Why the drastic change to 1H-Sword?

[Kilgar.7435]

So I'm a returning player. I have multiple 80th level characters - all that I really like to play. One of my favorites is the Ranger. I have two of them; both equipped with a 1H-sword for their main hand melee weapon. I login to play one of them and notice that 1H-sword has been changed dramatically.

Why are the 2nd and 3rd skills now both leap in skills? If I've already used one and I'm now toe to toe with my opponent why would I need to leap in again? The old skills for 1h-sword synergized GREATLY with the Ranger's ranged weapon (either longbow or shortbow). You could leap into combat, poison and evade, and then leap out (I forget the skill name) and go right to your bow for ranged combat. Leap back in if you wanted or just stayed ranged...it was a very mobile (and fun) way to play the class. Now with two leap ins and no way to leap back out it just kills the weapon and the accompanying synergy with the bow. It really does kill the class for me. Very unfortunate.

Somebody make this make sense.

Thanks in advance! 

[Sansar.1302]

3 minutes ago, Kilgar.7435 said:

So I'm a returning player. I have multiple 80th level characters - all that I really like to play. One of my favorites is the Ranger. I have two of them; both equipped with a 1H-sword for their main hand melee weapon. I login to play one of them and notice that 1H-sword has been changed dramatically.

Why are the 2nd and 3rd skills now both leap in skills? If I've already used one and I'm now toe to toe with my opponent why would I need to leap in again? The old skills for 1h-sword synergized GREATLY with the Ranger's ranged weapon (either longbow or shortbow). You could leap into combat, poison and evade, and then leap out (I forget the skill name) and go right to your bow for ranged combat. Leap back in if you wanted or just stayed ranged...it was a very mobile (and fun) way to play the class. Now with two leap ins and no way to leap back out it just kills the weapon and the accompanying synergy with the bow. It really does kill the class for me. Very unfortunate.

Somebody make this make sense.

Thanks in advance! 

Agree 100% but wait now the deffenders of this change come and scream that it is better now because it works better in raids 😞

The evade on Gs auto chain is gone too, and the block dont have the ranged attack compenent anymore. 

[Gotejjeken.1267]

Yeah, we've had this discussion a lot; I'm not even sure it has defenders just justifiers, as no one (at least competitive minded) has provided a good reason to even defend the change. 

It's more like 'well it does more dmg now and the old skills were all flash and no substance so meh'.  

Edited November 1, 2023 by Gotejjeken.1267

[psizone.8437]

They could have easily buffed the old skills to get them up to the current powercreep standard without destroying what made the weapon fun.

The only reason it was changed was to keep players stacked in raids/strikes.

[Fueki.4753]

I think they changed it, because they wanted it to harmonize better with the stacking+boon vomit meta.

It's no secret that they change many things to align better with that top end way of playing.

[EnderzShadow.2506]

14 hours ago, Kilgar.7435 said:

So I'm a returning player. I have multiple 80th level characters - all that I really like to play. One of my favorites is the Ranger. I have two of them; both equipped with a 1H-sword for their main hand melee weapon. I login to play one of them and notice that 1H-sword has been changed dramatically.

Why are the 2nd and 3rd skills now both leap in skills? If I've already used one and I'm now toe to toe with my opponent why would I need to leap in again? The old skills for 1h-sword synergized GREATLY with the Ranger's ranged weapon (either longbow or shortbow). You could leap into combat, poison and evade, and then leap out (I forget the skill name) and go right to your bow for ranged combat. Leap back in if you wanted or just stayed ranged...it was a very mobile (and fun) way to play the class. Now with two leap ins and no way to leap back out it just kills the weapon and the accompanying synergy with the bow. It really does kill the class for me. Very unfortunate.

Somebody make this make sense.

Thanks in advance! 

Same here, multiple 80s, 3 of them rangers. Sword/Warhorn was a very nice set up. It provided me opportunities to gtfo or to maneuver in a fight. But now? meh.
I've been playing mmo's before WoW and sadly I've never seen a company not fk up classes. They think its 'their' game. It's not. Without US, it's nothing. But they wont talk to the player base. No company ever has. WoW had a thinly veiled attempt to work with class representatives but didn't listen. So eh, par for the course ANET. What good does complaining about it ever do. They buff weapons that are fine, they change and break things that needed no change. Typical.

[Naxx.6203]

On 11/1/2023 at 3:52 PM, Fueki.4753 said:

I think they changed it, because they wanted it to harmonize better with the stacking+boon vomit meta.

It's no secret that they change many things to align better with that top end way of playing.

Don't need to think. Just watch a balance stream where they explictly explain reasoning behind that change.

[Levetty.1279]

On 11/1/2023 at 4:01 AM, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Yeah, we've had this discussion a lot; I'm not even sure it has defenders just justifiers, as no one (at least competitive minded) has provided a good reason to even defend the change. 

You are literally describing the trolls who think the change was bad since nobody used the sword anywhere before the buff. Sorry that Ranger is finally getting some buffs.

[Sansar.1302]

6 minutes ago, Levetty.1279 said:

You are literally describing the trolls who think the change was bad since nobody used the sword anywhere before the buff. Sorry that Ranger is finally getting some buffs.

For raiders it migth be a buff but raiders are a minority in gw2 ( think I heard that about 10% raid) 

1h sword where a defensive weapon (a realy good one) it newer where intended to have top dmg( it where still decent) 

Now that is lost and it hurts a lot as ranger have fewer defensive options than other classes. 

It where a nerf, a rater large nerf. 

[kharmin.7683]

20 minutes ago, Levetty.1279 said:

You are literally describing the trolls who think the change was bad since nobody used the sword anywhere before the buff. Sorry that Ranger is finally getting some buffs.

Point being is, sure, buff sword but why change the animation/movement?  Anet didn't need to do that.  They pretty much completely re-purposed the weapon.

[Teknomancer.4895]

On 11/1/2023 at 12:01 AM, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

It's more like 'well it does more dmg now and the old skills were all flash and no substance so meh'.  

I get that it didn't fit the meta anymore and apparently that's all that matters, but I loved that flashy animation! It was such a big part of what made using the sword fun.  😭

[Fueki.4753]

3 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

You are literally describing the trolls who think the change was bad since nobody used the sword anywhere before the buff. Sorry that Ranger is finally getting some buffs.

They could have buffed it without taking away the toy from the people who enjoyed playing with it.

1 hour ago, Teknomancer.4895 said:

I get that it didn't fit the meta anymore and apparently that's all that matters

And this is the biggest problem with the current professions changes team.

Too many changes are simply for the sake of fitting more with the top end minority, even when there's no need for it.

 

Edited November 5, 2023 by Fueki.4753

[Beddo.1907]

1 hour ago, Fueki.4753 said:

They could have buffed it without taking away the toy from the people who enjoyed playing with it.

They couldn't, because the way the weapon worked was flawed by design.

[kharmin.7683]

2 minutes ago, Beddo.1907 said:

They couldn't, because the way the weapon worked was flawed by design.

Ok, I'll bite: how was it flawed by design?

[Fueki.4753]

41 minutes ago, Beddo.1907 said:

They couldn't

Make number bigger!

Oh look! They've buffed the weapon without changing the design.

41 minutes ago, Beddo.1907 said:

the way the weapon worked was flawed by design.

It was absolutely not.

Merely because its former design didn't fit with how the top end minority plays the game, doesn't mean the design was flawed.

It was a fun movement weapon, now it's just leaps.

Redesigning sword was nothing but another example of developers breaking something that didn't need to be fixed.

Edited November 5, 2023 by Fueki.4753

[Beddo.1907]

5 hours ago, kharmin.7683 said:

Ok, I'll bite: how was it flawed by design?

Skill you'd want on hand for quick evasion frames being locked behind another skill and long animations.

[Sansar.1302]

2 hours ago, Beddo.1907 said:

Skill you'd want on hand for quick evasion frames being locked behind another skill and long animations.

That is false, what you describe is what it is now

[psizone.8437]

10 hours ago, Beddo.1907 said:

Skill you'd want on hand for quick evasion frames being locked behind another skill and long animations.

So we'd swap it back to the original sword right? With 2 being an evade that swaps to a leap and 3 being an evade.

The design flaw you pointed out was only introduced a few years ago, OG sword skills could have been buffed instead of butchered.

[kharmin.7683]

I wouldn't mind the original sword.  I was really used to it and it took some time to adjust when they swapped the skills around.  But I did, and found that I could still enjoy the mobility and evasion that came with that set up. 

For me, now, that's all gone.

[Acyk.9671]

Where were all the people complaining when a couple years ago a large number of people from the ranger subforum complained sword saw no play, was inefficient and ranger lacked a good offensive MH melee weapon? Now sword is an evasive offensive option that pairs better with specs and traits.

I can understand the fact that ranger now lacks a good defensive weapon but what if MH mace becomes that weapon? It's not far fetched to consider a mace might bring defensive abilities as it's already the case on multiple classes.

[kharmin.7683]

13 minutes ago, Acyk.9671 said:

I can understand the fact that ranger now lacks a good defensive weapon but what if MH mace becomes that weapon? It's not far fetched to consider a mace might bring defensive abilities as it's already the case on multiple classes.

Gosh, that would be a crap reason to fundamentally change an existing weapon.  But, it's Anet so we really can't put anything past them.

[Levetty.1279]

On 11/5/2023 at 5:32 PM, Fueki.4753 said:

Merely because its former design didn't fit with how the top end minority plays the game, doesn't mean the design was flawed.

 

It didn't fit with the top end, the bottom end, the mid end, the spin off end, the gap year end or the uncle that moved to Australia end. Nobody cared about Sword until it was buffed to be good for the first time in the games life and people wanted something to complain about.

[Oahkahmewolf.6210]

I pefer the changes to sword and its new synergetics with other utilities. Sure I enjoyed the defensive options it has, but it now a more offensive based weapon.

The weapon where it can now immobilize and even do more burst dmg under specific condition make it interesting. Like personally speaking I'm still a sword enjoy-er and it perfectly fits into my Ice trap playstyle when I roam. If people don't get chill effect from the trap, I can always set it up by leaping into it and causing them to get chilled. optionally if you play a druid you can use the daze glyph in mid jump to get the secondary effect. Pair it up with an off hand dagger and now dagger 5 sets you up for sword 3 and 2, I personally think which the changes to sword its in a very decent spot for majority of cool builds. I personally play a pure melee build as untame and its quite enjoyable.

The previous sword really didn't have a particularly good offensive capabilities compared to most weapons, it was mostly an evade and get the hell out of dodge weapon. You can kinda still do that with 3 but if you really want to evade alot you have to pair it up with off-hand dagger 4.

[Sansar.1302]

8 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

It didn't fit with the top end, the bottom end, the mid end, the spin off end, the gap year end or the uncle that moved to Australia end. Nobody cared about Sword until it was buffed to be good for the first time in the games life and people wanted something to complain about.

It is realy weak and usless  ( yes it does a bit more dmg )

It where way better before this nerf.

[Fueki.4753]

8 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

It didn't fit with the top end, the bottom end, the mid end, the spin off end, the gap year end or the uncle that moved to Australia end.

It did fit those who had fun with it. And Arenanet removed a large amount of said fun. And for what reason did they do it? Just so the top end gets yet another toy? That's not worth it.

Numbers can be adjusted without removing fun.

8 hours ago, Levetty.1279 said:

Nobody cared about Sword until it was buffed to be good for the first time in the games life and people wanted something to complain about.

Just because hardly anyone mentioned it on the forums doesn't mean noone cared about it.

Edited November 8, 2023 by Fueki.4753