Idea for the Revenant

[Ramenor.1074]

Revenant is objectively in a bad place currently: while we more or less agree that the profession is subpar compared to others, the possible solution doesn't easily come to mind. Here is an idea on how to bring it to the power level equal to that of other elite specs...

One of the best fixes can be a small change to how the Herald elite spec plays. Instead of Facet of Nature, Revs can get another skill, which would lead to demanding gameplay giving the profession an option to outplay opponents. This could be a very balanced thing which wouldn't anyhow oppress other professions/specs.

Skill: Mist Ambush"Step into The Mists, cleansing conditions and consuming boons to power the strike."Damage: 550Damage if 1 boon was spent: 700Damage if 2 boons were spent: 950Damage if 3 boons were spent: 1200Conditions Removed: 2Evade: 1 1/2 secRange: 450Single-target, 30 sec cooldown, 15 energy

The only issue ragarding this new skill may be incorporating it into the Glint theme but I'm sure that the community and developers can come up with the animation of the skill that would both compliment Glint Legend and showcase distinct Revenant features .

[MachineManXX.9746]

This post lost all meaning when you said "we more or less agree that the profession is subpar compared to others". "We" absolutely do not agree.

[Arcaedus.7290]

At least as far as pvp goes, S/S power herald does not need another strong burst skill.

[Trise.2865]

So you want to give Revenant a strictly-better Mind Wrack. Sure, why not?

[b k.1648]

There's a slight problem with focussing buffs on the Herald. Want to guess which trait line is currently most competitive?

[Palador.2170]

If you want to fix Revenant, you need to add the fix to the core Revenant. Adding it to an elite doesn't fix the real problem at all.

And I will agree that the Revenant needs a fix. I'm not going to say that it needs more power, though. It just feels... unfinished, maybe? Or more like it's a class from another game that they tried to translate to GW2, but it lost something in the translation.

[b k.1648]

It's kind of a class from GW1 that they tried to translate to GW2 (namely, Ritualist). But the implementation raises eyebrows so far they'll look like a bad plastic surgery.

If it's going to be the only class where you can't choose your utility skills, maybe it should have been the only one where you can choose your weapon skills. Or perhaps the utility skills should have different variants - for example, an option between the Herald heal that absorbs damage, and one that just has a flat regen rate but a lower cooldown. Or a choice between the Renegade spirit that applies conditions to enemies, or configuring it to remove them from allies. And just because we know Rit mains never used anything else, perhaps there could have been a Signet of Spirits option on the Renegade elite... ;)

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

@Ramenor.1074 said:Revenant is objectively in a bad place currently: while we more or less agree that the profession is subpar compared to others

No, Revenant is NOT objectively in a bad place currently. Objectively It's very much in an above average to meta place, depending on game mode and build. There are certainly revenant builds that only perform at an average level or worse, but again, that's entirely based on the build and the game mode it's being played in.

@"Ben K.6238" said:If it's going to be the only class where you can't choose your utility skills, maybe it should have been the only one where you can choose your weapon skills. Or perhaps the utility skills should have different variants - for example, an option between the Herald heal that absorbs damage, and one that just has a flat regen rate but a lower cooldown. Or a choice between the Renegade spirit that applies conditions to enemies, or configuring it to remove them from allies. And just because we know Rit mains never used anything else, perhaps there could have been a Signet of Spirits option on the Renegade elite... ;)

I think this is probably the most interesting discussion to have in terms of revenant balance currently. I'm a pretty staunch defender of revenant's current capabilities and I wouldn't want to see the current gameplay lost, but I do feel it's somewhat unfair we have such less utility choice when compared with other professions. Currently, when just comparing utility skills, Revenant only has access to 12 (core) utilities when compared to every other classes' 25 (core) swappable utilities (except engineer who has 20, but also has kits). I like (most) of all of our current kits, but adding in an additional utility to each legend wouldn't break the class if it was executed well and would give people a bit more diversity if they want it. For example, I don't really use Banish Enchantment much, except in niche situations, so it would be nice to be able to swap that in and out as needed. I know some others don't like the current Impossible Odds, so if Shiro had a 4th utility that could be swapped out for the alternative then those people could use that instead. Honestly, a change like this would stop a lot of the crying about revenant and it would still (mostly) fit the current "locked in utilities" thematic.

[Dace.8173]

@LucianTheAngelic.7054 said:

@Ramenor.1074 said:Revenant is objectively in a bad place currently: while we more or less agree that the profession is subpar compared to others

No, Revenant is NOT objectively in a bad place currently. Objectively It's very much in an above average to meta place, depending on game mode and build. There are certainly revenant builds that only perform at an average level or worse, but again, that's entirely based on the build and the game mode it's being played in.

@"Ben K.6238" said:If it's going to be the only class where you can't choose your utility skills, maybe it should have been the only one where you can choose your weapon skills. Or perhaps the utility skills should have different variants - for example, an option between the Herald heal that absorbs damage, and one that just has a flat regen rate but a lower cooldown. Or a choice between the Renegade spirit that applies conditions to enemies, or configuring it to remove them from allies. And just because we know Rit mains never used anything else, perhaps there could have been a Signet of Spirits option on the Renegade elite... ;)

I think this is probably the most interesting discussion to have in terms of revenant balance currently. I'm a pretty staunch defender of revenant's current capabilities and I wouldn't want to see the current gameplay lost, but I do feel it's somewhat unfair we have such less utility choice when compared with other professions.

Currently, when just comparing utility skills, Revenant only has access to 13 (core) utilities when compared to every other classes' 25 (core) swappable utilities

(except engineer who has 20, but also has kits). I like (most) of all of our current kits, but

adding in an additional utility to each legend wouldn't break the class if it was executed well and would give people a bit more diversity if they want it.

For example, I don't really use Banish Enchantment much, except in niche situations, so it would be nice to be able to swap that in and out as needed. I know some others don't like the current Impossible Odds, so if Shiro had a 4th utility that could be swapped out for the alternative then those people could use that instead. Honestly, a change like this would stop a lot of the crying about revenant and it would still (mostly) fit the current "locked in utilities" thematic.

I love Revenant as is myself. But I never felt that extra utility skills would add true diversity. There really isn't a way to add more utilities that also wouldn't rob Revenant's current set up of its uniqueness. One or two extra utilities would likely keep the status quo as most builds tend to hover around a small set of utilities that work well for that given concept. It works well for other professions because they have the entirety of their utilities to chose from and so we sometimes forget that the same set of utilities tend to circulate the same set of build ideas for a profession. With the exception of people who just fundamentally understand build craft that most of us really just have the illusion of choice when it comes to utilities for working builds. Revenant's big sin is that it strips the illusion away from us and we can't ignore it for Revenant the way we can other professions (though some more than others. I would be remiss if I didn't admit that some professions do actually have more choices than others). I think what we really mean when we are discussing lack of utility choices is really lack of build choices as for other professions the type of build you're going for (buster, bunker, condi, dps) determines the utilities being used and most builds of a similar type for a profession, such as condi, will run similar utilities. What seems to change is traits and weapons. But that's just my opinion based on builds I see on metabattle, an admittedly small sample size.

Thus I feel that adding more utilities is just slapping on a band-aid ..... and one of the off-brand ones that falls off the moment you sweat. I think what really needed to happen was that Revenant needed to have more Legends and the Elites really needed to change how Revenant is played like everyone else. I think the idea of making weapon skills choices would have been an excellent way to diversify Revenant builds though. That's a nice idea.