Hammer still needs work

[Mungrul.9358]

Don't get me wrong, I've come up with a fun, non-discipline solo PvE Hammer build post-patch.

 

But it still feels unfinished.

To get the most out of hammer at the moment on my core build, I've ended up sacrificing Discipline, going for Strength (BTB), Tactics (TTM) & Defense (BBB) instead.

 

I'm sure there's people out there who think I should be running an Elite spec instead of core, but I find this build gives me all of the nice bits of hammer while retaining good sustain through Strength from Mending Might and Vigorous Shouts.

 

Going for SB would lose what little sustain I have, while also sacrificing that third bar of adrenaline. In addition, for the vast majority of solo open world PvE, boon strip is utterly pointless.

Admittedly, it gives me some interesting extras for disables and immobilisation, and Insight seems like a no-brainer for synergy with hammer, but I also get similar but more generally applicable  benefits from the Strength minor traits (except Reckless Dodge; that needs something a little extra to make it pop as it's a bit anaemic at the moment). So I mostly ignore SB.

 

And while I miss out on Fast Hands by dropping Discipline, the rest of the trait line just doesn't synergise that well with hammer.

 

What I am finding is that I'm dishing out a lot of damage very quickly now, and scenarios I would previously struggle in, I can power through a lot more quickly, and I feel more effective and no longer handicapped simply because I'm a Warrior. The added quickness and stability are huge contributors to this.

 

But the loss of decreased skill recharge stings for Fierce Blow and Backbreaker especially, and I find myself waiting for cooldowns a lot more, having to fall back on auto-attack a lot more.

With the loss of Fast Hands, I can't swap to Longbow to take advantage of its combo field potential and the extra skills while I'm waiting on hammer cooldowns. Or rather i could, but the flow wouldn't be as good as it previously was, where I'd use my hammer skills to build up adrenaline, swap to LB, fire off Combustive Shot to create a massive combo field, fire Arcing Arrow at close range for the blast finisher and extra might, then swap back to hammer to Earthshaker into the still present fire field for another blast finisher and even more might.

That combo potential is still there, but because of increased cooldowns on skills and weapon swap, it's nowhere near as close together, and therefore not able to act like the excellent damage spike combo it has been in the past.

 

I don't know, maybe more consistent, single-weapon damage makes up for it?

But I also lose the flexibility of being able to switch frequently between melee and ranged roles, something that I've always liked about playing GW2, where other MMOs would force me to choose between one role or the other.

 

And the elephant in the room, that hammer has faced for a LONG time, is the Defiance Bar / Stability.

I still feel that in scenarios where you're fighting enemies with a Defiance Bar (or Stability), you suddenly lose too much of what makes a hammer interesting. So to compensate, I still think that any control skill that also does damage should deal increased damage to an enemy while its Defiance Bar (or Stability) is active.

Or, at the very least, modify Warrior's Cunning so that it does its extra damage to foes with Defiance Bars and Stability as well as Barrier. That feels like the most natural way to fix this massive hole in Warrior's Control skill mechanics.

 

And maybe take a look at the cooldowns for Fierce Blow and Backbreaker (reducing to 5 secs and 20 secs respectively seems good to me). At the moment, it's all too easy to get locked in to only having auto-attack available, thanks to a combination of still atrocious cooldowns on Warrior utility skills, and the increased cooldowns on all hammer skills except Hammer Shock.

 

I'd like Fast Hands to be baseline, and therefore available to all Warrior  builds, but if I'm honest, it's probably a little too much, and the changes proposed above (expanding Warrior's Cunning to Defiance Bars and Stability and reducing cooldowns on Fierce Blow and Backbreaker) may do enough to finish off fixing Warrior's Hammer for me, at least in a solo OW PvE respect.

They wouldn't bring back the great Hambow synergy of the past, but I think I could adapt to that.

 

My current build, if you're interested:

[&DQIWPwQ3CyWnAKcAqACoAGoAagCtAK0AnACcAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]

 

Gear is all Berserker's, with Eagle Runes, Sigils of Force & Impact on Hammer and Force & Battle on Longbow.

Edit: Forgot utilities: Mending, For Great Justice!, Shake It Off!, Bull's Charge, Signet of Rage

 

Edited November 15, 2022 by Mungrul.9358
UTILITEH

[Shadowpeixera.2918]

Hammer traits seem to synergize really well with each other, but the main issue is that the weapon still lags behind, and it's a heavy investiment for little benefit. I'm starting to believe that it's a weapon that's supposed to be camped ( it's autos are deceptively strong with quickness ), so Discipline does become a bait. But like you said, it's hard to make a non-swap build work ( only Axe/Axe, really ).

I've been trying to make a solo LI Hammer build for ages now, and it's has been an absolute pain. If you go anything but Berserkers, you lose too much damage, if you go Berserkers, your sustain isn't enough, even with VigShouts. I thought about mixing and matching some Healing Power ( but i don't know Warrior coefficients for that stat, and the stat seems weak ), running full Celestial ( which i did, and i didn't like the result, bodyblow doesn't make your condidamage worth it ), or foregoing Ferocity. I thought also about Marauders, but it just doesn't feel good.

Lately i was thinking about trying for Cleric gear with zerker or diviner trinkets, and running Brave Stride instead of PP since i wouldn't use physicals and would use Healing Signet. Other thoughts was to just scrap the whole Strength tree altogether, and live without the quickness, and get another traitline there.

Be as it may, it's a hard weapon to work out. If you go full DPS, the weapon doesn't pay off enough, if you go anything else, the weapon lags behind greatly. Whatever you find out, please let us know, i'm really interested.

Quick Edit:

What about not running Tactics and running Arms for Unsuspecting Foe/Sundering Burst and Burst Mastery? And Opportunist? It might be a huge sacrifice but at the same time, it kinda pigeonholes you into this absolute damage unit. Might be worth taking a look? Specially with the Defiance changes coming, might be a good glasscannon build i guess?

Edited November 15, 2022 by Shadowpeixera.2918

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Hammer has some extra precasts that were added to it since Feb2020. Earthshaker and staggering blow in particular of egregious precast animations. If those were removed, then it would flow much better. 

[Mungrul.9358]

1 hour ago, Shadowpeixera.2918 said:

What about not running Tactics and running Arms for Unsuspecting Foe/Sundering Burst and Burst Mastery? And Opportunist? It might be a huge sacrifice but at the same time, it kinda pigeonholes you into this absolute damage unit. Might be worth taking a look? Specially with the Defiance changes coming, might be a good glasscannon build i guess?

 

Interesting proposal, but I'm currently building for mostly solo OW, and the support that Tactics gives me currently scales up nicely if I run in to other players.

Your suggestion could be good for Fractals, where there's less worry about self-sustain.

Edit: Also, I am unreasonably fond of the synergy of Leg Specialist and Hammer Shock 😄

And while it needs a bit of buffing, I do enjoy the group utility that Soldier's Focus offers.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Mungrul.9358
Shocking!

[Shadowpeixera.2918]

32 minutes ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

 

Interesting proposal, but I'm currently building for mostly solo OW, and the support that Tactics gives me currently scales up nicely if I run in to other players.

Your suggestion could be good for Fractals, where there's less worry about self-sustain.

Edit: Also, I am unreasonably fond of the synergy of Leg Specialist and Hammer Shock 😄

And while it needs a bit of buffing, I do enjoy the group utility that Soldier's Focus offers.

I don't disagree. I hate sustain-less builds, because i play a lot of open world, but the problem is that Warrior is so prone to just eating mobility-disabling conditions that it feels painful when you need two traitlines to make your weapon work. I do like LS with Hammer Shock, it's good. I just find the lack of sustain besides the shouts to be really weak, like, even with MMR, lately, i found FGJ with VigShout to be weak.

But i'll try that build down the road, see what i think. I might end up just making a Cleric Hammer build ( i always liked that gear stat combo because of Mediguardian back in the day, but i know it's really really bad ) and just play for green numbers while hammering down HERESY.

[Mungrul.9358]

11 minutes ago, Shadowpeixera.2918 said:

I just find the lack of sustain besides the shouts to be really weak, like, even with MMR, lately, i found FGJ with VigShout to be weak.

 

That's where Mending Might helps out ; )

Remember, you'll be dishing out might to yourself and others whenever you burst thanks to Marching Orders / Soldier's Focus, and I'm pretty sure that for the purpose of self-sustain, you count as an "ally" (this seems to be the case for most "affect ally" skills in the game). So you're not just reliant on shouts for sustain.

[Shadowpeixera.2918]

2 hours ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

 

That's where Mending Might helps out ; )

Remember, you'll be dishing out might to yourself and others whenever you burst thanks to Marching Orders / Soldier's Focus, and I'm pretty sure that for the purpose of self-sustain, you count as an "ally" (this seems to be the case for most "affect ally" skills in the game). So you're not just reliant on shouts for sustain.

Are you sure that works? I remember having issues with Tactics exactly because MM doesn't proc on yourself. I think some Warriors run Golemancer/Privateer runes so they can buff the pet and get MM synergy.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

35 minutes ago, Shadowpeixera.2918 said:

Are you sure that works? I remember having issues with Tactics exactly because MM doesn't proc on yourself. I think some Warriors run Golemancer/Privateer runes so they can buff the pet and get MM synergy.

MM procs on yourself; you just don't see any healing numbers unless you've taken damage. Running golemancer, ogre, or privateer gives you double the healing (you plus one other ally).

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

They did a great job reviving hammer. But it does feel like something's missing.

For me, I've begun to think that they need another trait that goes along with CC. So far, I've only come up with getting barrier or to heal every time you CC something.

That's all I got.

[Shadowpeixera.2918]

5 hours ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

They did a great job reviving hammer. But it does feel like something's missing.

For me, I've begun to think that they need another trait that goes along with CC. So far, I've only come up with getting barrier or to heal every time you CC something.

That's all I got.

I still think the issue is sacrificing 3 traitlines to make the weapon work on somewhat of a par with Axe.

But you're right. It just feels wrong.

Anet has done it. They broke our spirits. A worthy weapon, destroyed by our perception. It demands love, yet we have none to give. We are the ones not worthy of it's earth-shattering competence.

I am tainted. I am lost. I can't love back the Hammer that loves me. Maybe i should play Bladesworn.

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

The changes to how fierce blow works on defiant enemies should greatly improve hammer's DPS in PvE (or at least make it more reliable).

 

In competitive, hammer is actually pretty good (and a lot of fun to play!). The thing that really stands out is Backbreaker...it needs a cast time reduction, longer range (like 180), become unblockable, or some combination of those three things (preferably all 3).  It's positively ridiculous that harbinger can float 5 people with a 3s pulsing AoE with 240 radius every 25s while Backbreaker is single target and super slow and telegraphed and on a 20s CD.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

10 minutes ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

The changes to how fierce blow works on defiant enemies should greatly improve hammer's DPS in PvE (or at least make it more reliable).

 

In competitive, hammer is actually pretty good (and a lot of fun to play!). The thing that really stands out is Backbreaker...it needs a cast time reduction, longer range (like 180), become unblockable, or some combination of those three things (preferably all 3).  It's positively ridiculous that harbinger can float 5 people with a 3s pulsing AoE with 240 radius every 25s while Backbreaker is single target and super slow and telegraphed and on a 20s CD.

I say make it an AoE and make the cast time 3/4s.

I'm of the opinion that all 2h melee skills should be between 180 and 240 anyway so /shrug. Wanna be mad? go look at the other classes' 2H weapon ranges that are 'melee' weapons.