Support Shield would have been better as a core weapon that other elite specs could use

[Knighthonor.4061]

Right now I only use Staffs since I have no other heal support options in weapon skills unlike most other support classes. Shield could have been that option. Heralds generally run Hammer in WvW for damage or boon spam. 

[Polar.8634]

If you mean you would want shield on your heal vindi, u really don't want it. Shield 5 by rooting you in place is useless in Zerg fight anyways. Try mace axe as second weapon for any support, for might generation(mace 2 + mace 3) and extra cc. Or sword offhand for immob. Even hammer could work for blasts and tagging enemy for sigil effect .

 If they added new core support weapon i would be happy, but no need for core shield .

[draxynnic.3719]

Plus, shield's skill design is pretty overtly Glint-focused. A core weapon should either be themed around a core legend, or have more generalised Mists-themed skills.

[Scoobaniec.9561]

Rev has shield?

[draxynnic.3719]

12 hours ago, Scoobaniec.9561 said:

Rev has shield?

Herald does! Commonly gets used for healing and durability-oriented builds.

[Shao.7236]

Never understood this obsession with Revenant needing more. Existing weapons do a lot and reflect on the concept of being a jack of all trade with an emphasis on specifics for each.

It's not until they started to touch the weapons that everything began to fall apart. Revenant had blocks other than Staff, GS or Shield.. They took it away instead of adjusting it.. Revenant had damage on off-hand with Axe.. People ignored it until the mentality of Dual Swords was in-grained to be power because having conditions automatically means it's a condition weapon even though off-hand sword had conditions anyway.

Revenant initial design at release after beta and weapon swaps added was perfect with it's weapons, people coming from other professions had to ruin it with those ideas because they couldn't wrap their minds around Revenant.

[Knighthonor.4061]

On 4/14/2023 at 2:49 PM, Shao.7236 said:

Never understood this obsession with Revenant needing more. Existing weapons do a lot and reflect on the concept of being a jack of all trade with an emphasis on specifics for each.

It's not until they started to touch the weapons that everything began to fall apart. Revenant had blocks other than Staff, GS or Shield.. They took it away instead of adjusting it.. Revenant had damage on off-hand with Axe.. People ignored it until the mentality of Dual Swords was in-grained to be power because having conditions automatically means it's a condition weapon even though off-hand sword had conditions anyway.

Revenant initial design at release after beta and weapon swaps added was perfect with it's weapons, people coming from other professions had to ruin it with those ideas because they couldn't wrap their minds around Revenant.

at this point, with elite specs, most classes can also do it all. Look at Rangers, Engineers, Necromancers, etc. They all can do it all. But the limited weapons that Revenant has was based on the old model when we couldnt weapon swap. Just like the other non weapon swap classes have small pool of weapons. That was scrapped, and with it, the limited number of weapons should have also been scrapped but wasnt before release. Right now we have weapons themed to a specific legend. 

 

But it takes no consideration for roles. A support Vindicator for example, has only staff for support. a Support Herald only has Shield in one weapon set without a support mainhand. Compared to a Guardian which has support main hand and off hand abilities along side 2hander support weapons.

 

if we wanted a ranged one hander for a feature elite spec, what weapon would go with it from the core? Unless you do it like they did Warrior Off hand Pistol https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bladesworn

 which pretty much is a Ranged weapon with melee ranged skills. Which I am sure isnt what most Revenant players want when they say they want a ranged 1hander weapon...

Edited April 16, 2023 by Knighthonor.4061

[draxynnic.3719]

On 4/15/2023 at 4:49 AM, Shao.7236 said:

Never understood this obsession with Revenant needing more. Existing weapons do a lot and reflect on the concept of being a jack of all trade with an emphasis on specifics for each.

It's not until they started to touch the weapons that everything began to fall apart. Revenant had blocks other than Staff, GS or Shield.. They took it away instead of adjusting it.. Revenant had damage on off-hand with Axe.. People ignored it until the mentality of Dual Swords was in-grained to be power because having conditions automatically means it's a condition weapon even though off-hand sword had conditions anyway.

Revenant initial design at release after beta and weapon swaps added was perfect with it's weapons, people coming from other professions had to ruin it with those ideas because they couldn't wrap their minds around Revenant.

So you think it's fine that condition revenants don't have another condition weapon to swap to, or a condition ranged weapon, unless they're playing renegade?

Revenant has the core weapons it has because it was designed around having no weaponswap, so weaponsets didn't have to complement one another. Turned out they didn't design the weapons well for a non-weaponswap profession, so they had to introduce swapping, but apart from some tweaks to skills, the weapons are the same. We got trident, we really should get a ranged condition weapon as well.

I'm sceptical about the OP's specific suggestion, but rev does need at least one additional weapon or a rework of hammer into more of a hybrid weapon rather than pure power.

[phokus.8934]

Rev is missing another core one-handed weapon.  But that ship has long sailed.

Hammer to work like underwater weapons and do different things based on the active legend would be fun, I suppose.

[Shao.7236]

20 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

So you think it's fine that condition revenants don't have another condition weapon to swap to, or a condition ranged weapon, unless they're playing renegade?

Revenant has the core weapons it has because it was designed around having no weaponswap, so weaponsets didn't have to complement one another. Turned out they didn't design the weapons well for a non-weaponswap profession, so they had to introduce swapping, but apart from some tweaks to skills, the weapons are the same. We got trident, we really should get a ranged condition weapon as well.

I'm sceptical about the OP's specific suggestion, but rev does need at least one additional weapon or a rework of hammer into more of a hybrid weapon rather than pure power.

Revenant plays great as an Hybrid, Hammer while not a condition weapon at first glance provides good tools for Condition Revenant to be good from a PvP stance. Sounds crazy I know but other than Mallyx being extremely weak to poison, the amount of things you can pull off using Mace/Axe + Hammer is extremely underrated and it's quite a shame that using Mallyx with Shiro is a bad combination because Conditions can't be dealt as well as before.

[draxynnic.3719]

4 hours ago, Shao.7236 said:

Revenant plays great as an Hybrid, Hammer while not a condition weapon at first glance provides good tools for Condition Revenant to be good from a PvP stance. Sounds crazy I know but other than Mallyx being extremely weak to poison, the amount of things you can pull off using Mace/Axe + Hammer is extremely underrated and it's quite a shame that using Mallyx with Shiro is a bad combination because Conditions can't be dealt as well as before.

Yeah, that's basically the same as saying that sword works for condition revenant from a PvP stance (mobility, evade frames, can be combined with shield for your defensive set if you're a herald, some chill to proc some token additional Torment) or, for that matter, staff (CC, block, healing). They all 'work' in the sense that they're power weapons that provide no significant contribution to condition damage themselves, but power damage is never zero, and that when combined with Embrace the Darkness you can be pulsing Torment while using those defensive or control skills.

Every non-renegade revenant is still in a situation where if they want to run condis, they're either running mace on both sets, or they have to accept that their second set isn't making much contribution to their condition damage. In a PvP scenario, that might be desirable, just like there are condi mesmers that take sword even though they have staff and scepter. But that should be a decision you make because you want that defence or other utility, not just because the alternative is mace on both sets. 

Edited April 17, 2023 by draxynnic.3719

[Batalix.2873]

I'm gonna disagree on the grounds that Rev's core fantasy is mist-jumping, either by throwing oneself through the mists, or their weapon, or otherwise summoning big things from the mists.

 

Half of shield is about rooting and hibernation, and I like it too much as a unique ability in juxtaposition to Rev's other weapons to want to rework it into something more "core".

 

In general I don't know how to address this because Rev has so few core weapons and each is highly niche. It could arguably use another condi weapon, another support weapon, another ranged weapon. And yet each weapon has so much personality I would hate to dilute that without adding corresponding legends that match the weightiness and distinctiveness of the core four. But maybe after the choice that was Vindicator, maybe that's what the profession needs to make Archy/Vikky feel less...duplicative.

 

So Iunno, maybe. Maybe what we need is core Legendary Vizier with a scepter/focus and kinda Orrian water magic theme. And core Legendary Zinnsation with a rifle that can summon little golems as ranged power damage. Iunno, the whole thing feels arbitrary though that a Zinn or Asgeir would be core but Kalla would be an espec. They really shot themselves in the foot with Vikky/Archy.

 

[draxynnic.3719]

I don't think it's a given that a new core weapon would HAVE to be linked to a legend. Spear exists. Trident exists. The entire Invocation traitline exists. There's already precedent for revenant to have some ability to manipulate the Mists that isn't directly reliant on a legend (even if it might be influenced by channelling a legend, as with trident), so a weapon could simply be themed around that.

If ArenaNet really wanted to go above and beyond, I guess they could do something like Odran and a Legendary Mistwalker stance, but I really wouldn't want a new core weapon to be held hostage to ArenaNet having the willingness and capacity to make a new core legend to go with it.

Edited April 27, 2023 by draxynnic.3719