is gold for a build which will rely on blocks and utility evasions to avoid oneshooters. Phase Traversal is also a solid source of quickness... 6) Traits: Devastation and Invocation 2,2,3; Vindicator 1,3,2. The offensive dodge smashes weak minions but will do poorly vs bosses, and the gutted defensive dodge won't do much against heavy attacks, Instead, the increased boons from the Vassals dodge will benefit both sustain and damage, plus the chill is lethal vs regular foes. The other trait lines and traits are oriented towards rising our damage and stacking boons like crazy, so 25 stacks of might, permafury and some other nice things are always on. Build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PmwAExzlxQmsO6kxRoMPKlRSqMCqkJ/lesF-zRZYBRwyDOqh5wFeI9ooyUq2rIQxngA+D-e Would it work? No clue, but trying both a more agressive full zerk PvE build or a more conservative Jalis + Retribution PvP approach both got my kitten kicked trying to solo hard HPs and bounties, whereas condi Herald/Renegade worked like a charm. I guess this approach at least keeps quicknes, might and fury constantly firing and defensively relies more in mobility and less in passive mitigation.

Since most of the talk usually evolves around the performance in instanced content for teams I'll put a link of a video which covers the topic with fairness and and realism (by a player with knowns alot better about the topic):

I agree with you. Vindi can be semi-decent againts trash mobs, but when comes to deal vs veterans, silvers and up, is significatively weaker than power builds as Spellbreaker or Bladesworn and way worse than any condi build spec from Rev or other classes. This is blatant soloing HP in HoT, there's not even need to go to solo legendary bounties: some HPs which are trivial with condi Herald or Renegade became lethal running a Vindi. There's a reason why Hizen hasn't release a single video using Vindi or Harb soloing hard content and went celestial Renegade/Mirage to solo Jade Junkyard/Kaineng instead. Vindi and Harbinger are very unidimensional and have big weakness, whereas going with a condi Herald, Renegade, Mirage, Mechanist, Willbender or Scourge you can solo all events of Lake Doric, Thunderhead Peaks and other maps mauling large crowds and champions without a blink, or doing legendary bosses/bounties in some cases.

Is hard to stop playing ranked due even at 50/50 w/l ratio you get a bizantium chest every 24 matches, which averages ~5 or 6 gold coins every hour (4 matches) of gameplay. Is low compared to fractals or farming Dragonfall, but if you enjoy PvP is miles ahead in rewards compared to the free arena. Ranked easily paid ~30/40% of my 12 legendary items.

Full power is just a worse choice: * You need three stats to maximize damage (power, crit chance and ferocity) vs two stats (condi damage & expertise), which leaves less room to improve your defenses and utilities (vit, armor, boon duration). * You usually only deal damage as power when you hit targets, and usually you can't do that while evading or blocking (albeit there's some exceptions as Unrelenting Assault) whereas condi builds keep doing damage while defending, so you just have to land your burst. *After the core game, creatures in further expansions (specially in HoT) have really big armor values which largely diminish power efficiency, whereas condition damage is armor piercing ammunition: kills everything ignoring defenses. *On top on that burns are really bursty: my trailblazer Willbender can stack 36+ burns so fast and deliver so much damage that can kill a veteran awakened abomination before it raises the shielding that reflects damage... But nothing wrong about, in my opinion: condi builds are fun. What ANet should do isntead of nerfing conditions and making the game LESS FUN is buffing power and recovering some of the damage lost when the cc skills got nerfed to death (specially at WvW/PvP).

The slender physical model loots a lot like a NBA athlete. Chose the thiner modelwith the shortest heigh and yo'll get a viking-like frame instead of a space marine crossed with a neanderthal...

The first sentence I can agree with. But not with the second: the current meta is near full condition (2 Harbingers and 1 Specter with carrion, a Willbender and core Guardian which although technically run marauder, proc a lot of burns). You won't see any power Herald coming back in PvP because even if they nerf the damage of the EoD specs the kind of damage (condi) they run is kryptonite to power Herald. If all, Bladesworn has much better chance to gain ground as meta if a new power spec is required to replace any nerfed spec. But that won't happen this year, anyway.

The whole concept of Vindicator is just silly. 25% of your damage depends of using your only dodge to proc a 15% damage buff and the other 10% relies in your endurance meter being partially depleted. so you're forced to spam your single dodge ASAP to prevent your damage to fall to 80%. Plus the damage in your largest burst is inconsistent due can't place all the hits vs normal sized targets... So, let's say that you do it and keep that +25% damage buff 100% of the time: then is not great due you only have a block to prevent enemy attacks, and some enemy skills and mechanics won't work well (looking at you Abominations) in a game designed around the concept of having two dodges available, so you'll end being one-shooted. Dead yo'll do 0 dps, and by the way Vindi doesn't provide anything interesting to team gameplay (the most useful boons are in the non-damage dodges). So support Vindi? Yeah, good luck competing vs Firebrand.... The is the other aspect, which is that in this game condition damage> power damage, so power is only better when the difference is huge. Which means that Vindi is permanently doomed to either be underpowered or overpowered, with no way to achieve balance. Power Vindi doesn't deliver more damage than condi Renegade or Herald, and in either of those I will always have 800 + armor and 7K+ more HP over Vindi, while retaining my two evades, and with condis also I keep delivering damage while I dodge or block.

If we are talking about staying on a place doing nothing while the A.I. farms for you the best choices are Turrets Engineer, Minionmancer or Mallyx Rev with the pulsating Embrace the Darkness upkeep (the first ones have better range). If we are talking about doing soloing content (Open World PvE, Story Mode, completing maps and events, even some instanced PvE content as Dungeons, Fractals and some Strike Missions) with low effort the choices would be: * Condi Ranger: very good for soloing and doing regular content since the pet can tank for you; condi Soulbeast is very powerful soloing hard content but requires high key strokes x minutes to work well. * Flamethrower Mechanist: similar to Ranger but the pet is stronger and the gameplay has lower intensity. The disadvantage is that albeit the skill ceil is higher with the Ranger the potential for solo runs is also higher. * Necromancer: Minionmancer variants are solid for regular content but in this game the minion aren't as powerfull or durable as, lets say, a pet Necromancer in DII. Very low input, propper core Necro and Scourge buils are superb for soloing hard content, but also more demanding than flamethrower Mechanist. * Condi Mirage: very easy rotations, requires to accurately spam evades and invulnerabilities since albeit the damage output is amazing is more frail than the previous choices. * Condi Herald or condi Renegade: huge sustain with good to great damage, probably the best soloers in the game, but they lack pets to tank so require a very active gameplay and high imputs. *Condi Eles: very good soloer with huge damage spikes, but probably the most demanding class in terms of key inputs x minute. * Condi Willbender/Firebrand: huge damage and tons of tools to del with any situation, but again no pets to tank and require a high level of gameplay. * Condi Specter: tanky and durable, but a bit boring to play and works better vs single targets than against mobs. Low imput required. * Bladesworn: the only "power based" spec I would put in the list (all others works the best with either full celestial or trailblazer or carrion or dire stats), very tanky, good damage, flashy style, is not as easy to play as Mechanist/Necro/Ranger but nost as hard as Ele/Guardian/Revenant.

Lore wise I would said either Norn or Sylvari; currently I have 2 Revs which are male Norn and a Rev which is a female Silvari. The link is that the spiritual world and the dream share some concepts with the mist, and the same way the Norns channel their totem spirits and are focused on improving their own legend, so invoking the powers of epic figures of the past make sense (well, lately they aren't "as epic"... ). Charrs are overall apprehensive against the use of magic (aside from members of the Flame Legion) and Asura are so centered in developing and enhancing their own intellect that borrowing abilities from other personalities seems off (despite they have acute interest in the technological advances in the Charr engineering). Humans a safe but boring middle ground: they trend to be organized so for a magic user a Guardain makes more sense than a Rev (Norn are more individualistic). My advise anyway is TO NOT repeat the same race+sex as with other professions you ar¡lready have, since having multiple characters sharing the same voice action ends being annoying (I have six characters sharing two voices).

* They made better the healing builds, which I don't touch. Nice, I guess. * They nerfed Mallyx (already dead, so who cares?). * At PvE they nerfed some Glint utility cooldowns to the PvP values, but buffed the damage coeficients and added 1.5 seconds of quickness procs with the most used trait. I have no idea if that would work, but so far for me PvE with Rev is either condi Renegade or condi Herald, everything else (specially power) just screams "play Guardian instead", so I'm neutral tho those changes. * They nerfed Renebow in PvP again: after butchering Forced Engagement from 1200 to 600 range to make duelling Necros almost impossible now they increased the Dome of the Mist cooldown from 20 to 30 seconds, so Harbingers and other ranged characters not only keep having range advantage but also a 26 seconds window to spam projectiles towards Renebows (a build already fading and largely unseen in MATs). This season I played ~15 of my ~150 matches with Renebow and this patch is a good bye. Another former viable Revenant build which ends beheaded... * They nerfed Vindi in PvP, which I don't care (they arleady were a free kill 90% of the time, anyway). Seems a very tame balance patch, I doubt it affects too much aside from narrowing even more the playable choices. By the way, the bug that resets the order of utilities changing between game modes is still happening, and made mad at PvP this morning turning a easy win into a disputed defeat. Hope they fix that (they won't, and being honest neither I hope it...).

Heavy: Either DIII's Crusader or BDO's Nova. Vindi should have been a Drakania, by the way. Medium: This is easy, the Striker from BDO or Lost Ark. GW2 just lacks a mele based, combo focused martial artist. Closest thing right now are some aura based Elementalist, but the feeling is entirely different. Light: The Sage from BDO; a magic user centered around forcefields and telekinesis. Tons of AoE ranged attacks which looks magic, instead of "Ele goes mele" for fourth time on a row...

What? Has a 0.25 seconds cast time and there's an animation for both Facet of Nature and True Nature, plus a 20 s cooldown for the later. Also, the "no tell" moan seems a absurd taking in consideration stealth: which "tell" I have when a Thief, Mesmer, Ranger or DH chose to burst on our Revs from. @GeneralBM.5781 The rune is a bit optional, in WvW I run antitoxin due both empowers the damage and increases the cleanses and defense vs condis, but in that game mode full celestial stats also helps a lot. Melandru is okish and works for me but I'm sure other players will find out better choices.