Are the new elite specs original enough for you?

[Daniel Handler.4816]

Maybe it's just the trailers not explaining the differences enough. Or there are too many recycled animations. But yeah.

 

edit:

it is definitely the trailers at least in the case of vindicator/catalyst/bladesworn.

Edited September 17, 2021 by Daniel Handler.4816

[Grand Marshal.4098]

Willbender impressed me. I don't see thaaat much thief into it as I see unique interaction for guard. Virtuoso is visual puke, harbinger is meh. Rev looks clean but still needs explanation on the dodge/combat part, ele looks like a magic scrapper which I dont rly like and warrior is a holo ripoff with a possible downside that can doom the spec.

[LucianDK.8615]

I am just happy to get a proper damage spec for Necromancers, whom also doesnt recolor the screen when in shroud. Thusly not making it easy to see everything.     Scourge I wholly expect is lining up for more whacks from the nerf bat.

 

Plus its nice that we get a new weapon with some range to it without invisible hits that doesnt feel impactful. Also no AA chain on pistol, which makes it a lot easier for me with my vision issues. Hard to tell them apart.

[mungozen.2379]

We will have the preview, the open beta for groups of 3 elites, the open beta for all 9 elites, the expansion release and likely 2-3 spec related patches around it as well. 
 

it’s far too early to decide what to make of these especs, are they really a knock-off of other especs?  It’s just as likely that some players are just associating what they know (existing especs in GW2 or classes in other Games) to what they are seeing here rather than focusing on what is new. 
 

 It will probably be a few weeks or months after EoD releases that the average GW2 player understands where the new elites fit into the hierarchy and meta.  

[Knighthonor.4061]

Everything seem to be a /Thief or /Engineer  so far. Its cool to have one or two of these but not every class. We need some more original themes. This has turned me off from the idea of future elite specs being all based on the Expansion location and theme.

[Fueki.4753]

Virtuoso definitely is original enough for me.

Harmbinger and Willbender felt fine, too.

 

However, Catalyst, Bladesworn and Vindicator looked really bad and unnecessary in their trailers, likely being no more than just different flavours of roles that already are present on their professions.

Catalyst looks like it's basically just yet another melee Elementalist.

Bladesworn looks like it's just a watered down version of a pop fiction Samurai with a Gunblade.

Vindicator looks like it's yet another unoriginal flavour of melee power DPS Greatsword.

 

[iKeostuKen.2738]

Feel like so far virtuoso is the only one that feel original. They are essentially what else want interms of just having a long range spec minus the weapon.

Honestly thinking about rerolling to that this expac if engineer, ele and warrior all fail to impress me.

But also interested in what this new ranger spec has to offer as I always miss my pet specs. (But god is it so boring to play atm)

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

I'm bit mixed here. I'm pleased with originality in terms of "how they do it". I'm less pleased by not seeing old professions get new roles.

1. Harbinger - we're good here. Fast and exciting gameplay, Shroud reversed (now base form is the tanky one, and shroud is the exposed mode). New role - offensive boon support.

2. Virtuoso. Semi - good.  The glaring issue of back-loaded damage for mesmer is resoved here. Virtuoso front-loads his making him an excellent mobber and can actually carry his stacked power from fight to fight without trash mob's death resetting all the build up he made. The less beautiful part is what he does - dps only. Chrono and Mirage are very nice boon supports. I was expecting a healer. But Virtuoso seems to be focused purely on ease of trash cleanups, not being a unique support.

3. Willbender - didn't play i don't like guardian so no feedback here

4. Catalyst - I've always considered elementalist bland, boring and not the best choice. I mean why pick a piano class that at the end of the day does less than others? My necro can rip/corrupt boons, grant team fat barriers and mass ress  cause he just farted. And he doesn't need need no piano lessons for that. Boonshare? Harbinger will have me (and team) covered. Weaver/Scrapper 2.0 doesn't make think about changing my stance.

5. Vindicator. Sounds interesting. Mechanically it'll be very interesting, though I'm not thrilled about Mirage Cloak 2.0. It'll certainly provide some missing fun for power revs, since they never had high dps ranged option (the jump) or solid AoE power cleave.
Personally I'm interested in that twin legend's defensive stance. What it'll bring to the table for allies and self.

6. Bladesworn - unlike the guardian I do not hate the warrior. But i generally just avoid it, as i think it's a too simple class with nothing cool to make my heart racing. Bladesworn may actually change that. The spec looks promising and I am a bit hyped. I like the idea of charge attacks that will make me work (or coordinate with team) to get a huge damage payoff.  Also it seems it'll be the most complex warr spec which I find tempting. The ugly part is that it seems to simply be dps. Warrior is very similar to ranger - and what he needs is his own "druid" spec. Both at their core have practical supportive features for their allies, but not enough to receive the full support and/or healer role. A spec to give warr the opportunity to be just that would be glorious...

Edited September 17, 2021 by ZeftheWicked.3076

[DeceiverX.8361]

They all seem like the result of ANet trying too hard and bending the bracket more than actual good ideas people wanted to bolster gameplay integrity for the reasons we played our respective classes in the first place. 

The very name of specializations is a betrayal.  Instead of pushing niche facets of the core class to it limits with a little flair at the expense of some other core strengths, now more than ever it looks like ANet is trying to blur the lines of the professions too much.  This wouldn't be that big of a problem as to let people diversify on their mains, but it is while they make these eSpecs OP to sell expansions while trying to make them overly-unique as to inadvertently consolidate tons of power into the most flexible ones depending on the content with no solace for others where that power and optimized synergy really matters (See: Scourge, Scrapper, and FB in WvW). 

Like if I wanted to play an assassin, why am I going to find out at level 80 they wanted me to play Guard/Willbender (assuming they fix its animation issues)?  Same said about the gun classes - why am I playing the thief to shoot people instead of the engineer? 

[Dahkeus.8243]

Despite your obvious bias in the phrasing of your question, the consensus is definitely heavy towards "yes".  The specs are definitely far from the Daredevil and Scrapper that you compare them to.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

14 hours ago, ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

I'm bit mixed here. I'm pleased with originality in terms of "how they do it". I'm less pleased by not seeing old professions get new roles.

1. Harbinger - we're good here. Fast and exciting gameplay, Shroud reversed (now base form is the tanky one, and shroud is the exposed mode). New role - offensive boon support.

2. Virtuoso. Semi - good.  The glaring issue of back-loaded damage for mesmer is resoved here. Virtuoso front-loads his making him an excellent mobber and can actually carry his stacked power from fight to fight without trash mob's death resetting all the build up he made. The less beautiful part is what he does - dps only. Chrono and Mirage are very nice boon supports. I was expecting a healer. But Virtuoso seems to be focused purely on ease of trash cleanups, not being a unique support.

3. Willbender - didn't play i don't like guardian so no feedback here

4. Catalyst - I've always considered elementalist bland, boring and not the best choice. I mean why pick a piano class that at the end of the day does less than others? My necro can rip/corrupt boons, grant team fat barriers and mass ress  cause he just farted. And he doesn't need need no piano lessons for that. Boonshare? Harbinger will have me (and team) covered. Weaver/Scrapper 2.0 doesn't make think about changing my stance.

5. Vindicator. Sounds interesting. Mechanically it'll be very interesting, though I'm not thrilled about Mirage Cloak 2.0. It'll certainly provide some missing fun for power revs, since they never had high dps ranged option (the jump) or solid AoE power cleave.
Personally I'm interested in that twin legend's defensive stance. What it'll bring to the table for allies and self.

6. Bladesworn - unlike the guardian I do not hate the warrior. But i generally just avoid it, as i think it's a too simple class with nothing cool to make my heart racing. Bladesworn may actually change that. The spec looks promising and I am a bit hyped. I like the idea of charge attacks that will make me work (or coordinate with team) to get a huge damage payoff.  Also it seems it'll be the most complex warr spec which I find tempting. The ugly part is that it seems to simply be dps. Warrior is very similar to ranger - and what he needs is his own "druid" spec. Both at their core have practical supportive features for their allies, but not enough to receive the full support and/or healer role. A spec to give warr the opportunity to be just that would be glorious...

I'll comment on this bit about Warrior. Bladesworn actually extremely strengthens one of Warrior's two support builds: HealShouts. This because Shouts use the ammo system. It may not be a dedicated support spec in a direct sense, but it'll all but replace Spellbreaker for support in competitive and will put out massive heals and cleanses because of the ability to recharge the ammo on these skills with its mechanics.

 

It'll also let Warrior stack massive Might on the party without taking GS/Phalanx Strength.

Edited September 18, 2021 by Hannelore.8153

[Dadnir.5038]

The second set of elite is pretty much disappointing in regard of originality.

Vindicator have daredevil's vault coupled with mirage's drawback with 80% of the spec's work on pigeonholing the spec to an optional dual legend. I think the focus on the legend is the major mistake of this spec, it's not that it's not cool but it restrain the spec a lot.

Bladesworn is highly disappointing, the gunsaber alone is a hard pass from my point of view. Replacing one weaponset with a weapon would be OK as an idea but not the way it is done and certainly not with this ridiculous idea of a weapon that the gunsaber is.

Catalyst is core ele with a F5. It seriously feel like they just spent their time working on the hammer (which is really cool) and forgot anything else until someone said "Hey! what about the mechanism?", and they ended up slapping a F5 to make it look like they tried.

[Vidit.7108]

For me they don't need to be completely original they just need to offer something new to the class. That's not to say I think what they added was all that good. I'm very skeptical the dps will be as good as they claim after the last specs. Also PoF beta damage was generally higher than it was on launch iirc. 

Past especs have also not been so creative, (Daredevil, Spellbreaker, Dragonhunter) so if new ones seems simple that's okay to me. Complicated has backfired on them before.

Bladesworn is however I think maybe too similar to engy. I thought when i heard no weapon swap it might be easier to balance but it doesn't look that way now. I seriously question if people will use the legend on Vindicator or stick with Shiro. So there is room for their creativity to not end up being all that consequential. 

[AikijinX.6258]

I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again. Daredevil is ANET’s baseline for elite spec creation. 
 

~You either die an Elementalist or live long enough to play like a Thief (Daredevil)

[Knighthonor.4061]

Virtuoso = Mesmer/Thief

Harbinger = Necro/Engineer 

Willbender = Guardian/Thief

Vindicator = Revenant/Daredevil Thief

Bladesworn = Warrior/Holo Engineer 

Catalyst = Elementalist/Scrapper Engineer 

 

 

I get the feeling that the Thief and Engineer new elite specs may be the only classes that dont follow this pattern once they are revealed for the final beta.....

[Zacchary.6183]

16 hours ago, AikijinX.6258 said:

Daredevil is ANET’s baseline for elite spec creation. 

Now everyone gets to play a thief. :^)

[montecristo.1324]

I also believe that not only the new specs are not original enough, my issue with the new specs is that they are overlapping with old espec from the same profession.

 

Guard in HoT got DH, then he got FB and the two specs are based on two different designs. Now willbender is DH 2.0 or a downgrade from DH depending on the balance, but it's not something guard needed.

 

Same with ele, it has weaver for melee and now he got catalyst. Also the design of catalyst is so bad... That F5 button should go on core ele, and the hammer 3 design should be catalyst mechanic in my opinion.

 

Necro the same, they already have reaper for burst power damage and now they got daredevil Necro.

 

All this plus the fact that the main feature is fishing... I think this expac is a fishing attempt

[Al Masone.1274]

I wouldn't say that originality has gone down, since it's easy for things so feel redundant with so many classes and specialisations. What concerns me is the feel that the new specs might easily trump the old ones. Coupled that with the fact that old specs may fallen away from their intended thematic. 

If I play warrior and want go for dps, why would I take berserker over bladesworn

If I play necro, why would I play reaper over scourge or harbinger.

Also I remain of the idea that at Anet they keep writing themselves into a corner, by avoiding the holy trinity. 

It's ok that every spec more or less has a dps option, but over the years we also had a fair amount of specs that are pretty effective at either being a dedicated healer or a support, by sharing boons with rest of the party. So why not make it so that some specs, that are already intended to be pretty survivable, can carve their own niche of taking damage for the rest of the party. 

We have dps, healers, boon supports, but we don't have tanks. And tanking is a dimensions on its own, that would make for entirely new playstyles, and could only increase the diversity thus the originality, of new playstyles.

Yes you can play almost any class as a tank if you want, but it's not something that is actively sought after, because parties don't really need them right now, in any game mode. And I honestly think that's a shame.

[Kodama.6453]

3 hours ago, Al Masone.1274 said:

We have dps, healers, boon supports, but we don't have tanks. And tanking is a dimensions on its own, that would make for entirely new playstyles, and could only increase the diversity thus the originality, of new playstyles.

We have tanks, tho? Some examples:

• Scrapper: definitely a tank spec for engineer. Gives access to tons and tons of barrier, has one of the best defensive weapons in the game with hammer, has several traits which increase durability (delayed strike damage, increased barrier gain + reduced condition damage taken, additional barrier if you hit enemies with CC, stability from having might on you or using the function gyro...), gyros add to survival as well (strong condi clean on purge gyro, alot of barrier + stability from bulwark gyro, healing + water combo field + protection from medic gyro, even stealth for disengaging).
• Daredevil: doesn't seem like a traditional tank, but it increases the survivability of thief quite alot. Additional dodge as class mechanic, perma weakness on enemies, good defensive weapon with staff (reflec, evade frames, weakness, AoE blind), traits give survivability through bonus vitality + endurance gain + weakness + healing + condi cleanses, utility skills provide a block and the healing skill refills endurance for more dodges.
• Spellbreaker: defensive class mechanic with full counter, weapon has reflec and alot of CC to limit the enemy damage output, utility skills provide tank tools like taunt, healing and they can rip boons (offensive boons ripped can enhance your ability to tank), traits add defense through protection, healing, resistance, copying conditions on enemies (like weakness, too). Granted, it has less defense added and more CC than the other 2 I mentioned, but I think this is mostly because warrior at it's core already has strong defense.

The problem with tanks in this game is not that we don't have capable tank specs. The problem is that this game is not really designed around having tanks. With the exception of raids in which you have 1 tank in the squad usually, there is not much content which calls for someone to take big hits. Most encounters (even "light raids" like strike missions) are balanced around having nothing but dps classes and 1-2 healers in the party to keep them alive. On top, all classes have some baseline defense to avoid the biggest hits through dodging.

If you want to play a tank, you are perfectly able to do this. The problem is that there are not many situation in which you want to USE these tank abilities of the elite specs.

Edited September 19, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[Al Masone.1274]

That's exactly my point. We already have specs that can play as tanks, but tanking as a role isn't a thing. There are no tanks right, just slight more durable supports. Giving barrier or protection or other defensive buffs to the team isn't tanking, putting yourself in front of the boss and taking the hits is. Yes, everyone can dodge and has some measure of sustain, but the fact that there are actual healer dedicated specs means that there's still room for roles that weren't originally intended. But to have that you have to kinda change how encounters work. You'd have to introduce like unavoidable damage that only a tank could deal with. IMO it would be interesting. And anyway, in the other MMOs, bosses have lots of aoe stuff going around and forcing the whole team to avoid damage as well, but there's still need for a tank to take most of the front damage. Why can't GW2 have something similar?

 

And yes, we already have specs that are designed to "tank", as in, be really tough by avoid/blocking hits and reducing damage. Yet they never have any reason to focus on that aspect, and instead everyone just goes full dps (power/condi) or full boon sharing.

Also, another intersting thing, that is already in the game but again isn't explored much, is tanking by redirecting damage:

Scrapper has the gyro that redirects damage from allies to yourself, which coupled with tha trait that delayes a portion of damage, makes for an interesting unorthodox tank. 

Similarly, necro has ways to take conditions from allies to himself, and in death magic you have traits that reduce the damage you take from conditions, along with a trait that cleanses conditions and gives you toughness everytime you cleanse one. 

I'd like there to be reasons for players to actually use these traits, echewing personal damage in order to relieve the rest of team of unwanted pressure. 

Otherwise, with each new specs introduced, we get lots and lots of new skills and traits, only to use a small amount of them, namely those that give more damage or more boons to the party, and ditch everything else. What's the point of giving us 9 trait options with each spec then?

[Allarius.5670]

I mostly just PvP. Conceptually I find them all to be original enough if not thematically great, even if the theme doesn't personally appeal to me. 

What I'm not so sure about is whether they feel like they transform the play patterns of the profession enough to feel uniquely different. 

Virtuoso - It just feels like a shatter Mesmer, full stop. The trade off between clones and blades is a great start but it does not feel transformative enough on its own. Skill design still forces (near)melee shatters to control projectile pathing.

Harbinger - Mobility and boon support are new tools, and the mobility itself opens up a new play feel for Necromancer. However, from what I hear, the optimal PvP strat is to just abuse the life force heal mechanic and play passively ... Passive tankiness is already Necro's M.O. With some tweaks this may be sufficient.

Willbender - Mobility at the cost of some support. From a non-Guard player, this just seems like core Meditation Guard with a bit more mobility once gameplay is tweaked to be smoother. Does it transform enough? I guess that depends on if an abundance of mobility is sufficiently transformative ... Not entirely dissimilar to Harbinger.

 

The newest set previewed look more transformative. 

Vindicator - The new legend interaction should create a new/unique ebb and flow feeling while the dodge forces new play patterns to work around it.

Bladesworn - Forcing the gunblade is inherently transformative by mandating use of their skills. Trading traditional bursts for burst-options in Dragon Trigger creates a new scenario where a new set of decisions need to be made.

Catalyst - This feels more like the first three previewed specs where the play will not be sufficiently transformed from core play patterns. Furthermore, adding an F5 without a tradeoff raises questions of design bloat EVEN IF F5 will be of questionable effectives and is locked behind an energy resource. 

 

I guess what I like to see is more emphasis on forced changes because they mandate a gameplay shift so it doesn't feel the same.

Virtuoso forces a change in this way, but the change does not feel sufficiently transformative. It's like with Chrono, the shatters are basically the same but now you lack the defense core is balanced around for the opportunity to create high impact with a single high cooldown. It doesn't feel transformative (other than trying to survive), it just feels like more of the same core offers.

[Kalocin.5982]

Daredevil just presses 1 for most of their rotation so yeah most of the specs are different from it lol. I think they're pretty unique but need more focus. All of them sort of have an idea of where they're going with it but the execution is a bit all over the place or clunky. Most people like the hammer 3 orbs of Catalyst, it's focused on as the spec's main mechanic... So why isn't that the main mechanic right? Bladesworn thematically feels cool and some of it is fun but in practice staying still for 5 seconds in a game that encourages movement and dodging feels bad. Potions for the necro feels like it'd be a cool concept, but it just doesn't have any real interaction with the shroud or pistol. Willbender is good in concept but in practice it's "run to enemy and skip step 3 to profit". I could on but you get the idea, the concepts are there but the focus/execution needs to be tightened across the board

[Bunny.9834]

A lot of this "new" e-spec feels very recycled tbh and not in the a good way. Maybe it's time constraints? maybe its lack of resource? 

So far it does not have the same impact as the previous e-specs that came before them. 

I understand when HoT came out, it was very exciting because that was the first time we were getting the e-specs that came with new animations, new mechanics etc. Add to that we got a new profession, the Rev WITH an additional e-spec. 

Then PoF came along and brought very unique e-specs as well. For example: The Firebrand with Tomes offer a very unique playstyle. The Deadeye with Rifle and Malice, the "Kneel" mechanic. The Holosmith was super exciting with the Photon Forge. Soulbeast was pretty groundbreaking for the ranger playstyle when they introduced the Beastmode mechanic. 

 

Now looking at the EoD Specs... they feel very similar to the professions they copied from. 

Willbender has one unique animation it feels like (that spinning kick thing). Rest of it just a bunch of Daredevil Rehash. 

Harbinger is another one that borrowed a lot of stuff from the Daredevil and of course the boring potion drinking from Engi. This one honestly feels like a very rushed project. 

Catalyst... do I even need to mention that this is basically a "Mage" scrapper? I mean... from the Gyro copy to flat out giving them a hammer. Very disappointing. 

 

I know this is Beta. I hope for major improvements before the EoD releases. 

[frareanselm.1925]

Playing the 2 betas I ended up with the feeling that the new e-specs have confuse mechanics and roles, and dont provide a significant advantage over core/hot/pof.

Edited September 23, 2021 by frareanselm.1925

[crewthief.8649]

Very disappointed with the lack of creativity; they’ve basically just taken things from already existing classes. That, and there’s a feeling of “cheapness” that sort of pervades all of them. Like, budget especs or something. I really, really hope this is because the especs are still in beta, because if that is not the case GW2 may be in trouble.