(1,000+ Hours) of Constructive Bladesworn Feedback: ANet Please delete [Unshakable Mountain] already instead of taking away the few remaining, actually functional, parts of Bladesworn's kit.

[PseudoOAlias.4279]

TL;DR :: Bladeworn's anemic PvP / WvW implementation and balance are affeting it's design across all game modes. [Unshakable Mountain] is absolutely carrying now both the power-level of Bladesworn, and along with [Tactical Reload] are dictating the Balance Direction of the class, instead of their actual class mechanic of Dragon Trigger. Which is unhealthy and needs to go.

 

 So I'm in this awkward position of being able to provide all of this experience / feedback but I'm not really sure how to do it because if I a) Make short posts, they frequently leaves out details that I end up having to fill in later or b) Make a long, detailed posts, that largely gets ignored by both the community, and (hopefully not) by the Balance Dev Team. But, "Welcome to the internet" I guess. For those who want it: The information's here, and for those who don't the TL;DR above should suffice.

 

 But if ANet truly, really, wants constructive feedback. This is what 1,000+ hours of Bladesworn feedback, papers, and compiled projects look like.

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 Today's Patch:

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 If you're not a wandering Gun-Samurai you probably won't know that ArenaNet heavily GUTTED my boi. Likely to avoid back-to-back stuns being possible with the reworked [Heightened Focus] which allows you to reset your Burst Skills every 12 or so seconds.

 

 *Altho if it was this specific I'm not sure why this was a problem seeing as both old [Daring Dragon] and [Dragonspike Mine] already were in the game. And these weren't a problem / no one used those outside of niche PvP builds and PvE rotations for the latter.

 

| And while I have very knowledgeable Bladesworn friends who currently lament the loss of their stun setup combos. I actually played a more niche build when I got top 250 / do not use [Unyielding Dragon] and largely don't have a dog in this fight. |

 

 *2nd Side note [Heightened Focus] still doesn't have any visual indicator by the way, and is on an awkward and invisible 12s icd. - So, as I posted on their preview feedback thread, there's no "prepping double burst" because you'll likely be out of adrenaline / flow when it randomly triggers if you were to use it in PvP anyway. And there's not counterplay to this because your opponents have no idea when a double-burst is potentially up. I expect that they intent [HF] to be only functional-enough to be used by mashing the healing on the F1 for Raid Berserker Staff healers. But if this is the case then it shouldn't be solely affecting Bladeworn [UD] functionality/balance... anyway different discussion.

 

 What I can tell you is that this came along with some more, very damaging, additions to the whole kit that on balance make the class feel even worse than it already did to play. The most damaging of which, being the effective doubling of the cast time of [Dragon Slash - Boost] (the 2'nd one that's a dash,) from .25s to .5s. This may not sound like much, but this is basically an eternity for Bladesworn players. The larger problem that I have with this tho, is that this does nothing to nerf the actual power level or "value" of the skill because (because of how Dragon Trigger tracking works as a whole) you still continue tracking your target before Boost actually casts. Giving it effectively the same functionality, but just making it feel like absolute butt to use now.

 

 To compensate for this, or more realistically because someone on the balance team finally slotted in Bladesworn to try to figure out what was up with it this past season in PvP, they shortened the aftercasts of Gunsaber 2 and 3. And while this is appreciated, all it really does is enhance your ability to spam [Unshakable Mountain] like a troglodyte more effectively. Effectively side-stepping the ditch where we were already straddling the main issue of the class, and off potentially into a field of no-return.

 

 It also does nothing to fix any of the myriad of bugs (listed below) notably that Gunsaber 2 will often hit / explode but not do it's damage - because it does not "attach" to your target like power damage packets such as enemy spider's spit attacks, or current necro swords multi-hitting damage packs, or that Gunsaber 3 has such a long cast time that it just "goes straight up into space" half the time. These collectively happened a total of 28 times on my stream last night alone. Not to mention actual functionality problems such as that it still doesn't work properly with [Lush Forest] in PvP or WvW because it's not technically "at max 3 stacks" because it literally can't be in these game modes and doesn't display breakbar values at all.

 

 ANet, look, I know you have limited resources for Balance Devs, despite this game's combat being the actual best that has ever existed in any MMO. And not all of them can main' every class. I get it. I wouldn't know where to start with something like Revenant. I never thought I would like Bladesworn, but what I do know is Warrior. And honestly this Spec might as well just be renamed "Unshakable Mountain" at this point. Because that's all it does. I made this point in my full Bladesworn dissection video as well but the sheer existence of [Unshakable Mountain] and [Tactical Reload] are hamstringing the functionality of this class everywhere. No where is that more apparent than today's patch.

 

 | So what can be done? |

 

 However, I do not believe in criticizing something without putting in actual work & providing actual, actionable, constructive feedback. I have already put numerous(1) posts(2) on their forums(3) detailing how sacrificing pieces of Bladesworn's already anemic PvP / WvW kit in service of making it something even barely approaching functional in PvE, has really only removed the actual few "fun" aspects that it barely had, and has done nothing to actually nerf it's PvP power level. As well as said 200+ work hour video detailing the problems with the fundamental design of this class and how to fix them.

 

 Below I will also list an unfinished proposed rework for the design of this class that I was cooking, as well as the 2+ pages of still unfixed bugs this class has, as well as try to link to examples of the ones that are not easily replicable.

 

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 An (In)complete List of Bladesworn Bugs.

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*While you may consider some of these "features," I have reported all of these bugs multiple times. And none of them have been fixed. So here we are I guess:

>> + Weapon Swap Timings for switching into/out of Gunsaber are STILL desynched from the F1 vs Weapon-Swap buttons. And have been since the introduction of Bladesworn. Making it more advantageous to F1 swap to/from Gunsaber if you have alacrity on you but more advantageous to use the Weapon Swap button if you are afflicted with chill, as said button's cool down is unaffected. <<

+ The error message "Cannot Drop Bundles Wile Airborne" will display when attempting to swap from Gunsaber while in the air via the weapon-swap button, but not the swap Gunsaber F1 button.

+ Gunsaber skills 1, 2, & 3 are all listed as 900 range. But all go different distances, none of which are 900 range.

+ Gunsaber skill 2 frequently just fails after colliding with a target and will not do damage even if the explosion triggers especially if the target's hit ox is slightly elevated. -- Wurms in the Desert WvW borderlands are a good example of this.

+ Gunsaber skill 3 does not work with [Lush Forest] in PvP and WvW because it is never at "max charges" (3).

+ Dragon Trigger 2 - Frequently just fails on open, flat ground.

+ Dragon Trigger 3 - If the hitbox of this skill ever has to travel "up and over" terrain or an object to hit an enemy on the opposite side, the hit ox of this skill will frequently just continue up and over said terrain/object, over the enemy, and miss them.

+ Dragon Slash 1 & 2 are jumpable and 3 is jump - dogdgeable with correct timing. (This is due to the jump elevation and not the dodge frame as the attack will not be marked "evade".)

+ The UI is bugged and has been for over a year. Despite Untamed's UI both becoming similarly bugged and being fixed within that timeframe.

+ [Furious Burst] Does not properly interact with burst skills and only grants Fury if Dragon Trigger ends not when Dragonslash is cast or before. (Depreciated)

+ [Dragon Trigger] will continue tracking / homing a selected target even if they move out of the selectable 5,000 range. (And about 50% of the time if they enter stealth, but not reliably.)

+ [Flow Stabilizer] can inconsistently be double-tapped without gaining the benefit of the additional cast similar to the problem with old mantras.

+ If the cast for [Tactical Reload] finishes slightly after a cast of [Flow Stabilizer] it will inconsistently not reload this charge.

+ [Artillery Slash] Does not display breakbar values in any game mode.

| Other stuff that bothers me: |

+ Discounting the 1-frame static image tied to Dragonslash 1 and 2, [Flow Stabilizer] is the only unique animation that Bladesworn got. And it was reused on a pack of Gemstone skins.

+ You STILL cannot actually sheathe your Gunsaber. Despite the bundle F1-swap skill being called "unsheathe Gunsaber." You also pull the Gunsaber out-of-nowhere off your back like an idiot despite the draw animation off-the-hip for the [Grenade Kit] swap animation already being in the game.

+ [Flow Stabilizer] no longer provides Stability and has not been renamed.

+ You still can't actually cancel [Dragon Trigger] by pressing F2 again. (Add a 1/4s micro cd as on reaper shroud to prevent double-taps) and must mash your movement buttons in the most awkward way possible to cancel [DT].

+ You can aim your Dragon Slashes in Action Camera but not Free Cam.

+ You can't dye, or otherwise customize the look of your Gunsaber. At all. And it inherits none of the properties of any of your Legendaries.

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+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

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 A Healthier Bladesworn Remake:

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+ Remove the cooldown from Gunsaber Weapon Swap and all ammunition charges from Gunsaber Skills. Have each 1-4skill have 0 cooldown but cost various amounts of "Bullets" to use. (See Below.)

+ Class Mechanics: Add an F3 to manually' load flow > bullets. Make this load bullets at a rate of 1/.5s and have a .25s icd. Set "Max Bullet Level" to 9. *Giving this a .5s/charge interval makes this essentially the limiting-factor in Dragon-Slash / Burst Skill Use interval, just as it is now. -- Similar to how the old cooldown on F2 DT stance was. (F2) does not exit until you move or all Bullet charges are consumed. As well as the effective cooldown on the following:

+ Give Bladesworn back Core Burst skills.++ Have ^ Trigger levels based on the #of Bullets currently loaded / used. 1-3 = level 1, 4-6 - = level 2, 7-9 = level 3,

+ By default have Dragon Trigger is your burst skill when Gunsaber is equipped only. It consumes all of your bullets to do proportional "exponential" scaling damage as now.

+ Rework all of the "on ammunition use" traits to scaled down/balanced equivalents of "on bullet charge." *Since there are very few remaining ammunition skills that even still function as such in Bladesworn's remaining Kit.

+ Give [Flow Stabilizer] a reduced effect, but 3 charges by default with a higher CD.

+ Make Tactical Reload instead automatically refund half of all of the bullets used on your last Burst Skill or DT and reset your Burst Skill Cooldown. Keep [Tactical Reload's] existing cooldown to prevent burst skill spam.

++ That's it!

*Other notes that will help make this "work:"

++ Change the Grandmaster Traits actually affect interesting functionality so they don't all play the same.

++ Fix ALL of the existing Bladesworn and Gunsaber bugs.

++ Change Gunsaber 2 & 3 skills to actually do something meaningful other than damage. Or at the very least: pierce targets.

+ Profit!

*I still don't think this fixes many of the problems that Bladesworn has mechanically. But I think this rework would be easy enough to implement and would go a long way to affording Bladesworn Design Space for the Addition of interesting things to it's supposed class mechanics of Gunsaber/Dragon Trigger. Instead of revolving everything/every balance decision around what has become it's real class mechanic, and ultimately a detriment to affording it interesting mechanics elsewhere: [Tactical Reload].

 

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 Conclusion: Get rid of [Unshakable Mountain]. If there's budget for it, rework the class entirely.

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 Which leads me to my last and final point: Designing / Balancing a class fully around ammunition isn't ideal. Giving a bad skill ammunition doesn't make it good or usable. It just artificially jacks up the power level as we've seen with [Kick] and ["On My Mark]. So it follows that an entire class based around this should (and does) simply have an artificially steroid-infused power level as well.

 

[Unshakable Mountain] and [Tactical Reload] continue to be the class's actual Class Mechanic/Fulcrum around which the implementation of Bladesworn in every game mode swings, and the class really just needs to be redone entirely. If you want an explainer for why' go read my above ^ rework post and/or watch the video. But if you want the TL;DR on that: Half of Bladesworn's "armaments and ammunition skills" don't even function as true ammunition' skills - they consume "all charges to do x," and again, this was just in service of adding PvE functionality where it didn't belong.

 

- Thanks for Reading! I will hang around to try to answer any questions people might have below.

  - Pseudo

Edited November 29, 2023 by PseudoOAlias.4279
Added UI bug note.

[ilabsentuser.8726]

Copy pasting the same I said on reddit about my feelings relsted to this and warrior in gemeral:

I have always said this: the warrior is supposed to be the weapons expert of all professions and its mechanic is burst skills. Bladesworn making warriors forget how to use their backuo weapons while other classes (engi, firebrand, ele, rev) can use 3 million skills effectively no problem (even being more versatile and generally effective) and also forget how to use their core mechanic is the dumbest shitiest thing I have ever seen. Worst designed spec out there imo, I know some people like it, but its crap lore/fantasy/mechanics wise. I pray every day that the redesign it entirely so that I can actually use a third elite spec, I can't stand it. O hope one day warriors all around band together and do some pressure on the profession issues so that the developers decide to do something, its due time. And I don't buy the scarcity of dev resources as the main issue, not while each profession gets plenty of things each patch and we keep getting the most barebones/just do the minimal stuff. Look at the lates weapons for instance, staff is cool, not complaining, but it is obvious that the amount of thought that went to it in comparison with lets day mesmer rifle or engi shortbow or rev scepter is way lesser. If they can make such awesome animations and such good ideas for those, why not for warrior? That's not a resource issue, is an attitude/bias/whatever one. Ranger maces feel more warrior tham many warrior weapons, getting stacks that make you big and more damagy is definitely better put there for instance. Don't get me wrong, I don't want it switched, I am just pointing out what we all know, when it comes to designing each profession they don't seem to put much effort on warrior. Don't know why honestly. I must admit though, I was kinda negative about staff, but it surprised me as I thought it was gonna be crap. So yeah, redesign bladesworn and in the meantime, give warrs some loce, no more damage, we don't want bigger numbers (okay we do want, but not at the expense of everything else).

[GoldSilva.8950]

This 1 post (I know it's a lot more than that) has more effort time, testing, and design passion put into it than all of Bladesworn, and for that matter Warrior does right now.

 Why are people who sell Automated Tournaments and who say bigoted things openly for years on their streams in the Alpha-Testing/Partner programs but people like this aren't again?

[Jobber.6348]

I'm just gonna go ahead and step on many many toes here:

I feel like Unsheathe Gunsaber is just stupid. It's a dumb weapon set and it being the reason Bladesworn can't use 2 weapon loadouts is stupid. 

I'd rather Gunsaber set be reworked entirely and Unsheathe Gunsaber IS THE BURST. 

Flow? Get rid of it. Dumb mechanic too. Adrenaline? Put it back it. Each segment of Adrenaline = 1 cast of any skill from Gunsaber. 

Gunsaber skills replaced entirely by Dragontrigger skills, now each just costing 1 segment of Adrenaline to cast. Can sheathe and unsheath the Gunsaber as you like and Gunsaber skills have no cooldown, because you already pay an Adrenaline segment to cast it.

So if you wanna pull out your Gunsaber and Shadowstep 3 times, YOU CAN. If you want to pull out your Gunsaber and do an AoE cleave 3 times, YOU CAN.

And to the potential people crying OP to me I just have this to say: Willbender.

 

[TiedHam.4923]

@Yasai.3549

Both your rework and the one proposed here are masterclass. You could even combine the 2:

 No Unsheathe cooldown. Bring Burst skill(s) on non-GS weapons back.

Gunsaber 1 - Still an auto attack chain.

Gunsaber 2-4 - Existing Dragon Trigger 1-3 (hopefully with a less stupid implementation of Boost.) But uses adrenaline.

Gunsaber 5 - Existing Flicker step. But also give you the aegis from Triggerguard.

[Unyielding Dragon] Makes you use all 3 bars at once for DSs but Daring and Immortal let you use one at a time.

...or literally anything but what we have now...

 

For being "Basically the Face" of EOD I'm truly astonished the state of unplayability that it's in. CmC has admitted it's design faults many, MANY times both accidentally on-stream at this point. He specifically called out the stupidity of having to stand in 1 spot in PvP. And cited [Daring Dragon] as the cool PvP trait. Then that went away. Then they called [Tactical Reload] a balance nightmare when they removed it from reloading all ammunition to just Bladesworn stuff. And promised "We're not just going to delete Bladesworn" 9 months later they added ranged attacks to the GS 1, 2, and 3 but cited PvE for this. Good thing too because as cited above those skills literally never kittening work or hit.

He's either starting to contradict himself or getting really good at just lying to camera. Idk why he has a hate banana on for Bladesworn. By all means, give ele 19 new pistol skills and take up 1/4 of the whole preview stream talking about it. Make it God-Tier and Dumpster Warrior's numbers to dirt. I literally don't care. But for God's sake leave the fun functionality stuff alone.

The part that gets me tho is every single warrior patch doesn't even smack of a child throwing a tantrum to break another's toys. It smacks of complete apathy and lack of playtime/care/understanding how the class works. Idk why ANet condones this kitten. And while I think the rage tantrum that people threw over Banner Quickness implementation where they called Daddy NC Soft and literally threatened/demanded that certain people be fired was INCREDIBLY stupid. It's starting to feel like that's the only way to get any feedback actually read/or any degree of care' given for any of the classes the Devs don't play.

Also, if it's a personal grudge against the person who designed it or something that seems pretty petty but that's def starting to feel like a possibility as well. My big issue is they may be "communicating more" with preview streams n such. But it feels very 1-way, and most of that just feels like false justification and lies. I don't want to be a downer. But after 2 years Bladesworn is so completely mangled and unusable now that they may as well just remove it so I can stop being sad.

[DownDrisis.4826]

| Jesus, if I got this quality of feedback for my company we'd have hired this guy by now. Granted I brute force fail-test stock trading algorithms so *shrug.* |

But remember ANet: For ever 1 paperroll, or pseudo, or even pre-hire Taylor Brooks, CmC, or Roy Marks who are actually patient/passionate/committed enough to try to give you Constructive Feedback, there's 20 more that have, and more still that will, are say nothing and will just rage quit and are no longer buying Gems or Future Expansions. The dude has receipts. This is A-Tier feedback, complete with bugs, fixes, and even videos. If someone clearly cares about something enough to put something this comprehensive together they may have something worthwhile to say...

Edited November 29, 2023 by DownDrisis.4826

[FellFalls.3750]

[Tactical Reload] needs to die so Bladesworn can live.

[Langeball.9351]

I have no problem with nerfing Bladesworn. My build benefits greatly from Tactical Reload(who doesn't) and nerfing it is the right move. Then I can go back to Signet of Rage which I was using before ANET forced Tactical Reload on everyone.

100% undo the terrible delay on Dragon Slash Boost. I don't even understand the logic here. You still can't see when someone is about to release Dragon Trigger so what's the point? It just feels like you're playing with high ping..

I don't feel good about Unyielding Dragon either, but I can understand it. I've never considered using the other ones. But losing a CC is very painful. Maybe just add a stun natively to Dragon Trigger Force. Gives me a reason to actually use it.

[CrashCrusFGH.8904]

While I don't disagree necessarily with the current sentiment of the Warrior forums. I believe in being productive, so bumping this thread  💪 as it seems the be one of the few with actual play, bug testing, experience, and more importantly actionable suggestions behind it. And for what it's worth, while I don't think everyone will ever align on what they think ANet should do with Bls, I like a lot of the suggestions made here, (as they're backed up with actual data,) and this is objectively better than what we have.

 

I only pray that ANet reads it.

Edited December 18, 2023 by CrashCrusFGH.8904