Jthug.9506

Sounds like a lot of good reasons to keep GS5 strong. 😇

I think the swap is ok, but it may take time to get used too, I actually think your idea isn't bad, would be nice to pick from both, but also keep the ability to swap all to have access to everything on the fly if needed. Last night in my wvw rally I actually settled on using jallis/mallyx for the night. Mainly because both upkeep skills continue to proc on enemy players while I am in my dodge. I do find SA to be pretty strong, but because it has no damaging upkeep skill I can't justify using it in a rally. GS5 is amazing but I would actually prefer it to be 33% weaker and cool down 33% faster. I think the best thing that could change for vindicator from a wvw rally perspective would be to move the arch spear to an fkey and give the elite a damaging upkeep skill that's also an ally might stacker, which would help justify running vindicator over herald in comp. Also fwiw I ended up settling on ret/dev/vin in terms of talent trees, and using marauder stats/eagle runes/energy-force & energy-bloodlust sigils. Felt pretty good.

Having serious heartburn watching your health pool there though...

I hope GS5 stays dangerous enough to punish tightly stacked zergs, and if the burst is toned down I hope the cd is also reduced. But I have seen some wild numbers this time around on it. Main gripe now is that Spear of Archamorus is completely lame, bad damage, torment why? Misses my target 95% of the time… Fix it and move it to an fkey, add an upkeep damage skill in the elite spot instead if you ask me

Personally for wvw gvg play I am very happy that there isn't any cc on the gs. However if they were going to put it somewhere I believe it should be on the leap and even then maybe only if traited to do so... I am glad they added the 5 target 1.5s daze on the stun break however. I still find getting to battle dance for disengagement to be a bit awkward for me, but it could be down to my key binds. Also I wanted to shout out the cool down reduction on scavenger burst, feels good. Unfortunately spear of archemorus is still hot garbage, it almost always misses anyone you shoot it at if they are moving at all, the wind up time is HUGE and the damage is mediocre. Honestly I would prefer it function like DH pull and be reliable, even if the damage was never great. Even better would be to move this to an Fkey and give LA some kind of damage based upkeep elite skill ala impossible odds in shiro. Although I don't use it much the Urn of St. Viktor seems pretty bad as well still even though it's been improved slightly. I don't know how I would even modify this to make it attractive to use at all, it just seems weak.

Herald is fine, but ss4/2 isn't as dangerous as gs5/2, that's not just down to numbers tuning but in large part due to the mechanics of gs5 which even if nerfed tremendously could still be highly dangerous to tightly stacked wvw zergs. Also if you are just doing open field gvg stuff with lots of stealth bombing it's probably reasonable to play with both ss and gs over hammer... then the nasty combo would be dodge to engage, ss4, jade winds, weapon swap, legend swap with sotm, gs5 etc. Anyone that got caught in that is almost certainly very very dead by now. Can't wait till my 1st rally since this beta started tonight to find out. To be clear I don't think vindicator can replace herald in the current meta due to a lack of might gen. However it might be competitive for a dh spot, lacks the pulls and traps but makes up for it with crazy burst, and the LA luxon elite can at least reach as far as a dh pull to pressure those long range freecasters.

I am having a ball with GS in wvw right now. Roaming I am running shiro/la and comped I will probably run dwarf/shiro or dwarf malyx if I feel I have enough endurance. I am using energy/impact on GS, and energy/cruelty, and berserker/scholar. I can pretty much get a 2nd dodge on demand with legend or weapon swap + energy meld, and then have access to several more evade skills if needed. Haven't put much time in on this beta yet but so far I can tell you that gs5 is putting up very very big numbers. Even if they nerf it down hard it's going to probably change the meta bit by punishing stacking for boons and such. GS5 is much less threatening to clouded out positioning. So yeah it's fun rn imo

I’m planning on bringing 2 builds for wvw depending on the situation, hammer/gs and ss/gs

My raids have long since switched to staff mirage in most encounters. We also use heal herald as a solo healer as often as possible. I would love to use dual rr condi rens but it’s difficult to get people on board.

Well I am actually glad that they didn’t nerf the GS with CC, but glad to see the aoe daze on stun break. That said if they were going to put hard cc on the GS I would prefer it on the leap. The 10% buff on endurance not full is nice, and the split for FoD damage is also great. I’m also looking forward to not having ridiculous air time with FoD which should also improve the dps bench, as well as feel a lot better in competitive.

They did add a daze to the stun break on LA stance, which is nice, hopefully it can be tuned to be on par for break bar damage with dwarf taunt, Mallyx leap, and jade winds. Although even with all the extra damage stuff they have bumped in LA stance I don’t know if it’s going to bench better than a proper upkeep skill like vengeful hammers or not. But if you are using vindicator in pve with multiple targets such as the Conjured Amalgamate boss, I think LA is probably better than shiro, and oddly I would personally probably run Mallyx/LA for that kind of fight, just for the Mallyx leap pull. And to be honest there are only a few fights where I would use power over condition anyway. I’m feeling pretty happy with all the changes they have announced, I am hoping it will bench a tad better than ret renegade with notoriety over AP or about 37-39k. Obviously traiting AP would be a personal dps loss but perhaps worth it if you have at least 2 more power dps in your sub. In build crafting this I am thinking that it will be optimal to take the crit trait in invocation with scholar runes vs retribution and something like thief runes and a piece or 2 of assassins. However I prefer ret and eagle runes for wvw. Hype level elevated.

I actually found it to work well as a Zerg buster with s/s 2&4, and gs 5&2, it’s looking like it’s only going to be more viable now, although I would probably choose dwarf/shiro still. I have to say GS5 in particular is amazing in Zerg combat. I am also very excited to see the improvements to the block and flip over, it’s a key skill that you really want to make strategic use of to offset the single dodge.

I mean you do have the improved vigor trait. You also can get a bit of extra disengage with la

It looks to me like another 10% is coming in from the FoD change in PvE, so that's a total of 20% increase, plus several other damage buffs across the weapon and legend.

My only issue with the green blocks that some are comparing to giant jello cubes is not actually the color it's the reflectivity, if this were an actual block of real jade, no mater how pure and exceptional, it would be in a rough cut form, not polished like a skating rink. The texture should reflect a rough cut stone, not a highly polished gem.

Hopefully they fix the bugs allowing us to take damage during the dodge, also it felt very bad to trait for the damage buff and die to condis while waiting what feels like an eternity to come down. It is too weak in pve, and lacks cc for break bars, urn is bad and at the very least should be instacast. F2 is underwhelming especially when not in LA stance. Basically fix bugs, tune numbers, maybe add some cc and rework urn.

Unpopular opinion: this is my favorite color and also the color of the purest jades.

It’s a better 5 target healer than herald maybe but it’s definitely not as good for solo healing 10 man content. And it doesn’t bring quickness or alac while 5man healing so it’s a less attractive healer than scrapper or firebrand, it also doesn’t bring unique 10 target buffs like spirits that would make it more attractive than Druid. Herald otoh has facet of the dragon which gives a 20%boon duration increase not affected by capped bd, so I would personally prefer that to vindicator unless we really needed the vigor. Or maybe if we were looking at an extremely high pressure encounter. However it’s probably quite good for a heal slot in competitive modes, although it will still be lacking for cleanse and defensive boons compared to scrapper and firebrand.

fiendish tenacity (gm middle) can overcome replenishing despair depending on stats, should work great on cele.

My take on it was that it is quite powerful in small scale competitive mode like pvp or wvw roaming, but that for comped wvw or pve you just don’t want to use the legend. In small scale it’s nice to have 3 stun breaks, and extra mobility and self boons and healing even if your build is purely damage oriented. But that stuff is simply not very helpful in any kind of organized group, and so I personally found myself using shiro/jallis exclusively in wvw and pve. Maybe if the quickness from legendary alliance could be shared, it would be different.

IMO Vassals of The Empire: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Vassals_of_the_Empire would be a lot cooler if it were 10 target. It might actually see play.

I bet they don't change the flip over stuff at all, I just hope they at least add some hard cc somewhere, and fix the urn.

I got into a protracted 5+ minute fight with a cele ele against my cele ren in wvw about a month ago, eventually we both just decided to walk away. Although I think I got slightly closer to death at some points than they did, but ultimately neither one of us was going to die, ever.

Mallyx is totally fubar since the resolution/resistance changes recently, however anet probably won't decide to devote engineering hours to another core rev overhaul until sometime after eod, probably when we're in to the next living world saga. Since that's about the time in the release cycle where we got the last major core rev overhaul.

You never know, they might make a new mastery some day to allow this, and maybe the other way around too, use land weapons underwater.