Buran.3796

Is one of the few New specs which actually looks promising for PvP (most of them look weak) and has good synergies between the spec traitline and the weapon and skills given. Could be op? Yes, but better a new adition which shakes the meta for some months that a full release of 9 specs which remains useless in PvP for 2+ years as happened with the Renegade in PoF...

I would like to see a ranked mode in which losing with a 480-500 doesn't punish you score so hard as losing <100-500, so even if the outcome of a match (a defeat) is clear after a few skirmishes you still feel compeled to scratch every possible point. The other problem (balance issues aside) ranked has to be avoided is that is a "decent" source of gold: once repeating the bizantium chest and even in a 50% w/l ratio you're granted at least 6 gold coins x hour on average (each 4 matches), which is pity compared to PvE but way better than WvW or unranked matches. So if you enjoy the game mostly due the fighting mechanics and PvE bores you ranked PvP is the way to go to get gold, no matter if is worse than unranked or not...

In WvW condi Renegade with short bow is fairly effective in duels, solo roaming and small skirmishes EVEN against foes with powerfull anti-missile tools. This is due the combo of Shiro + Jalis and trailblazer + viper stats provides you sustain and health recovery enough to make that in some of those fights those tools from the enemy start to enter in cooldown, and a few well placed burst of condi stacks can finish foes very fast if they fail to cleanse the conditions. Think also that the combo of stats, runes and sigils in WvW are massively stronger that what you can get in the dull array of PvP echosystem. For PvP instead short bow Renegade usually runs power stats (zerker or demolisher amulets), since you don't have viper (albeit grieving is available), bursting and malice sigils or nightmare runes. Is NOT the strongest Rev build (power Herald and even condi Herald are usually above) but I just saw todays automated matches in the Teapot streaming and there were short bow renegades in the quarter finals, so the build can definitely work and be viable. Is not easy to value its weight on void, tho; this afternoon in one of the matches a team was riding two necros + 1 condi herald and in that context the condi herald was a stronger choice since Invoking Torment + Permeating Pestilence being unblockable and ignoring blind had a beastly outcome in teamfights. But yeah, overall Renegade short bow albeit not the strongest or skill demanding build from competitive Revenant is very viable. Some builds will counter you but that doesn't mean that used well can't win fights even against the odds.

I don't known about others but despite having all the classes and specs I don't swap main just beacuse other ones get good things. I mean, I play mostly 2-3 classes and I don't jump in the new spec of my main if I think that doesn't work (I didn't touch Renegade for more than two years, until the short bow got buffed and become viable in WvW/PvP and even today power Herald is still my fav/most played spec. I didn't saw much praise for Willbender nor Catalyst by either main or non main players. I think that overall the tradeoffs for half of the new specs are hard, and I think that for first time in GW2 history a large portio of the new specs won't be touched in specific game modes due they are worse than what already exist.

Preliminary feels: Virtuoso: Seems ok, I guess; not a class I play, tho. Willbender: LOL, a worse core Guardian which is supposed to be a single target killer but which abilities only increase they weigth to decent values while facing multiple foes (aka: heavily outnumbered) which will probably end killing you most of the times. Harbinger. Interesting design but probably weaker than current Necros overall. Vindicator: I think could end providing a viable bruiser at PvP/WvW and a better strike damage builds at Open World PvE, but probably will outpowered by Renegade and Herald condi builds at PvE and not as good 1 v 1 fighter as power Heralds. All of this assuming you're not using The Alliance legend, which is pure garbage. Bladesworn: My favourite new spec in terms of design; not much variety in terms of weapon usage and skills but at least hits hard and blends together lore, looks and functionality in a interesting package. Catalyst: Nicest looking design (remembers me the FB) with weakest potential; bottom tier along Willbender. Specter: Good for OW PvE since now will provide strong AoE condition builds while keeping mobility and more tankiness over core Thief; has potential in PvP/WvW. Lacking in instanced PvE since there are stronger support specs but probably you will be wanted as a dps in that parts of the game. Untamed: I liked the hammer versatility (condi/power) and array of skills; seems a solid bruiser with some of the best trait synergies of the new specs. TBS. Too much robbed animations, tho. Mechanist: The mech seems good for having fun at OW PvE, but the spec tradeoff is huge and probably will do poorly at competitive game modes and instanced PvE content. As with the WB, the core Engineer seems a lot more robust and versatile, so this siims a downgrade. Preliminar rating: Bladesworn> Specter> Untamed/Vindicator> Harbinger> Virtuoso> Willbender/Catalyst/Mechanist. Overall the new specs aren't as striking as were the ones in HoT/PoF and they lack a lot in innovative animations and mechanics, with heavy tradeoffs and clear weakness, so they don't feel op compared to core and previous spec builds. Tha's good for balance but doesnt make them inherently more desiderable/fun. Up to PoF I though that the spec system in GW2 was great, but looking at EoD I'm starting to think that the release of new classes with a single spec as in BDO can provide better variety, because you can always mix new things without having to be worried with tradeoffs to don't rend the older specs/core builds obsolete.

Mechanically, the two main features of the Revenant are the use of energy as and extra "currency" you must spent to execute a lot (most) of the skills and the simultaneous use two of legends which gives you diferent sets of predefined skills but prevents the use of racial skills or a direct customization of our skills (as other classes do). The main mechanics of energy are easy: off combat you have 50 units, and when you are in combat you gain 5 units x seconds and the max energy cap is raised to 100. Your RESET your energy to 50 units every time you swap your legend (exception: Invocation's trait "Charged Mist" resets your energy to 75/75/60 in PvE/WvW/PvP when the swap is dome with yoir energy at 10 or below). Most of the skills have both a energy cost and a recovery time (cooldowns); but others have instead a upkeep cost while they activate an active effect. Herald's skills work a bit as signets, since you have passive effects if you pay the upkeeps but also a more powerful but brief effect with no cost which you can activate at the enpense of putting them on cooldown. Try also to avoid falling below 1 energy at all cost since when 0 is reached you don't regenerate energy in the next ~4 seconds. Since you're talking about PvE and OW specifically I'll keep the things simple. You can run Revenant using either power (strike) oriented builds or condition centered ones. In PvE as a rule condition based ones are stronger due they have better AoE damage, only need two main stats (condition damage and condition duration) opposed strike (power, crit chance, crit damage) so you have free stats to asign to extra power (viper and grieving stats) or go extra tanky (dire or trailblazer). Condi also has better ranged tools compared to power damage in PvE (comparing hammer to short bow, albeit that one requires to run a Renegade). But that doesn't mean that power Revenant's can't do PvE: just is slower killing things, specially crowds. In WvW/PvP power builds can be stronger. Traitlines and legends are usually focused in some specific task: Devastation in dealing more physical damage and siphoning life (but can also benefit condition builds); Corruption in enhancing our condition damage; Retribution gives us more tankiness and defensive tools; Salvation enhances our healing and support abilities. Finally, Invocation is a traitline centered in enhancing each legend and the legend swap mechanic, so oftenly is used by a lot of builds no matter their nature (not mandatory, tho). Legends have their "personality", also: Shiro provides mobility, evasion and physical damage; Jalis tankiness and survability; Mallyx condition damage, resistance/resolution and boon stripping; Ventari healing and support. Herald shares and enhances a lot of boons and Renegade provides group alacrity and enhances team damage. ALL the traitlines and legends have plenty of cc and team support in different ways (Revenants are team frindly, really). Revenant has currently a good place in the WvW and PvP metas with some very viable builds, and has a solid place in instanced PvE content (mostly Renegade variants) but in solo PvE is arguably -at the moment- the strongest class in the game, thanx mostly to the condi Renegade and the condi Herald builds (as was said, you will find exceptionally well explained and showcased examples of both in the Lord Hizen channel in Youtube). BUT mind that those builds require quite expensive gear for a newcomer (tormenting runes or nightmare ones) and good knownledge of the champions/bounties mechanics and a fine use of the Revenant to have success. I recently rised my third Rev across HoT/PoF using two core builds (one based in physical damage and other in conditions) just with core legends and traits without problems (can provide those if you want) but as I said knownledge about enemy mechanics and practice with Rev's weapons and legends is more inportant that just showcasing a build. Both use Invocation and Retribution, changing Devastation and Corruption based on the desired source of damage. Being said that: once you unlock the specs, you'll be in a stronger place, specially the Renegade. Core is very capable (and condi Core will work better in HoT due a lot of the enemies there have high armor values, which are ignored by conditions but mitigate a lot of our power damage. Condi Renegade is the ultimate PvE bulldozer, tho: you'll curbstomp most of crowds at range before they can even touch you, and bosses are just matter of focusing in avoiding the dangerous attacks and spam condi burst while recovering life.

So now that Firebrand has been deleted entirely from the PvP game mode for more than a year, and that burn DH have been nerfed to nothingless fror more than half a year you want the power DH trapper (which also has no place in high end PvP) to be replaced by a non-trapper DH (which probably won't work anyway)? And all of this while the next spec will bring Guardian players an absolute joke of yolo build with 0 chances at PvP... You (and a lot with you) moaned about symbols being passive gameplay and op and boring, so ANet destroyed both symbolic core Guardian and symbolic Firebrand, the same way that they deleted the radiant blade (retaliation x enhanced fury) and now you're asking again for the deletion of a build which at least is played/viable, granting nothingness instead... What the game needs is more viable builds, not erasing the current ones. An changes based on balancing the skills, not in removing half of the amulets and runes we had on the past. And if people are running glass cannon DH trappers is because they made the meta so spongy in terms of damage that going full zerk and having some cc suddenly works.

Boon duration since I think that in order to work the Vindicator needs quicknes & vigor and currently I would use the Leadership rune as a fundation, with only Traveler/Fireworks as a backup.

Bladesworn. Currently learning Guilty Guear Strive and already cosplayed one of my Warriors to clone Nagoriyuki's appareance. Some of the new specs looks neat in terms of design but their numbers are weak.

^ I'm more worried about all the new classes seems to use older gear and the art pieces for the new specs look lame compared to the pictoric quality in previous expansions (map pictures seems rigth, tho).

Come on. Is not a minor problem. When happens to me in PvP is like riding with 2 gears less in the car: chances of winning that match fastly fades... And is a programming bug: not a intended feature. They SHOULD have solved it and I'm not surprised they don't do showcases with public or open questions, since ANY Rev player would start his questions with "Wait.... What about my bugs?". They have the whole template system implemented (a feature which earns they money for the extra slots) and is not working in one of the nine classes of the game (and one which is purchased through the buying of an expansion). So much inclusivity but Rev users still are in a wheelchair waiting before the stairs for the programmers to DO THEY WORK and build a ramp (solve the bug). I wouldn't accept a "sorry your class is broken, it born handicaped; recast and move on" when a solution is as simple as "code the game to work as intended".

For PvE use GS could outperform the swords, and still won't be used because is nowhere near the damage condi Renegade provides with the shortbow, a build which is also safer because regular mobs get killed at range in seconds before even reaching the Renegade, and bosses can be poked at distance and defeated with condi burst while we dance around them. Also, the Vindicator lacks any highly desiderable boon as quickness or alacrity. I agree that the largest portion of the playerbase is devoted to OW PvE, but I think that the Vindicator will be fastly ditched once they find that is easier/faster to just run a condi Renegade or some other of the new specs.

GS main reason to be is #2 (Mist Unleashed), but feels too slow and damage lacking to work in fights vs humans, specially due you lack cc to grant the impact. For GS to truly work you need quickness, and you have a few sources: * Superior sigil of Agility would never work because the quickness duration is bad even with concentration stats, specially at WvW/PvP. * Superior sigil of Celerity would be better, but you need to use a legend skill (Jade Winds, Forced Engagement...) to profit, or having access to Surge of the Mist/ Temporal Rift then inmediatly swap to GS to land your attacks at enhanced speed. It only would grant quickness once each 20 seconds, so wouldn't be a very reliable source in fights, so most of the time you'll be framed in a subperforming set of weapons. * Brutality is more reliable, with a 9 seconds cooldown and with a quickness duration that can be extended to 4-5 seconds mixing zerk with commander stats and Leadership runes. But with Vindicator + Devastation traitlines set, you have now to chose either Retribution or Invocation, and both have good things that you'll miss, since your legend choices at that time would be Jalis + Shiro (being the Legendary Alliance utterly useless at competitive game modes). Now, in order for GS to work in WvW/PvP, you would also need the jump to be a complete i-frame sequence for the full duration of the "animation" (including the recovering), and probably run staff as secondary weapon. All of this wouldn't be enough if the damage isn't touched, because at the moment it only works decently in PvE. The Vindicator is a limited spec, since has no real condition damage (which dominates the PvE scene), has the same lacks in condition cleanses (Redemtor's Sermon has a 90s cd in WvW/PvP) and the only way to do damage is a physical weapon with a slow main attack. You can't preesure enemies with ranged attacks since you lack the bow and and the hammer has been garbage for ages (even if you run full zerker stats. which I do), and you don't benefit at all from celestial stats (which are keeping Firebrands alive for roaming and gave the Herald a nice new condi build which doesn't need Mallyx). At this moment, Vindicator won't be able to succesfully duel power or condi Heralds or Renegadees, and is just a bruiser which can be really boring to kill in some roaming scenarios. But is just a low damage striker which worse tools than a power Herald or even a core build (core's F2 is way stronger that anything Vidicator has).

After 9 years of ANet trying to not make a specific PvP skill balances, taking instead the lazy route of removing entire amulets, runes, and sigils (and even nerfing stats in the Crusader amulet, which is a sort of aknowledge that the combo stats is too strong but also too valauble to delete it) is absolutely impossible to run "normal" (PvE/WvW) stats in PvP. Bunker builds would absolutely dominate the landscape if that were allowed: even with the current stat comps with no Nomad, Minstrel, Trailblazer or Celestial stats pure dps berserker and viper builds are unable to kill people without +1 fights and heavy cc focus.

Herald felt the best at his release and is still capable in several game modes. Still my fav. Renegade felt like crap at the release and for long time; after the buffs is viable in PvP/WvW and dominant in PvE, but I won't touch Kalla with a 3m pole, no matter how good the dps is. Vindicator feels much better than Renegade but not as well rounded as Herald or even core. The legend is useless and as happens with Renegade I'll probably play it with Shiro + Jalis forever, but at least the traitline and weapon could give me some use from the start. Anyway: is a pure physical damage spec, so unless the skills get powerful buffs, will never be able to compete with condi in PvE.

This post is full of bias. First of all, most of the damage from Sevenshot comes from torment, which is a condition: conditions ignore the armor value, so no matter if you're wearing 2K robes or you're a Stalwart Defender Guardian in full Knigth plates with 4K+ armor, the damage would be the same. Second, torment mechanic was recently changed, so now works exactly the opposite as before: now does more damage to still foes and way less to the ones which are moving. Overall this can be considered a buff in PvE since most of fast moving enemies aren't too strong and die anyay, whereas bosses, champions and dangerous elites tend to be more static and now you can kill them faster. In PvP/WvW is clearly a nerf since staying without moving means death, so everyone moves around, no matters if is in a duel, roaming in small groups or fighting in large groups. With the changes Sevenshots now does way less damage to moving foes afected by this condition. Finally, by design in GW2 there's 0 correlation between having a class complex mechanics (Thieves, Engineers, Elementalists) and that granting more dps or any competitive advantage istself; otherwise those three classes would be top in dps and use in every game mode, and simple classes as Warriors, Rangers and Necros barely would have any players. Classes are easier or harder to use (and even in classes there's divergences between specs and core builds) just to provide different flavours in gameplay. Some people like run spellcasters, other prefer sword & board mele characters, others like subterfuge and attacking from range with bows, etc. So your moaning about how hard is to fight against Renebows & Necros or even Engies (lol, that one even contradicts the argument about the skill needed) has no fundation, not only because I've seen bunker Eles played by Cellofrag, Vallun, etc. being utterly unkillable in 1 vs 1, but because is you're running a Ele is because you like that gameplay style and that dificulty and that level of skill requirements. I play all kind of roaming builds in WvW (power Herald, condi Renebow, core Hammer Rev, celestial Firebrand, power DH trapper... ...And sometimes I've overcome fights vs a Thief or a Necro and in others I've been demolished by them., and sometimes I've beaten Eles and in others I've only achieved a long stall battle or getting crushed... Rev has been purely a mele class in WvW/PvP for 5+ years until the changes in the damage (nerfts) and the buffs in the bow made Renebow viable, and as I said is not like is the top roaming build or something similar. Git gud man. Edit: being said that, I would trade a full nerf of the short bow (to unplayable levels) in exchange for a return to Rev's hammer state at HoT's release.

Didn't even pass 4 weeks and here we are again... Sevenshot is not OP. Its changes made possible to use Renegade in WvW/PvP. Prior to that was unviable, and currently is competitive but not broken: the reverse in the torment damage mechanic halved its burst, so in large groups is very weak now, and builds with access to projectile blocks/reflects can oftenly hard counter Short Bow Renegade. I've killed them using core Rev with hammer, which is a sub-par roaming build. Next spec is 100% mele; short bow is the only "playable" ranged weapon for Revs, and is still a very clunky weapon which has problems with terrain behaviour in some of its skills: So: nerft 7S and you'll erase Renegade from WvW/PvP (realisticaly: no longer anyone uses it at MATs, anyway), the same as ANet butchered Firebrand outside PvP. I think that the game needs more variety in viable builds AND more damage instead of less options. The game is already FULL of skills, weapons, traits, runes and sigils THAT NO ONE TOUCHES, EVER, AT ANY GAME MODE.

Forget about the not very relevant piñata golem: at soling legendary bounties condi Renegade and condi Mirage are pretty much on par if not better than condi Necro and superior to condi Firebrand.

Is not surprising. In large groups long bow's projectile attacks can be easily negated/reflected and the soft cc removed/ignored when each squad has at least 1-2 players spamming atability and cleanses. Characters with ranged large AoE attacks which pulse damage/conditions over time are stronger in zerg vs zerg because they can exhaust the amount of cleansing and defensive tools the enemy group has. I'm not saying that in a very coordinated group can't work, but if you want to break havok in ZvZ there's other classes with better tools than the DH. But there's not a better class for team support than Guardians, so unless your wan't every group full of Guardians and spreading their roles between support and attack, the most common scenary is to chose your priorities (not all the players sun Guardians), so from your Guardians the Commander usually demands support, and from their Necros AoE damage & cc.

I think you missed my point, which isn't to critize the dps potential of the Vindicator, but pointing this reality: none of the top power builds in the game in PvE are comparable vs the top condition or hybrid builds. Not even close. The golem piñata can showcase a different picture because it doesn't return the blows, but when you compare the times at which some players are soloing legenday bounties (a content designed to be defeated for mid sized groups) you'll notice how some condition builds for some classes are doing the task with half of the time cap to spare, and that is because by nature using defensive tools doesn't hurt their dps too much as long as they keep landing their condition burst. So, even if they ramp up the dps for Vindicator to 40k/s or more, don't expect that to make him instantly the "go to" for PvE.

I'm currently leveling (getting hero points for the specs) a second (third) Warrior (I deleted one to swap the race) and this and the leveling of my third Rev made me think about how condi builds compare to power ones at PvE/OW in GW2.... Honestly: don't expect the Vindicator to ever compete vs condi Renegade/Herald. Condi will always be better soloing content due a) you need less stats to deal damage, so you either go hybrid for extra damage or tanky for more sustain; b) condi builds usually are slower ramping up damage (except if is fire), but they don't lose dps the same way when your need to evade/block/retreat because the stacks keep ticking in the targets when you need to defend or get interrupted. And that doesn't even take in consideration that a lot of HoT foes have huge armor values, which benefits condition builds even more. So, at best, Vindicator will provide tools buffed enough to fastly dispatch PvE crowds with power AoE attacks without loosing too much compared with single targets (which is what happens now), and maybe ith will provide a good PvP bruiser. But condi Renegade/Herald will be always easier to play and safer (more defensive stats, ranged damage...).

Just as a reminder: this keeps happening. No patch expansion or beta has fixed this bug for years. Is also particulary bad in PvP since you can't re-arrange your utilities once the match have started, and can ruin your entire match. This class not only has to deal with the lack of utility customization but also with the lack of competent programmers, which have been unable to fix a well known bug for years, a bug which worsens our quality of life despite having paid the same money as other players. This is unnaceptable.

I agree with Zef; Rangers are very good roamers with access to stealth and great mobility tools which can perform very well as sneaky killers in both strike and condition builds, and the Druid spec opens the door to a very good support role. In the future, Thieves could maybe get a support spec and Guardians will get a more "killler" build from the Willbender spec, but is hard to judge to how much extent would those fit both roles. In terms of testing classes at early levels, PvP arenas are the perfect field: no requirements, normalized stats... But be aware that stats, runes, consumables and sigil combinations are way more powerful in PvE/WvW than in PvP, so the experience will vary.

I agree. Firebrand was too strong, and deserved some cuts. But is weird how is top notch at PvE and very strong still in WvW (with celestial stats) whereas in PvP due the extent of the nerfs and the lack of proper amulets is not only out of the meta but also subpar. By the way, I main Rev, so is not like I'm invested with FB (which at the PoF release didn't even like, lol!), but I hate when a spec is nerfed to the extent of being kicked out of a game mode. Is bad for the game variety and also for the people which don't multiclass, and that hurts the game.

Support Guard has no damage and is fairly frail. Also, you deserve this stagnated bunker meta because you (players) moaned about burst damage so ANet shaved 1/3 of the damage, turned cc skills in 0 damage ones and made dps builds useless vs bruisers/tanks. Please enjoy what you have voted. (Also remember that FB was entirely removed from PvP thanks to the nerfs in heals, support, symbols and dps, the same as condi DH with Sword of Justice). So enjoy chasing core Guardians and being comboed by Turbo Trappers in this bliss of meta devoid of Firebrands, as you requested.