The Janthir Wilds Spear Preview in a Nutshell

[bethekey.8314]

 

[Magmi.6723]

Prolly about time ele won 😂

[Dadnir.5038]

47 minutes ago, Magmi.6723 said:

Prolly about time ele won 😂

I don't think ele really won, though. That said Elementalist would win if they had devs cheat key "no CD on skills".

All in all, it's difficult to say for sure who won or lost due to the dev's overuse of cheats when they showcased the various spears. I personally think that everybody lost thought...

[Magmi.6723]

3 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

I don't think ele really won, though. That said Elementalist would win if they had devs cheat key "no CD on skills".

All in all, it's difficult to say for sure who won or lost due to the dev's overuse of cheats when they showcased the various spears. I personally think that everybody lost thought

Given the fact Anet have shipped it with “as an apology for no longbow” I get the impression Anet will look after it, that’s a lot of development to not make it the best weapon. 

ironically outside of Revenant and Warrior everyone won, they finally didn’t do the same Mess up as soto, not making weapons stand alone try to cover gaps in classes 

I think for the most part those spears look really good. 

Edited Sunday at 06:38 PM by Magmi.6723

[Gaiawolf.8261]

4 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

I don't think ele really won, though. That said Elementalist would win if they had devs cheat key "no CD on skills".

All in all, it's difficult to say for sure who won or lost due to the dev's overuse of cheats when they showcased the various spears. I personally think that everybody lost thought...

I don't think most people are complaining about the weapon's performance, but rather the obvious time the design and art teams spent on the skills compared to the other professions. Cal even teased Ele multiple times while other professions supposedly had the spotlight.

[Dadnir.5038]

16 minutes ago, Magmi.6723 said:

I think for the most part those spears look really good.

I guess that's your point of view.

From my point of view I don't see Revenant's and Warrior's spears as any worse than the others. And I don't think any of the spear look especially promising. It's true that they outdid themselves when it come to the visual effects but my praises stop right there.

• Elementalist: Even Cal with all it's cheat codes "on" was struggling to do anything with the spear.
• Engineer: They sell a lightning rod yet, out of 5 skills, only one seem to deal with lightning.
• Guardian: I realy wasn't impressed by what I saw there. It was yet another mesh of heal and damage with relatively low "numbers". Best part of the announcement was the AA which promise to be great to get bags (just like staff AA was great to get bags in it's early days).
• Mesmer: The positioning requirement on this spear skills already annoy me.
• Necromancer: Soul shards don't crit (or at least they never ever critted in the 10 to 20 time the devs used the skill with soul shards on + unrealistic PvE numbers, if soul shard do more than 500 individually in competitive mode, the forum is going to burn). And objectively, if you read properly the skills effects, they won't really help the necromancer in any way.
• Ranger: Stealth attacks? Really? Again, it might be great with the dev's cheat codes "on".
• Revenant: The red "balls" were visually impressive but that's all.
• Thief: I'm already starved for initiative while using a single skill, I can't wait to have to mind how much initiative i'll need to unleash my full combo chain.
• Warrior: "It's raining spears, alleluia! It's raining spears, yeah eh!"

[Jski.6180]

Ele spear realty all about fulgor. This effect going to carry the spear wepon in any game type. I kind of wish to see it on other core ele effects. 

Haboob is an red haring for the real power of the ele spear.

Over all the classes that got new effects on spear "won." So necro counter boon apply maybe eng lighting dmg. I did not realty look at the others.

[Magmi.6723]

1 hour ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Mesmer: The positioning requirement on this spear skills already annoy me

I am very curious to how this will play out In pvp

1 hour ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Thief: I'm already starved for initiative while using a single skill, I can't wait to have to mind how much initiative i'll need to unleash my full combo chain

The spear has inbuilt regeneration to cover this really. as they’ve said they intend to make the rotation doable with good uptime 
 

Edited Sunday at 09:06 PM by Magmi.6723

[Magmi.6723]

5 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Elementalist: Even Cal with all it's cheat codes "on" was struggling to do anything with the spear

I don’t think your far off here though, I think ironically when it comes to the final product eles won’t be as happy with this as they’re expecting.  I think being even squisher and it’s power in etching I can’t imagine this things gonna be great out of instanced content and wvwvw but we shall see

Edited Monday at 12:59 AM by Magmi.6723

[Emberheart.8426]

How quick we are to forget the dry spell that ele has been experiencing ever since the staff nerfs. For 6 years ele has been getting the short end of the stick, and it's somehow a problem that is finally gets a fraction of its overdue attention with a decent balance patch and a new weapon that actually looks promising. 

Edited Monday at 04:01 AM by Emberheart.8426

[draxynnic.3719]

10 hours ago, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

I don't think most people are complaining about the weapon's performance, but rather the obvious time the design and art teams spent on the skills compared to the other professions. Cal even teased Ele multiple times while other professions supposedly had the spotlight.

I think the actual reason for all the ele comments is that they knew that demonstrating how many skills a 2H ele weapon was going to receive was going to take a while.

 

9 hours ago, Magmi.6723 said:

The spear has inbuilt regeneration to cover this really. as they’ve said they intend to make the rotation doable with good uptime 
 

Yeah, I was watching the initiative bar in the thief showcase - there didn't seem to be any indication that they had an infinite initiative cheat, but it wasn't going down by a lot. I suspect the initiative costs of the chains have taken account that they're intended to be used as a chain, rather than as a single high-impact initiative expenditure.

[DanAlcedo.3281]

11 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

I guess that's your point of view.

From my point of view I don't see Revenant's and Warrior's spears as any worse than the others. And I don't think any of the spear look especially promising. It's true that they outdid themselves when it come to the visual effects but my praises stop right there.

• Elementalist: Even Cal with all it's cheat codes "on" was struggling to do anything with the spear.
• Engineer: They sell a lightning rod yet, out of 5 skills, only one seem to deal with lightning.
• Guardian: I realy wasn't impressed by what I saw there. It was yet another mesh of heal and damage with relatively low "numbers". Best part of the announcement was the AA which promise to be great to get bags (just like staff AA was great to get bags in it's early days).
• Mesmer: The positioning requirement on this spear skills already annoy me.
• Necromancer: Soul shards don't crit (or at least they never ever critted in the 10 to 20 time the devs used the skill with soul shards on + unrealistic PvE numbers, if soul shard do more than 500 individually in competitive mode, the forum is going to burn). And objectively, if you read properly the skills effects, they won't really help the necromancer in any way.
• Ranger: Stealth attacks? Really? Again, it might be great with the dev's cheat codes "on".
• Revenant: The red "balls" were visually impressive but that's all.
• Thief: I'm already starved for initiative while using a single skill, I can't wait to have to mind how much initiative i'll need to unleash my full combo chain.
• Warrior: "It's raining spears, alleluia! It's raining spears, yeah eh!"

Warrior spear has no use case currently. 

With the only place it could see play is Power Berserker if spear out dps's Greatsword. 

It's awful on Spellbreaker and you can't even make a single good Openworld build with it. 

And I kitten tried to come up with something. 

No CC on burst/no short CD skill with CC kills the weapon for spellbreaker. No way you drop dagger Axe for spear. 

It even has anti Spellbreaker synergy with the backwards movement skill. Have fun using that as part of your rota. 

The Primal Burst having a cast time of 2.5 seconds kills it for Openworld Zerker and Quickness Zerker. 

The CD of the Primal burst only starts after the skill finishes. Good luck giving people quickness with that. 

There was no thought put into this weapon whatsoever. 

[Magmi.6723]

4 hours ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Warrior spear has no use case currently. 

With the only place it could see play is Power Berserker if spear out dps's Greatsword. 

It's awful on Spellbreaker and you can't even make a single good Openworld build with it. 

And I kitten tried to come up with something. 

No CC on burst/no short CD skill with CC kills the weapon for spellbreaker. No way you drop dagger Axe for spear. 

It even has anti Spellbreaker synergy with the backwards movement skill. Have fun using that as part of your rota. 

The Primal Burst having a cast time of 2.5 seconds kills it for Openworld Zerker and Quickness Zerker. 

The CD of the Primal burst only starts after the skill finishes. Good luck giving people quickness with that. 

There was no thought put into this weapon whatsoever. 

In before they bloat the numbers to make it required in pve DPs builds haha 

I think they will in all honesty, weapon gimmicks don’t age well, look at soto, warriors spear is really basic and missing that unique mechanic, but I think warriors spear will remain relevant, while others will prolly hit the chopping block later in the cycle when players become irritated by the gimmicks once newness has come off 

but yeah it’s likely gonna be a pve only weapon, and ye spell breakers really not gonna use this weapon at all

Edited Monday at 11:51 AM by Magmi.6723

[Gaiawolf.8261]

5 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

I think the actual reason for all the ele comments is that they knew that demonstrating how many skills a 2H ele weapon was going to receive was going to take a while.

 

Yeah, I was watching the initiative bar in the thief showcase - there didn't seem to be any indication that they had an infinite initiative cheat, but it wasn't going down by a lot. I suspect the initiative costs of the chains have taken account that they're intended to be used as a chain, rather than as a single high-impact initiative expenditure.

Sure I caught some of that, but the quality was also teased. 

Taylor: ["These graphics are amazing." ]

Cal: "Just wait till we get to ele, guys." 

[Vinny.7260]

I personally found Mesmer to have the best effects visually, just because of the theme. The skills are BEAUTIFUL.

Though, Ele does have pretty skills too.

 

As for mechanically, I think Ranger and Warrior got the biggest value in PvP. Warrior finally can bully people from ranged, you might see Staff/Spear Spellbreakers this week. Spear for Ranger I don't know yet, but it has a great mechanic built into it.

 

I could possibly see FA Weaver or FA Core using Spear with all the ranged damage. Scepter was limited to 900 range, 1200 range just allows them to keep away from people even more. Especially since Air 2 basically just latches onto a target instead of being a quick zap. It'll be a very different playstyle from old school FA.

[Magmi.6723]

1 hour ago, Vinny.7260 said:

 

I personally found Mesmer to have the best effects visually, just because of the theme. The skills are BEAUTIFUL

 

Mesmer ones look rly good, I rly do wonder around its positional requirements in PvP though haha but it looks like a pretty cool mechanic 

[draxynnic.3719]

On 6/24/2024 at 10:01 PM, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

Sure I caught some of that, but the quality was also teased. 

Taylor: ["These graphics are amazing." ]

Cal: "Just wait till we get to ele, guys." 

Fair. Mind you, there's a degree to which elementalist SHOULD have spectacular visuals. You can get away without on martial professions, even on spellcaster professions where the effects might just be some form of colour-coded magical energy, but elementalist is based around the fantasy of throwing around elemental effects, and you can only skimp on graphics so far when people are expecting fire, ice, lightning, and big chonkin' rocks. They kind of kittened themselves by making the profession with the most graphical demands also the profession with the most weapon skills per weapon, then making that even more extreme with weaver, and then decoupling weapons from elite specialisations so they had to give the weaver treatment to weapons while also committing to weapons being the main piece of horizontal progression with new expansions...

They got away with a bit of skimping through sword and hammer being mostly melee (where a few particle effects around the weapon could suffice for many of the skills) and then they completely failed to get away with it when they skimped on pistol. So they kind of had to do better this time around. That said, there's still evidence of corner-cutting there if you think about why certain design decisions might have been made.

[Gaiawolf.8261]

7 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Fair. Mind you, there's a degree to which elementalist SHOULD have spectacular visuals. You can get away without on martial professions, even on spellcaster professions where the effects might just be some form of colour-coded magical energy, but elementalist is based around the fantasy of throwing around elemental effects, and you can only skimp on graphics so far when people are expecting fire, ice, lightning, and big chonkin' rocks. They kind of kittened themselves by making the profession with the most graphical demands also the profession with the most weapon skills per weapon, then making that even more extreme with weaver, and then decoupling weapons from elite specialisations so they had to give the weaver treatment to weapons while also committing to weapons being the main piece of horizontal progression with new expansions...

They got away with a bit of skimping through sword and hammer being mostly melee (where a few particle effects around the weapon could suffice for many of the skills) and then they completely failed to get away with it when they skimped on pistol. So they kind of had to do better this time around. That said, there's still evidence of corner-cutting there if you think about why certain design decisions might have been made.

True, maybe for the more stabby stabby martial skills, but many mesmer, guardian, necromancer, and even revenant players tend to like big spell effects just as much as eles. I mean the new etchings out-symbol every symbol, mark, well, etc. except maybe Symbol of Vengeance. 

And almost every one of my engineers would just love to blow the pants off of any elementalist with their big guns and bomb effects. "Your puny fireball magic is no match for my advanced explosives engineering!" 😄

[draxynnic.3719]

17 hours ago, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

True, maybe for the more stabby stabby martial skills, but many mesmer, guardian, necromancer, and even revenant players tend to like big spell effects just as much as eles. I mean the new etchings out-symbol every symbol, mark, well, etc. except maybe Symbol of Vengeance. 

And almost every one of my engineers would just love to blow the pants off of any elementalist with their big guns and bomb effects. "Your puny fireball magic is no match for my advanced explosives engineering!" 😄

Agreed, but mesmer, guardian, necromancer, and revenant tend to get big spell effects as well. However, I think there's a bit more space for them to cut a few corners there. Guardian and mesmer, for instance, can get away with simple beams of blue or purple light - elementalist generally needs to be specifically elemental in nature, and recognisable as such. Consider virtuoso (and virtuoso's dagger) as a comparison point: it's a fairly visually spectacular ranged build simply through different iterations of purple dagger projectile themes. But even if we didn't have the attunement mechanic, you probably wouldn't get away with having an elementalist that is just throwing around a ton of ice knives, even if it behaved exactly like virtuoso except that the knives were frosty blue-white rather than pink-purple. And with the attunement mechanic, you're definitely not going to get away with four attunements of differently coloured knives (that's not far off what they did with pistol, and pretty much everyone hates it except for the people who really enjoy golem rotations).

Engineer has done fairly well from a graphics perspective of late (other perspectives are... a bit more contentious), but I think engineer is just a bit more grounded than elementalist. Big explosions, sure, a few electrical discharges, poison clouds... but people don't expect engineer to manipulate the weather or reshape the earth like an elementalist.

It's a sliding scale, but I think elementalist is probably the theme where you can least afford to skimp on visuals without negatively impacting the class fantasy. Which just becomes all the more awkward for ArenaNet when it's combined with the attunement system and weapons are now the primary new options being added in expansions. With elite specialisations they could at least make up for some of the extra effort going into the weapon skills by cutting corners on the rest of the elite specialisation (looks pointedly at catalyst, but there are signs in tempest and weaver as well), but I suspect there are some in the company that are probably wishing now they hadn't done the attunement mechanic and had just made different weapons key into different elements or something like that.

[Gaiawolf.8261]

4 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Agreed, but mesmer, guardian, necromancer, and revenant tend to get big spell effects as well. However, I think there's a bit more space for them to cut a few corners there. Guardian and mesmer, for instance, can get away with simple beams of blue or purple light - elementalist generally needs to be specifically elemental in nature, and recognisable as such. Consider virtuoso (and virtuoso's dagger) as a comparison point: it's a fairly visually spectacular ranged build simply through different iterations of purple dagger projectile themes. But even if we didn't have the attunement mechanic, you probably wouldn't get away with having an elementalist that is just throwing around a ton of ice knives, even if it behaved exactly like virtuoso except that the knives were frosty blue-white rather than pink-purple. And with the attunement mechanic, you're definitely not going to get away with four attunements of differently coloured knives (that's not far off what they did with pistol, and pretty much everyone hates it except for the people who really enjoy golem rotations).

Engineer has done fairly well from a graphics perspective of late (other perspectives are... a bit more contentious), but I think engineer is just a bit more grounded than elementalist. Big explosions, sure, a few electrical discharges, poison clouds... but people don't expect engineer to manipulate the weather or reshape the earth like an elementalist.

It's a sliding scale, but I think elementalist is probably the theme where you can least afford to skimp on visuals without negatively impacting the class fantasy. Which just becomes all the more awkward for ArenaNet when it's combined with the attunement system and weapons are now the primary new options being added in expansions. With elite specialisations they could at least make up for some of the extra effort going into the weapon skills by cutting corners on the rest of the elite specialisation (looks pointedly at catalyst, but there are signs in tempest and weaver as well), but I suspect there are some in the company that are probably wishing now they hadn't done the attunement mechanic and had just made different weapons key into different elements or something like that.

Sure elementalist gets more of them because of the attunements. I never had a problem with quantity, just quality and attention to detail. Yes, elementalist does have more requirements for physical textures especially with water/ice and earth magic. I have no problem with this either, although I would like to see more cool graphics and interactions with spiritual and illusionary weaponry. I don't think either of us even mentioned that both mesmer and guardian are battlemage classes, which also use martial skills (engineers tend to mix physical and sciency effects too), so some of their skill effects can be physical animations and not all flashy graphics. I think we're mostly in agreement when it comes to quantity of high-level graphics and time commitment, and yes my joke in the other thread about cost investments was complete hyperbole. 😄

But going back to quality, notice how the etchings are fully animated graphics on the field that even change as the skill charges and flips over, while the flashiest skill for mesmers and guardians, both at number five on long CDs too, are mostly static. They could have at least done something for the symbol that animates it like symbol of vengeance. Actually I think the Mental Collapse might have a small pulsing effect, but it still pales in comparison to the multi-layered graphics of etchings. The engineer's flashy skill looks really cool too and so does the lightning rod mechanic, but they're rather short, so still not as much of a feast for the eyes.

That's even more noticeable! If guardians, mesmers, necromancers, and engineers are only getting one flashy skill on the weapon, they could at least put half as much attention to detail in it as they did for just one of over a dozen of the elementalist skills, especially if you count the elevated etching skills as a separate graphic which they are. (The revenant mechanic looks pretty graphically intense, so I'm not including them in that list. I think that looks kitten great!)

Edit: I forget the name, but I also think that skill #4 on the guardian spear is really impressive but could be boosted up a bit visually to level the playing field. I kind of wish the spear shards coming down were a bit more textured and worthy of significant divine power. If anything that looks like the key skill on the weapon, maybe as much as the symbol, so the graphic should represent that. But I still don't think both of those skills combined match the graphic quality of just one elementalist etching skill. So that's kind of my point I guess; the two most graphically intense, big spell-effect skills on another weapon together can't even match one skill on the elementalist spear.

Edited Thursday at 01:06 PM by Gaiawolf.8261