Is Revenant Spear Fun?

[Umbrose.3609]

Is the spear fun?

That is my question to you all. Not if it's viable. Not if it's good. Not if it feels great to do a lot of damage. Or if it needs a buff/nerf. I know it has it's place in the PvE meta even after the "bug fix" and damage nerf. We aren't comping it like we were but Snowcrows builds have replaced Shortbow in favor of  Spear in condi builds. It's a  (Air quotes) "good" weapon. I'm pretty sure there are roaming builds in WvW that use it but I can't really comment on the WvW or PvP side of things. Is it fun to use? Do you enjoy the playstyle of spamming Abyssal Raze to build up stacks of Crushing Abyss and maintaining those stacks? Do you enjoy using your other abilities in order to use Abyssal Raze more? Does it make Condi Revenant more fun? 

Personally... my answer is no. I don't find it fun at all. I tried. I played it mostly in Open World, World bosses, Strikes and I took it into a few raids back when damage was insane. Sure, big numbers made monkey-brain feel real good. Beyond that... I was not having fun. Still not having fun after the changes to Crushing Abyss. I kind of hate that the Spear playstyle boils down to pressing the five key as much as possible. Spam 2 and 4 so you can spam 5 more. I dislike that when you can't spam 5 anymore, you are encourage to stop using spear all together for the next ten seconds. Condi is already a playstyle where your damage ramps up so having a mechanic that also needs ramping up just makes it feel even slower to do my full damage. It feels awful to be miss an Abyssal Raze and lose all my stacks. To top it all off; as much as we have to spam 5, because it is a ground targeted spell we have to press the button twice so it will fire, just adding to the spammy mess. I find it so annoying and unfun to use that I'm sticking to Shortbow and maxe/axe. It does less damage. How much, I don't know. 

So... Do you find spear fun? I need to know if someone out there is having fun with this weapon. Am I missing something?

Edited November 29 by Umbrose.3609
Typo

[Jobber.6348]

It's fun when I use it in ways it's not intended to be used eg. 

I use Spear 5 for its Blast Finisher on a healing build in both PvP and PvE because it's funny how much healing you can pull off with Relic of Karakosa and access to spammable Blast Finishers. 

Actually gonna try Celestial Healer Renegade in Fractals for pure memes. So anyway I started Blastin' 

Need to CC but no staff? Spear 4, Darkrazor, keep Blastin' idgaf. 

Need AoE cleanse? Centaur Bubble, keep Blastin' idgaf.

Edited November 29 by Jobber.6348

[Buran.3796]

  Of course is not. The only fun skill is the cc, which isn't as powerfull tbh, but fits well in cc heavy builds; the movement skill is crap, and the other three skills are unremarkable and have a range so short that feels mele, but the thing is mace + axe are mele and they are more fun. 

   I run spear + sb in OW because stacks more torment than mace, but most of the stacks comes from Mallyx, not the weapons themselves. In PvP I run a power build with hammer + gs; spear doesn't do anything for me and when face Revs I'm more fearfull about short bow players than anything running spear.

   Can't talk properly about WvW; barely jump in since they placed the alliances; I don't like my PvP hammer build in that game mode and overall don't like the performance of power Rev builds at WvW; it looks like condi builds do fine in terms of performance but i dislike the gameplay (condi Rev builds are very slow moving , and disengaging is like 70% of the self sustain for most classes).

   IMO the only spec weapons that are fun are the greatsword and the short bow, albeit the later only became playable after deep changes (and still has targeting issues). Shield, Scepter and Spear are mostly crap. I would say I'll move away from Spear in PvE as soon as a new OP weapon replaces it, but the TRUTH is I'm barely playing GW2 lately, so in the end I don't even care much about it...

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

I agree with Buran, the only fun skill in the kit is #4, the CC. The rest of the kit is just abysmal and feels awful tbh. #3 is such a short range dash/evade it feels kitten and the constant spam 5 playstyle is just dumb, especially if you end up losing your stacks for whatever reason. The traditional mace/axe/shortbow playstyle is far superior

[Umbrose.3609]

Using Abyssal Raze's blast function to turn spear into a support weapon is incredibly amusing. Good on you for finding some out-of-the-box use for the thing.

I did forget about the range factor of spear. I'm not sure what Anet considers considers short or medium range but Spear is shorter range than Shortbow. This compounds that you must land hits to not only do damage but maintain the all of the mechanics. Missing an Abyssal Raze sucks.

While I'm not sure I could say mace/axe and Shortbow "fun" either. They are not frustrating to use. I like that I can flow Mace 2 to 3 to Citadel Bombardment. I love chasing down a boss with Frigid Blitz (Which, by the, was more range than Spear). Shortbow is just easy to use. Range. Some single target. Some AoE. Some CC. They work. When I play Necromancer or Memser with Spears. One builds shards for spike damage and the other has to combo skills. They are FUN to play! They flow so much better and play so much easier. Not a clunky mess that is punishing if not played perfectly. I want that for Revenant spear but at this point I'd take something as brainless as Warrior spear.

Edited November 29 by Umbrose.3609

[Angesombre.4630]

Well, we know what the next nerve of the spear is: its explosive capacity...

[arazoth.7290]

8 hours ago, Buran.3796 said:

  Of course is not. The only fun skill is the cc, which isn't as powerfull tbh, but fits well in cc heavy builds; the movement skill is crap, and the other three skills are unremarkable and have a range so short that feels mele, but the thing is mace + axe are mele and they are more fun. 

   I run spear + sb in OW because stacks more torment than mace, but most of the stacks comes from Mallyx, not the weapons themselves. In PvP I run a power build with hammer + gs; spear doesn't do anything for me and when face Revs I'm more fearfull about short bow players than anything running spear.

   Can't talk properly about WvW; barely jump in since they placed the alliances; I don't like my PvP hammer build in that game mode and overall don't like the performance of power Rev builds at WvW; it looks like condi builds do fine in terms of performance but i dislike the gameplay (condi Rev builds are very slow moving , and disengaging is like 70% of the self sustain for most classes).

   IMO the only spec weapons that are fun are the greatsword and the short bow, albeit the later only became playable after deep changes (and still has targeting issues). Shield, Scepter and Spear are mostly crap. I would say I'll move away from Spear in PvE as soon as a new OP weapon replaces it, but the TRUTH is I'm barely playing GW2 lately, so in the end I don't even care much about it...

I am pretty sure spear gets a slap in pvp atleast, because 🎉logic🎉

[Jobber.6348]

13 hours ago, Umbrose.3609 said:

Using Abyssal Raze's blast function to turn spear into a support weapon is incredibly amusing. Good on you for finding some out-of-the-box use for the thing.

Right? Combine this with Tablet Bubble, Karakosa and Revenants finally, FINALLY have a ranged heal! Yes it's 600 range but it's consistent ranged healing!

I REFUSE TO USE SPEAR THE WAY IT'S INTENDED, THIS IS WAY MORE FUN.

[arazoth.7290]

1 hour ago, Jobber.6348 said:

Right? Combine this with Tablet Bubble, Karakosa and Revenants finally, FINALLY have a ranged heal! Yes it's 600 range but it's consistent ranged healing!

I REFUSE TO USE SPEAR THE WAY IT'S INTENDED, THIS IS WAY MORE FUN.

or kalla elite

[Shagie.7612]

I was really excited to make the legendary spear and then backed out of it, for two reasons mostly:

One is that Rev's shortbow is my favorite weapon kit in the entire game by miles, and now it and spear are permanently locked into making each other obsolete based on patch tuning. I think spear being 2h melee as a counterpart to mace/axe (like sword/sword and GS) would have been better.

The second is that the entirety of condi revenant being playable in PvP hinges upon spear being built to cover everything it's been lacking. Like 95% of that is because it has actual condition spread. I don't believe it's very good design in GW2 to "fix" things by creating explicit powercreep targeting it, rather than more general trait/utility changes.

I guess the third, more minor reason is that I don't think it's been a good direction to try and create weapons that contain so many mechanics, basically new elite specializations, within them. Think ranger maces and how nuts they were as a big shining example.

[nosleepdemon.1368]

Absolutely useless in WvW, feels horrid because the range is too short, cast time on #5 AoE is too long, dash is too short, and it has absolutely no defensive utility whatsoever. I gave up on it. Also aesthetically 99% of spear skins are ugly and the red/black effects / pools / spikey balls look like an intern did them in a day.

Edited December 1 by nosleepdemon.1368

[Rocker.2906]

The kit feels a little basic but it's..... alright? Not very good nor bad? 
I feel like it could actually be pretty fun, having a pull and AoE condi, but it gets dragged down by how unfun is Herald. It feels outdated because it's not played with it's EoD spec, kinda like Thief and Warrior whose spears are unsurprisingly not that popular. Their HoT specs are the ones that use it too. 

I'd say, looking only at FUN factor with the spear in a vacuum:

Mesmer > Guard > Thief >  Engi > Revenant > Warrior > Ele > Ranger > Necro

[Angesombre.4630]

The warrior spear and the revenant spear were nerfed. I don't know about the thief.

[Me Kill You.9035]

I would say it is, but I actually stopped playing my Rev mostly after using it for a few weeks because I got tired of the exact same combo over and over to make sure you don’t lose stacks and major dps 

[Cuks.8241]

I dont like it. Too much 5 mashing.

Use quick cast or cast on release. Cant imagine how annoying cast on click is.

[Angesombre.4630]

And to think they changed quickness on ingenieur because they were saying that drones were squeezed, now it's skill 5 spam.

[Umbrose.3609]

Like I said in the original post... spear is "good". Even after the nerf from it do insane damage. It's at least good enough for Snowcrows to replace shortbow on condition builds. Better or worse is subjective. Better damage potential, most likely but only if you play perfectly on a mostly stationary target. I have seen some people using it for pvp or wvw. But no one is having fun using it. At least no one coming to the forums.

Except the madman using it blast finishers.

If anyone at Anet sees this; please, it doesn't need a buff but it needs a rework or something to make Rev spear less of a clunky, spammy mess!

Edited Friday at 09:04 AM by Umbrose.3609