Janthir Wilds Spear Beta Event Feedback: Revenant

[Batalix.2873]

I think it would be nice to have some of Rev's characteristic "white mist" in the Abyssal Raze spell, and maybe the AA. Just to better tie it to the profession fantasy and provide some slight visual variety to the weapon.

1 hour ago, Oldyoung.6109 said:

As with every post on this thread i will start with the slow Cast times and 600 range being totally insufficient, should be at least 900 as for the speed i have thoughts on each skill individually.

 

1. Abyssal strike  ¾ is simply too slow ½ would be much better 

2. Abyssal Force feels good to use but is too slow to combo well with other skills would  bring it down to ½ cast time also the AoE effect seems unnecessary it could be dropped for balance without much issue.

3. Abyssal Blitz feels really good although it could stand to have it's range increased a bit.

4. Abyssal Blot is slow and the dark field duration is too short to combo effectively, i would bring it to at least ¾ cast time and double the dark field duration.

5. Abyssal Raze feels slow but i don't believe it requires cast time adjustments rather i would reduce the cooldown to ½ from 1s and increase the radius to 240 up from 180 while it was sometimes difficult to land in competitive scenarios it was always close and given it's numerical power it should only need slight adjustments; the real issue is the Crushing abyss effect only lasting 8 seconds which is far too low to allow for weapon swapping or even missing a single shot,  the effect would be gone before i could position correctly in a fight or regain enough energy to cast again it should have a duration of at least 12 seconds you could probably push it over 20 seconds before it becomes too strong.

 

In summation Revenant's spear has opposite issues compared to scepter it's mechanically solid but with abysmal numbers holding it back.

 

I disagree with most of this, this feels like it is better tailored to PvE and hits the flavor well.

I like the 600 range, it's a unique niche.

1. I like the weightiness of the slower Abyssal Strike, fits the fantasy.

2. I do agree Abyssal Force could have a faster cast time, but the AoE effect can stay.

3. Abyssal Blitz is the appropriate range for a weighty, mid-range bruiser.

4. Fine with a longer cast time for Abyssal Blot, but it does need longer duration.

5. Range feels appropriate to differentiate from Abyssal Blot. And I like that Crushing Abyss only lasts 8 seconds to encourage players to camp spear and commit to weapons as stances. I have hated how much GW2 has leaned into spastic weapon-swapping, and designs like this which incentivize them away from that is greatly appreciated. 

Overall, I think this is actually a very good design. What it needs is increased damage numbers to justify the lack of range, speed and mobility (and in a somewhat unrelated vein, the game generally needs a few more damaging condi types to play around with--I'm not for just tacking on poison or whatever to this. Mayyyyybe bleeding would fit). Not everything in this game needs to be PvP-viable or super-speedy, and I am really digging this spin on Rev.

Edited June 27 by Batalix.2873

[Seth Moonshadow.2710]

Yeah, not bad but as many stated slow. Sure I could keep a CC bar down like nobodies business, but I can do that with my Renegade.  The Blitz mines are fun though 😁but a bit inconsistent, the same number doesn't drop each time. Is it 2, 3, or 4 that the skill drops?

That's all for now, thanks

[Buran.3796]

I don't see the point in giving feedback, since the scepter had like 20 pages of feedback and yet remains utter grabage... So why to waste time saying anything?

I tried the spear this evening, for like 10 minutes. As expected, I didn't like it: doesn't seems to have any role or function; is not good for defense, neither for mobility, not healing or support, nor for crowd control, and the damage is bad. Slow animations and no cover conditions, any of the underwater weapons we had for ages is better. Seems useless for competitive game modes and there's no place for use it at PvE.

   I won't buy the Jantir Wilds expansion; as Revenant main player, I don't think it has any of value for me. That's my feedback. My only advice would be: hire again the original designer of the Revenant, or the one which remade the short bow.

[Bdecki.7856]

3 minutes ago, Buran.3796 said:

I don't see the point in giving feedback, since the scepter had like 20 pages of feedback and yet remains utter grabage... So why to waste time saying anything?

I tried the spear this evening, for like 10 minutes. As expected, I didn't like it: doesn't seems to have any role or function; is not good for defense, neither for mobility, not healing or support, nor for crowd control, and the damage is bad. Slow animations and no cover conditions, any of the underwater weapons we had for ages is better. Seems useless for competitive game modes and there's no place for use it at PvE.

   I won't buy the Jantir Wilds expansion; as Revenant main player, I don't think it has any of value for me. That's my feedback. My only advice would be: hire again the original designer of the Revenant, or the one which remade the short bow.

Exactly how I am feeling right now. The scepter is still such a clunky horrible weapon. No feedback has been taken for it, where you at ANET? Fortunately I am sure at least this weapon will be tuned up a bit and at least be more fun than scepter. But would it kill them to have the weapons be a bit overtuned and fun for the beta? The new Rev weapons have both felt awful on release and scepter is still in that state.

Edited June 27 by Bdecki.7856

[Doctor.1384]

The weapon would feel much better if instead of the 4th skill they gave it the current aquatic spear 4, igniting brand. This would give it hit dependent mobility and make the weapon flow much better. Then the 3rd skill can be left as is so you can use it if you want some guaranteed gap closing or some disengage. The lack of range on the current 3rd skill makes me confident that the mobility aquatic spear 4 gives wouldn't break the weapon. It would also add some depth to the weapon since you could decide whether you want to use the follow up skill to get in melee range or if you want to stay at distance to apply the burning. 

The current aquatic spear would have translated very well as a land weapon and I think that what they're trying to do with the weird slow ammo skill on new spear 5 is simply a bad idea that needs to be abandoned before it gets too solidified. There shouldn't be encouragement to swap out of the weapon, those types of mechanics belong on warrior or on sigils. 

If nothing else at least scrap the current 5 skill and just make it a flurry of attacks that gives some invuln frames or something, maybe something like sword 3 but on a longer cooldown and a larger range, like you dive into the mists and attack a bunch of targets in an area. I really think aquatic spear 4 would be great on it. Aqua spear two would also feel nicer than the current 2. Also the pull on the 4th skill should be instant. 

Just delete land spear 5 and make the 4th skill the 5th skill, and in place of the 4th skill give it the aquatic 4th skill. Maybe increase the melee attack speed too and consider reworking the 2nd skill. These changes would fix the weapon. 

[Mangoyami.2418]

me on a quickness support build following revs around giving them quickness for their spear.

[arazoth.7290]

2 hours ago, Thevaultdwellinggamer.4267 said:

Plays like Hammer, but somehow feels worse to play than hammers. I can't believe Anet managed to pull that off.

Dont underestimate their power

[Shagie.7612]

Pretty clear the overwhelming consensus is the weapon is slow, lacks condi cover, the auto should be ranged by default, it's insanely energy demanding which means spending energy on anything but spear skills is going to feel awful (PvP/WvW, needing to heal in PvE, etc)

Please don't pull another mace/scepter and nerf shortbow to make spear look better by comparison.
Give it a redesign so it actually fills a missing style (melee 2h condi) instead of having two weapons that do the same thing and will forever make each other pointless depending on the tuning of a given patch.

[HotDelirium.7984]

I'm fighting constantly with the timer for skill 5 to try and get max stacks that I don't even have enough time for professional skills or utilities. Also, collectively the visuals are nice but they are just SO saturated with red that this looks less like "the mists" and more like channeling blood magic and haemomancy.

[Za Shaloc.3908]

Ummm…yeah I don’t really know what to say about this one. ANet, please don’t try to squeeze these weird mechanics into weapon skills as if they are elite specs. They are not. This is where a lot of the SotO weapons went wrong. I’d rather have a more straightforward weapon than this overly conditional must do XYZ to get value from a skill nonsense. What a mess. 

[Shagie.7612]

35 minutes ago, Za Shaloc.3908 said:

ANet, please don’t try to squeeze these weird mechanics into weapon skills as if they are elite specs. They are not. This is where a lot of the SotO weapons went wrong.

Eh, I dunno about that one. It works fine for Ranger maces. They're hilariously busted and powercrept, but it's just an additional feature for them because they don't have something like energy, just cooldowns.
Even Thief axe works with an extra mechanic because their utilities don't cost initiative.

It's basically just Rev energy that interacts poorly with having both weapon mechanics and legend mechanics/utilities.
And I don't think there's any getting around that.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

1 minute ago, Shagie.7612 said:

Eh, I dunno about that one. It works fine for Ranger maces. They're hilariously busted and powercrept, but it's just an additional feature for them because they don't have something like energy, just cooldowns.
Even Thief axe works with an extra mechanic because their utilities don't cost initiative.

It's basically just Rev energy that interacts poorly with having both weapon mechanics and legend mechanics/utilities.
And I don't think there's any getting around that.

There is but no one wants to say get rid of the energy mechanic.

[Shagie.7612]

Just now, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

There is but no one wants to say get rid of the energy mechanic.

Yeah I guess that'd fix it, but I don't think energy is a bad class mechanic. I quite like it even if they've nerfed a lot of what made it significant in the past (low cooldowns, mostly) over the years.

Energy works relatively fine in all the game modes for every other weapon and for all the legends. Doesn't that suggest it's Crushing Abyss and not energy?

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

2 minutes ago, Shagie.7612 said:

Yeah I guess that'd fix it, but I don't think energy is a bad class mechanic. I quite like it even if they've nerfed a lot of what made it significant in the past (low cooldowns, mostly) over the years.

Energy works relatively fine in all the game modes for every other weapon and for all the legends. Doesn't that suggest it's Crushing Abyss and not energy?

I can tell you right now, most of revenants problems begin and end with the energy mechanic. It was suppose to be the reason that revs had shorter cooldowns and stronger attacks but they keep nerfing revs and their utility into the stone age.

[SWLDguitar.5746]

This weapon (as predicted) is so garbage. 

The press skill 5 over and over again gameplay is horrible.  On top of that, !!2 charges!! in WvW??????? Great!  I tried to kill a 20% Harb with all their CDs spent exiting a fight with Spear and guess who got downed and died? Yup this guy holding a spear. I don't think i did more than 5% damage to them.  Exited the game and came here to post MY feedback. 

If nothing changes, this weapon WILL NOT BE USED.  If it stays this way revs using it will be blacklisted.  

Edited June 28 by SWLDguitar.5746

[MileVual.9241]

Going to have to be another echo or mimic here and just be short and to the point.

The spears skills need to be sped up, for sure, specially the auto attack, don't mind skill 3 and 5 staying as they are, those feel impactful but if you speed those up as well I would not mind.

Edited June 28 by MileVual.9241

[China.5268]

Slow, slow and SLOW! 

What is slow? the casting, specially skill 1..

 

[UncreativeGreen.2019]

PVE point of view

I'll start with the positives. Visually the weapon is nice. I agree with others that there needs to be more white mixed in so its more "mists" and less dark knight, but I can live with it. Animations, while slow, are decent.
I also enjoy having the freedom to use all mt skills while not facing my target.

And that's about it....

The negatives... oh boy....

Let's just start with the fact that this weapon feels like it was designed only for a DPS golem. The animations and after casts are so painfully slow until you add permanent quickness. Then most of the cast times feel like a normal weapon. However the melee auto still has a strange after cast and the cast time on skill 2 is still noticeably slow. Also the weapon's "flow" doesn't feel right until you have permanent alacrity. There's these gaps where you you're waiting for skill 2 so you can cast another skill 5 and the stack timer goes all the way down to 2s.... add in a forced pve mechanic and I just lost all my stacks. When you add in alacrity it solves all that and it feels like I always have something to press as long as I have energy. No weapon should be designed out the gate with permanent quickness and alacrity on at all times. It makes the weapon feel lack luster everywhere else outside of  comp'd groups. 

The stack mechanic needs tweaks. This is the one mechanic where it feels like it wasn't designed on a single golem. 5 stacks is just not feasible in a 10-12 second timeframe outside the initial starting swap. You can easily hit 5 stacks when you start with 3 ammo charges, but if you're swapping back and forth on weapons, you tend to come back to spear with just over a single ammo charge. This severely limits your ability to hit 5 stacks. Most of the time it resulted in me only hitting 4 stacks and getting 0 pay out. The way they're counted too is dumb. Currently the applied torment is based off the stack on your bar not on the number of skill 5 used. SOOOO... the raze used to torment counts goes like 1:0, 2:1, 3:2, 4:3, 5:4, Swap off:5. That means you get NO BONUSES for landing the first raze and for 50e spent you get a total of 15 torment. With only torment applied, this is painfully bad. There needs to be a base application before any stacks are applied, even if its just one. Also I recommend the stack cap being changed to just 3 and the ammo on Raze being set to 2. Then the base application of Raze being set to 2, with each stack applying 2 more. So the formula is 1:2, 2:4, 3:6. And remove the current max stack swap mechanic. It doesn't makes sense to have a self targeted melee skill fire off on a melee range hybrid weapon. This brings us to 12 stacks every weapon swap with only 30e spent. 

Everything above is easy enough to tweak and if done, we have a functioning weapon... not a good one, but a mechanically functioning one. Everything below is my suggestion for reworking the kit that is well outsides Anet's current scope and timeline. But it's fun to imagine....

Skill 1 Ranged: 1 torment, 2 vuln
Skill 1 Melee: New 3 chain attack. chain 1: 1 torment 1 vuln, chain 2: 1 torment, 2 vuln, Chain 3: 2 torment, 2s chill.
Skill 2: 4s cd, 8s ammo reduction for Raze, 3 torment, 2s chill, 3s blind
Skill 3: COMPLETE REWORK...  Skill 5, Abyssal Raze is moved here to save our fingers. 2 ammo charges, 12cd recharge. 1/2 evade during the cast. 2 torment, 3 vuln baseline. Applies crushing abyss stacks per successful hits. Each stack of crushing abyss add 2 torment and 3 vuln, up to 3 stacks. 
Skill 4: 10e. 4 pulses. starts 180u radius and grows to 360u radius. Each pulse applies 2s chill, 2s slow. (think necro GS 4, Nightfall) Now has a flip over skill, "Into the Abyss". 5e, Collapse the growing well to pull everything to the center and apply 3 torment, 3 vuln. (1s window until the skill flips to the pull for counter play and to avoid double tap. the collapse is instant cast so it can be combo'd mid Raze.)
Skill 5: COMPLETE REOWRK... 15e. ground target, 360u radius. Stab your spear into the ground and consume all stacks of crushing abyss, raining down (*or maybe coming up from below) projectiles that scale in damage and quantity per stack consumed. 2 torment, 1 burn per projectile, 8 projectiles baseline. 2 extra projectiles per stack. 120u radius explosion on each projectile. (this is where you can reuse the mine animations. By having them as the projectiles the rain down from the sky. Or if you went with the surfacing from below aspect you could have them stick up out of the ground before detonating.)

I felt like the weapon needed a bigger payout skill that hooked into the stacking mechanic more that just a bonus for when you swap off the weapon. This way the weapon still follows the growing power theme but is a bit more self contained. It's easier to reach the stacking mechanic as well and has a bigger payoff. Also with these changes the weapon comes with a lot more defensive utility between the blind, ammo evades, chill and slow field, and the instant flip over pull. 

I know Reworks at this point are off the table, but This is how I would have designed the weapon and possibly in the future they can draw some inspiration from it as it seems like the majority of people in this forum are un happy with the current iteration... or at least the ones that are unhappy enough to post something. People that enjoy the weapon are playing the game xD


 

Edited June 28 by UncreativeGreen.2019

[Kotori.3516]

Not really sure what to say about this weapon. It serves no purpose that short bow can not already do, in every way better. I think even just making the cast times faster will not make this viable, and increasing it to 900 does nothing as well. If you are going to keep it at 600, or even make it 900, then it needs something to differentiate itself from short bow like maybe removing energy cost from spear and only having cooldowns, this would free up energy for utility and make it stand out. Else I think this weapon needs to be 1200 range, slightly bigger radius and still needs faster cast times to hit anyone. Skill 3 needs to be at least 600, just space the mines out (I never see 5 anyways), at 450 its more like a third dodge than a kite tool. 

Also, the scaling going from PvE to WvW feels terrible. Skill 4 does 0 dmg in WvW while having a delayed CC?

[Angesombre.4630]

When I see the necro's pistol or the thief's axe. I look at the spear we're given and cry over how poor ours is in terms of damage and alteration, how slow it is, how much energy it takes to use certain skills. Even the necro swords have a good range of damage and life theft.

You've given us a failed sceptre and now the spear, you're not giving us any reason to want the extension, but at least this time we got to see it first.

Edited June 28 by Angesombre.4630

[Angesombre.4630]

As has been said, what's the point of trying to leave comments when it's clear that Anet isn't listening? It's just pretending to ask without any motivation to change anything.
I'm trying anyway, but I'm not sure I'll be listened to.

[SidewayS.3789]

I like how you guys are trying to write feedback only to be thrown at the garbage bin in a few weeks. Remember the feedback that we all given to Anet for the Scepter? How that turned? Yeah...

[arazoth.7290]

8 hours ago, Batalix.2873 said:

 

1. I like the weightiness of the slower Abyssal Strike, fits the fantasy.

 

Because of that in pvp with multipble abilties pressed in spear with corruption traitline, Did my mace auto attack on dummy more condi damage in total 😂😂😂

[Jobber.6348]

I feel like the importance of Skill 2 and Skill 5 should be swapped. 
Skill 5 should be landed to recharge Skill 2 and Skill 2 should be spammed for Abyssal Raze. 

I feel like if these two skills were swapped in terms of gameplay loop, it'll make Spear flow much, much better. The exchange here is Spear no longer being an AoE centric weapon but rather a weapon that primarily does single target damage but can gather and pull enemies together to reward the player with more Skill 2 casts. 

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

6 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

I feel like the importance of Skill 2 and Skill 5 should be swapped. 
Skill 5 should be landed to recharge Skill 2 and Skill 2 should be spammed for Abyssal Raze. 

I feel like if these two skills were swapped in terms of gameplay loop, it'll make Spear flow much, much better. The exchange here is Spear no longer being an AoE centric weapon but rather a weapon that primarily does single target damage but can gather and pull enemies together to reward the player with more Skill 2 casts. 

I don't think this would change much. Making the spear rely on a one button that requires building up over time and then maintaining that buff when it doesn't refresh itself just will not work. I mean mace alone is already still doing better DPS than the spear, and so is shortbow. The key placement isn't the problem, it's the slowness and the fact they built an entire core mechanic around this one button effect that has to land before we can get it.