nopoet.2960

I kind of wonder how it would play without flow. What if we could freely swap to dragon trigger as long as you are in combat and the payoff skills just do more damage the longer you charge. But I agree, I'm not sure why they complicated it with two resources.

Ahh ok, I thought the range mismatch would be problematic but maybe I just haven't thought it through.

If it were mh pistol you would be stuck playing pistol/warhorn. Would anything else really work?

Stupid question: Do we loose stats by using the popsword? It's not technically equipped... or do we carry over the stats from the swap weapon? No sigils right?

So I gave Bladeswarm a little more playtime and thought. It's not a bad spec at all. Once I stopped thinking that dragontrigger had to be this massive payoff I was able to make it work as part of my rotation. There is still a problem though. The dragontrigger stance is ... fickle. It drops to easily. I think the best thing that can happen for the spec is loosing the concept of charges. 1. Abandon the charge up mechanic 2. Get rid of the Dragon trigger button 3. Add F2 - F4 buttons for the dragon trigger attacks 4. Give f2 - f4 some alternative function when not using sword gun perhaps based on the off hand weapon rather than the main hand

It's kind of cool with rifle. Seems like there is a range build in there somewhere. I played around with it. Should be able to get it to work eventually.

1. I like pistol. Actually played mace/pistol and it felt good. The range on pistol 5 is hilarious. Guys, we were only joking about warriors getting melee pistols! It works though. 2. The utilities seem to be made for range so I tried them out with rifle and I can see how that would work. Didn't work as well with bow. It's odd though because the gun blade is largely melee. 3. Flow feels bad when you are not on gunblade. I kept wanted to do something with it but a lot of the time i was fine just using mace/pistol and didn't want to switch. I really wish flow could be used for something outside of gun blade. 4. When flow is full I wish it would start filling ammo. Maybe it could start filling each bullet halfway once you get to 100? 5. Dragon triggers don't feel right. I would take less damage if I could use them more fluidly. I think it comes with having to manage two resources. I get flow comes from combat. Ammo comes from standing still? I can foresee no situation where I would ever fill up all the ammo. It's too much a departure from how the rest of the game has trained us to play.

Wow 21 pages... Just had a random idea. They could put dueling areas near the entrances of jumping puzzles. They are out of the way and sometime people can use a distraction after repeatedly falling to their death because some leaf hid the edge of the platform you needed to get to. Even with that I would still not endorse direct challenges. You walk up to a guard and essentially get yourself flagged and the guard does the matchmaking or if two people want to fight each other you let the guard know and he will try to arrange it.

The fellas over in the thieves den find this idea amusing. Let's make it happen.

I don't even play an ele but I'm going to level up a Catalyst. I think they got it "right" with hammer. The element should determine how close you play to your foe not the weapon. Earth and Fire should always draw you closer to the action. Air should encourage movement and Water, in my opinion should be the only reliable range option. I'm probably wrong about all of which is why I don't play an ele but this spec is attractive.

There seems to be some logic behind how the classes were released. The first group had a single target focus. The second group were all multi target classes. I wonder what could unite the third group? Like others are saying I suspect pet summoning. Not sure how i feel about that for thief but the possibility has me really interested in what they will do for rangers.

For game play reasons only. It doesn't have to make sense. Dominating your enemy to the point where they can't even respond is one of the most satisfying things that a player can do to an opponent. On the flip side, forcibly losing control on your character so they can't even respond to a threat is probably the worst experience a player can have. Control Effects exist so there must be a way to combat them. In my opinion stability goes to far by providing immunity. I've tried to find some middle ground with diminishing returns on control effects. It allows players to knock you around a bit but only to a point. Insolence, as I call it, is your character saying enough is enough.

I feel like the specs this year aren't meant for people who play that class as a main but instead to draw people who main other classes to the spec. For example, I main a Thief and a Warrior and this looks interesting. Long term, it could be healthy for the game if people start new characters. Sorry Ele mains but if I'm correct you are going to love the new Thief spec.

Ok so new suggestion for diminishing returns on control effects. The mechanic would be called Insolence. Insolence has three tiers. Every time a player is hit with a control effect they gain one tier of Insolence for 2 to 3 seconds after the effect has worn off. The first tier reduces the duration/distance of control effects by 33%. The second 66% . The third grants immunity. So lets say you are hit with a 2 second stun. You would be stunned for 2 seconds then gain Insolence for 2 to 3 seconds. If you are are again hit with a 2 second stun the stun would only last for 1.3 seconds. You would also gain an additional tier of Insolence after the stun wore off. You now have tier 2 Insolence. If you are hit again with a 2 second stun it would only last .6 seconds. You would also gain the final tier of Insolence for 2 to 3 seconds making you immune to control effects. In this model Stability would change to grant 2 tiers of Insolence.

There's something really interesting here. What if CC skills had there damage split? You would first take strike damage from the hit then additional damage as a result of being knocked down, launched, stunned or whatever. That would allow Anet to do the thing you suggest but also give them a tool to fine tune the skills for different game modes. Anyway, I still think that CC immunity is a bad thing for the game but you guys have also convinced me the problem is bigger than just stability. I don't think the devs considered how cc would work when you scale up the encounters in pvp. PVE has defiance. I almost think pvp should have a reverse defiance bar where you gain resistance to CC (maybe to the point of immunity) the more you are hit with control effects over a certain amount of time. Maybe stability just advances the bar quickly.

So you wouldn't give up cc immunity for more stability uptime even though it would still severely reduce the effectiveness of those cc attacks? So like the 2 sec stun on mesmer pistol would be reduced to a little more than a half of a second if stability was changed based on my suggestion AND you get to keep stability for rest of the duration.

Maybe you get to choose your utilities for the first time so you can mix?

Stability is currently immunity to control effects. It feels good to have it but miserable to play against. Also, immunity in general just seems wrong and it screws things up especially when you gain it passively. I would like to see Stability changed so it reduces the effectiveness of Control effects by 66%. That would mean a 66% reduction in duration of knock down, stun, dazed, fear, and taunted and a 66% reduction in distance for push back, pulled, launched, floated and sunk. It would stack duration and would not be removed when you are hit with a control effect. Chilled is weirdly powerful to be so uninteresting. So, to make it more interesting, I would like for it to be a stacking condition; up to 3. The first stack would reduce movement speed by 50% and recharge by 30%. The second stack would reduce movement speed by 75% and recharge by 55% but also increase the targets armor by 50%. The third stack would completely freeze the target in a block of ice and increase its armor by 100%. Players would also be able to break out of ice with a stun break. Blocking with a weapon skill; not the block effect should be buffed. My way of doing that would be to give every skill across the board the ability to taunt the current target if it is in weapon range. I’m talking about a 1 sec. taunt. Yes, it would be disruptive, but I think in the best way possible giving players who use shields, maces, and offhand swords a new way to play their weapons. What do you guys think? Too much, too little?

Honestly, just try everything. It's a long road to daredevil. You'll die a lot until you stop dying so much and hopefully you'll be having fun by that point. There may be an objectively best thief by the numbers but that doesn't mean you'll enjoy playing it.

Thief: *Holding scepter in offhand* Caster: You're holding that wro Thief: *Stabs caster in the mouth*

You know your OP is an interesting idea. Maybe only allow offensive stats on weapons and defensive stats on armor? Of course that would mean changing everything but it's interesting to think about and would make traits even more impactful.

There are places on the map where it makes sense to allow player duels; the Bane in the Black Citadel is one and there's a small Norn area too but I can't remember the name. I suspect there are others. Also I would allow duels under the supervision of npc guards. Essentially you would have to pay them to ref. So a player would signal they are willing to dual by paying a guard (maybe a symbol appears over the guards head). Someone can accept the challenge by telling the guard. This gets people out of issuing direct challenges and gives the devs a way to control where people can duel by not allowing guards near busy hubs to referee.

Wouldn't they have to create new animations if they added spears on land? I'm not sure Anet is willing to do that.

So are we going to be able to equip pistols in our glove slot?

So Warrior through the lens of Engineer?