Vindicator Feedback Thread

[Sagarsdude.3209]

1 hour ago, Kidel.2057 said:

Honestly no. The dodge is fine and is proving to be valuable in pvp and for tank builds in pve. The problem is that only one of the 3 dodges is valuable and will probably be nerfed. 

This problem you describe is because the dodge has been turned into a gimmick. Why is the trait that requires the least amount of endurance to dodge the most viable? Because it literally lets you dodge the most. This is what I mean by 1 dimensional gameplay. You are already seeing the affect of this, the most viable build is the one that spams this dodge the most. Are you seriously telling me that this is the gameplay that you want? You just want to hit dodge as much as possible? In my opinion its very unfun. Furthermore, let me tell you that if the dodge remains as is, this class will ONLY be viable if that dodge is spammable. If you cannot spam that dodge anymore then suddenly this class will not be viable in pvp/wvw. So dodge is not fine, it needs to be reverted back to a regular dodge.

I think it would be really cool if the dodge would replace the current elites. The current elites do not feel good at all and I think it would be much more interactive gameplay if the rev is allowed to use skills and dodge normally and have this extra mobility/damaging/healing ability as an elite skill.

Edited September 22, 2021 by Sagarsdude.3209
To give further suggestion

[Kidel.2057]

16 minutes ago, Elric.4713 said:

That's actually not true, a lot of people complain about GS: from its trash animations, unfitting icons, incoherent kit, low damage and it basically being yet another melee weapon that brings nothing really new.

I should have said "not as much as the broken mechanics". Also because you may have noticed that I didn't praise the GS at all. 

[Kidel.2057]

2 minutes ago, Sagarsdude.3209 said:

Because it literally lets you dodge the most.

True

2 minutes ago, Sagarsdude.3209 said:

Are you seriously telling me that this is the gameplay that you want?

We probably agree but are talking about 2 separate things. I don't dislike the dodge animation and mechanic of leap + invuln + attack/support. I do agree with you that the 2 "offensive" dodges are bad and unusable and basically remove your ability to evade attacks entirely. But that's easy to fix: they just have to make them more similar to the barrier dodge. 

[Kidel.2057]

38 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Again, choices should give variation

You need to give something in exchange for the lack of CC and damage. At the moment it's not there. The class needs to compete, one way or another. 

[Obtena.7952]

Agree with most of OP's assessment:

1. Dodge - I can see why they restricted it to 1 dodge because no matter what, being able to dodge twice with access to Forerunner of Death ... that's a no go and to some extentm, the barrier/heal one as well. It seems contrary to Daredevil design but I think the difference we have to recognize here is theme, not performance. Even Daredevil has Exhaustion on one of it's dodge variations, so even as far back as PoD, Anet recognized using dodge mechanics in these ways requires limitations. It's weird Anet didn't implement that effect here somehow. 

2. Alliance Skill Flipping - Again, I can see where Anet got excited about the idea of 'flipping' because of the alliance theme. It is clever, though it does make skill management overly complicated for little reason other than to appease a theme.  Personally, I would prefer being able to choose red or blue skills but thematically, I can see why that won't happen. 

3. I disagree with your GS assessment. GS is just a sword replication and that's really not 'fine' ... it should be changed, to something else that differentiates it from Sword. 

4. Traits ... agree with your assessment. We have three themes going on here (Skill Flipping, Dodging and DPS/Support Dichotomy) Traits should be more evenly distributed between the themes of the espec to ensure a consistency of play variation that exists the design philosophy of previous especs (A different topic, but this play variation reduction is more significant on EoD Especs that previous ... and it's not a good change IMO)

5. Just generally, I get why GS might not pack the punch people think it should .. it's a classic problem of multiple target DPS balance, similar to how AOE skills typically work in MMO's. They simply can't be balanced because the player doesn't control how many targets it hits. If I had my way, each weapon skill would hit fewer targets and give some splash/shrapnel effect on a surrounding AOE. This would keep the AOE flavour, but make the focused target aspect more balanceable. 

 

Edited September 22, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Obtena.7952]

3 minutes ago, Kidel.2057 said:

You need to give something in exchange for the lack of CC and damage. At the moment it's not there. The class needs to compete, one way or another. 

Sure, you need something else, but it's not true that something else isn't there. I mean, Even though I'm not liking the overlap with Sword, there is LOTS of things going on with GS that are attractive for players to have. 

In otherwords ... if Sword builds have 'the something that should be there', then GS must as well. 

Edited September 22, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Sagarsdude.3209]

8 minutes ago, Kidel.2057 said:

True

We probably agree but are talking about 2 separate things. I don't dislike the dodge animation and mechanic of leap + invuln + attack/support. I do agree with you that the 2 "offensive" dodges are bad and unusable and basically remove your ability to evade attacks entirely. But that's easy to fix: they just have to make them more similar to the barrier dodge. 

If the goal is to evade attacks then regular dodge is strictly superior than any iteration of this dodge. This is simply because you have 2 of them. Think about the encounter, if you force a rev dodge out in pvp/wvw then you know they don't have anything and have to legend swap/weapon swap + f2 to refill endurance bar and get the dodge back. So essentially any class can press W on a vindicator who has just dodged and there is little the vindicator can do besides try and get that dodge back. If the vindicator has a regular dodge, then this cannot happen because it still has 1 more dodge and so can keep up pressure knowing that if there is another skill to cc or damage it then it can dodge again. But if there is only 1 dodge then you have forced this vindicator into an unfavorable position just because he dodged.

 

Also about the actual dodge, I think its actually fine IF this were an elite instead of the dodge. I think an elite should be impactful and the invuln + aoe + heal/damage would make sense to put on the elite instead of what we currently have.

Edited September 22, 2021 by Sagarsdude.3209
clarification

[Jthug.9506]

After giving it some thought I believe that the urn should also be a dps increase of some kind, perhaps an aoe pulse? Also I believe that both the upkeep cost and the self damage are way too high. And the flip over should be instant cast so it can be triggered even if you are CCed.

[Loules.8601]

13 minutes ago, Sagarsdude.3209 said:

If you cannot spam that dodge anymore then suddenly this class will not be viable in pvp/wvw. So dodge is not fine, it needs to be reverted back to a regular dodge.

I think it would be really cool if the dodge would replace the current elites. The current elites do not feel good at all and I think it would be much more interactive gameplay if the rev is allowed to use skills and dodge normally and have this extra mobility/damaging/healing ability as an elite skill.

No need to revert to normal dodge - it'll be complete downgrade and plain boring. And it can be viable - I played with Mirage for several month in ranked with single dodge - not completely comfortable and balance-correct (need revert nerf), but totally viable. And Revenant have much more survivability (and this spec need some more I think) - so it's totally okay, mechanic-wise... not current balance-wise, tho. 
And we don't need to delete two interesting elite's (again - visual/mechanic-wise, not balance) - just because some people can't approve different dodge mechanics (because of personal tastes, I think). 

[Conncept.7638]

Not perfect, but it is fun, and as an Ele main, a lot closer to where you want it to be than the Catalyst. 😒

I think the jump dodge is fun, but it needs a little more uptime, and the traits/class mechanic need to reward active and aggressive use of the jump mechanic with more returned energy.  I wouldn't even be opposed to a "refill energy on kill" reset trait that lets you lance hop from one trash mob to the next.

I also don't think the kurzick/luxon flip utilities are as bad as people are saying, I just don't think they fit what people want to play on a dragoon class.  This class makes you want to jump in the fight full steam ahead, and then your utilities flip over to support skills that don't facilitate that.  I found the class to be a lot more fun when I stopped using the new legend and switched over to assassin/dwarf.

You could somewhat address both of these issues by making alliance tactics/energy meld a weaker but more frequently usable skill.

I also think the kurzick/luxon skills would be better themed as aggression/sustain, rather than agression/support, so that it matches the "charge head first into battle" playstyle people want out of this class, and Revenants don't need another support spec anyway.

Edited September 22, 2021 by Conncept.7638

[Sagarsdude.3209]

1 minute ago, Loules.8601 said:

No need to revert to normal dodge - it'll be complete downgrade and plain boring. And it can be viable - I played with Mirage for several month in ranked with single dodge - not completely comfortable and balance-correct (need revert nerf), but totally viable. And Revenant have much more survivability (and this spec need some more I think) - so it's totally okay, mechanic-wise... not current balance-wise, tho. 
And we don't need to delete two interesting elite's (again - visual/mechanic-wise, not balance) - just because some people can't approve different dodge mechanics (because of personal tastes, I think). 

What I think is that rev will end up like mirage in the sense that every viable build will end up being double energy sigil and spam dodge as much as possible. With mirage this results in very high mirage cloak uptime and the usage of mirage ambush skills and with rev it will literally be just jumping as soon as that dodge is ready. We are already seeing this with the most viable pvp brawler spec of vindicator being the one that dodges the most. What you call the boring dodge is actually the most big brain one, because it can be used strategically when you have 2 of them. Because they have attached a gimmick to this dodge, they have reduced it to 1 dodge and it is now a class that only gets value from dodging. Why is the dodge only valuable? Because it will determine literally if you win or lose every encounter in pvp/wvw.

[Loules.8601]

3 minutes ago, Sagarsdude.3209 said:

With mirage this results in very high mirage cloak uptime and the usage of mirage ambush skills and with rev it will literally be just jumping as soon as that dodge is ready.

Nope: because mirage = condi with light armor, and Revenant = heavy armor + power-DPS + additional survivability, so you don't die without dodge the same moment. 

Edited September 22, 2021 by Loules.8601

[Barraind.7324]

I'm not quite sure what this spec is supposed to be or do, really.

 

GS Weapon Skills:

 

Auto Chain - This doesnt feel bad

 

Mist Unleashed - Why does it have such a long delay between button press and doing anything?   For being a front arc skill with less damage than the first 2 auto chains, it shouldn't be that clunky.

 

Phantom Onslaught - Unlike Guardian GS3, you dont fly into outer space when pressed.  Now you take a casual jog past your target instead.  This is also one of the most responsive buttons GS gets. 

 

Imperial Guard / True strike -  The damage feels awful, but it does its blockyblock thing.

 

Eternity's Requiem - Preview:  "This button sounds cool but looks awkward"     Beta: This button is awkward and sounds awkward.   Damage reduction per hit seems a needless addition, the hits are so fast and in such a wide spread, it should be impossible for things to be hit by more than the cluster they may have been standing in when used. 

 

 

Utility Skills:

 

Selfish spirit - Great if you're hitting 5 things.  One of the worst heal skills available if you're hitting 1 or 2.

Selfless spirit - Solid heal in a party.  Not a good heal if not in a party.

Energy cost and cast time of both heals is steep, and require you to be hitting multiple targets with both casts.

 

Nomads Advance - Its effectively GS3 that gives you might.  The cost is steep. 

Battle Dance - Self displacement that puts you out of range for everything except spear, GS3, and the skill it shares a cooldown with.  Its useful to position yourself as a support, but its effectively dodge #2 that isnt a dodge

 

Scavenger Burst - High Cast time? Check. Total damage of 1s autoattacking? Check.  Doesnt aggro anything not in melee range making it ineffective as an opener in PvE? Check.   Costs 15 energy for no good reason?  check.  Is one of only 2 skills that does anything condition based in the spec? Check.    Is only good when it hits 4-5 targets? check

Tree Song - This is really good if you're playing a heal/support character, as your go-to "im not doing damage, but have this useful thing" button.  If every other Kurz skill wasnt also "I'm not doing damage, have this same thing" button, we'd be good. 

 

Reaver's Rage - It does what it says on the tin.  Its a stunbreak that you're only pressing when you need a stunbreak, unless you wont need a stun break and are near enough things to give yourself fury. 

Awakening - Group Stunbreak is pretty neat when you need it.

 

Urn of Saint Noplease -  This doesnt make any sense.  Its seeming best case is being a 3 second cast regen.   In its heal/boon support build, it would be a really good skill when you need lots of group healing,  as your 50 energy hop covers your self healing, and you can keep pulses up for your group, but it has a -10 energy upkeep, so you cant actually keep it up for all that long, especially if you have to do anything else before (and you do) or if you didnt have to press f2 before leaving Alliance after using it (and you more or less do).     With a halfway reasonable Pip cost, this skill could be saved in the one place you would even possibly think about using it, though it does absolutely require Healhop. 

 

Spear of Tickles - 2000 range ability on a significantly long delay that does what seems to be this kits standard 1 second of auto-attack damage, doesnt aggro things it hits out of melee range, with a 20 energy cost that adds torment instead of, say, long duration Chilled and 5 vuln, which might make it useful at times you're waiting that long to get a 2k range skill to go off.   

 

 

F2:

Energy tax in Alliance that you can not and must not ever press in any other legend because it absolutely must be pressed in Alliance.  This button feels bad. So very bad. 

 

Traits:

 

Dodgedives:

Healhop - 10/10, would healhop again.   To be fair, this trait could do nothing except say "costs 50 end", and it would be better than the alternatives often enough to get taken regularly.

Death (of self) From Above - For 150 end, this doesnt feel like it does enough.

Imperial Impact - This might be good in a raid situation where its going to be a boon extender that gives some amount of might and protection uptime.  This can have 100% uptime with Reaver's Curse

 

 

Endurance:

If you arent using Death Drop, and are in a group, the only trait to even look at is Reaver's Curse.  

For all other situations, Song of Arboreum has the best end regen. 

 

Angsiyan's trust - This trait exists.  It might be worth using if you're running healhop, and you need to semi-frequently dodge as a group, but not so often that you can lose 15 self endurance regen, or you get stuck in a sub-group with everyone else who only gets 1 endurance bar.  But I dont see this ever beating out Reaver's curse for practical use. 

 

 

f2 alterers:

 

Leviathan's Strength - If you didnt have to use f2 just before exiting or just after entering Alliance every single time you change legends for any rotation you have to come close to working, this might be a trait you could look at.

 

Redemptors Sermon - 30s cooldown on the trigger kills it.

 

Amnesty of Shing Jei - This skill doesnt mess up your rotation and actually does something, so congrats, you get to take it. 

 

 

Overall Impressions:

 

The rotation is clunky, animation delays and .75s cast times on everything make it feel unresponsive, the dodgehops dont give full I-frames, and it doesnt have the damage to be a power dps spec.  Its boon support spec is reliant on staff + utilities, and just makes me ask "why am I not playing Herald, ill get permanent quickness instead of a group stunbreak". 

 

The benchmarks are pretty horrific at the moment.  Its Core Legends Shiro/dorf zerker pure dps build is sitting down with Banners.   Its Alliance benchmark is at QScrapper level.  Its Diviners gear QRvind is below any other benchmarkable build. 

 

 

What would I do in a perfect world?

Make Alliance require taking Arch as one legend and Viktor as the second, give one the dps kit, one the boon support kit, significantly reduce cooldowns, and incentivize the player to swap to the "offspec" legend either through end/ene recovery mechanics or giving boosts to skills in one based on skills used in the other. 

 

It couldnt be worse than what it currently is in terms of how it plays. 

Edited September 22, 2021 by Barraind.7324

[Sagarsdude.3209]

3 minutes ago, Loules.8601 said:

Nope: because mirage = condi with light armor, and Revenant = heavy armor + power-DPS + additional survivability, so you don't die without dodge the same moment. 

What is more survivable, instant cast invis or some heavy armor (which btw if you want power dps then the rev has to go berserker which has 0 defense stats)? Also, the condi build that you just mentioned, guess what it plays like? Yes, it has double energy sigil and spams dodge as much as possible to keep mirage cloak up so it can be invuln to everything. The problem with rev is more that if you force out a rev dodge, then the rev HAS to legend swap/weapon swap or f2 to get a dodge back. So when a rev dodges you are essentially guaranteed free pressure onto them until they have their dodge back.

[thewarlokk.7312]

So here i am, giving my 2 cents to... this...

My View is purely from PvE Perspective and All i can say is "The Vindicator feels bad to play".

I dont play PvP or WvW (that much), but i kinda know what a class needs to be "good" at that kinda playstyle, as i played years and years of PvP in WoW. And Vindicator feels like it would get steamrolled by WvW Bots that are stuck in the terrain.

 

Cons:

------------------------------------------------------------------

* It provides nothing to you OR your party other Specs can't do or can't do more than twice as good. (Mechanically)

* You lack in generation of Might and/or Fury. As a Power Spec, not good.

* The Greatsword Damage is lackluster. Should Hit like a truck, feels like hitting Enemies with an Foam Sword.

* GS 5 is too random to actually be "good".

* The Alliance feels really, really clunky to use. Not having control over which skills i can use makes me wanna stay away from this Spec as far as i can.

* The F2 feels unrewarding and a waste of Energy outside of Alliance. More to the Dodge Mechanic further down.

* St. Victor Elite. Yikes. That Skill is a dunking pile of goatshit and makes me wanna do that, what you probably do when you use that skill. die.

* The Selfsustain (Using Berserkers/Diviners) is abysmal, as the Heal Skills provide not enough heal throughput.

* Only one dodge is pretty bad when combined with the low selfsustain and animationlocking. Have fun doing any HoT/PoF or Living World Seasons with only one dodge.

* The "Dodge-Jump-Superhero-Landing-AoE" may look cool, but is a DPS loss as it's Damage isn't near as much as you would hope it to be. Also way too long. And animationlocking is cringe.

* The Traits. Choosing between "Bigger AoE, even longer cooldown", "Smaller AoE, less but still long cooldown" and "Not completely unusable" in the last row seems like Christmas Decoration. Stuff that this tree doesn't look empty. 5 of 9 choosable Traits are for the lackluster Dodge Mechanic.

 

 

Pros:

------------------------------------------------------------------

* The Archemorus/St. Victor Stunbreak. Nice reliable Stunbreaks without too much Energycost and cooldown. 

* Two new people who banter with my character now and then. Probably a Con when it starts to annoy me.

 

 

How could it be made better? Some Proposals:

------------------------------------------------------------------

* So 2 Legendarys are better than one? Why not let us choose between Archemorus and St. Victor similar to the other Legends? One for Power (Archemorus), the other for Support (St. Victor) and switch with F1. So Power Players can choose Archemorus/Shiro, Archemorus/Jalis and Supporting Players can choose St. Victor/Jalis or St. Victor/Ventari. Think about the banter between these Legendpairings 😉

* Change F2 to give Boons based on active (or even the inactive!) Legend by default.

* Add Vuln to the GS Auto Attack Chain to buff it's damage, take it from GS2 and make that Skill, so that Enemies get "grouped" like Malyx' Call to Anguish so that GS5 actually can hit more than 2 mobs.

* Completely rework the St. Victor Elite. I don't even know how to salvage this. Let it drain Energy instead of Health and Provide Pulses of Barrier or something like that. idk.

* Allow the Player to do the Superherolanding when they want to and refund Energy based of how "fast" you land again, balance it with percentile less damage if you land prematurely. Also get rid of the animationlock.

* Provide a way to reliably generate Fury and Might.

* Get rid of the "More Targets hit = more HP gain" from the healing skills. Sounds cool and Looks cool on paper, but is actually useless outside of Zergs or getting mauled by Pocket Raptors.

* Rework the Traits, all of them at the moment are "Do you want this Core Mechanic of this spec to 'be slightly less bad', 'even worse' or 'meh, but still bad'". Serioulsy. 5 of the 9 choosable Traits are for the Jump-dodge-mechanic thingy. That alone should tell you that this Mechanic isn't fleshed out enough.

* Let Archmorus Spear actually hit something. Feels like an Eternity until that spear hits something after using the skill.

 

 

Also small rant at the End: What about Vizu? She was the one who enabled St. Victor and Archemorus to kill Shiro. Yet they get all the praise.... Tsk, tsk, tsk.... Missed opportunity to give Daggers to the Revenant instead of a GS, which let's be real, should have been Core Rev to begin with.

 

tl;dr: Bad and needs a lot of work to actually be competetive with Herald/Renegade/Core in any way or Form. If it stays like this, i won't be playing it.

[Loboling.5293]

I agree with some here that the spec feels more awkward that it should because the shared utility cooldowns. Swapping over to the next legend shouldn't keep cooldown on the new ability. This creates strange timing with the Rev. I must admit, I didn't too much with this spec yet. So I'll let others cover the bulk of the feedback. But the utilities need to have independent cooldowns of their flip skills. 

I must say, generally. I'm very happy with the new elite specs. They feel very niche and gimmicky, but that is good for the long-term health of the game. Not saying changes aren't needed, just that they are clearly specializations, rather than upgrades like many of the PoF elites. 

Vindicator is powerful, and even though skill 3 on gs is bugged, the weapon is awesome. (maybe a little lacking in animations on skill 2) I do think this spec will be enjoyed by some, not by others. 

I still would prefer if the dodge mechanic wasn't changed, but instead you got an f2 ability (scrap the current one) that activates the special dodge ability. So they can maintain regular dodging, or use up their endurance on their f2 ability for a more impactful dodge. This way the f2 is useful for all legends, and the spec doesn't feel as clunky. (Especially once the flip-over skills share separate cooldowns) 

[TheGrimm.5624]

Will drop other feedback later. But wouldn't the Spear Elite make more sense to apply either a long chill or a longish poison over torment? Coming at this from the WvW/sPvP side of it. It's more of a power build but at least those two condi's seem to make more since and would have more impact on gameplay, especially after the nerf torment took in player versus player style game plays. 

[Brunnsteinangel.2568]

Confused Gameplay?

 

I want to voice my thought once more, after spending some more time with the Vindicator and thinking about it.

This time, I want to take a look at what our "gameplay mechanic" is supposed to be as Vindicator, because I think many problems go back to this mechanic not beeing there.

 

As said mutliple times, the dodge is gimmicky, trhe flip-over klunky, the GS is bland.

In my eyes the reason for this is, that there is no overall "theme" or concept behind the class.

There is no clear idea "what the new way to play" is.

Compare it to the Bladesowrn or Catalyst, you know exactly what your playstyle is about.
Same for older Rev specs & legends.

Not so with the Vindicator and the alliance stance.

 

So, here is one ideathat you might want to consider:

"Weaving Alliance skills"

What does this mean? Each red skill gets an additional effect, depending on which blue skill you used before.
Then it flips over, you use the blue skill get a "perperation buff" depending on the skill, use a "red skill" and get additional effects.

 

Sounds complicated, I know, so I give you an example:
You use the blue healing skill. Now the red chagre skill gives you also alacrity. You use the blue dodge back skill afterwards, now your red stun break applies superspeed and so on.
 

If every skill gets the same bonus effect or if every oneis different is a whole other thing, but that is the base idea.

The spec would be meant to be played, by using one legend side as a "set up" and the other as a "pay out".

This would go perfectly with the traits, which now could also focus on this utilitiy weaving.

For example this "setting up" could now buff, heal or damage and you could veen bring the dodge into the play.

Critical hits could also aplly a "preperation proc", which would tie in with the pdps spec, maybe reducing the energy costs or things like that.

 

Overall this would add a certain gameplay feel to the rev, that is not yet present and be engaging and interessting.

If done right, it could even allow to "camp" the allaiance stance for longer times, so players do not have to focus that much on swapping legends, but on chaining their utilities, which would help with the "playing the UI not the Game" side of thing.

[Sagarsdude.3209]

3 minutes ago, Loboling.5293 said:

I still would prefer if the dodge mechanic wasn't changed, but instead you got an f2 ability (scrap the current one) that activates the special dodge ability. So they can maintain regular dodging, or use up their endurance on their f2 ability for a more impactful dodge. This way the f2 is useful for all legends, and the spec doesn't feel as clunky. (Especially once the flip-over skills share separate cooldowns) 

 

My suggestion is that they should move the dodge mechanic to the elite, and give the Archemorus side the dodge + the top gm trait and the St Victor side the dodge + bottom GM trait. Scrap the current elites because I really do not see any value in them, and the urn being able to down you is a yikes. The elite should be IMPACTFUL and I think the current dodge mechanic has a place there.

[Loules.8601]

1 hour ago, Obtena.7952 said:

3. I disagree with your GS assessment. GS is just a sword replication and that's really not 'fine' ... it should be changed, to something else that differentiates it from Sword. 

100 times “yes” - too much “placeholder” type of skills (except GS-5)

[Barraind.7324]

12 minutes ago, TheGrimm.5624 said:

Wouldn't the Spear Elite make more sense to apply a long chill over torment?

 

Why yes, yes it absolutely would. 

[Kidel.2057]

I don't agree with people asking to remove the new dodge entirely (or make it another skill....). PvP is showing us that a dodge similar to Saint's Shield works perfectly fine. 

It's also unreasonable to ask to separate the 2 legends and make them 2 separate kits or make f2 swap them (a second swap? Wtf). Removes all the flavour from the spec.

Anet is already super stubborn with reasonable changes, so let's try not to be unreasonable and thrash all the flavour and design. 

There are many ways to fix Alliance without making them yet another legend swap. F2 (or better F3) could simply reset the loadout to Archemorous (or Saint Viktor if traited to do so). Or can "freeze" the current loadout (this is actually better and will allow some customization on Rev for the very first time, and on the fly based on the situation, even midfight!!).

It's a smart way to turn a terrible design into something truly great for the profession. Let's push it. 

Edited September 22, 2021 by Kidel.2057

[MIkoToriSU.7451]

I main a rev, and from my experience playing this new elite spec there are a couple things I would like to see changed.

 

First, I dislike how the elite spec utilities swap. I would much rather have the option to put them separately as legends. This could be done by either putting them in the legend selection area. Or by having the F skills be used to choose which version you enter.  The only issue with having the F skill be used for this manner is if you are in an original legend the F skill is useless and would need to have some other special modifiers.

 

Secondly, the utility skills should put a focus the same energy mechanic that the rest of the legends use and have no or limited cooldown with the exception being the elite skill. The elite skill for both the kurzic and luxon utilities are lackluster. The luxon elite does not do nearly enough damage to make it feel worthwhile. It could use a massive dps increase at the cost of large energy use. Or  moderate energy use with a cooldown. In addition the elite spec as a whole feels more aligned with power damage, having the torment be on the elite skill just feels out of place. The Kurzic elite utility has potential however I feel that its health degeneration mechanic along with not being able to heal yourself limits its use too much. It would perform much smoother if it had a time limit for it to be held, and the longer that you hold on to it the more benefit it provides. This would encourage players to maximize its held duration while still having the option to trigger and immediately drop it for a small benefit. The demerit of the Kurzic elite utility is that while holding the urn you are unable to attack or do anything else as is, so it needs to feel more rewarding to use. As it is in its current state, it feels like you are getting punished for using the skill.  However overall, the rest of the utility skills including the heal utilities feel decent and have their specific uses, but they would benefit from more offensive boon support for the team.

 

Thirdly in regards to the dodge mechanic. I actually really like this concept. However I feel it does need some adjustments.  When using the dodge/leap it should still provide the evade/invul status. And since we are only able to essentially only evade 1 time it should have the potential to enable us to be able to dodge out of aoe that a regular dodge would have the capabilities of.  This would mean that either the leap has the same speed and duration of a normal dodge while still being able to  control its direction or by keeping it "slow" and having the evade/invul last longer. As it is now, the dodge mechanic can get interrupted which should not be happening. I really like having the ability to use the traits to impact what the dodge does, and the trait synergy feels rewarding to spec into.

 

Fourthly, If I am forced to choose between sword/sword and greatsword, sword/sword wins out on damage potential on Single Targets. When comparing the two weapon sets on a single target, they both have a gap closer GS3 and S5. Sword 5 does more damage and gives Fury. GS1 and S1 have the same speed according to the tooltip and I feel GS1 wins over S1 here. Between GS2 and S2, S2 does more damage. Now, looking at GS4 (the block) and S3 (the evade). The damage from S3 is constant regardless of the evade on a single target and can be used in all settings. Unfortunately, GS4 damage is reliant on getting blocks which if in pve on a single target wont amount to much. However it is a different story if you look at pvp where you can block and accumulate much more damage than which S3 would give. But coming from a PVE perspective S3 wins easily. Now im going to compare S4 and GS5. Both are high damage AoE attacks. S4 has an immobilize and instant damage. GS5 has a large area of effect but reduced effectiveness per hit done. The biggest drawback here IN PVE is the reduced damage per hit and the large radius of the skill effect where not all hits will even hit the target. I feel that GS5 would benefit from a targeting similar to how Renegade Citadel Bombardment works. Ultimately, because of these effects it cripples greatsword 5's potential damage and puts it behind S4. In PvP GS5 is meh as the player will just dodge out of the area of effect and since each individual hit is so spaced out they probably wont get hit anyways since everyone is constantly moving.

 

When looking at the traits, some feel good and some feel bad. I dont feel much use from the traits in the first column we get to choose from. I actually quite enjoy the Traits in the second and third columns. The only adjustment that I feel would be more fluid would be to make it so that forerunner of death (death drop) affects 10 enemies instead of 5. This would give it more synergy with reavers curse and feel more impactful for its large endurance requirement.

 

Overall, the new revenant spec has potential, and I would love to see it realized.

[Ulysses.2058]

4 minutes ago, Kidel.2057 said:

 Anet is already super stubborn with reasonable changes, so let's try not to be unreasonable and thrash all the flavour and design.

This. We should stick to reasonable demands and changes, in order to make the spec as playable as possible. Otherwise we will get nothing.

[Zikory.6871]

Initial thought from a few hours of WvW group fights (not particularly competitive). Also just thoughts, not hard opinions. 

F2 - Just ideas. Seems fine while in Alliance stance. 
  - F2 still swaps Alliance skills while in another legend. (In a few hours this seemed most preferable for energy management) 
  - F2 cooldown reduced in other legends.
  - F2 does endurance + something while in other legends. (Maybe re work a trait like spirit boon to effect F2).

Mist Unleashed GS 2 - Could use a slight range increase. Like 240 to 300. 
Phantom's Onslaught GS 3 - It doesn't seem to go the full distance without a target. If that's is the case, it being a leap finisher would be nice. 
True Strike GS4 2nd skill - 3/4 -> 1/2 cast. Unsure about counter play atm but it feels really bad.

Battle Dance - This should be instant or at least remove the freeze frame when giving the boons. 

Spear of Archemorus - Needs something more. Maybe Unblockable, Maybe slightly faster cast time, maybe CC. 

Urn of Saint Viktor - I really want to be able to double tap it instead of the cast time. 

Overall the biggest let down (to me) is the lack of CC, which is just what I was hoping for.