Willbender Feedback Thread

[otto.5684]

20 hours ago, Sonork.2916 said:

What is the foundation exactly? A bunch of short dashes?

theoretically it fills the niche that guardian is missing. But ya, the execution is terribly botched. And dunno why it has physical utilities.

[oscuro.9720]

1 hour ago, otto.5684 said:

theoretically it fills the niche that guardian is missing. But ya, the execution is terribly botched. And dunno why it has physical utilities.

They would work if they were better thought out. They should have been closer to warrior physicals, giving a combination of mobility and hard CC on each one, since high mobility guardian could use lock down to land it’s bursts. It would perfectly fill the niche that is missing from guardian; high mobility, high CC burst that sacrifices a degree of sustain to attain this assassin-lockdown burst style play.

For example, the spinning kick thing is a lot of damage, sure, but it would’ve been better if it was a 2s knockdown + projectile reflect so that you could actually land sword 4 or GS2, similar to how warrior lands bulls charge+100blades+arcing slice, then leverages combat mobility to recreate spacing, only higher mobility, better sustain, etc. 

Edited October 28, 2021 by oscuro.9720

[ClanConflicts.4731]

22 hours ago, oscuro.9720 said:

...They should have been closer to warrior physicals, giving a combination of mobility and hard CC on each one, since high mobility guardian could use lock down to land it’s bursts. It would perfectly fill the niche that is missing from guardian; high mobility, high CC burst that sacrifices a degree of sustain to attain this assassin-lockdown burst style play.

For example, the spinning kick thing is a lot of damage, sure, but it would’ve been better if it was a 2s knockdown + projectile reflect...

Now this I could get behind. Giving Willbender a kit and Traits like a Core Warrior's Physical setup would honestly make the Elite Spec feel like it does something. It'd regain and retain the Guardian feel that Willbender is sorely missing, in a sense that you're protecting allies by zipping around disrupting enemy actions.

In regards to Tatsumaki Senpukyaku Whirling Light (the spinning kick), I feel like they should swap it with Heaven's Palm -  the knockdown in Willbender's kit and, in its current state, a joke of an 'Elite Skill' - and make it Willbender's Elite, removing the need of enemy targeting while making it more of a slower moving Warrior's Whirlwind Attack, and giving it a sort of pull-in effect along with the projectile reflection you described. They could move Weakness to Willbender's F1 activation upon hitting the fork of flames or something.

If they could rework the Traits to give us a modicum of choice that several of the other Elite Specs have (i.e. Bladesworn, Vindicator, Spectre), so that we could spec Willbender to be some sort of High bullrush CC/Highly mobile Self-Sustain/High Anything, it would also salvage the sacrifice-something-for-almost-nothing Traitlines we have now. 

Edited October 29, 2021 by ClanConflicts.4731
Spacing. Corrected labelling "Reversal of Fortune" as Willbender's Elite to "Heaven's Palm".

[oscuro.9720]

40 minutes ago, ClanConflicts.4731 said:

Now this I could get behind. Giving Willbender a kit and Traits like a Core Warrior's Physical setup would honestly make the Elite Spec feel like it does something. It'd regain and retain the Guardian feel that Willbender is sorely missing, in a sense that you're protecting allies by zipping around disrupting enemy actions.

In regards to Tatsumaki Senpukyaku Whirling Light (the spinning kick), I feel like they should swap it with Reversal of Fortune -  the knockdown in Willbender's kit and, in its current state, a joke of an 'Elite Skill' - and make it Willbender's Elite, removing the need of enemy targeting while making it more of a slower moving Warrior's Whirlwind Attack, and giving it a sort of pull-in effect along with the projectile reflection you described. They could move Weakness to Willbender's F1 activation upon hitting the fork of flames or something.

If they could rework the Traits to give us a modicum of choice that several of the other Elite Specs have (i.e. Bladesworn, Vindicator, Spectre), so that we could spec Willbender to be some sort of High bullrush CC/Highly mobile Self-Sustain/High Anything, it would also salvage the sacrifice-something-for-almost-nothing Traitlines we have now. 

If I’m being honest, I don’t even remember the willbender utilities well. None of them were worth taking in competitive modes because the class was so anemic in its implementation. Re-looking at them, you could go something like;

Flash Combo: Final hit stuns for 2s

Whirlwind Kick: Perform a sweeping kick that burns and knocks down foes

Heel Crack: make melee range, instant cast, daze on regular hit, stun on interrupt

Roiling Light flip skill (Quick Retribution): replace daze with stun.

Heaven’s Palm: make it a 600 range leap with an I-frame. Maybe replace the knockback with a pull so you can gather targets for a burst. 

That will give everything a clear role that is different than everything else; whirlwind is pbaoe knockdown, heel crack is interrupt, high reaction speed based, Heaven’s Palm is for mobile area control and setting up multi-target bursts.

I’ll probably make this a post to get more feedback on this concept, since I just made it up off the top of my head 🙂 

[Ragnar.4257]

No amount of tweaks to mobility/CC utilities will matter if you still HAVE to take meditations on the majority of your bar to sustain a fight more than 10 seconds.

 

It could be a 10s knockdown with a 2000 teleport, or a 1s daze with a 300 range teleport, they're both equally useless if you can't slot them.

 

Priority #1 for Willbender is making the Heal-skill and F2/F3 sufficiently strong that you don't have to take Valor + 3x Meditations to sufficiently sustain.

 

(Priority #2 is fixing clunky animation locks, Priority #3 is adding some cripple/chill so that target's can't immediately re-open a gap as soon as you close it).

Edited October 31, 2021 by Ragnar.4257

[Ragnar.4257]

Reminder, that Guardian has had Bane Signet (3s knockdown, 0.75s cast time, 1200 range) since 2012, and nobody has ever been able to find space for it on their bar.

So why, in god's name, would you give Willbender a utility skill AND an elite skill, that both do the exact same thing as Bane Signet, with the additional handicap of being melee-range, and not providing a passive bonus. It's a straight downgrade to something that is already too bad to use.

Who was thinking that 3x Bane Signet guardian was gonna play well?

[Buran.3796]

23 hours ago, Ragnar.4257 said:

 

Who was thinking that 3x Bane Signet guardian was gonna play well?

   I think that this post is brilliant and summarizes in a single line most of the problems of the WB.

   Is a badly designed spec which puts much effort into ensuring you are punished for chosing the Willbender spec (removing the passive effects of the virtues, which from the beginning  was a bad idea because any skill with passive and active parts in which the passive is good enough to not want to use ever the active part is a failure) but then in replacement provides nothing of use.

   Yes, you have new mobility skills, which are worse than Judge's Intervention in that role and which you won't try to use because the need to fill your skill bar with sustain tools because now you are more frail than core Guard (and with less damage).

   Will teach you how to design a "better" Willbeder: "you lose your virtues, but now you gain 5K HP and 500 armor". See? Doesn't provide any new mechanically, but at least opens the door to experimenting with stats....

[Arken.3725]

I think to address potential problems with WB; you need to look at core Guardian as an antiquated design that conflicts with WB.  Currently, you have too many mechanics that hinder Willbender's design of a highly-mobile roamer.  From Symbols, to Consecrations to a plethora of slow and uninteresting/weak weapon-skills.  For Willbender to truly be what Arenanet wants it to be, you need to look at the core design of Guardian as a whole.

 

I think this should be the way forward not just for Willbender or Guardian, but as for the game as a whole.  The game's design is to utilize Line-of-sight, mobility and tells for its combat.  With that alone, the game should have skills/traits designed around that, not standing-still for lengthy periods of time.  

[Caid.4932]

 

33 minutes ago, Arken.3725 said:

I think to address potential problems with WB; you need to look at core Guardian as an antiquated design that conflicts with WB.  Currently, you have too many mechanics that hinder Willbender's design of a highly-mobile roamer.  From Symbols, to Consecrations to a plethora of slow and uninteresting/weak weapon-skills.  For Willbender to truly be what Arenanet wants it to be, you need to look at the core design of Guardian as a whole.

 

I think this should be the way forward not just for Willbender or Guardian, but as for the game as a whole.  The game's design is to utilize Line-of-sight, mobility and tells for its combat.  With that alone, the game should have skills/traits designed around that, not standing-still for lengthy periods of time.  

 

Make symbols used by willbender a single hit attack instead of pulsing

[Drael.2015]

With some number tuning, animation tweaking and quite frankly, redesigns to some of the virtues and traits and the Willbender could be such a fantastic class. I love the idea of Willbender but cannot applaud the execution.

[Clockless.2503]

On 11/4/2021 at 7:32 PM, Caid.4932 said:

Make symbols used by willbender a single hit attack instead of pulsing

I think that would be too big of a change.  You could make them track their target.

[Caid.4932]

4 hours ago, Clockless.2503 said:

I think that would be too big of a change.  You could make them track their target.

Yeah it was kind of a throwaway idea. The spec needs to be pushed away from static damage fields though so something in the ball park will be necessary imo.

[wolfyrik.2017]

21 hours ago, Clockless.2503 said:

I think that would be too big of a change.  You could make them track their target.

This was my suggestion. Static AoE fields make no sense for WB, infact they counter the entire point of the class. It's self-defeating. The WB flames should attach to the target and pulse from it in a similar way to Signet of Vampirism's Active. Whether the class should do this to Symbols, I don't know. It'd be a hell of a good GM trait to experiment with during the beta phases tho

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

I doubt they'd do it but can we get the Whirling Defense like skill Almorra has during Darkrime Delves as an Elite? Specifically the projectile hate cage she does (and so does Harrower Veltan) because during beta, Heaven's Palm was absolutely useless for much of the time. I think Almorra/Veltan's projectile cage would've worked perfectly as an Elite. Caged in enemies can get punished when low HP and if you're feeling the pressure yourself maybe because the enemy managed to recover, you can come out of it but the enemy can't. 

They claim it as a mobility/CC E-Spec yet somehow the two NPCs that are based on Willbender feel more like actual Willbenders than the E-Spec because they have genuine CC/immob skills yet still maintaining mobility. 

[oscuro.9720]

9 hours ago, ChronoPinoyX.7923 said:

.They claim it as a mobility/CC E-Spec yet somehow the two NPCs that are based on Willbender feel more like actual Willbenders than the E-Spec because they have genuine CC/immob skills yet still maintaining mobility. 

I 100% agree. The actual CC and lockdown is non-existent in the spec. The mobility is there, but has weird cast times preventing follow up.

On top of the idea for making utility skills have hard lockdown, I think some sort of lock on several of the virtues would be good. Something like:

Justice: Immob (2s) in foes struck

Courage: Knockdown in the circular AoE

This would allow following up on these built-in mobility with actual burst instead of being strangely suck in place as the opponent walks away (or counter bursts).

[otto.5684]

9 hours ago, oscuro.9720 said:

I 100% agree. The actual CC and lockdown is non-existent in the spec. The mobility is there, but has weird cast times preventing follow up.

On top of the idea for making utility skills have hard lockdown, I think some sort of lock on several of the virtues would be good. Something like:

Justice: Immob (2s) in foes struck

Courage: Knockdown in the circular AoE

This would allow following up on these built-in mobility with actual burst instead of being strangely suck in place as the opponent walks away (or counter bursts).

Anything here would be nice. I want to quote something from earlier:

On 11/3/2021 at 5:27 PM, Ragnar.4257 said:

Reminder, that Guardian has had Bane Signet (3s knockdown, 0.75s cast time, 1200 range) since 2012, and nobody has ever been able to find space for it on their bar.

So why, in god's name, would you give Willbender a utility skill AND an elite skill, that both do the exact same thing as Bane Signet, with the additional handicap of being melee-range, and not providing a passive bonus. It's a straight downgrade to something that is already too bad to use.

Who was thinking that 3x Bane Signet guardian was gonna play well?

This is what happens when whoever designing the elite has never played a single PvP game with guardian. I am not even sure they ever played guardian in PvE either.

[jimmybob.5628]

So I main a Guardian and I have loved this class from the 1st day I played it . But I think this new Guardian Elite specialization Is not so fun is feel a bit on the Clunky  And not as fun not to say it wont be when it go's live. Just my thought 

[Cynova.1236]

No one likes that sad, pathetic excuse for an "elite spec". Anet mentioned they were all giddy for players to try it and patting themselves on the back as they usually do when they produce lukewarm content. And as usual they were completely blown away that everyone despises it. Easily the worst, most boring, poorly designed, and embarrassing "elite spec" GW 2 has ever had. What a huge middle finger to Guardian mains. You wait all this time for an impressive, fun, satisfying new way to play your favorite class, these only come once per expansion, and you get slapped with this trash... Peachy hated it. Anet should feel deeply ashamed and embarrassed by ever releasing or even thinking this travesty was anywhere near a good idea for an elite spec. Plenty more disappointment to come in EoD. This spec is the embodiment of what EoD has to offer. Just ridiculous.

Edited November 30, 2021 by Cynova.1236

[Caid.4932]

The animation changes help a lot, feels a lot smoother and more fun and natural to play. Offhand sword damage feels much better. Most things feel in the right ball park this time out at least. Not too convinced by its cc and lockdown or its mobility. It has a lot of movement skills and shadowsteps but they're all quite short range and fairly low impact. You probably need to use 2 to 3 utilities, virtues or weapons skills to cover the distance of one blink. Hurricane Kick utility helps a fair bit with synergy, feels like it could be a good skill for the class.

Its getting there.

[Drael.2015]

My biggest gripe with the class still hasn't changed and that is the Willbender flames requiring the target to stand still.

 

They are only useful in PvE and you hit like a wet noodle on single moving targets. If the flames stuck to the player it would encourage that high intensity gameplay better.

 

These changes are a step in the right direction. It's slowly getting there.

[Monarc.9726]

2 hours ago, Drael.2015 said:

My biggest gripe with the class still hasn't changed and that is the Willbender flames requiring the target to stand still.

 

They are only useful in PvE and you hit like a wet noodle on single moving targets. If the flames stuck to the player it would encourage that high intensity gameplay better.

 

These changes are a step in the right direction. It's slowly getting there.

Agreed. It’s getting there. I appreciate the updates, some very important improvements to animations and traits, but it still feels like a work in progress.
 

Virtues are getting there. Willbender Flames is still the biggest pain point for me. It’s okay for stand still PVE gameplay, but useless everywhere else. The flames for at least justice need to pulse from the player, but I would prefer that for all of the virtues to make them more consistently useful for the mobile playstyle. 
 

More of a wish list, but I’d love to have condi cleanse on roiling light, just to have one option for condi cleanse without going to the core kit. Although Absolute Resolve trait in Virtues is very strong with Flowing Resolve.

 

The traits are still a little meh for an elite spec, especially the master traits.
 

Also would love superspeed to fit with the fast and mobile concept (I’d like shorter duration superspeed over swiftness on virtue activation/Righteous Sprint)  and some applications of short duration cripple would be nice for sticking to a target. Maybe a master trait option to add to lethal tempo?

Only played for a few hours so far, but can definitely say WB is much more fun and fluid. I’m happy to see the positive progress in the right direction. I hope a few more important tweaks (please improve flames) can be made before release.

Edited November 30, 2021 by Monarc.9726

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

Reversal of Fortune

- Need better visual tell when it triggers. The VO is great but a visual tell will help a lot.

 

Still no visual tell.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

- When used with Smiter's Boon and Monk's Focus, it heals a whole lot even when not triggered and heals over the tops due to low CD and two charges.

 

I guess I can't complain about this anymore due to the change to Holy Reckoning no longer heals.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

 

Holy Reckoning

- When used with Phoenix Protocol, it heals for a lot.

 

The revamp of this trait solved the "wet noodles" issue. The difference in DPS is very noticeable although I mourn the loss of the heal, but not too much.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

Phoenix Protocol

- This conflicts with Absolute Resolve and Battle Presence, not very clear which effect happens.- It's not applying Alacrity -- or the Alacrity icon doesn't show up.

 

Alacrity is now present. However, Absolute Resolve should increase the Regen heal amount from Phoenix Protocol.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

Suggestions

- Power for Power should give more Power per Toughness loss. Even a 1:2 is still reasonable given how squishy they become.

 

I love the new change for this. No more Toughness loss and got a 33% damage boost. Great job.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

- Lethal Tempo's duration should be 10s at 3% dmg and 5s at 5% dmg (Tyrant's).

 

Not exactly what I suggested, but I like the new change. Boosting condition damage also, I believe, is better than what I suggested. 

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

- Tyrant's Momentum --remove the Justice increase duration -- add 2s Quickness every time Justice triggers instead.

 

I'll take the new change. This is much better.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

- Deathless Courage needs a rework. This is the only GM trait that reduces the duration of Virtue and doesn't really do anything beneficial to anyone, not even to the Guardian. Willbender has tons of survivability thus this trait won't be of any use.

 

Still useless. Unless you're one-shotting mobs, you won't be able to kill anything fast enough to refresh the duration.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

- Flash Combo - more damage

 

With the change to Lethal Tempo, this suggestion is no longer valid.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 6:56 PM, Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

Overall feel

- Willbender has a lot of mobility, in fact too much, but no damage. It moves to location but there's nothing to do but move to another location. I'm not really sure what you're trying to do with this E.Spec but -- where's the damage???

- The sword skills also need improvements.

- Keep in mind that this E.Spec is following the footsteps of the Firebrand. So in terms of damage and support, Willbender doesn't bring enough to the table that Firebrand already do better.

 

 

Overall feel (Beta 4)

- I think the Dev team did a good job boosting the Willbender's damage.

- The sword skill #4 did see a damage boost, slightly, but the over change to Lethal Tempo I think fixed a lot of the damage issue.

- There is sometimes an animation delay when chaining skills but most of the time I can chain skills smoothly and continuously.

- I think this E.Spec has improved a lot and playing it now is a lot of fun. Great job to the team.

[Brian.5324]

Better than round one, but still missing a few things.

One, I think Willbender NEEDS cripple somewhere. It’s too hard to stick to targets once you get there without that soft CC.

Two, Willbender flames need a tweak. They’re clearly an intended feature of the spec, especially with the Adept trait rework now all involving them, but their static nature clashes with the intended mobile nature of the spec. Perhaps they should reproc whenever the 5-hit Virtue active occurs? Perhaps they should follow the player? Not sure what the answer is here, but something needs to give.

Three, the utilities need more… utility. Perhaps Whirling Light can remove movement-impairing effects from the player? Perhaps Heel Crack (a laughably bad skill) can remove boons from struck foes? Perhaps the heal skill can grant a little barrier upon expiration? Again, I’m not sure what the best answer is here, but Physical skills need more work.

Most of the changes are a step in the right direction, but the spec needs more work.

Edited December 1, 2021 by Brian.5324
Typos

[Jah Warrior.9682]

In addition to the above- please change Lethal Tempo to 20%, and instead of the other Trait being 120 power, make it 180 or 200. Culling power willbender to make condi wb a thing isn't a great decision. Other than that things are looking much better! 

[Sir Vincent III.1286]

15 minutes ago, Brian.5324 said:

...Whirling Light can remove movement-impairing effects from the player...

This^

 

Definitely needed, badly.