Bladesworn WvW Balance (Suggestions)

[Curt.7963]

I've been trying Bladesworn for the first time in WvW over the last few days (about 10 hours) and the changes that need to be made to make it viable are very obvious to me. They're mostly simple number changes since the core functionality feels just fine to me.

Firstly, here's my build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PKABc6d7llySYtMRmLO6W+RXA-zVRYiRD35RQYHSTigGVA9KFU8AA-w

I worked the build to try to compensate as well as possible for the intrinsically weak aspects of Bladesworn.

 

Problem 1: Dragon trigger's functionality. 

This is the bulk of your burst damage, and you can only use skill 3 (the ranged one) in zerg combat. If you're able to get away with using Force (1) or Boost (2) in a zerg, then your team has already won that fight. 

Suggestion: Add an evade to Boost. Add Stability in addition to Protection on the 2nd minor trait in WvW Only. Increase the teleport range on Flicker Step (300? really??).

 

Problem 2: Dragon Trigger is too slow.

You have to put yourself in combat, land hits/weapon swap/and use movement skills to increase your flow generation to set up a Dragon Trigger. This takes an agonizing amount of time where you are utterly useless to your team. When you finally gather enough flow, you HAVE to use the Tactical Reload elite to build charges at a reasonable rate to use Dragon Trigger, and that thing is a full minute CD.

Suggestion: Increase the rate of flow generation, OR allow for some percentage of flow (maybe 50%) to remain passively outside of combat to be able to open with Dragon Trigger. Decrease the time it takes to gain Charges when activating Dragon Trigger. 

 

Problem 3: Dragon Trigger is too weak.

There is very little pay off for the amount of effort you have to go to, to land a Dragon Trigger skill. Tell me why I can land 130k damage in PvE (https://imgur.com/a/0pAn4Fq), but I can barely squeeze out 7k under identical conditions against NPCs in WvW. I've slotted Dragonspike Mine to reset Dragon Trigger, because you HAVE to use it two or more times to have enough damage to down anyone.

Suggestion: Either reduce the time it takes to build Dragon Trigger so it can be used more often, or increase the damage coefficient in WvW by at least 2x.

 

Problem 4: There's no poke in a pirate ship.

A lot of WvW engagements occur at maximum range (just beyond 1200) until one side has a clear advantage. Bladesworn can't even put themself into combat to build flow at 1200 range without using rifle or longbow. Rifle is hot garbage on Bladesworn for anything but ammo synergy (why would you ever use a rifle without Killshot/Gunflame?), and bow is just hot garbage in general. The answer is in Artillery Slash (Gunsaber 3).

Suggestion: Give Artillery Slash a 360 explosion radius in addition to its 900 range, and cause it to explode if it does not hit a target. OR change Artillery Slash to 1200 range. You could also rework Bow with more un-reflectable AoEs and faster projectiles. I see some viability there with Bladesworn.

 

For Bladesworn to be something people want to use in WvW, its burst damage needs to hit harder than a weaver Meteor Shower, or a DH Trueshot, or an Arc Divider, because rooting yourself for that long needs a bigger payoff. I feel like warriors in general are in a rough place in the current meta, but Bladesworn could be really fun to play if it weren't undertuned. If the damage on Dragon Trigger was higher, you could drop Strength for Defense and have a banger WvW build. And if flow generation was a non-issue you could drop Discipline for Defense and also have a banger WvW build. 

 

-With Love from Maguuma ❤️

[Infusion.7149]

It needs to hit harder than Arc Divider when in melee.  Flicker step is 300 range because it's more or less replicating a dodge except with a huge cooldown.

All the problems of charge time without Tactical Reload and missing the ranged attacks has been since beta but nothing has been done about it.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

They could split the base flow generation rate between modes. Current rate for PvE, double up on it for competitive.

[Infusion.7149]

16 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

They could split the base flow generation rate between modes. Current rate for PvE, double up on it for competitive.

From a gameplay point of view I think that increasing the minimum payoff would be better since you would not have a split mechanic. Because it scales as a polynomial , not having a full charge effectively is exponentially worse and the only way around this is having a higher top end number and increasing the base damage to be less pitiful. This is compounded when you run Unyielding Dragon since if you aren't full charging you don't have the might stacks.

To illustrate what I mean:

if the current scaling is 1.16 in PVE minimum value and 20.4 at full charge the competitive value could easily be something akin to 1.2 minimum value with 2.1+ max value instead of the really terrible 0.535 minimum and 1.295 max coefficients it has currently.

This is painful to even think about when you consider that Explosive Thrust (final hit on gunsaber auto) has 1.05  + 0.2 coefficient from explosion totaling 1.25.

Edited January 17, 2023 by Infusion.7149

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

1 hour ago, Infusion.7149 said:

From a gameplay point of view I think that increasing the minimum payoff would be better since you would not have a split mechanic. Because it scales as a polynomial , not having a full charge effectively is exponentially worse and the only way around this is having a higher top end number and increasing the base damage to be less pitiful. This is compounded when you run Unyielding Dragon since if you aren't full charging you don't have the might stacks.

To illustrate what I mean:

if the current scaling is 1.16 in PVE minimum value and 20.4 at full charge the competitive value could easily be something akin to 1.2 minimum value with 2.1+ max value instead of the really terrible 0.535 minimum and 1.295 max coefficients it has currently.

This is painful to even think about when you consider that Explosive Thrust (final hit on gunsaber auto) has 1.05  + 0.2 coefficient from explosion totaling 1.25.

Both should happen tbh.

[Dahkeus.8243]

I mean...the biggest problem that stands out to me on a build like this is that you only have one condition removal and it's from Brawler's Recovery. 
(edit: technically there's soft CC removal from brave stride, but you get what I mean.)

Edited January 18, 2023 by Dahkeus.8243

[Grand Marshal.4098]

28 minutes ago, Dahkeus.8243 said:

I mean...the biggest problem that stands out to me on a build like this is that you only have one condition removal and it's from Brawler's Recovery. 
(edit: technically there's soft CC removal from brave stride, but you get what I mean.)

Food for anything in WvW. Literally. Shoutsworn was alive only due to the extreme number of healing/cleanse skills.

There is a reason no one plays BsW, except for pugs from PvE or players who literally have not played BsW since release. 

[Infusion.7149]

Bladesworn even at release before banner reworks occurred was pretty poor in WvW as the coefficient on Dragon Trigger was always that terrible. To top it off at the time gunsaber had double the PvE cooldowns which I had advocated to be merged between modes. Luckily Arenanet took that suggestion or conjured it up on their own.

As a bladesworn you aren't going to take the spot of a heal firebrand, scrapper (even after the nerfs to sneak gyro), tempest (aura share is strong on its own but also the ability to swap out of combat to meteor siege), spellbreaker (boon rips being the primary reason), herald (which has stability on Inspiring Reinforcement), or vindicator (Inspiring Reinforcement plus Saint's Shield or all the Alliance stunbreak/condi clears). Shout bladesworn didn't bring enough to warrant taking over spellbreaker honestly. Even a superspeed holosmith is more useful if you are talking about DPS since you can superspeed the golems in WvW : it is the antithesis of Bladesworn design since it is made to be highly mobile.

If you need a refresher:
https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/topic/105528-what-do-you-want-for-gunsaber/