Janthir Wilds Spear Beta Event Feedback: Revenant

[astralrisotto.3206]

Hey team, great job on the spear skills overall. I've got a few points for feedback though, which could help improve things for everyone (or just for me).

I'll break down my feedback into 2 categories: animations & effects (art team), and UX usability. I won't get into numbers or anything about damage/conditions etc. — that's your expertise and I'm clueless about balancing that.

Animations and Effects:

• Cast times feel slow and the damage lands slowly.
• The range and animation of skill 1 make it hard to hit enemies.
• Skill 2 has the same animation as skill 1, sometimes I can't tell if I'm autoattacking or pressing my 2.
• Skill 3 is fine with cast times.
• Skill 4 concerns me because of the "light" at the top of the spear; all the other effects are black and red, so the light feels out of place. Maybe make it red or black to match the others.
• Skill 5 is where things really slow down; it's hard to cast and hard to land, and the animation lifts you into the air while moving, which feels awkward.

UX Usability:

• Another user mentioned in the forum last week that skill 5 shouldn't be in the last slot, especially since it's used frequently.
• My suggestion is to swap the skill order: move the current skill 2 to slot 4, the CC skill (current skill 4) to slot 5, and the Abyssal Raze (current skill 5) to slot 2. This way, we're pressing the second slot skill more often, like with many other weapons.

That's it for my feedback — mostly about animation timing and usability. Thanks for reading!

[Silesium.5623]

3 hours ago, phandaria.4891 said:

I have this issue that Abyssal Blitz sometimes produce 3 mines, sometimes 2 mines. Does anyone else have this issue?

Depends if u move or not if u just click it make 3 if u move direcion and use it it make 4

[Kheron.9062]

55 minutes ago, arazoth.7290 said:

What I noticed, if you run forwards while pressing it without mobility increase, you get 4.

If you use it without moving, you get 3. 

Use it while moving forwards with mobility increase enough, you get 5.

 

I don't like this weird inconsistency 🥲

Me neither, it should just be increased to a longer set distance and always give the 5 mines. Then it'd be a better escape/mobility

[Kris Knives.8513]

So I don't see many people commenting about the passive effect of Abyssal Raze, the max stack trigger on weapon swap which I believe was intended to be an important part of its gameplay.

Clearly the intent is you spam out Abyssal Raze and then flip to your second weapon set so you have time for those base 3 charges to regenerate.   I'm just not sure about this game play loop as it leaves you energy starved when pulled off.  It might work better if you got an energy burst if the passive Abyssal Raze hits would address some of the energy concerns state above.

Having it be both an ammo and stack on Raze feels a bit much.  I think I would prefer this to work like Artillery Slash, having it build up charges and then spend them all at once for larger effects.  That would keep the current game play approach but streamline it.  Personally I also think it would be a better experience to have Raze used less, but feel more impactful when you do.  I think part of the slowness of the weapon is the fact you have to spam Raze which has a long casting time for a rev ability.

I would also echo some of the complaints about force not being visually clear enough and a little lacking.  Could use something like more range or a boon or something to make it feel more impactful.  It just feels too similar to Raze.

I know a lot of people dislike them but I enjoy the mines and sucking people into them with Blot.  I do wish visually it was a mist jump rather than a dash.

Over all I like the rev spear and its general vibe, but do agree it isn't 100% there.  I personally feel confident there is enough of a solid start here that this will get revised into something decent.  I just worry that won't happen before launch and we will end up waiting for some future balance patch.

--------------
I find it interesting that the mines have the explosion property even though currently that isn't mechanically relevant to the Rev.  I wonder if that is just for lols or if explosions will get a relic in the future.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

12 minutes ago, Kris Knives.8513 said:

So I don't see many people commenting about the passive effect of Abyssal Raze, the max stack trigger on weapon swap which I believe was intended to be an important part of its gameplay.

Clearly the intent is you spam out Abyssal Raze and then flip to your second weapon set so you have time for those base 3 charges to regenerate.   I'm just not sure about this game play loop as it leaves you energy starved when pulled off.  It might work better if you got an energy burst if the passive Abyssal Raze hits would address some of the energy concerns state above.

Having it be both an ammo and stack on Raze feels a bit much.  I think I would prefer this to work like Artillery Slash, having it build up charges and then spend them all at once for larger effects.  That would keep the current game play approach but streamline it.  Personally I also think it would be a better experience to have Raze used less, but feel more impactful when you do.  I think part of the slowness of the weapon is the fact you have to spam Raze which has a long casting time for a rev ability.

I would also echo some of the complaints about force not being visually clear enough and a little lacking.  Could use something like more range or a boon or something to make it feel more impactful.  It just feels too similar to Raze.

I know a lot of people dislike them but I enjoy the mines and sucking people into them with Blot.  I do wish visually it was a mist jump rather than a dash.

Over all I like the rev spear and its general vibe, but do agree it isn't 100% there.  I personally feel confident there is enough of a solid start here that this will get revised into something decent.  I just worry that won't happen before launch and we will end up waiting for some future balance patch.

--------------
I find it interesting that the mines have the explosion property even though currently that isn't mechanically relevant to the Rev.  I wonder if that is just for lols or if explosions will get a relic in the future.

If this was how the gameplay loop was designed then why did they design it that all the other skills of the set functionally recharge that skill rapidly? The spear is sending mixed messages and not a one of them leads to a good outcome.

Edited Friday at 03:49 PM by Ravenwulfe.5360

[Silesium.5623]

Overall weapon is slow.

Change mechanic of Crashing abyss skill 2/3/4 will add 1 stack insted reduce timer on 5 

Remove timer on Crushing abyss 

1. Need speed up + add more 1/2 condi 

2. When lands implods around target in to 3/4 small aoes. 1 stack of crashing abyssal

3 . Make orb fallow target. Increase distance of character travel. If at least one orb hit target get 2 stacks of crashing abyssal

4. Switch 4-5 skill space/animation remove long cost time or change to instant skill. Leaves abyssal rift on ground for 5 sec each 1 sec tick apply crashing abyss/dmg/slow change to area ground dot

5. Switch 4-5 skill space/animation now abyssal blot works diffrent for each stack

1* dmg/chill

2* dmg/chill/poison

3* dmg/chill/poison/torrment

4* dmg/chill/poison/2x torrment

5* dmg/slow/poison/burn/x3torment/pull

Sorry for eng

[Kris Knives.8513]

14 minutes ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

If this was how the gameplay loop was designed then why did they design it that all the other skills of the set functionally recharge that skill rapidly? The spear is sending mixed messages and not a one of them leads to a good outcome.

No argument here.  I agree it is counter intuitive and I don't think it really works as is. 

Maybe I'm reading too much into it but as I see it, the design seems to be you NEED those 3 base charges & recharge reductions to get stay on max Raze stacks but for it to be bursty.  You hit max stacks, spam Raze for a bit to load up torment and the "cash out" for a final raze when you switch weapons.  Then eventually you flip back and have the three charges back to repeat the process.  Much like how a herald will cash out their facets before running out of energy.  It is a reward to paying close attention to your resources and switching out at a key moment.

[GrayListen.3587]

Totally missed this thread, thought it was an existing pinned thread and put my thoughts in the other one.  Condensed/updated form here:

• Skill 1 needs faster cast times, would love an auto attack chain of some sort even if only part of the chain lessened AR cooldown.
• Skill 2, needs 3/4s cast, would like 900 range + stack of Crushing Abyss to make this more reliable, and valuable.
• Skill 3, would love either "dash toward target" or "dash forward" instead of ground targeting, would make this faster and more reliable - for me at least.
• Skill 3, seems to be a bug where this movement skill does not grant Resistance via Aggressive Agility.
• Skill 4, needs 3/4s cast - compare to necro staff 5 which is a 1200 range 3/4s cast fear.
• Skill 5, needs much quicker cast.  Nothing justifying 1.25s.
• Skill 5, needs some other condis at higher crushing abyss stacks to make it more valuable.
• Crushing Abyss needs other sources of generation, and the stacks should not expire (or a new count of it should refresh the whole stack, and needs a longer timer before expire).  Near impossible to build up 5 stacks in a standard PvP match and incredibly difficult to build up to 5 stacks in general.
  • Would love to see Crushing Abyss accumulated on Skills 2 and 4.
• Bug where Abyssal Raze will not cast on weapon swap when at 5 stacks of Crushing Abyss, stacks just disappear with no cast.
• Very much agree with the point that we should swap the skills around on the hotbar, my hand was not feeling great trying to spam 5 so often.  Abyssal Raze should be Skill 2.  Skill 4 should be Skill 5, Skill 2 should be Skill 4.

Long casts at the moment make this weapon a fight against itself, interrupting your own casts too frequently.  Crushing Abyss is actually a really fun mechanic with nice visuals, and the weapon swap perk is a fun one but currently has a bug where it won't trigger all the time.  Overall somewhat disappointing condi application, though Skill 3 unexpectedly works well to dodge through groups staying in that mid range while applying some extras.

With some tweaks to cast times, more reliable Crushing Abyss and a bit of extra condi damage, I think this could be a lot of fun.  I do hope any tweaks keep it in the realm of more condition-based, because we desperately need another condi weapon (mace + SB and sort of axe, compared to sword, hammer, GS, arguably axe, staff, scepter all being more valuable on power builds).  While I do think some skills (Skill 2) could benefit from longer range, I actually don't want to see this turn into a long-range weapon.  Revenants work really well in mid-close range, and Demon Stance is a lot of fun to pair with this weapon, working in close range most of the time but having some mid-range attacks to keep up the pressure as needed.

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

I genuinely feel like this design for spear would have been decent on any profession EXCEPT for Revenant (Thief could potentially have skills refund initiative).  Because of the energy mechanic and how everything but the auto attack requires it, this weapon just doesn't leave you with much play options.

Perhaps Abyssal Raze should refund some energy per stack of its buff?

[latlat.4516]

Here's my feedback.

Context : I ran my tests through reset blob. Well, I'm sure a lot of people here will share my problems with the weapon

 

1. the fifth skill is far too slow, borderline unusable. This skill is impossible to time with the bomb (+ the fact that it is a 600 range, and not 900)

2. the fourth skills should only have a low coefficient on in its last hit. I kinda want to be mean here, but how come we have a skill that hits 6 times over one second and a half and only has an effect on its last hit ? That means that the weak 180 pull in a 240 radius with 600 range only happens 2 and a half second after we decided to use it ?

3. the power coefficient is not enough for a weapon with more than a 1s cast time and only one single condition

And I'm lucky, when I did manage to hit people that were not in their invul phase of the downstate, I could hit multiple targets at once, which meant I could build the power up quicker. I do pity anyone that would bring this weapon on boss fights.

in conclusion, this weapon does less power damage than the shortbow, less condition damage than the short bow, with only one single damaging condition, is slower than the shortbow, with 300 range less and a mechanic that could be fun if it were not linked to a 1 and 1/4s cast time that you should multiple times -- to a really meager result.  Which means the weapon brings nothing more than what the SB offers, except its short dodge. 

[Apolo.5942]

Damage is sub par.

Utility is non existant.

Animations are sssssssllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

Animations dont make sense, they seem like an attempt from a 90s free to play at reusing badly put toghether free assets.

This is not selling me the expansion.

Edited Friday at 08:05 PM by Apolo.5942

[Buran.3796]

5 hours ago, Kris Knives.8513 said:

Over all I like the rev spear and its general vibe, but do agree it isn't 100% there.  I personally feel confident there is enough of a solid start here that this will get revised into something decent.  I just worry that won't happen before launch and we will end up waiting for some future balance patch.

   You mean like with the scepter...  oh wait!

 

   In other order of things. how much torment  is people being able to stack on bosses with the spear? Because with mace + axe & sb and Mallyx I find out reaching  burst of 45-50 is quite easy despite my skills are mediocre, and that doesn't even counts the burns and bleeds I get on top of that torment. How much stacks of torment your spears paired with Mallyx and whatever other set of weapons of your choice are you getting?

[GrayListen.3587]

2 hours ago, Apolo.5942 said:

Utility is non existant.

Animations dont make sense, they seem like an attempt from a 90s free to play at reusing badly put toghether free assets.

Don't think I'd go that far.  Yes the cast times are slow, but it's not without utility.  The dash/mines are a lot of fun, they can make for a nice deterrent, cover a retreat - and I've enjoyed several times dashing around placing them + pulling into them thereafter.  I like having more mid range non-projectile attacks, the extra pull is fun to chain with something like Call to Anguish, and while the weapon is definitely lacking some in terms of overall condi output and it definitely needs some tweaks to Abyssal Raze/Crushing Abyss, I think it's evident that they actually put some time into spear animations and vfx.  They're pretty clean, they're not a huge deviation from the established standard (unlike scepter), we even get a new little idle animation.  They could've phoned this in a lot more.  Edit: Actually, looking at it I think it's fair to say they put a good bit of thought into the vfx.  If base weapons are "mist", this weapon is "ink".  Very obviously intended to have an inky, brushstroke feel to it - and I appreciate that attention on their part.

I'm optimistic.  Granted - I was optimistic with scepter after that beta, and can't bring myself to use that weapon, but this feels a bit different.  The simple fact that it's an expansion launch weapon and not two episodes into it I think is a good sign.

We'll see I suppose.  Scepter was one that I felt like I could come up with a use for, spear is one I want to use...pending some tweaks.

Edited Friday at 10:43 PM by GrayListen.3587

[Batalix.2873]

4 hours ago, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

I genuinely feel like this design for spear would have been decent on any profession EXCEPT for Revenant (Thief could potentially have skills refund initiative).  Because of the energy mechanic and how everything but the auto attack requires it, this weapon just doesn't leave you with much play options.

Perhaps Abyssal Raze should refund some energy per stack of its buff?

This I do agree with, and would jive with the idea of what abyssal raze is flavor-wise.

[Tambaloneus.6290]

Now, I preface this with the clear admission I am a scrub & only do pve and mostly build for looks. This was fun on vindicator, fun and looked cool! I was happy where I tested in Orr. I only do pve scrub tier stuff & that's all I'm commenting on. I loved the vindicator jump with this one, Very Dragoon. Please can we have more spear skins? I have some nice ones but there are so many sets that are missing the spear. If you're going to change anything maybe there could be some cool spear specific things in the vindicator trait line (or a new trait line for the new stuff we've got/will get for new weapons).

[arazoth.7290]

12 minutes ago, Tambaloneus.6290 said:

Now, I preface this with the clear admission I am a scrub & only do pve and mostly build for looks. This was fun on vindicator, fun and looked cool! I was happy where I tested in Orr. I only do pve scrub tier stuff & that's all I'm commenting on. I loved the vindicator jump with this one, Very Dragoon. Please can we have more spear skins? I have some nice ones but there are so many sets that are missing the spear. If you're going to change anything maybe there could be some cool spear specific things in the vindicator trait line (or a new trait line for the new stuff we've got/will get for new weapons).

It's better to make it baseline then  being forced to take traits to make it better, which other weapons arent forced to take

[arazoth.7290]

In really short summed up again ==>

Revenant spear is really good in making the openent immortal. Because revenant spear has:

1) No damage

2) too slow cast time

3) no condi cover

4) too low power damage

5) too expensive energy wise

6) too much abyss stacks required for optimal effect in 5th skill. Should be 3 stacks max, 1 stack gained per time max you hit with it.

Poison, vulnerability, torment 1 stacks ramping up to 3 stacks each of them when 3 abyss stacks has reached better hybrid.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

1 hour ago, arazoth.7290 said:

It's better to make it baseline then  being forced to take traits to make it better, which other weapons arent forced to take

Except the spear for mesmer gets a boost from the mirage line. I am believe the engie spear gets a boost from the holosmith line as well. Not really looked at others but if you look there are probably one or two others that a get a boost from a specific line.

[arazoth.7290]

Just now, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

Except the spear for mesmer gets a boost from the mirage line. I am believe the engie spear gets a boost from the holosmith line as well. Not really looked at others but if you look there are probably one or two others that a get a boost from a specific line.

Still bad design imo to do and make reliable more on it, they can make it perfectly work without being depended on traits.

I have rather traits be usefull to fill other stuff in

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

2 minutes ago, arazoth.7290 said:

Still bad design imo to do and make reliable more on it, they can make it perfectly work without being depended on traits.

I have rather traits be usefull to fill other stuff in

I mean if ANet wants Vindicator to be the DPS (Jonny Gat knows they blatantly refuse to give vindicator proper support for their support build) then they should go all in on it and make sure Vindicator gets a major damage boost since it really can't do anything else now after having it's support tools ripped from them.

[arazoth.7290]

1 minute ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

I mean if ANet wants Vindicator to be the DPS (Jonny Gat knows they blatantly refuse to give vindicator proper support for their support build) then they should go all in on it and make sure Vindicator gets a major damage boost since it really can't do anything else now after having it's support tools ripped from them.

ehhhh no idea why this now suddenly goes about vindi but oke.

They can ez help this with urn reworked, made some thread about it some time ago how it could be like then and for different modes.

Urn was a mess from the start, but now it becomes more clear and this can ez solved with some tinkering in the right direction. "If" they would their heads together atleast for it lol.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

2 minutes ago, arazoth.7290 said:

ehhhh no idea why this now suddenly goes about vindi but oke.

They can ez help this with urn reworked, made some thread about it some time ago how it could be like then and for different modes.

Urn was a mess from the start, but now it becomes more clear and this can ez solved with some tinkering in the right direction. "If" they would their heads together atleast for it lol.

I've made several threads about them needing to make zu Heltzer a better support set up, especially now they took the ability of being a good heal support from Renegade completely (was bad before but now worse).

[Pyra.2583]

Overall, the spear cast times, damage, range and utility are 'abysmal', to say the least.

Theoretically, it is impossible to ever get 5 stacks of Spear 5 for its initial use, which is relatively good in many game modes, but alas it is never plausible outside of pve. The cast time is the worst for any weapon I've ever seen. It will never see any real use unless it is reworked, or has decreased cast time with less required stacks. Decreasse cast time and increase damage, or completely rework. ***EDIT*** Even if you get 5 stacks of crushing abyss, and swap weapons, the proc only works around 25% of the time, if even. I know this is a beta, but figured I should mention. double edit: this skill just flat out sucks, and will never see any real use in pve, pvp, or in the game. Please rework. 

The 4th skill suffers from the same issue, the cast time, but it also suffers from the fact that anyone, or anything, can just simply walk out of the aoe before it can pull in any enemies. It applying chill on the pull makes zero sense. Either make it chill on the initial hit or have it chill for each tick for a small duration. 

For the third skill, it is relatively okay. It hits decently hard and applies nice condis, but just make the mines a flat number amount and not rng, unless it is bugged as the tooltip says it can spawn 5, but I've only ever spawned 3 or 4. Also, reduce cooldown by at least 2-3 seconds.

For the second skill, it suffers from its abysmal cast time, does pitiful damage, and has bad tracking. Decrease cast time, increase damage

The auto just flat out sucks. Slow cast time and does little to no power damage. Decrease cast time increase damage. 

 

We don't need any more condi weapons, please. It seems like a sick joke. Just make this a power weapon so it has some genuine real use in all game modes. It has great potential for a usable weapon. 

Edited Sunday at 04:23 PM by Pyra.2583
typo.

[Angesombre.4630]

For vindicator even in power it's experienced so much nerfing between trait and GS, while other professions are above what vindicator could do. Look, some vindicator bugs are still present despite numerous requests for corrections. And if a member of the staff happens to see this message, there's a post dedicated to the returning bug.

When I see the axe thief, I know they can make it see, the spear thief too, even the pistol necro or even swords that are not too bad either in terms of damage and projectile speed and distance. And then there's the lance returning a failure. For me, there's no will to make the spear viable, just like the scepter (although the thief's scepter is good).

Oh yes, the alterations made by the alliance are only marginally better than the spear.

Edited Saturday at 03:24 AM by Angesombre.4630

[Batalix.2873]

2 hours ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

I've made several threads about them needing to make zu Heltzer a better support set up, especially now they took the ability of being a good heal support from Renegade completely (was bad before but now worse).

Vindicator is just a mess of a design, generally. It should never have happened: far too ambitious of a concept, made worse by minimal copy-paste development, lack of good job design vision in EoD, and a gimmick that was very quickly abandoned but never given the proper consideration to rework/retool it into more than a clumsy "yo dawg" legend. Partly why I was very relieved to see spear is not Archy themed, we needed to move on from that garbage.

I agree with @Pyra.2583 this just wants to be a power weapon. I could see it maybe working with bleed, but then we are moving even more into Necro territory and I hate that. We need more damaging condis, Janet, things to make all these weapons and professions feel a bit more distinct. Thanks.