How would you rate Bladesworn during this beta?

[Kodama.6453]

2 minutes ago, Mesket.5728 said:

You are describing a design flaw. You don't make something to work sooo different in-between modes. One thing is a value tweak, another is to completely change how you should do it. It is no longer a matter of strategy. People should stop thinking the devs are some kind of design gods we should interpretate. They made mistakes. A lot actually. And this is one of them. This class didn't have enough thought and it is obvious. ANET dropped the ball here.

I am fully aware that it is a design flaw, since it is so highly counter-intuitive that a spec works so majorly different in the game modes. Especially with how the spec was advertised, I completely understand that people were expecting to have to sit through the channel in PvP as well. And I am far from considering Anet some design gods, I am personally criticizing them alot for how they handled scrapper back then at HoT release and am in constant fear of them wanting to release another AI based elite spec for engineer.

My point is not that this design is perfect, but that it is functionally not as bad as people make it out to be. I think this spec can function decently well in PvP, but it requires a completely different approach than in PvE, which, as pointed out already, is counter-intuitive and a design flaw on it's own. But I prefer a counter-intuitive spec which still works if some thought is put into the approach over a spec which is dysfunctional entirely.

[Geoff Fey.1035]

8 minutes ago, Mesket.5728 said:

This class didn't have enough thought and it is obvious. ANET dropped the ball here.

I've been pondering a lot about this and Bladesworn appears to be more an Elite/Champ/Legendary killer rather than (I use these classifications loosely) the  Brawler (Core), Spiker (Berserker), and Duelist (Spellbreaker).

The foundation is there, its just not executed to a way that fully fits into the needs of PvE vs. PvP/WvW. Especially the traits which definitely need a hard revamp

• Adept Traits (Flow Focus)- 1 & 2 are good, although I'd argue trait 2 should have a stacking effect on movement skill. Trait 3 is very ho-hum as Bladesworn is not exactly a weapon-swapping dynamo like the other Warrior Specs and could use a rework. Perhaps generate Flow on hit? 
• Major Traits (Ammo Focus) - Lush Forests. The other 2 aren't even worth using because Lush Forests is just so powerful and synergizes with the mindset of the spec (Ammo Spam). Fierce as Fire needs to be wholly revamped (ideally to allow condi spec; burning on explosion?) and Unshakeable Mountain just doesn't give you enough barrier for it to be worth it vs. Lush Forests. In all honesty, without revamping the CD across the entire Bladesworn Spec, there's no point to using anything except Lush Forests.
• Master Traits (Dragon Trigger Focus) - All 3 are decent and have their uses in different content (1 for Sustain, 2 for CC/Ensure you Hit, 3 to Chain-Bursts). That said, the Flow/Charge mechanic itself is the issue, not necessarily these traits. If anything, one of these should also cause Burning to synergize with a condi spec (perhaps 1 stack burning for each charge?)

[Mesket.5728]

11 minutes ago, Kodama.6453 said:

I am fully aware that it is a design flaw, since it is so highly counter-intuitive that a spec works so majorly different in the game modes. Especially with how the spec was advertised, I completely understand that people were expecting to have to sit through the channel in PvP as well. And I am far from considering Anet some design gods, I am personally criticizing them alot for how they handled scrapper back then at HoT release and am in constant fear of them wanting to release another AI based elite spec for engineer.

My point is not that this design is perfect, but that it is functionally not as bad as people make it out to be. I think this spec can function decently well in PvP, but it requires a completely different approach than in PvE, which, as pointed out already, is counter-intuitive and a design flaw on it's own. But I prefer a counter-intuitive spec which still works if some thought is put into the approach over a spec which is dysfunctional entirely.

It seems we agree then. I didn't meant to target you personally but it is a feeling I get reading some comments.

I understand how players are driven to find new and better ways of using the spec but at this very point the spec should work on its own trails. We will have time to improve it with strategy and theory-crafting but we shouldn't justify the spec by doing so now.

[draxynnic.3719]

6 hours ago, Kodama.6453 said:

I get the feeling that people are using it not correctly in PvP, tho. 

Anet told us that they adjusted the scaling to not be exponential in PvP like it is in PvE and that it scales faster with the first charges and then falls off. It seems the intention is to not commit to a full charge, but using several small charges in a row with the trait which lets you reenter dragon trigger over and over as long as you have flow.

Might be counterintuitive for people, since it is exactly the opposite of what you want to do in PvE, so it needs to be communicated well that this skill functions entirely different in both game modes. But I think it might not perform so badly once people realise that you don't have to make yourself a sitting duck for 5 seconds.

Yeah, I suspect you might be right there, although we'd need to see the full breakdown to be sure. However, even then, it's still a pretty small payoff for building up a resource, switching into a specific weapon, being all but helpless for a few seconds, then being locked into that weapon. To put some numbers to it, DS:Force goes from a coefficient of about 1 to a coefficient of about 2.5. Greatsword burst off a spellbreaker is about 2. So if it's linear, you need to go through two thirds of the channel - about 3 seconds - to get the same damage. Which, I think, is why people are saying you need Unyielding - the only way you could possibly justify that is when the end result is a stun in addition to non-negligible damage. Even then, though, at best it's going to have a big CC ME NOW sign on its back. Two counts of aegis only go so far.

[Raolin Soulherder.3195]

On 9/30/2021 at 6:33 AM, Kodama.6453 said:

I get the feeling that people are using it not correctly in PvP, tho. 

Anet told us that they adjusted the scaling to not be exponential in PvP like it is in PvE and that it scales faster with the first charges and then falls off. It seems the intention is to not commit to a full charge, but using several small charges in a row with the trait which lets you reenter dragon trigger over and over as long as you have flow.

Might be counterintuitive for people, since it is exactly the opposite of what you want to do in PvE, so it needs to be communicated well that this skill functions entirely different in both game modes. But I think it might not perform so badly once people realise that you don't have to make yourself a sitting duck for 5 seconds.

I don’t think it’s great design to practically mandate certain traits.
 

and if you are forced to take Daring Dragon, now you can’t take Unyielding Dragon, so opponents have even more ways to completely mitigate your damage down to zero. 
 

They’d be able to blind or block you in a myriad of ways, plus what they can already do:

-LOS you

-dodge you

-stroll out of range

-abuse minor elevation differences to cause complete misses. 
-CC to interrupt your charge

 

they have all those mitigations, & the mini-charge doesn’t really do much more damage than 5s of autoattacks. 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

19 minutes ago, Raolin Soulherder.3195 said:

I don’t think it’s great design to practically mandate certain traits.
 

and if you are forced to take Daring Dragon, now you can’t take Unyielding Dragon, so opponents have even more ways to completely mitigate your damage down to zero. 
 

They’d be able to blind or block you in a myriad of ways, plus what they can already do:

-LOS you

-dodge you

-stroll out of range

-abuse minor elevation differences to cause complete misses. 
-CC to interrupt your charge

 

they have all those mitigations, & the mini-charge doesn’t really do much more damage than 5s of autoattacks. 

5s of AA would do more damage.

[Salvatore.3749]

Yo, I felt like this Espec's PvP ability was just forgotten about when they made the espec. Did anyone else feel that way?

I don't even play warrior much, like I recently started Spellbreaker in sPvP for fun and ended up liking it, but the Bladesworn just left a bad taste in my mouth when I tried it in PvP. It actually worries me about the remaining EoD specializations since the Bladesworn couldn't synergize with a general warrior build. No bursts and no ability to remove boons on burst. I tried the little bullet dragon triggers and it didn't work. Compared to Core Warrior and Spellbreaker, it just didn't feel like a warrior, but like Engineer with 1 kit and no tool belt trying to be a warrior. 

[Gorem.8104]

On 10/1/2021 at 12:20 AM, Geoff Fey.1035 said:

I've been pondering a lot about this and Bladesworn appears to be more an Elite/Champ/Legendary killer rather than (I use these classifications loosely) the  Brawler (Core), Spiker (Berserker), and Duelist (Spellbreaker).

The foundation is there, its just not executed to a way that fully fits into the needs of PvE vs. PvP/WvW. Especially the traits which definitely need a hard revamp

• Adept Traits (Flow Focus)- 1 & 2 are good, although I'd argue trait 2 should have a stacking effect on movement skill. Trait 3 is very ho-hum as Bladesworn is not exactly a weapon-swapping dynamo like the other Warrior Specs and could use a rework. Perhaps generate Flow on hit? 
• Major Traits (Ammo Focus) - Lush Forests. The other 2 aren't even worth using because Lush Forests is just so powerful and synergizes with the mindset of the spec (Ammo Spam). Fierce as Fire needs to be wholly revamped (ideally to allow condi spec; burning on explosion?) and Unshakeable Mountain just doesn't give you enough barrier for it to be worth it vs. Lush Forests. In all honesty, without revamping the CD across the entire Bladesworn Spec, there's no point to using anything except Lush Forests.
• Master Traits (Dragon Trigger Focus) - All 3 are decent and have their uses in different content (1 for Sustain, 2 for CC/Ensure you Hit, 3 to Chain-Bursts). That said, the Flow/Charge mechanic itself is the issue, not necessarily these traits. If anything, one of these should also cause Burning to synergize with a condi spec (perhaps 1 stack burning for each charge?)

 

It does appear to be, only issue is if those pve denizens have the ability to cc you. As any form of CC almost breaks you out of DT, removing every charge and not giving you flow back, its incredibly annoying to use this in pve. 

 

Its like, sure, we might not be able to die, and we can take stronger things now, we just spend large portions of the fight, sitting there, unable to move, not hitting anything, boringly sitting there, waiting, oh cool now we can attack. 

 

Its just funny how this specs ability is "flow" and yet it has the least flow of all warrior specs. Seriously, please Anet, give DT some CC immunity. 

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

On 9/30/2021 at 5:33 AM, Kodama.6453 said:

I get the feeling that people are using it not correctly in PvP, tho. 

Anet told us that they adjusted the scaling to not be exponential in PvP like it is in PvE and that it scales faster with the first charges and then falls off. It seems the intention is to not commit to a full charge, but using several small charges in a row with the trait which lets you reenter dragon trigger over and over as long as you have flow.

Might be counterintuitive for people, since it is exactly the opposite of what you want to do in PvE, so it needs to be communicated well that this skill functions entirely different in both game modes. But I think it might not perform so badly once people realise that you don't have to make yourself a sitting duck for 5 seconds.

While you're right on one level, ie it's not realistic to try to fully charge DT in competitive modes, the problem is that DT is just too inherently clunky and slow.  Its design will ALWAYS make it a liability in competitive play.  There are ways you can make it less clunky and more viable, but only to an extent.  Consider the following:

 

Arcing Slice:  Press F1 (assume 1/8th second for a key press) +1/2s cast time  = 0.625s

Dragon Slice-Force:  F2 (1/8s) + [at least 1/2s to charge 1 cartridge] + Press 1 (1/8s) + 1/2s cast time = 1.25s minimum (i.e., you could charge longer)....all while being rooted in place.

 

In a game where most actions/skills are measured in 1/4s increments, the extra 0.6s to pull off DS-F is a big deal.  Especially when you consider that the current damage on DS-F is so low....you could currently get more than double the damage on Arcing Slice for about 1/2 the activation time.  The only way to get any meaningful value out of this burst is to trait Unyielding Dragon to get the unblockable, unblindable CC.

 

Even if you completely eliminated the Dragon Trigger charge time (or allowed charging the cartridges without using them so you could charge a few at a time and then save them for a later burst)--which is probably the best case scenario for improving DT--you still have an extra key press to get off a single underwhelming burst.  Changing the damage would help with this, of course, but you'll never completely remove the "clunky" feeling that stems from having to hit more buttons to get off a single attack.

 

In summary, Dragon Trigger is an inherently clunky mechanic.  Gunsaber would feel and perform so much more smoothly if the Dragon Slice burst skills (1-3) were burst skills directly accessible from the Gunsaber (i.e., bound to F1-F3 keys).  Thus, you'd have a new weapon with a choice of 3 separate burst skills without needing to pass through DT first.

[anbujackson.9564]

I questioned in the feedback and I will also question it here:

 

Why are Adept, Master and Grandmaster just tied to ONE mechanic (flow, last ammo use, dragon trigger)? Is there any other traitline that is so.... fixated? What about diversity? Why is there not a trait for ammo use in every tier for example? Makes no sense. What if I dont want to spam ammo skills? All my master tiers would be worthless (just imagine F2 being always accessable).

Edited October 2, 2021 by anbujackson.9564

[Obtena.7952]

8 minutes ago, anbujackson.9564 said:

I questioned in the feedback and I will also question it here:

 

Why are Adept, Master and Grandmaster just tied to ONE mechanic (flow, last ammo use, dragon trigger)? Is there any other traitline that is so.... fixated? What about diversity? Why is there not a trait for ammo use in every tier for example? Makes no sense. What if I dont want to spam ammo skills? All my master tiers would be worthless (just imagine F2 being always accessable).

Lots of the EoD spec traitlines suffer from this fixation. Vindicator has the same problem on it's Master for example (three ways to do the same thing ... get endurance). Seems to me there is a new design philosophy at play here and yes, it does lower the diversity of options for the spec. I believe there are advantages to this approach ... but they aren't for the player. 

Edited October 2, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[oscuro.9720]

39 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Lots of the EoD spec traitlines suffer from this fixation. Vindicator has the same problem on it's Master for example (three ways to do the same thing ... get endurance). Seems to me there is a new design philosophy at play here and yes, it does lower the diversity of options for the spec. I believe there are advantages to this approach ... but they aren't for the player. 

I don’t think the format is necessarily wrong. I actually quite like the concept of vertical integration of tiers. However, the execution is lackluster imo. It’s very 1 dimensional and leaves the user taking the best trait in each line, rather than encouraging diversity. 
In my opinion, horizontal integration of play styles accompanied with the vertical integration of class function would make a much deeper and richer trait line that has its place in a variety of builds. I wrote up a summary of what this would look like in one of my previous posts if anyone is interested; 

 

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

1 hour ago, oscuro.9720 said:

I don’t think the format is necessarily wrong. I actually quite like the concept of vertical integration of tiers. However, the execution is lackluster imo. It’s very 1 dimensional and leaves the user taking the best trait in each line, rather than encouraging diversity. 
In my opinion, horizontal integration of play styles accompanied with the vertical integration of class function would make a much deeper and richer trait line that has its place in a variety of builds. I wrote up a summary of what this would look like in one of my previous posts if anyone is interested; 

 

I agree, I think horizontal integration makes more sense. You want the traits to be able to harmonize with one another, not compete with one another.

[draxynnic.3719]

4 hours ago, anbujackson.9564 said:

I questioned in the feedback and I will also question it here:

 

Why are Adept, Master and Grandmaster just tied to ONE mechanic (flow, last ammo use, dragon trigger)? Is there any other traitline that is so.... fixated? What about diversity? Why is there not a trait for ammo use in every tier for example? Makes no sense. What if I dont want to spam ammo skills? All my master tiers would be worthless (just imagine F2 being always accessable).

It kinda started with Daredevil's dodges, I think, and developed further with holosmith. I think it's the same general idea of 'we wanted the trait category to be three different ways of interacting with a mechanic' - it makes sense that you'd be choosing one of them rather, than, say, stacking all of the heat-related traits.

 

They do seem to be more prevalent this time around, though, particularly with bladesworn having all three being this type. They're also a bit more blatant - holosmith masters, for instance, are all 'modify this holoforge skill', but it's a little less in-your-face about what it is because they each modify a different skill towards a different function.

[Gorem.8104]

Only issue is the weapon swap trait - no one will take in its current form as you can never proc it, however the heal trait will be active nearly 100% of the time. The reduced CD's one is just the best in the next tree. 

 

So you basically already have 2 trait lines that will always be taken by every Bladesworn alive. Then you have the Grandmaster traits, which don't have an obvious best choice. Unless the bottom path actually gives you an increase in dps there is no point to ever take it in any mode. And the middle will most of the time have no effect against pve mobs and in pvp, you won't be using Bladesworn. At least the top path offers some great sustain in pve. With the heal doing squat in pvp but again, asif Bladesworn in pvp. 

[Zergs.9715]

I really like the concept of it, but it is seriously undercooked. My biggest worry is that elite specs don't come out regularly enough to be stuck with a meme build for +2 years. It needs to keep people interested and occupied far past "OMG I'M ANIME GUY NAO!"

I don't want it removed completely but I think it needs a serious rework.

[Grand Marshal.4098]

3 hours ago, Zergs.9715 said:

I really like the concept of it, but it is seriously undercooked. My biggest worry is that elite specs don't come out regularly enough to be stuck with a meme build for +2 years. It needs to keep people interested and occupied far past "OMG I'M ANIME GUY NAO!"

I don't want it removed completely but I think it needs a serious rework.

We can now cosplay as Kirito from Sword art! 

 

Cause sure as hell, we'll not cosplay as Guts. 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

1 hour ago, Grand Marshal.4098 said:

We can now cosplay as Kirito from Sword art! 

 

Cause sure as hell, we'll not cosplay as Guts. 

Gotta be a Memebeast for that one.

[JTGuevara.9018]

8/10

The only bad thing about Bladesword is really the Dragon Trigger, as pleasing as it looks. You're basically planted there with a giant "CC Here!" sign. Any little soft CC can disable it. Also, nobody in pvp/wvw is going to sit there for 5 seconds and wait for an attack. I would either scrap Dragon Trigger and maybe put all the Dragon Trigger skills as F1, F2, F3 etc bursts or if you are going to keep it, proc stability and punish any CC attempts. Everything else is fine though. Gunsaber, pistol, utilities, spec.

[DemonCrypto.6792]

3/10

I see most of the notes here speak firstly of the dragon trigger and gunsaber so i will speak of the poor pistol.

Personnaly i can't like a spec who does not respect is new weapon, in the trailer it was already obvious the pistol was badly put for this spec. The OH, the semi Gap closer.
in comparison the other weapon spec can stand on their fit on their own(or in good synergy like torch bers), not here , pistol is a close distance weapon, but it shouldn't , a pistol should be  a mid to long distance weapon (to have a reteat or ingage option when gunsaber doesn't work) and quicker than what we already have (rifle is pretty slow).
this weapon need a good amount of love and rework put into it because right now if it stay the same warrior will never have good pistol gameplay.

Edited October 18, 2021 by DemonCrypto.6792

[Multicolorhipster.9751]

5/10, only in PvP

Fun to play, but pretty ineffective. 

 

It had good mobility and decent damage, but the root from dragon trigger was crippling, and it doesn't do enough damage at high charges to ever be worth it. Mostly just took the trait that made dragon slash stun and ignore blocks/blinds to be used instantly as a quick panic button rather than ever letting it reach max charge. 

Like a weaker Full Counter basically.

 

The shout healing nerfs combined with the lack of defense also made Bladesworn a pretty meh healer. You'd probably be better off with Healbreaker because Healbreaker has a lot more utility for your team, even if they can't heal as much.