New Legendary Proposal: The Marauder

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

The following is a brainstorm idea I have that I would like to see for the next revenant legendary. I wanted to move this to its own thread instead of clogging up the other more ranty thread. Most of these are just suggestions for theme and not hard and fast rules. There's not going to be a ton of deep dive but general concept ideas I think would be great, as well as offering some new tools as well.

Type and Theme: Ambush style Legendary DPS focus with torment, poison and confusion damage

Legend Influence: Captain Mai Trin (with a tinge of Scarlet)

Weapons: Dagger (Main hand) Pistol (Off hand)

Special Legendary Effect (F2): Through the Mists - The revenant teleports through the mists to a targeted location, shrouded by the mists for a short duration. This effect triggers the next attack to ambush.

Trait Line - This is just a generic trait set up not really going to go into names just give a general idea of what to focus on.

First the Minor Traits the first one of course unlocking Marauder, unlocking dagger and pistol, and changing the F2 into Through the Mists, also granting the ability to trigger ambush on weapon 1 attacks. Second minor trait should be something dealing with Mai Trin being an opportunist and taking advantage of a situation gaining a boost to damage from ambushes or something similar or even increasing damage or duration on conditions. Third minor trait should deal with Mai Trin's madness and fear of Scarlet Briar, this paranoia leading to her lashing out and inflicting more damage based on a health threshold.

Adept Line of traits should probably focus on Through the Mist and how it can be utilized. Suggestions include allowing it to have a teleport back option, a damage boosting effect option, and a utility line that allows the revenant to create a portal from where they were to where they are going. Sort of a mini mesmer portal, as it were, with less utility.

Master Line of traits should focus on Mai Trin's wilyness, utilizing either her cunning attempts boosting up condition damage or her brutal assault and potentially offering the ability to give her more opportunity to trigger ambushes from say swapping legends, or utilizing dodge mechanics as well.

Grandmaster Line of traits would focus on the Scarlet Briar madness that Mai Trin is afflicted with. There would be defensive abilities and boosts based on use of Through the Mists function. The utility and pinnacle effects of course.

Abilities - Once again just suggestions not really focused on names here.

The heal skill, maybe have it be called Scarlet's Eye, effect can be an overlay of Scarlet Briar appears on the Revenant, leaving a small regeneration effect. If the revenant is struck during this period the regeneration ends and the revenant is healed for a percentage of the damage they would have taken.

The three core skills would focus on thief like actions that lean towards the revenant such as essence stealing, interrupts, flanking attacks, fissures. These attacks should be tinged with the fact Mai Trin is still being tormented by Scarlet in the mists even now. Perhaps she mentioned this when abilities are used such as saying "Oh no, she's close." Her torment and fear resulting where her lashing comes from.

Finally the ultimate. This one I think should revolve around the madness Scarlet Briar inflicted on Mai Trin. Make it a toggle and a soft laugh of Scarlet can be heard when turned on as this gives boosts to the other damaging effects within the set of Marauder. Possible effects being such as when using Through the Mist the Marauder rips a tear open that acts as a small AoE causing damage and inflicting torment on those around the revenant.

The Weapons - Alright dagger and pistol. These should be close range, melee focused weapons. The dagger attacks should focus on drains and siphoning while the pistol should be focused on area denial and control. Conditions such as torment, poisons, and confusion should be the mainstay of these with some crippling attacks like slows and such added on.

Edited July 1 by Ravenwulfe.5360

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

An alternate to the ultimate I was thinking since this is madness related, maybe when the ultimate is active, it lasts for a few seconds, and it turns the 3 core abilities into alternate skills based on the madness inflicted by Scarlet Briar.

Overall the theme I am thinking of is how Mai Trin and her fear of Scarlet Briar was sinking her into madness. Of course, we as the players (especially if you were a revenant player) brought her out of the brink but after death, there would be nothing stopping scarlet from seeking her out to drive her even more insane, essentially Mai Trin would be on the edge of madness and this would bleed into the player in powers and voice lines. Go for a real Jekyll and Hyde approach to the style of the character. If it has any support it would be extremely limited though, so I see this as mostly a DPS first and foremost though trait lines should emphasize melee, range, and defensive I would think.

[Angesombre.4630]

I think ANet had said they wouldn't put in a character from the existing story unfortunately, so for Mai or Scarlet, I don't think we'll see them.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

32 minutes ago, Angesombre.4630 said:

I think ANet had said they wouldn't put in a character from the existing story unfortunately, so for Mai or Scarlet, I don't think we'll see them.

I am sure they've said a lot of things. And they've also done things now that have basically gone against things they've said in the past. Just because they said something once, I would not hold it that they won't change their mind. And likely it was just more of them saying they had no plans to. Though they sort of broke that rule with Glint anyways, since she was part of the existing story with Destiny's Edge.

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

I am sure they've said a lot of things. And they've also done things now that have basically gone against things they've said in the past. Just because they said something once, I would not hold it that they won't change their mind. And likely it was just more of them saying they had no plans to. Though they sort of broke that rule with Glint anyways, since she was part of the existing story with Destiny's Edge.

Glint was already dead when the story started, though, so there's no risk of someone going up against Glint or Glint's forces empowered by her own legend. As I commented in another thread, too, with Mai Trin specifically, I really don't think her impact was large enough to be a legend. In the history books of the future, she won't be much more than a footnote when measured against Scarlet and Ankka.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

30 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Glint was already dead when the story started, though, so there's no risk of someone going up against Glint or Glint's forces empowered by her own legend. As I commented in another thread, too, with Mai Trin specifically, I really don't think her impact was large enough to be a legend. In the history books of the future, she won't be much more than a footnote when measured against Scarlet and Ankka.

Ankka is really more of a foot note than Mai Trin was. Most people wouldn't even know who Scarlet is anymore if not for them bringing her up again in the EoD story and resurrecting the LW1 story stuff either. Mai Trin we've actually dealt with a few times, including she shows up in the actual Fractals to. 

Not like ANet will need to address it anyways. They certainly stopped bothering to address key plot points with our current legends anyways. I don't even think a single thing in SotO a one of my legends have spoken up to talk about it, in fact.

Edited July 2 by Ravenwulfe.5360

[draxynnic.3719]

20 minutes ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

Ankka is really more of a foot note than Mai Trin was. Most people wouldn't even know who Scarlet is anymore if not for them bringing her up again in the EoD story and resurrecting the LW1 story stuff either. Mai Trin we've actually dealt with a few times, including she shows up in the actual Fractals to. 

Not like ANet will need to address it anyways. They certainly stopped bothering to address key plot points with our current legends anyways. I don't even think a single thing in SotO a one of my legends have spoken up to talk about it, in fact.

From the player's perspective, perhaps? Even then, though, I'd say that someone who's played through the entire story will probably have more of an impression of Scarlet, who was the centre of Season 1 and played a significant posthumous role in Season 2.

However, ArenaNet tends to choose legends according to their in-world significance. Kalla, for instance, was never directly interacted with by the players, having been an important figure during events that happened between the games.

So from an in-world perspective, what are we looking at?

Scarlet, ultimately, was responsible for making Mordremoth fully awake well ahead of schedule, with pretty much all of the story thus far hinging from that moment. Forcing the death of a second dragon so soon after Zhaitan (otherwise, the Pact might have figured out that killing the dragons was having undesirable impacts before they were already two down), and putting Tarir in danger when it was expected to be safe for long enough to raise Aurene, has such far-reaching effects that it's hard to predict what path Tyria would have taken without her actions.

Ankka is less significant, but she was the driver for everything that happened in EoD, even after her death.

Mai Trin, though? She was basically just Scarlet's pet pirate captain. If it hadn't been Mai Trin, the Aetherblades probably would have had another captain, or Scarlet would have found another band of pirates to give technology to. If Mai Trin had had her way on returning to Tyria from the Mists, EoD would have been a nothingburger, although it's strongly implied that Soo-Won would have eventually succumbed and needed to be put down regardless. As is, though, her only real contribution was preventing a reactor explosion. While that certainly saved a lot of lives, it was still, ultimately, reacting to what Ankka did, and did not even stop Ankka's primary goal.

One could probably imagine a Tyria where Mai Trin was simply deleted and things more-or-less ended up the same in the end - at most, Ankka wasn't brought to Cantha, so Soo-Won holds out for a bit longer. One can't really imagine the world ending up the same without Scarlet - can't just assume that some other random sylvari would have speed-run through the colleges and caught Omadd's attention and followed the same path. Mai Trin just didn't have a historical impact beyond being a lackey of Scarlet and, later, one more temporary companion to the PC who died within a couple of chapters of joining up. Might as well make Blish a legend. Heck, Blish's contribution to fighting Kralkatorrik might well be more legend-worthy.

[Frozey.8513]

Legend Mai Trin won't likely be happening due to conflict of channeling to her Legend whilst doing any content where she is alive. Think her Fractal dungeon for instance.

Now that being said we are missing Elona-based Legend, thus perhaps Varesh Ossa or Margrid the Sly might be good contender to the idea you are pitching in as highly impactful and cherished characters of the Guild Wars Nightfall.

[Frozey.8513]

2 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

ArenaNet tends to choose legends according to their in-world significance. Kalla, for instance, was never directly interacted with by the players, having been an important figure during events that happened between the games.

And that is the biggest downfall of Renegade as a legend. Having Legend that you can't have any personal connections to, nor having any kind of mention in the original game leaves her as very shallow character that just shots nonsense such as "Freedom must be earned, not given" leaving you to wonder what in the world is she even talking about, as you have no way to experience any of that in-game. Glad Anet understood this and didn't repeat the mistake with Vindicator.

[draxynnic.3719]

35 minutes ago, Frozey.8513 said:

And that is the biggest downfall of Renegade as a legend. Having Legend that you can't have any personal connections to, nor having any kind of mention in the original game leaves her as very shallow character that just shots nonsense such as "Freedom must be earned, not given" leaving you to wonder what in the world is she even talking about, as you have no way to experience any of that in-game. Glad Anet understood this and didn't repeat the mistake with Vindicator.

I disagree with this - revenants shouldn't be entirely limited to things that were in Guild Wars 1, and Kalla was foreshadowed in GW1 and was present in GW2. If anything, I consider Vindicator to be the mistake from a thematic perspective: the Vassal States duo were pretty much only famous for fighting Shiro who was the real legend, and neither of them really had powers that went outside what regular professions could do. If they wanted something from Factions, Zhu Hanuku or Urgoz might have been better choices, and possibly more if they expanded to Canthan history in general.

[Frozey.8513]

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

 and neither of them really had powers that went outside what regular professions could do.

This goes for all the Legends with the exception of Glint and Mallyx. We don't channel to Legends because of their power standing among their peers, we channel to them due to their historical significance - their Legend status that was established by their actions, and that is what we draw our powers from.

[Jobber.6348]

>Scarlet and Mai Trin

>No Captain's Shield 

#NotMyCaptain

[Genesis.8572]

The reality is that the profession sold to us as being the "darker, anti-paladin" type profession would likely be given yet ANOTHER legendary hero (e.g., Glint, Kalia, and Archie/Vicky) and not a legendary villain. 

[arazoth.7290]

New Core Lich stance + new core traitline 

Edited July 2 by arazoth.7290

[Dadnir.5038]

2 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

I disagree with this - revenants shouldn't be entirely limited to things that were in Guild Wars 1, and Kalla was foreshadowed in GW1 and was present in GW2. If anything, I consider Vindicator to be the mistake from a thematic perspective: the Vassal States duo were pretty much only famous for fighting Shiro who was the real legend, and neither of them really had powers that went outside what regular professions could do. If they wanted something from Factions, Zhu Hanuku or Urgoz might have been better choices, and possibly more if they expanded to Canthan history in general.

I think it's more about the "story" of these legends than their real abilities.

When it come to the vindicator's legend, I think the issue is that the devs wanted to use Archemorus and St Victor as the vessel of the "luxon x kurzick story". The main issue is that these characters are involved in the "shiro story", the legendary skill feature the tools used in the "shiro story" and are mainly known for this role. This is without forgeting that Nika had a very important role in the fight against shiro. All this weaken the fondation of the vindicator's legend and confused the GW2's customer. For this reason, I do agree with you that this legend was indeed a mistake.

Now, for vindicator itself, the devs would have needed to find a legend that fit the theme and neither Zhu Hanuku nor Urgoz fit the bill. I believe more fiting legends could have been found among the Tengus, the Wardens or even the ministry of purity's lore. In fact, they could have kept the "luxon x Kurzick story" but they should have used different characters to embody it.

Now, for the thread itself:

• While I think the devs stay open to any possibility, I don't think May Trin is "legendary" enough to become a legend.

Spoiler

The true issue is that she already became a revenant that channel Scarlet as a legend. Honestly, a revenant channeling a legend eventually becoming a legend haunted by the legend he was channeling just feel extremly wrong.

• The focus of the e-spec is clearly steping on Renegade's toes. Ambushes and conditions... You might not express it in the same way but, nonetheless, I feel it's too close to really bring something interesting beyond skills that might perform well if the devs allow them to.
• We are not getting Dagger and Pistol at once. Sometime one need to be realist.
• The F2 is interesting but to close in effect to the vindicator's dodge.
• What you want to do with the skills simply don't fit May Trin's lore/story, take a look at the wiki.

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

1 hour ago, Genesis.8572 said:

The reality is that the profession sold to us as being the "darker, anti-paladin" type profession would likely be given yet ANOTHER legendary hero (e.g., Glint, Kalia, and Archie/Vicky) and not a legendary villain. 

Not sure where that was said, the revenant was always said as a mist warrior, that channeled that power of others. Revenants are not "darker, anti-paladin" types though that appearance wasn't helped by the official revenant armor. They are actually a combination of ritualist and warrior from Guild Wars 1. Neither of those are a dark anti-paladin.

Of course now, with this new spear, they are definitely trying to force it to be like the death knight of WoW in appearance. I mean ANet has been shirking their own lore lately, completely neglecting the reason why revenants wear the eye covering and just shrugging and say, they don't really need it despite that was the entire reason ritualists closed their eyes while casting.

Edited July 2 by Ravenwulfe.5360

[Angesombre.4630]

In the names there are "Cobiah Marriner", "Vekk" or "Jora". Then there would be things to do with the assassins in gw1, the dervish could have been fun but I think impossible in gw2 and the ritualist are similar to kalla although different. Maybe something like the rodeur could be done but less obviously, we're talking about revenant.

I was reading Nikka could be good from a certain point of view, but it's Anet who's in charge, so we know it's going to end badly.

[draxynnic.3719]

4 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

This goes for all the Legends with the exception of Glint and Mallyx. We don't channel to Legends because of their power standing among their peers, we channel to them due to their historical significance - their Legend status that was established by their actions, and that is what we draw our powers from.

 

2 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

I think it's more about the "story" of these legends than their real abilities.

Historical significance is the main "in universe" criteria.

However, I think it's a bit of a waste when revenant just copies the theme of another profession.

While many of the legends are members of an existing profession, the powers you actually channel are typically associated with the thing that made them a legend, not how they actually would have fought in life. Channel Jalis, and you're effectively channelling the Rite of the Great Dwarf and the dwarf spirit as a whole, you're not just copying the powers Jalis had in life (we can see what those were in the GW1 wiki). Ventari is all about the tablet - you're not really channelling Ventari, you're actually channelling the founding principles of sylvari culture. Channel Kalla, and you're not just cosplaying as the greatsword/shortbow ranger she probably was in life, you're literally calling on the spirits of the revolution. Shiro comes closest, since he was an assassin, his skills are assassinlike, and you are mostly copying them... but that assassin-like is important: he was empowered well beyond the assassins of his day, and even those skills that aren't directly invoking the Jade Wind are still tinged by it. 

The duo just don't have that. Impact on the Kurzick and Luxon societies? They're revered, but their impact wasn't really all that significant. They didn't establish the cultures, they were already centuries old at that point. They didn't help their societies survive the Jade Wind - they were already dead. Their cooperation didn't herald peace and friendship between their cultures - the Kurzicks and Luxons fell straight back into on-again-off-again fighting that only ended when both were rendered functionally extinct by the Ministry of Purity.

So what skills do they have? It basically just feels like you're copying a W/E and a W/Rt. Seriously, you could transplant their skills into the utilities of a melee elementalist spec (would be more interesting than what Catalyst actually received, and maybe if Catalyst was Luxon-themed it could have the animal spheres without them being projected holograms) and a guardian spec with minor modifications and they wouldn't feel out of place. The only thing they have special is that they're a two-for-one deal, but since they require very different stats (and ArenaNet seems to be hostile to condi vindicator, and therefore celestial vindicator, existing), in practice you very rarely see players actually take advantage of that.

My philosophy - and it mostly held up to Vindicator as discussed above, with Shiro being a possible minor exception - is that revenant is an opportunity to have powers that don't fall within the usual bracket of what the other professions can do, so that's what it should do. If something could fit into another profession, that's where it should be. Is there a famous member of that profession you want to reference? Great, make that famous member the founder of the tradition that led to the latest elite specialisation for that profession, they don't need to be a revenant legend. The most boring thing I can possibly imagine for revenant, apart from no new legends at all, is if they made a mesmer legend and a warrior legend and a necromancer legend and... you get the picture.

Which is why I normally propose monstrous legends (Glint, Mallyx, Zhu Hanuku). Or individuals that have been externally empowered by some more-than-mortal power (Jalis, Shiro, Asgeir, Svanir). Or failing that, at least theme the legend's skillset around their deeds, and the consequences of those deeds, rather than just a copy of the skillset they might have had in life. Ventari probably wasn't shifting a giant stone tablet around to heal people when he was alive, and I don't think Kalla was summoning spirits of her warband in life unless they all died before her (I'm pretty sure they didn't...) and she was secretly a ritualist all along.

So if it's a Tengu, it shouldn't just be a serious of warrior-like skills because Talon Silverwing is the tengu everyone thinks of. Make the skills reflect the winds that the Dominion was named after, or the challenges the tengu faced in their migration and the means used to overcome them. If it's a warden theme... that's honestly basically Urgoz, although I'm not sure how to make a good legend out of him. Ministry of Purity? Don't just make it a set of mesmer skills because Reiko, make it a set of skills that reflect the ideals of Purity and the harsh measures employed to enforce them.

holy kitten I just realised that firebrand isn't guardian/elementalist or anything else that's been proposed, it's guardian/revenant channelling the spirit of the Elonian people through the tomes.

TLDR: Revenant is the opportunity for crazy stuff that doesn't fit in any other profession, it's a waste when a revenant legend is just copying what could be in the skillset of another profession.

1 hour ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

Not sure where that was said, the revenant was always said as a mist warrior, that channeled that power of others. Revenants are not "darker, anti-paladin" types though that appearance wasn't helped by the official revenant armor. They are actually a combination of ritualist and warrior from Guild Wars 1. Neither of those are a dark anti-paladin.

They did say that revenant was a darker profession, but I'm pretty sure that was in the context of being willing to channel the legends of villains (such as Mallyx and Shiro, ArenaNet seems to have held back from using villains since) rather than everything being dark as a general thing. To be fair, having a couple of 'dark' weapons can be viewed as balancing out all four elite legends being heroic in nature - they'd probably feel better if they had actually come with a legend, and had been designed to work with those weapons rather than feeling like they're just throwing stuff at the wall and insisting that it sticks even when people can plainly see the streaks they left sliding down to the floor.

It does strike me that revenant and engineer are probably the professions which are least suited to weapons being the main source of "new combat options". Revenant is so heavily defined by the legends that it's hard for revenant to really feel fresh without a new legend - running condi herald or condi renegade with spear is still running Mallyx/Glint or Mallyx/Kalla when all's said and done, after all. While engineer is typically so heavily defined by its utilities that it's hard for a weapon to really freshen up the profession when you're still using the same utilities, especially when the lack of a weaponswap makes competition for that slot that much fiercer - I do wonder sometimes if engineer might be better off getting a new kit than a new weapon (as long as the balance team actually commits to keeping the kits up to date). 

Edited July 2 by draxynnic.3719

[Jobber.6348]

2 minutes ago, Angesombre.4630 said:

I was reading Nikka could be good from a certain point of view, but it's Anet who's in charge, so we know it's going to end badly.

If I had a say in anything, I would revamp Shiro and rename it to Nikka. Nikka is the Legendary Assassin here, without her there would be no dead Shiro.

Shiro would then be the Legendary Betrayer/Traitor with a skill set more reflective of his GWW boss abilities:

Meditation of the Reaper: Channel a heal which also lashes out at nearby enemies, stealing life

Riposting Shadows (THE REAL ONE): engage to enter a Stance which allows you to Shadow Step to your target when you are dealt damage, dealing damage when you arrive to them. 

Impossible Odds (Now his Stunbreak): Breaks Stun and Cleanses all damaging Conditions currently affecting you. You then gain double strike for 10s. 

Echoing Banishment: Summons a Spirit Binder which inflicts Chill and Cripple on the target per interval. The target cannot leave 600 range from the Spirit Binder unless it is destroyed. Spirit Binder lasts for 5 seconds. 

Jade Winds (Upkeep): Inflict Vulnerability per second around you. End Jade Winds to strike enemies, dazing them. Stuns enemies with more than 10 stacks of Vulnerability. 

Just spitballing here but Shiro feels more fitting if he was a survivalist and insane duelist more than a zoom zoom Assassin. 

 

[Ravenwulfe.5360]

8 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

If I had a say in anything, I would revamp Shiro and rename it to Nikka. Nikka is the Legendary Assassin here, without her there would be no dead Shiro.

Nika did not kill Shiro, that was Vizu, Nika's ancestor, who helped kill Shiro along with Archemerus and St. Viktor.

[Jobber.6348]

58 minutes ago, Ravenwulfe.5360 said:

Nika did not kill Shiro, that was Vizu, Nika's ancestor, who helped kill Shiro along with Archemerus and St. Viktor.

Oh my bad, Vizu then.