Dragonhunter needs buffs - Arken's PoV

[Math.5123]

7 hours ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Why does everyone want to buff deflecting shot its already an aoe unblockable blind+cc+projectile block on a 10s cooldown and you can cast it behind you.

Because you can't hit it vs anyone with half a brain. 

[NorthernRedStar.3054]

7 hours ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Why does everyone want to buff deflecting shot its already an aoe unblockable blind+cc+projectile block on a 10s cooldown and you can cast it behind you.

You weren't there in 2015, were you? The skill is a shallow shadow of what it used to be.

[Dadnir.5038]

We've pretty much known and said what the OP say here for years already... I doubt yet another person stating those facts will change things at this point (especially since trapper DH is no longer a "hot" topic).

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

26 minutes ago, Math.5123 said:

Because you can't hit it vs anyone with half a brain. 

maybe dont try to land it on 1200 range targets

22 minutes ago, NorthernRedStar.3054 said:

You weren't there in 2015, were you? The skill is a shallow shadow of what it used to be.

looking at the patch history i only see buffs except for the feb 2020 pvp patch.

[Tayga.3192]

10 hours ago, Math.5123 said:

Make soaring devastation keep move Speed buff regardless if you use f2. This is the only 25% ms trait that works like this.

While I really like most of your ideas (except for deflecting shot), that's not the only one. See https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Quickening_Thirst. Both of these should provide a permanent movement speed increase imo.

[NorthernRedStar.3054]

1 hour ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

maybe dont try to land it on 1200 range targets

looking at the patch history i only see buffs except for the feb 2020 pvp patch.

It was a superb skill (arguably DH's best skill pre-Feb 2020) ever since it got the unblockable buff (late 2015). The short cast time (but medium projectile speed) made it flexible as a burst setup - or even part of it due to the damage bonus - or defensive tool (disengage). It was one of my favorite skills.

Now it's so slow you're arguably limited to melee range, and it's hardly good at disengaging. One of the reasons DH is so bad w/o Trapper Rune, imo.

At least they implemented the projectile speed buff I (numerous times) suggested for Symbol of Energy back in the day. A criminally underappreciated skill, by the way.

Edited October 22, 2021 by NorthernRedStar.3054

[Math.5123]

2 hours ago, Tayga.3192 said:

While I really like most of your ideas (except for deflecting shot), that's not the only one. See https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Quickening_Thirst. Both of these should provide a permanent movement speed increase imo.

That's not dependant on you not using your skills though. Warriors is also while wielding a melee weapon, so it technically has a trade off too.

[Arken.3725]

Just an idea of how weak I find dh: I'd rather fight two dh's vs one Necro or one Holosmith. 

[Swagg.9236]

On 10/21/2021 at 11:20 PM, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Why does everyone want to buff deflecting shot its already an aoe unblockable blind+cc+projectile block on a 10s cooldown and you can cast it behind you.

Because, like I said, it's the only thing that people CAN do to "make Guardian/DH good" if you remove invisible, PBAoE-Man.  GW2 is not a good game for buffing anything because nothing in GW2 is all that complex or interactive.  The only yield from a GW2 skill buff is either nothing at all (because the buff didn't make the skill effortlessly warp the field) or an oppressive impact on the field (because there aren't very many subtle or universal interactions in GW2, so when one skill or build succeeds, it's almost guaranteed to be at the COMPLETE and UTTER expense of another player's efforts).  Basically, only one person can have fun, and it's going to generally be the person whose build does the most with the least effort (if you can really call that fun--because apparently the GW2 community does).

When people say "it's a shadow of its former self" or "you can't use it to hit anyone with half a brain," they're actually saying that it isn't completely fire-and-forget.  That's what GW2 players want:  fire-and-forget.  I think that people who play this game "seriously" just attribute "skill factor" to a build's "fire-and-forget factors" being mildly restricted to limited-target attacks with cooldowns rather than a PBAoE that can techincally have an infinite duration if the user doesn't lay the latent PBAoE in a different location.

Edited October 25, 2021 by Swagg.9236

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

On 10/20/2021 at 6:46 PM, Arken.3725 said:

AFTER the removal of Trapper Runes.

 

As many of you know me, I'm very reasonable on what I think makes Guardian strong/weak and in my humble opinion, DH is only strong due to Trapper runes.  If these were to be removed, DH wouldn't see the light of day as a viable specialization and many of you know this is true.  There's a reason I pretty much never play dh due to its toxic viability.

 

Let's have a reasonable discussion about this with an objective attitude.  

^ He's right about this you know.

It's been a long time since I've really played DH, so my suggestions may be garbage.

But I'd say that they should get rid of the trap rune, and then emulate partial effects of the trap rune right into DH traits.

Example:

1. Add not a stealth function, but rather a break target function onto one of the DH traits. So each time a trap is a laid, it breaks the enemies target on him. It wouldn't make him as slippery as having trap rune, but it's halfway there.
2. Add another effect onto one of the traits that grants 2s of super speed or w/e when he lays a trap. Not a big deal, DH needs it anyway.
3. Now the DH is free to actually use other rune options.

Maybe this would be a good route to consider.

[Morwath.9817]

4 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

^ He's right about this you know.

It's been a long time since I've really played DH, so my suggestions may be garbage.

But I'd say that they should get rid of the trap rune, and then emulate partial effects of the trap rune right into DH traits.

Example:

1. Add not a stealth function, but rather a break target function onto one of the DH traits. So each time a trap is a laid, it breaks the enemies target on him. It wouldn't make him as slippery as having trap rune, but it's halfway there.
2. Add another effect onto one of the traits that grants 2s of super speed or w/e when he lays a trap. Not a big deal, DH needs it anyway.
3. Now the DH is free to actually use other rune options.

Maybe this would be a good route to consider.

 

Aegis on trap would be much closer to Guardian mechanic than targeting break and probably better, because if you don't disapear then pressing "tab" or simply auto targeting on hiting targets would make it worthless. Aegis at least blocks one attack.

[Ragnar.4257]

2 hours ago, Morwath.9817 said:

 

Aegis on trap would be much closer to Guardian mechanic than targeting break and probably better, because if you don't disapear then pressing "tab" or simply auto targeting on hiting targets would make it worthless. Aegis at least blocks one attack.

Traps don't need fixing, they do what they're supposed to do just fine.

 

The problem DH has is that if you want to kill someone, you have to take berserker amulet with 3x damage trait lines. If you make a more 'balanced' build with, say, marauder amulet and some meditations/shouts, and one sustain traitline like valor/honor, then you'll literally never kill anybody. Necros can afk on node and the game will end before you get them below 50% HP.

 

Trapper Runes allow you to build as stupidly glassy as 11k HP with 3x damage traitlines.

 

If you wanted to retain DH's current power level, while removing the stealth gimmick, then you have two options:

 

One is to continue to force DH to pick berserker amulet + 3x damage traitlines in order to kill, and provide an equivalent level of survivability through some new gimmick attached to traps. Bare in mind that this would allow, say, bunker-DH to leverage this as well, and congrats you've just created a new decap nightmare.

 

A better option, IMO, would be to make DH able to legitimately pick marauder amulet and a defensive traitline without hitting like a wet noodle. Ya know, don't force people once again into a cheesy gimmick? We don't want to replace one build with a full bar of traps, with another build with a full bar of traps. It would be far better if the optimal DH build only had 1 trap on its bar, and balanced out the rest with medis/shouts/spiritweapons.

 

I would remove trapper-runes, and then look at the cast-times on all longbow skills, especially the auto-attack which is just garbage. Fun fact, if you trade 111111 with a necro on staff, the necro easily wins, and necro staff #1 is generally considered to be awful. What. Is. This. Symbol of Energy, reduce the cast time and increase the projectile speed. Hunters Ward, reduce the ward duration from 5s to 3s but also significantly reduce the pre-impact barrage time. Basically, stop the weapon being 100% about landing a cheesy 1-shot TS.

 

Incidentally, longbow has the same issue that hammer has, which is that ALL of the damage is packed into 1 highly telegraphed skill. Which means that the only way to do damage against a player who isn't asleep is to exploit a cheesy gimmick like stealth or teleporting from beyond LoS. The damage needs sharing out a bit so that it isn't all-or-nothing.

Edited October 25, 2021 by Ragnar.4257

[Stand The Wall.6987]

shave off 10 sec from spear and f3 would be a good start. the cd increases from way back when aren't relevant anymore and this is a problem affecting all classes.