Dear CMC: Sword Needs More

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

@Cal Cohen.2358

 

Thank you for the proposed buffs to sword in the upcoming balance patch.  The addition of bleeding to Final Thrust and increased damage on Savage Leap are appreciated.  However, these changes will not be enough to make sword a good weapon.  Not even close.

 

To put it bluntly, sword sucks.  It pretty much only sees play on condiberserker (where it is carried by Flaming Flurry and synergy with torch and not any of Sword's actual kit) and occasionally as a means of mobility.  But as a condi weapon in its own right, it is positively terrible.  For instance, the condi spellbreaker build (using rabid amulet) that became briefly popular a few months ago in PvP used dagger instead of mainhand sword.

 

 That's right. A condi build with 0 added power opted to use an exclusively power weapon because MH sword is so bad.  Let that sink in.

 

MH Sword probably could benefit from significant design changes to make it more functional.  However, there are a few very small changes that could be made to greatly improve sword's effectiveness:

 

1) Flurry: Reduce cast time to 1.5s and increase range to 180. 

Flurry's damage is terrible for the time it takes to complete the cast, and it is difficult to land because of the self root.  These changes would help with these issues.

 

In a perfect world, Flurry would become unrooted and would apply immobilize once per target per interval (not just on the first attack), but I promised you simple changes, and the above proposal would at least make Flurry a B-tier burst skill with a small amount of utility.

 

2.) Savage Leap: Inflicts cripple and 2 stacks of bleeding.

The power increase is nice, but sword is primarily a condi weapon and this skill's current design helps it not at all in this regard.  Adding bleeding (or vulnerability or some other cover condi) would help the skill actually contribute to condi builds beyond simple mobility.

 

3.) Final Thrust: Reduce cast time to 1/2s in addition to your planned changes.

A 3/4s cast makes this very difficult to land, usually requiring a CC or some other set up.  That is too high of a price for 3-6 stacks of bleeding.  Meanwhile, harbinger is spewing 6 stacks of torment on a single skill from 900 range. Even for the 2.0 power coeff on foes <50%, this is steep; consider that Axe 4 is a 2.0 power coeff on 1/2s cast whose damage is not conditional on the enemy's health and it even grants quickness. 

 

Please consider adding these changes to the upcoming patch.  Thank you so much for your consideration and the work you, Roy, and the team are putting in on this!

Edited February 7 by CalmTheStorm.2364

[Yasai.3549]

51 minutes ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

1) Flurry: Reduce cast time to 1.5s and increase range to 180. 

Flurry's damage is terrible for the time it takes to complete the cast, and it is difficult to land because of the self root.  These changes would help with these issues.

 

In a perfect world, Flurry would become unrooted and would apply immobilize once per target per interval (not just on the first attack), but I promised you simple changes, and the above proposal would at least make Flurry a B-tier burst skill with a small amount of utility.

I don't even like Flurry's current functionality and want it changed tbh. 

I'd prefer more if Flurry was like a wild and rapid series of slashes that carries momentum a few 100 units forward in the direction it was cast, destroying projectiles. Primal Burst Flaming Flurry would inherit the same function but instead be a 360 degree wild spin which shoots Fireballs out in all directions, abit like Guardian's GS2. 

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

14 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

I don't even like Flurry's current functionality and want it changed tbh. 

I'd prefer more if Flurry was like a wild and rapid series of slashes that carries momentum a few 100 units forward in the direction it was cast, destroying projectiles. Primal Burst Flaming Flurry would inherit the same function but instead be a 360 degree wild spin which shoots Fireballs out in all directions, abit like Guardian's GS2. 

Yeah I think Flurry could ultimately stand to be reworked completely. But my goal here was to answer "how could we make sword at least decent without completely reworking it?" 

[Yasai.3549]

2 minutes ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

Yeah I think Flurry could ultimately stand to be reworked completely. But my goal here was to answer "how could we make sword at least decent without completely reworking it?" 

 

Savage Leap: Instead of a Leap with track on target, do a leap which just damages enemies it passes through and does a small 'AoE' hit registration check at the end of the leap for the big hit. To do this, all they have to do is look at Reaper Shroud 2, which functions exactly like this.

Most of the time when people use Savage Leap, it's purely to gap close due to how bad it actually hit registers when using it from full leap range. This change should solve the problem.

 

Final Thrust: Yep long cast time is one of the issues, I think there is also a little hit registration issue for the tip of the thrust as well. What'll will absolutely help is to make it have a little more stab hit reg AoE at the tip. 

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

From my point of view:

 

1. Leave Flaming Flurry alone -  I don't want or need another melee "spin to win" move. Current iteration is great for competitive, don't try to fix what ain't broken.
    
2. Regular Flurry does indeed suck - there's too much cast time while rooted for questionable returns on dps front. Self rooting that long for a pure melee skills is setting yourself up for some big punishments and/or big fat whiffs in competitve.
    
3. One simple improvement is giving sword the hammer treatment - make the cooldowns from related trait (blademaster) baseline.
    
4. Short reminder - mainhand sword is not a condi weapon. It's a hybrid weapon. It's true dps shows only on hybrid builds (grieving, viper).

Edited February 7 by ZeftheWicked.3076

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

MH Sword probably could benefit from significant design changes to make it more functional.  However, there are a few very small changes that could be made to greatly improve sword's effectiveness:

I think part of this problem is lack of a decent condition line that isn't just passive stat buffs. Sword could be made better by traitline changes to Arms beyond the mechanical changes below.

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

1) Flurry: Reduce cast time to 1.5s and increase range to 180. 

Flurry's damage is terrible for the time it takes to complete the cast, and it is difficult to land because of the self root.  These changes would help with these issues.

Flurry is terrible. I'd prefer the self-root removed though. We have the animation with Flamming Flurry, so just use it. Sans that change then increasing the range to 180 or 240 and reducing the cast time to 1.5s would work. 

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

In a perfect world, Flurry would become unrooted and would apply immobilize once per target per interval (not just on the first attack), but I promised you simple changes, and the above proposal would at least make Flurry a B-tier burst skill with a small amount of utility.

Yeah, in a perfect world Flurry would be mobile, even at reduced movement speed and inflict 0.25s of immobilize per strike.

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

2.) Savage Leap: Inflicts cripple and 2 stacks of bleeding.

The power increase is nice, but sword is primarily a condi weapon and this skill's current design helps it not at all in this regard.  Adding bleeding (or vulnerability or some other cover condi) would help the skill actually contribute to condi builds beyond simple mobility.

This one may be better addressed through better traitline support. Perhaps Opportunist should be changed to inflict X stacks of bleed or torment for Y seconds when you inflict a movement impairing condition on a target? I'd prefer not a bleed, as warrior needs some form of extra cover conditions. I point to Wounding Precision a lot to resolve this, but this change would affect the final hit of the AA chain, Sword2, Flurry, and Sword4 as well as the cripples/immobs on some other weapons. I like the idea of giving Bladetrail a cover condition.

To keep it from being too overbearing since it would cover multiple skills instead I'd propose instead:

Opportunist: Gain 1 adrenaline and inflict 1 stack of torment for 5s/3s when you inflict a movement impairing condition. No CD. Torment would be better than bleed as it gives MH sword more cover conditions.

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

3.) Final Thrust: Reduce cast time to 1/2s in addition to your planned changes.

A 3/4s cast makes this very difficult to land, usually requiring a CC or some other set up.  That is too high of a price for 3-6 stacks of bleeding.  Meanwhile, harbinger is spewing 6 stacks of torment on a single skill from 900 range. Even for the 2.0 power coeff on foes <50%, this is steep; consider that Axe 4 is a 2.0 power coeff on 1/2s cast whose damage is not conditional on the enemy's health and it even grants quickness. 

There is a mixture of things at play here though. It's not just the cast time, but the range. Warrior uses its 'magic' to enhance its physical prowess, so why can't that affect the range of our attacks? This is the kind of skill that could have 240 range, with a hitbox extending to the sides of the warrior from the force of the thrust. The cast time reduction I'm luck warm on as we have a lot of access to quickness lately, But I'd support increasing the coefficient to reflect how much more difficult the skill is to use, to 2.5 perhaps.

10 hours ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

Please consider adding these changes to the upcoming patch.  Thank you so much for your consideration and the work you, Roy, and the team are putting in on this!

@Cal Cohen.2358, I'm going to second this, please extend our thanks to Roy and the rest for all their hard work. Mainhand and Offhand sword are both really in need of work. The changes to Savage Leap and Final Thrust are welcome, but more really does need to be done. @CalmTheStorm.2364's suggestions above would make MH Sword better. But please also consider changes to the Arms traitline like I mentioned above with Opportunist as an example. Warrior needs those kinds of changes, especially in competitive play, to function at a higher level with a condi build.

Edited February 7 by Lan Deathrider.5910
some more clarity

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

@Cal Cohen.2358

 

The changes to final thrust are great; thank you! It's much more usable now. I especially appreciate the reduced cast time.

 

However, as predicted, MH sword still is weak. Please consider buffing/reworking the rest of sword (OH too, if you can) for the next patch. Lots of good ideas in this thread for your consideration.

[eXruina.4956]

yes please, for the love of god rework flurry, and hopefully rework it into something good, just saying its bad right now is a huge understatement. T^T

[Shinja.3451]

The thing that fails the most about the sword is its burst ability, it is the main source of dps of the weapon as it was to eviscerate in axe, but being the condition version, but there are too many attacks and too much casting time, at this point it would not be strange for him to apply immobilize in each attack due to the other absurd things that are out there, it would be good if each attack will apply 2 hemorrhage for 8s and immobilize for 1/2s, at level one there are 4 attacks, at level 2 there are 5 attacks and at level 3 there are 6 attacks with a casting time of 1s at all levels.

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

14 minutes ago, Shinja.3451 said:

The thing that fails the most about the sword is its burst ability, it is the main source of dps of the weapon as it was to eviscerate in axe, but being the condition version, but there are too many attacks and too much casting time, at this point it would not be strange for him to apply immobilize in each attack due to the other absurd things that are out there, it would be good if each attack will apply 2 hemorrhage for 8s and immobilize for 1/2s, at level one there are 4 attacks, at level 2 there are 5 attacks and at level 3 there are 6 attacks with a casting time of 1s at all levels.

That's a very good idea.

 

I'd still love for flurry to be unrooted, but doing what you propose would be really solid.

 

I'd suggest a 0.45 power coeff per strike (PvP/WvW) so it could still be good on power builds, too.

Edited February 24 by CalmTheStorm.2364

[Mikali.9651]

I personally don't care about the physical dmg component on Sword, I think that its hybrid nature limits it too much. I would rather have it changed to condition damage weapon and balance it from there. 

 

I still think that a no-brainer change here would be that Flurry acts just like Flaming Flurry but inflicting Bleeding instead of Burning - it would Pierce, Block missiles, Range of 900, and the player is moveable. 

extra wish: at this point, I am too used to Burst of Aggression giving Quickness that speeds up Flaming Flurry...my wish would be that Flurry itself gains Quickness for at least 1 1/2 seconds on use instead of just getting reduced cast time as many have requested. 

 

Another change that I see should happen is Savage Leap getting Evade, I mean, the way it is used is so clunky because it is a leap, it is a terrible feel using it in melee range and waiting for its whole animation to end, and at the range, it misses damaging target regularly. With Evade one can start to outplay the enemy. Unrelenting Assault has it, Savage Leap can too.

Have it inflict 2 stacks of bleeding.

Giving it an actual AoE component on hit is IMO something that it should have at this point - I mean look at Leap of Faith.

 

Final Thrust is the interesting one, it had many changes. After so many years it finally got what we all asked for - inflicting bleeding on >50% of health as well. Now, the next change it should get is 1/2 sec cast time and a range of at least 300. 

I mean, even Revenant has Chilling Isolation with 1/2 cast time and 450 range! 

extra wish: Daze on hit, Daze for longer when hitting <50% health enemy. If not Daze so it is not too similar to Disrupting Stab, then Torment or Vulnerability stacks. 

Though, I would like to see 2 seconds of Daze when hitting <50% health enemy - it would really feel like a scary skill that rewards its playstyle - opponent needing to be careful at lower health. 

 

Impale - I like that it is a ranged skill, I just don't like the Rip component of it - I don't like that it stops Torment and Cripple application, pls remove that component, and let it inflict pulsing Torment and Cripple even if one uses Rip.
Also, instead of Rip doing damage, I would rather it inflicts Slow/Weakness/Vulnerability. 

 

Riposte - 2 seconds block. It should work like Ranger's gs Counterattack. On block, it flips to another skill - one that applies 8 stacks of bleeding. 

 

More AoE pls. Impale and Riposte can both be AoE. At least their flip skill. 
 

Arms traitline:

Furious Burst - 5 seconds cooldown. There is no need for 15 seconds cooldown limitation at all. 
Signet Mastery, Opportunist, Unsuspecting Foe, Sundering Burst, Burst Precision, Dual Wielding - IMO all failed traits or traits that should be in other traitlines. 

 

There are so many things you can do with Arms. You can freely redesign every single trait. Let us see what you have in store!

 

 

 

[Shinja.3451]

On 2/26/2023 at 8:29 AM, Mikali.9651 said:

I still think that a no-brainer change here would be that Flurry acts just like Flaming Flurry but inflicting Bleeding instead of Burning - it would Pierce, Block missiles, Range of 900, and the player is moveable. 

extra wish: at this point, I am too used to Burst of Aggression giving Quickness that speeds up Flaming Flurry...my wish would be that Flurry itself gains Quickness for at least 1 1/2 seconds on use instead of just getting reduced cast time as many have requested. 

 

The changes are fine but the Flurry thing doesn't make much sense, even so, anything would be better than this death sentence we currently have.

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

On 2/7/2023 at 12:16 AM, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

"how could we make sword at least decent without completely reworking it?" 

Which is how everyone on this forum should look at class changes. Anet is not going to put extraneous effort to rework something. We'd be lucky with just simple value changes with numbers.

But by all means, people should continue to discuss. It is fun to talk about what if's and what could be's. Just keep a realistic outlook.

[NeverLoseGuy.3894]

Switch sword burst and sword 3 tbh. Sword 3 works well as a burst skill with modifiers depending on adrenaline for an instant attack (like greatsword). Flurry can be a sword 3 skill for soft cc and I guess, a mirror to guardian sword 3 which is also rooted for some reason.

[that baby stealing dingo.7]

I. Ian mentioned incorporating more Torment into the sword, via Arms traits. I agree with this, and any other way of getting a little more Torment in. I state the obvious, but one problem with relying on Bleeding is that 20 stacks may be cleansed as easily as 1. Having more access to a secondary damaging condition (Torment) helps. 

II. Make the default Cripple duration on the Sword auto attack 2 seconds. This would be helpful in general, but more specifically with Leg Specialist. 

III. I honestly don't think it is too much to ask for Final Thrust to be made Unblockable. 

Edited March 3 by that baby stealing dingo.7
Clarification.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

4 hours ago, that baby stealing dingo.7 said:

I. Ian mentioned incorporating more Torment into the sword, via Arms traits. I agree with this, and any other way of getting a little more Torment in. I state the obvious, but one problem with relying on Bleeding is that 20 stacks may be cleansed as easily as 1. Having more access to a secondary damaging condition (Torment) helps. 

This is why I've been pushing for another damaging condition being added to Arms. Confusion on CC would work as well.

4 hours ago, that baby stealing dingo.7 said:

II. Make the default Cripple duration on the Sword auto attack 2 seconds. This would be helpful in general, but more specifically with Leg Specialist. 

That may or may not be too much. Considering the soft CC spam of other classes I'm inclined to say no, but be prepared for the QQ as soon as warrior does anything effectively.

4 hours ago, that baby stealing dingo.7 said:

III. I honestly don't think it is too much to ask for Final Thrust to be made Unblockable. 

It would be too much. Take Signet of Might if you really need the unblockable.