Berserker feels waaaaaay too punishing for what it is

[Sarius.9285]

So after the recent buffs, I finally decided to play my favorite build again: A/A Berserker but oh boy.....it's hard. The High APM is fun, but takes some time to get used to after months of Spellbreaker, but seriously, I didn't remember how punishing the Berserk mode was! If you only miss the timing by a tiny amount, or suddenly get stability, you're screwed.

 

If you compare that to Reaper, a spec that also got buffed and deals similar dmg in theory, Berserker feels just way too punishing to be fun anymore. 

 

Do you guys feels a similar way, or do I just need to practice Berserker again?

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

Nah I like the skill demand.

 

I would love it if every balance patch didn't stealth nerf power zerk for pvp though. 

[Sarius.9285]

7 hours ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

Nah I like the skill demand.

that part is fun yea. Just the debuff for messing up once, seems a bit much

[sigmundf.7523]

Kinda punishing but not that much. I only did 33k in few tries with 250ms and unoptimal gear setup, and also dropping berserk mode once. And yea, its not fun of dropping berserk mode because either missing timing by tiny amount, or because of latency, since I am about 220ms slower. 

 

The idea of maintaining berserk mode works well on golem, but no really on real encounter. Boss phase + doing mechanic = most likely to drop berserk mode. I'd rather have berserk mode as a powerful CD to use once every, like maybe 30 seconds,  for maybe 10 seconds and its empowering every weapon skills that berserker can use. With that, which utilities skills that zerk take, and when to use it become more flexible. I prefer using headbutt as opener / hard CC when needed, instead of spamming in off CD for extending berserk mode. But the current berserker should do dps just fine and able to compete with other dps spec in actual battle.

Edited May 7, 2023 by sigmundf.7523

[felix.2386]

15 hours ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

Nah I like the skill demand.

it's not skill demand tho

it is a clunky limitation that goes against boss phases and mechanics in a very unfun way with a hefty punishment

[Sarius.9285]

7 hours ago, sigmundf.7523 said:

only did 33k in few tries with 250ms and unoptimal gear setup, and also dropping berserk mode once.

that was my first impression on the golem as well 

 

7 hours ago, sigmundf.7523 said:

The idea of maintaining berserk mode works well on golem, but no really on real encounter. Boss phase + doing mechanic = most likely to drop berserk mode. I'd rather have berserk mode as a powerful CD to use once every, like maybe 30 seconds,  for maybe 10 seconds and its empowering every weapon skills that berserker can use.

yea that would feel a lot better in actual encounters I think. Cause the reality is that there's almost no encounter where you can keep the berserk mode up 10p% of the time.

 

But your suggestion sounds pretty cool tbh

[Infusion.7149]

I prefer spellbreaker since it is less linear in gameplay compared to power berserker (and rips boons). If playing berserker then I opt for condi since it can have a ranged weapon. However, I have seen people do 36K or something on axe-only benchmark these days.

 

Edited May 7, 2023 by Infusion.7149

[the krytan assassin.9235]

I think there are 2 main problems considering berserker. 

1. Non dps output & reliability of dps output is insufficiently taken into account when determining the power budget of a class. Spb, Cmech, virtuoso, Reaper, scourge and vindi dominate the strike/raid scene atm. Currently the difference in potential dps output between these builds and the relatively selfish/cc lacking/hard rotation/melee builds is somewhere between 0-10% dps difference. For selfish/hard rota/melee/condi to be a viable alternative the dps output difference should be around 15-25% depending on the amount of utility/reliability of the build. Aslong as this isn't the case the only place where you'll find real usage for builds like berserker are target dummy bosses such as MO. 

 

2. The awkward placement of quickness in the warrior traitline. With discipline being standard traitline for berserker and the major master traits not offering any good dps traits the cost of adding in extra quickness into the build is basically only the cost of a couple utility skills. So in order to balance the Qbers dps output these utility skills need to be extremely important for the functioning and overall dps output of the class (hence the importance of berserk increase duration and the big dps loss whenever leaving berserk). With banner of tactics+doubled standards already yielding 50% quick uptime the double quick berserker is probably going to be the highest Qdps by far which is kinda ironic since Anet made quite some effort to nuke all the high dps boonsupports last patch. Putting quickness in the berserker traitline (or any other Espec) would've made way more sense and would open up the possibility for other interesting build designs with alac. 

[Shagie.7612]

zerk being non-extendable is exactly how it was prior to the rework back in 2019 lol

[eXruina.4956]

since they're restricting berserker's peak performance behind berserk mode duration,

 

then berserker should by all means be pushing much higher numbers when in berserk mode relative to other dps,

 

and not just put out the same numbers as other dps that have no restrictions.

 

other dps should be catching up during berserk mode's down time.

 

but this isn't the case, they're just unnecessarily imposing drawbacks on warrior, and justifying it as gameplay. an example of this is the melee struggle, all the hurdles, yet lack of enablers and no reward.

 

balance should be relative. if there's a drawback there should be a proportional reward, if its unrewarding then its just fluff.

[The Boz.2038]

5 hours ago, eXruina.4956 said:

other dps should be catching up during berserk mode's down time.

If you play optimally,  and boss doesn't do stupid stuff to interrupt your rotation, there is no downtime.

If you don't play optimally, you have massive downtime and massive DPS loss.

[Sarius.9285]

44 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

If you play optimally,

nobody plays 100% optimally.

 

44 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

boss doesn't do stupid stuff to interrupt your rotation

pretty much every encounter has phasing, invuln phases and thus downtime.

[Arewn.2368]

We need tools to manage Berserk mode. 

Not just extend it, but actually manage it.

The ability to exit should be baseline. And Headbutt should cause you to immediately enter Berserk mode, independent from the "Berserk" button's cool down.

It shouldn't be so hit-or-miss to maintain a state that the specs dps is entirely dependant on.

[felix.2386]

10 hours ago, Arewn.2368 said:

We need tools to manage Berserk mode. 

Not just extend it, but actually manage it.

The ability to exit should be baseline. And Headbutt should cause you to immediately enter Berserk mode, independent from the "Berserk" button's cool down.

It shouldn't be so hit-or-miss to maintain a state that the specs dps is entirely dependant on.

brooo, headbutt reset berserk would actually be amazing

Edited May 9, 2023 by felix.2386

[Arewn.2368]

17 hours ago, felix.2386 said:

brooo, headbutt reset berserk would actually be amazing

There is someone on these forums that really hates that idea for some reason.

Pretty sure it's the same person, but there's always a single confused face on my post whenever I suggest adding Berserk mode from Heabutt the past few months.

They have never replied to explain what they don't like about the idea though.

 

I think it's a pretty reasonable effect to have on an elite, and a sorely needed tool for Berserker's kit 

Edited May 9, 2023 by Arewn.2368

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

3 hours ago, Arewn.2368 said:

There is someone on these forums that really hates that idea for some reason.

Pretty sure it's the same person, but there's always a single confused face on my post whenever I suggest adding Berserk mode from Heabutt the past few months.

They have never replied to explain what they don't like about the idea though.

 

I think it's a pretty reasonable effect to have on an elite, and a sorely needed tool for Berserker's kit 

If Shadow Meld can remove Revealed, then Headbutt can refresh Berserk Mode

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

6 hours ago, Arewn.2368 said:

There is someone on these forums that really hates that idea for some reason.

Pretty sure it's the same person, but there's always a single confused face on my post whenever I suggest adding Berserk mode from Heabutt the past few months.

They have never replied to explain what they don't like about the idea though.

 

I think it's a pretty reasonable effect to have on an elite, and a sorely needed tool for Berserker's kit 

 

Ignore it. There's lost redditors wandering the forums that dislike everything but don't have their own ideas. Reactions don't matter. 

[eXruina.4956]

8 hours ago, Arewn.2368 said:

There is someone on these forums that really hates that idea for some reason.

Pretty sure it's the same person, but there's always a single confused face on my post whenever I suggest adding Berserk mode from Heabutt the past few months.

They have never replied to explain what they don't like about the idea though.

 

I think it's a pretty reasonable effect to have on an elite, and a sorely needed tool for Berserker's kit 

you have a confused emoji stalker too! welcome to the club. 😁

[Crystal Paladin.3871]

On 5/7/2023 at 2:43 PM, sigmundf.7523 said:

Kinda punishing but not that much. I only did 33k in few tries with 250ms and unoptimal gear setup, and also dropping berserk mode once. And yea, its not fun of dropping berserk mode because either missing timing by tiny amount, or because of latency, since I am about 220ms slower. 

Should I use 16 +5 might infusions to get 42k? ... I did watch a berserker 42k benchmark video and slowed down the video playback to notice his first 2-3 seconds burst reaching 42k in his dps meter but my first 2-3 secs doesn't go beyond 32k.... Or it's unachievable on 250~300 ping?

Does fully optimized gear let us reach 42k? Also does stability boon affect the result as well?

Edited May 10, 2023 by Crystal Paladin.3871

[Katary.7096]

8 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

If Shadow Meld can remove Revealed, then Headbutt can refresh Berserk Mode

That is a valid point, we really should see-
February 14, 2023 Update: This skill no longer removes revealed in PvP and WvW.
...
We can't have nice things, can we?

On a more serious note: In the long run there have to be changes to how Berserk mode is managed. The fact that Berserker DPS builds load up their bar with rage skills because all of them have a secondary effect of "more berserk time" attached to them is functionally very similar to boon support builds that have to spam wells, facets, spirits or banners to provide a key boon and apparently that is supposed to change in the future.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

2 hours ago, Katary.7096 said:

On a more serious note: In the long run there have to be changes to how Berserk mode is managed. The fact that Berserker DPS builds load up their bar with rage skills because all of them have a secondary effect of "more berserk time" attached to them is functionally very similar to boon support builds that have to spam wells, facets, spirits or banners to provide a key boon and apparently that is supposed to change in the future.

Except the more successful supports don't have to spam their skills off of CD. Anet has realized that though, so we'll see some changes in June.

[Katary.7096]

On 5/10/2023 at 1:25 PM, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Except the more successful supports don't have to spam their skills off of CD. Anet has realized that though, so we'll see some changes in June.

I'm willing to bet that "not having to spam skills on CD" is one of the reasons why these particular support builds are more successful. Which is why I'd like to see something similar applied to Berserker.

[sigmundf.7523]

On 5/10/2023 at 1:09 PM, Crystal Paladin.3871 said:

Should I use 16 +5 might infusions to get 42k? ... I did watch a berserker 42k benchmark video and slowed down the video playback to notice his first 2-3 seconds burst reaching 42k in his dps meter but my first 2-3 secs doesn't go beyond 32k.... Or it's unachievable on 250~300 ping?

Does fully optimized gear let us reach 42k? Also does stability boon affect the result as well?

Infusion surely does affect dps but not that high. Latency as well, because slower skill activation / weapon swap, even if its at 0,25-0,3 second slower, it accumulates overtime and resulting in lower dps, and potentially dropping berserk mode. 

I don't know if its unachieveable with 250-300 ping even with fully optimized gear, but from information that I tried gathered, one of the gimmick in zerk rotation is to weapon stow when using f1 greatsword. I didn't do that and don't know how to do it properly. Maybe someone with similar ping, optimized gear, and know how to weapon stow at f1 greatsword properly able to achieve such numbers.

Also, the benchmark dps video fully retain berserk mode, while I was dropping it once, so most likely thats the cause for me to only deal 33k.

[Myror.7521]

@sigmundf.7523 The thing with Berserker is .... on video is seems to be somewhat ezy but you need to time weapon stow on GS but also on axe If im right. If you dont doing that your DPS will drop from 42k Bench to Something Like 35k. Which is where i am imo so all I need to Deal with is Just weaponstow Timing xD 

Edited May 13, 2023 by Myror.7521