Discipline: Enhancing it's Identity

[Grand Marshal.4098]

Hey everyone, Marshal here and today I was chilling at work when I was scrolling through the latest patch notes to see this: "Double Standards now apply Resolution". Naturally I already knew this since the patch notes came out, but in combination with recent forum talks on warrior and support abilities, it got me thinking. Why so persistently shoehorn Banners in Discipline? What does the traitline offer to the warrior exactly? How does one pick this trait, in a line where inherently, most other picks are associated with DPS increases and personal QoL features?

 

Therefore, I merged most of my past ideas with notes from other talks in the past, here on this sub, to try and salvage something out of this neglected yet overused line.

 

My main line of thought for Discipline on this breakdown and rework is separated among 3 concepts.

 

1) Personal utility

2) Allied support

3) Damage (strike)

 

I aim to construct a Discipline tree which can be utilized by roamers, zerg combatants, support oriented warriors in PvE instanced content, WvW combat and even PvP scenarios.

So here we begin, by addressing the biggest question regarding Discipline; Fast Hands. I won't touch upon this, but needless to say, I am a advocate for its function to be made baseline. Moving on...

 

Minor Traits

 

Before any work on the main traits, the Minor traits require some tinkering.

 

Versatile Rage: "Gain Adrenaline on weapon swap. Grant swiftness to yourself and allies (5 seconds)".

 

Reasoning; The class needs desperately to improve on the QoL part without sacrificing the party-wide potential. Not an intrusive trait to any other line and one not overpowered enough to necessitate a spot in a proper trait. 

 

Fast Hands: If baseline; "Swapping weapons grants you Quickness (3 seconds). If not baseline; "Swapping weapons grants you Quickness (1 second)".

 

Reasoning; The only reason I'd put such a miniscule change between the 2 trait variants is because without baseline FH, the Quickness being the single defining aspect of the trait would allow it to possess a longer duration as opposed to a minor trait with 2 benefits. Discipline has been the place for Quickness in the past, so this change allows for a strong selfish boon which can allow for more rune/sigil without being too strong.

 

Versatile Power: Fine as is, considering adding Fury on weapon swap for 4 seconds.

 

Reasoning; literally no other sources of fury for warrior anywhere else and if someone is willing to slot a traitline it will be Discipline and not Arms. This frees up space for utility slots and runes/sigils.

 

Now we move on to the real meat and potatoes of the discussion. The actual trait changes.

 

Adept Tier

 

The line with the biggest problems, 2 adept traits are terrible and need a full rework while the third is too strong.

 

Crackshot renamed to -> Revitalized Strength: "Swapping weapons restores endurance on allies (15 endurance points). The effect is weaker on the warrior (5 endurance points)".

 

Reasoning; a unique and potent trait to assist allies in combat, similar to the niche use of "To the limit". Endurance recovery is something worth looking at for warrior support builds. It's obviously nerfed on the warrior themselves due to the amount of endurance recovery one can have from MMR combined with Tactics. Furthermore, the effects of current crackshot are to be made fully baseline.

 

Warrior's Sprint: "Movement skills remove Immobilize. Removing debilitating conditions grants Superspeed (2 seconds, stacks duration)".

 

Reasoning; removed the movement speed increase in favor of quicker access to Superspeed as well as due to further trait changes down the line. This is the trait most warrior's will want to use in solo content for movement. You can potentially add an ICD but given the rate at which a warrior may cleanse debilitating conditions, it would require experimentation in all game modes.

 

Vengeful Return renamed to -> Vicious Retaliation: "Deal increased strike damage to enemies within the range threshold (900 range, 7% increased outgoing damage)". 

 

Reasoning; A more simple damage increase trait for an otherwise initialized slot. Makes up for the removal of Warrior's Sprint current damage increase and improves the melee/mid-range encounters for the warrior. 

 

Master Tier

 

Double Standards: as they will be soon, with Resolution cover, party-wide.

 

Destruction of the empowered: "Deal increased outgoing strike damage per boon on you (15% total)". 

 

Reasoning; The exactly opposite of the current trait. A similar trait exists for rangers in the Nature Magic line. So why this change you may ask. Simple, you are in control of your outgoing damage by the numbers of boons on yourself. Relying on enemy boons to deal damage is only applicable in large scale combat of WvW. In smaller scenarios, you are better off with sustain traits and in PvE the enemies hardly get enough boons in the first place. The current trait also clashes with boon removal, which is a priority over direct damage, since with no boons an enemy (player or NPC) becomes less threatening.

 

Brawler's Recovery: as is, good option for any solo build.

 

Grandmaster Tier

 

Axe Mastery renamed to -> Combat Strategies: "Using any combination of 1-handed weapons, your critical strikes give bonus adrenaline. Deal increased critical strike damage with your critical hits (+15% crit damage), more if your enemies have protection (+20% crit damage total)".

 

Reasoning; continuing with the trend of a damage increase part for the line and since Axe Mastery will be bad without the CD redu, might as well make it all encompassing for one handed weapons. Some crit damage reminiscent of Mesmer' superiority complex and you got a good candidate trait for DPS, particularly good for crit capped builds.

 

Burst Mastery: "Your burst skills grant swiftness. Swiftness's effects are increased (50%)".

 

Reasoning; keeping it in line with the current iteration and foregoing the damage on burst skills for the utility of a great swiftness amplification, allowing the warrior to easily maintain nigh-superspeed levels of movement speed. 

 

Heightened Focus: "Swapping weapons grants barrier to you and your allies (9 sec ICD, 4k barrier). You take reduced incoming condition damage while under the effects of barrier (10% reduction)".

 

Reasoning; The culmination of a support grandmaster trait in Discipline. It allows for in-line synergy between weapon swap and allied support via barrier. The barrier itself being present on this skill, banner of defense and warhorn (excluding runes) allows for a more versatile playstyle if needed against conditions. A strong competitor trait, particularly strong for supports.

 

Most numbers and ideas are obviously up for changes. Honestly I wish I could get a bit more creative with the direct strike damage modifiers but I'll have to give it up to you guys for any potential changes in mind. Let me know if you think that the support options I presented in Discipline can work as a supplement to Tactics or potentially as independent options.

 

 

Edited June 22, 2023 by Grand Marshal.4098

[DanAlcedo.3281]

I take anything at this point.

Discipline is in such a bad state.

 

 

[Myror.7521]

This change is btw not that bad for support warr in PvP since in comb with soldiers comfort applying protection it might be able to protect your teammates from 33% condi and power dmg at the same time. But i think it will still left behind since we still miss a real support weapon ^^ but also it will still see no play in pve cause yea you know why xd

Edited June 22, 2023 by Myror.7521

[Grand Marshal.4098]

45 minutes ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

I take anything at this point.

Discipline is in such a bad state.

 

 

I hope they visit it at some point. I'll gladly take Discipline changes over Arms reworks since they don't seem particularly invested in that.

 

20 minutes ago, Myror.7521 said:

This change is btw not that bad for support warr in PvP since in comb with soldiers comfort applying protection it might be able to protect your teammates from 33% condi and power dmg at the same time. But i think it will still left behind since we still miss a real support weapon ^^ but also it will still see no play in pve cause yea you know why xd

I mean the change is not bad no. Resolution is a nice boon and there is incentive for it to exist on warrior, given how the original resistance got gutted and defense has a bit of synergy with the boon.

The problem is that the whole line offers nothing else support-oriented! It's literally a single support trait! They could have moved anything else from Tactics into discipline and the line would be entirely damage and selfish. 

So my aim is to fix some solo trait issues and add some more versatility to someone slotting discipline for support purposes. 

Swiftness share, endurance recovery, Banners with reso and some barrier would go a long way to assist. 

Also had been considering to make a trait which was "When sharing swiftness, grant fury to allies) a strong synergistic trait, but due to traitline overlapping, I'd much prefer to add some Fury in Versatile Power for the warrior, since we hardly get fury from anywhere else in terms of traits.

[Myror.7521]

@Grand Marshal.4098 yea i still dont get while the Banner traitline is still not in tactics. Just makes totaly no sence to me at all ^^

[eXruina.4956]

2 hours ago, Grand Marshal.4098 said:

Hey everyone, Marshal here

hi marshal!! 👋

 

2 hours ago, Grand Marshal.4098 said:

Why so persistently shoehorn Banners in Discipline?

i really think banners belong in tactics where it was originally located. and wish they could rework it into our group heal and boon option for pve.

 

they could design the healing to revolve around blast finishers and work with hammer, longbow and warhorn.

 

this way it would be a fun and active playstyle and would be more exciting vs our current static and immobile banners.

[Grand Marshal.4098]

19 minutes ago, eXruina.4956 said:

hi marshal!! 👋

 

i really think banners belong in tactics where it was originally located. and wish they could rework it into our group heal and boon option for pve.

 

they could design the healing to revolve around blast finishers and work with hammer, longbow and warhorn.

 

this way it would be a fun and active playstyle and would be more exciting vs our current static and immobile banners.

Yo eX,

Yeah some type of combo finishers doing heals would be interesting, I doubt they would go that far tho, but hey, we can dream!

[felix.2386]

I was lazy to post this but

Warrior is the only class that has class mechanic linked to every single core trait lines, while other classes have trait line that enhances gameplay in different ways. 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Personally, I think Anet should lean into the explosion tags they've added to core warrior skills.

For instance I think Crack Shot's current effects should become baseline. The new Crack Shot becomes:

Crack Shot: Your explosions inflict 3 stacks of bleeding for 4s. *When the Bladesworn traitline is equipped this is reduced to 1 stack of bleeding for 1s.

I have other ideas for other traitlines, but wanted to put this idea our there since this is a Discipline focused idea.

[DKRathalos.9625]

I want the ARMS rework T_T

[Batalix.2873]

Putting Resolution on Double Standards is just...odd to me. Feels like just slapping a boon on just because people expect something.

I actually think that Discipline should be made more bannery. Remove this dumb Zerker/BS alac/quickness feature and just redo banners as a soft "fourth support espec" that all Warriors can slot into in a pinch. Bring back banner kits and add the ability to throw them like spears so players have their spear fantasy. Have a matching trait to Double Standards that applies alacrity, and add alacrity to Banner of Defense--that way Warrior can trait into alac or quickness banners ala Chrono.

Now that bannerslaves aren't *mandatory*, I actually would enjoy having the option to slide into a sort of passive tactician role on Warrior. Would make commanding metas fun.

[Leo G.4501]

On 6/22/2023 at 3:45 PM, eXruina.4956 said:

hi marshal!! 👋

 

i really think banners belong in tactics where it was originally located. and wish they could rework it into our group heal and boon option for pve.

 

they could design the healing to revolve around blast finishers and work with hammer, longbow and warhorn.

 

this way it would be a fun and active playstyle and would be more exciting vs our current static and immobile banners.

I would absolutely love for Tactics to get a couple of traits that enhanced finishers again. Something that increased outgoing healing + healed allies in Blast Finishers would be both bunkerish and supporting for a team. Another trait to make you rethink how you capitalize on finishers on top of that would be pretty cool too.

[Dahkeus.8243]

5 hours ago, DKRathalos.9625 said:

I want the ARMS rework T_T

Yea, Discipline may be a big ambiguous and have some strange decisions, it's overall a solidly good trait line.  Arms is much less likely to be a good choice for most builds.