gwf is not at the bottom, he can burst some classes easily CW, WL, Hunter, TR and using daring shout-->mark target gives you 15 or is it 20% ocerall piercing since it mitigates t negation and arp resist
you do need equip, thats right but if you have enough deflect/dex and some defence + negation you become a monster (as long as a TR walks along and onehits you with SE, or kills you in few seconds with his daggers )
vinceent1Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,264Arc User
edited June 2015
oh, i am sorry, i forgot absolute abusers use that hr glitch. what a shame. we demand only solo que or separate que, please cryptic
can only imagine how miserable their lives are when they play like this
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seventhpillarMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 216Arc User
edited June 2015
Honestly I think gwf needs boost esp on the sentinel side. With how people are asking for nerfs for TR, then they should have someone that can kill those immortal DCs/HPs and it should be GWFs. It's annoying to babysit an OP/DC for 40 mins match, and that's pretty much what I did with my gwf. Sitting mid for that long and he doesn't want to stop hitting me so I had to keep hitting him back, until someone from each side comes to help. Man my fingers hurt....
Let's face it, PVP will never be balance to where regardless of class, one can take down the other. Now as far as GWFs, they are not in a good spot, esp for malee. My GF can freaking anvil someone and kills on crit. It's ridiculous. Now a gwf, esp the sentinel is so lacking that I'm hitting DCs/OPs with a wet noodle. Lame. I could even argue to give to SWs, hell they are even in the worst place but someone has to be able to take them down. To me, I vote gwf esp being a malee toon holding a **** huge sword and can't deal that much damage while he's in your face? Come on.
icyphishMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,255Arc User
edited June 2015
I agree GWF is disadvantaged against most equally geared opponents the only class GWF has better chance beating up is SW/HR.
Fighting against
TR = SE and pierce from stealth, no chance, this is even worst if they use fire wheel with LM set.
DC = Cannot be killed alone and can still be challenging with 2 vs 1
OP = Cannot be killed alone and can still be challenging with 2~3 vs 1
GF = 95+% of the GF are fine, but for those that are very skilled or uses TARGET-LOCK to block you all the time, it becomes impossible for GWF as you will almost NEVER be able to land a hit from behind him.
CW = 95+% of them are easy kill, but for the really skilled ones, they can really keep their distance and dodge on the right time, it becomes very hard to land any encounter on them, even if you do, you probably wont be able to finish them in a rotation, and they will just keep staying the distance and attack you while healing themselves back....
On top of this, I have came across several (about 5) OP and GF that abuses the aura/feytouch bug, which hits you like 200~300 times within a few seconds, this bug has been reported in bug section but its just sad to see people openly abuse the bug.
This is my experience from a 4.88K ilvl BIS GWF with about 1/10 Death/Kill Ratio consistently taking out on average 2~3 pugs at once (I only do solo queue in DOM and is currently at Page 5 of NCL leaderboard). I can murder 98+% of the people I came across easily, but when fighting equally geared opponents, GWF is definitely disadvantaged. (and yes, even with my gear, there is no chance of me taking down OP/DC of similar gear level)
The only way to encounter those DC/OP is to ensure I can lead my pug team to spread out to cap nodes and then seperate the DC/OP then take them out seperately, however pug teams does not always have the power to take down the DC/OP even with 2~4 of them ganking on one, and things get even worst if its' 2 OP+1 DC+2 DPS combo... 95% of the pug teams would have no chance on that....
I've mentioned this in the past, but the problem with GWFs is that their powers are:
1. in general the game NW itself, is unfriendly to sustained-melee mechanics
2. most GWF powers are very
'aged' -- slow, not very responsive, clunky, glitchy
3. most utility powers the GWF has is overly diversified with minor/gimmicky buffs/debuffs
4. none of the real GWF players are paying attention to the above problems and asking for QOL fixes -- instead, they are all BURIED with demands and complaints that sorely focus on spec/performance/numerical aspects of the class
...what do I mean by this? You can give the GWF players all they want, and still the GWF players would be extremely in trouble and complaining about it when they meet an opponent that plays his el matador role well (Olleh!). How you gonna land anything when the whole [move to target → activate-melee power → your clunky power self-roots you in an awkward position → your target moves a little → your power misses] routine goes against you?
IMO this is what the GWF players should actually be focusing on.
Why do you think it's only the 4.8k IL guys with huge BiS gear advantage + broken shi* WoE artifact damage boosts that get to kill anything? Why do GWFs always rely on these 1~2 rotation mega-damage builds? Why is the more "technical" type of fighting/builds/tactics like pando's Inquisitor style generally looked down upon and considered not viable by most GWF players?
It's because the general melee mechanics of the GWF, how its melee powers work, activate, initiate, land, take effect, etc etc.. it's because these powers are so INEFFICIENT in-game that you can't expect to land any real, meaningful hist/attacks in prolonged fight.
Against those who know how to bob&weave it's so goddarn difficult to land anything else than one or two attacks, that the GWF players have become to rely on a mega-damage build that concentrates in dealing huge damage to a target in that short, rare opportunity he has to land an attack.
You can immediately recognize the pattern here if you look into it.
The mod2 GWF -- a time when prones were working in PvP, and allowed like 2~3 consecutive chain proning in game. Hence, with also stuff like unlimited Threatening Rush, GWFs rarely had any trouble in closing in to its target, spamming prones. High regen/tough defense/temp-HP + high-damage attacks + chain proning, the golden age of the GWFs with easiest combat management up to date
The mod3 GWF -- few aspects nerfed, but replaced with equally OP mechanic through a bug that persisted with Roar, it wasn't as powerful as mod2, but the AoE disable+root effect on Roar still allowed for generally easy combat management.
The mod4~5 GWF -- the troubles begin here. Threatening Rush is now limited, prones have changed to stuns. For the normal level GWF player, this is when it truly began to be difficult.
For the first time, the GWF faces the fundamental, problematic truth with melee classes in this game -- self-rooting melee attacks are difficult to even graze the target. Most offensive encounter are slow and clunky and difficult to even land in the first place. The only GWFs that can survive these troubled times, are those with gear spec so high enough to stay alive throughout the entire wild goose chase where you chase a target all over in hopes to even land one attack .... and when that one attack lands, the fight is finished. Stuff like "Mega-burping" CAGI builds come out, relying on the power to finish fights quickly within 1~2 shots.
The mod6 GWF -- This trend continues. While it has become a bit more lenient for the GWF players as a whole, the main problem is still not fixed. Attacks are slow, unresponsive, clunky, hard to land. Only the 'top bulls' of the GWF, that are well-adapted to mod5 tactics, skilled in following around the
matador to shove the horns through, are allowed to survive.
Yeah, you could come up with a more nimble, technical type of fighting using all those nice debuffs or side-effects.. but guess what -- this GWF can hardly kill anything. It provides an interesting fight, but that's all. In the end, with the powers as inefficient as the GWFs, you're gonna go for an all-out 1~2 rotation build.
That's the problem the GWF players should be addressing to the devs. To improve the QOL and the efficiency of those old, clunky-designed powers. Not asking for just more DR, more damage, which does nothing to solve the problem, because, in the end, the only place where the GWF players will be satisfied with this trend is the place where even average players can survive through the wild goose chase and then deal a 1~2 attack that's so powerful as to decisively shift the battle to your favor. If average players can do this, then imagine what the good ones can do --- IT'S MOD2 ALL OVER AGAIN.
That's definitely not the direction I'd want to see NW GWFs go to.
The GWF is the most gear dependent class in the game.
......which must be why it attracts so many players who pay for their gear and than want to be invulnerable while they mash buttons.
Seriously, if sprint (the single worst idea in the game, letting a heavily armored character zoom around on rocket skates), unstoppable and a decent amount of life steal - and significant self-healing feats if you choose them - aren't enough survivability for you, you're doing something wrong. No class on these forums expects more return for less input.
......which must be why it attracts so many players who pay for their gear and than want to be invulnerable while they mash buttons.
Seriously, if sprint (the single worst idea in the game, letting a heavily armored character zoom around on rocket skates), unstoppable and a decent amount of life steal - and significant self-healing feats if you choose them - aren't enough survivability for you, you're doing something wrong. No class on these forums expects more return for less input.
It's one of those things which do not turn up in the numbers or descriptions in the tool tip, the actual troubles and difficulties of managing the powers in real combat, as opposed to just theorycrafting their effects/mechanics or observing from the opposite end.
I've leveled a GWF before I went serious with my CW, just to learn how the mechanics really work. The more time I took with the GWF the more I realized just how dumb, inefficient the class is, and why people want/need the premade level gear to make it work. Like mentioned, things were different in mod2. The 'closing-in' part isn't really a problem. The 'landing attacks to make it work' part is. In mod2 GWFs had multiple prones to attempt to continue with the assault, the GWFs after mod2 don't.
Sure, the GWF also has some utility powers to help with the fight, such as gap closers like P-Charge or M-Leap, or nice, strong slowing attacks like Not-so-Fast. Except these powers aren't really too threatening in terms of damage. If you slot utility encounters, then you have to manage the main, damaging attacks with at-wills -- except you can't, because even if you close gaps or slow enemies with such attacks, it lasts very shortly and maybe you can get in 3~4 sure strike attacks. This is where the 'technical GWF builds' usually fail in PvP -- because even if you use these utilities to make up for the difficulties of fighting, the effects are short and gimmicky, and therefore you don't have a real window of opportunity to make your attacks count.
So, in the end, people inevitably arrive at the non-technical, "mega-damage 1-rotation attacks" conclusion, where your main mode of damage is handled by offensive encounter powers -- except these are even harder to land than going the 'technical path.' So in actual combat, closing in is easy, but your attacks simply won't land. You run around chasing enemies moving about, and by that time your stamina is out. The stamina, for some reason, doesn't recharge like other classes and always "pauses out" for 3~4 seconds before starting to recharge, so what happens is:
...you find an enemy, close up to them, they move away and dodge/teleport, you follow them around, stamina is out, about 90% of your attack misses, and you're battered senseless by enemy retaliation. This is why that much gear is needed -- you need to stay alive all the while you're being hit one-sidedly like a punching bag, and then have enough damage/power to knock off at least like 1/3rd of HP in that 10% of attacks you actually do land.
This is the "secret" behind the GWFs. You don't realize this until you play one yourself. That's why they need that huge HP, that's why they always complain about piercing damage, that's why they're all so inclined towards 1~2shot builds. That's why the GWF players endlessly ask for more DR and more damage.
Like I said, at this rate, when the GWF is manageable by GOOD players as is the current trend, which may be like only 5~10% of the GWF population, the rest 90~95% of average people with lesser gear level basically have no way to make it work unless they start coming near that amount of gear/IL. When the GWF, at this state, is buffed enough that most average players are content with it, that makes the top-level GWFs hopelessly out of control and OP -- just as it was in mod2.
This is basically because the GWF is set-up/designed in a wrong way, and therefore there's no other way to really balance it. It relies on too much passive traits, because the "active traits" of the class --> the manually activated powers, are generally weak and inefficient.
The class needs a new, streamlined design to make it easier for people to fight with, such as allowing moving-attacks with their at will combos, more slows/side effects, and perhaps even return to them some of their prones -- and then, we can start balancing and chopping off some of their over-the-board damage or other areas which may become OP as consequence.
An example: Swordmaster's Strike in the Swordmaster paragon.
In theory, this at-will power seems just ideally matched with Inquistor path, since a crit-strike from behind will prone(stun in pvp) your targets, and SM Strike does just that -- it conjures up a phantom illusion of yourself and strikes from behind. This actually works in PvE, as this power does not bad damage, and is AoE as well, so the more enemy you have caught in your "lumberjack-swing", the more you can see your phantom illusions appearing behind the enemies and just proning them around non-stop.
In PvP?
Good luck trying to even land this thing. A big, wild swing that is slow to activate, difficult to land. The worst part? Even if it lands, the phantom illusions that show up behind your target often have positioning issues, appearing slightly off the range, so the 'back attack' part doesn't even hit. It's especially evident when fighting in small areas with walls or other LOS inhibitions. Even if it appears at the right spot, its also slow, so the slightest movement of your enemy it misses. The only instance when this tactic begins to work is if the enemy chooses to humour you by standing up to you toe-to-toe into a slugging match, at which point you can engage Unstoppable and back-attack your target into chain-stuns with SM Strike.
Other than that.. no hope of actually landing this power at-all.
So yes, it's inefficient, so then do you have an alternative? What are you gonna use? The slow-<font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> Wicked Strike? The equally slow and repulsively ineffective Reaping Strike? The only useful secondary at-will, at this point, is Threatening Rush, and it's limited in charges now, and you have to change your paragon if you want to use it.
GWF powers are like... abysmal, when you actually experiment and see how much of them can be found a use for PvP.
Exactly what he said. GWF want more and more damage and survivability for exactly these reasons. They are without a doubt the easiest class in the game too kite and poke. With no targetted encounters, and the only gap closers being lackluster / affected badly by rubberbanding. All they can do is build for one rotation burst.
At higher itemlevels you can mix it up a little but (once you get your negation etc) but by doing this you essentially sacrifice even more ability to lock down your enemy. I've found myself walking at / harrassing enemies by making them dodge a lot making it look like i'm going for them, maybe landing a few at-wills here and there. using a few daggers here and there and a daring shout for the DR and mark. then when crescendo is up, sprint at them, wait for the dodge.
Pop crescendo for the lockdowns, then go through my rotation. Problem with this is you don't have all the stacks from your continuous damage, but unless I'm vsing a bad player who facetanks or another melee. building and maintaining those stacks in PvP isn't an easy task. That being said. I usually go too 2 in domination and that way I get to make use of WMS and other aoe damage to build up my stacks. the example above is more of a 1v1 situation (example from when I was fighting a rogue)
If you want gwf to have less OMFG damage, they need more than a little rework. they need basically a redesign.
But which would be the point in asking an update to GWF's encounters while devs are not listening to us, GWF-players, at all???
Dunno. How did us TRs receive the goodies at the beginning of mod5?
Many TR players had open discussions about all those ideas between mod2~mod4... and when finally mod5 came it was a big surprise to us that they implemented many of the ideas we've talked about, especially dividing the play styles of the different TRs by Sabo-stealth / Scoundrel-CC / Executioner-burst.
From the shoes of someone not a part of the 'GWF community', to me it looks many GWF players are still very divided about what they want. Some still say they want to return to mod2 days (or suggest changes that would essentially have the same effect), others thinkg they're fine, many don't know what they want, and I don't seem to see a big consensus forming at all, and most of the thoughts of the GWF players, again IMO, are focused at the "more DR and more damage" think I've mentioned above.
It seems most aren't really too interested in why the GWFs fail so much and why it's so difficult, and more interested in "how can we continue to do that big-shot damage we used to deal in stuff like mod5" thing. Most common complaints are, for example, about Destroyer stacks. Which I admit, touches an aspect about the general difficulty and clunkiness of the class mildly, but still way more focused on "we want more/easier damage buffs" than "we want to be able to fight efficiently".
I don't really see a consensus, and my opinions about the GWF class are probably utmost minority. Most high-level players probably wouldn't even be interested in it at all, since its me who is bringing it up, as well as them being good players they probably forgot about just how difficult to handle the GWF is.
IMO the GWF hits like a truck, and handles like one, too.
Hey Titania, you're pretty good. About you vs Paladins. Just running around them does nothing. Pay attenton to what they are using. This past weekend you were beating on my Binding Oath and probably wondering why my Pally takes 0 damage. Its all timing when you're VS a Paladin. Your GWF has the tools to take one down but it must be done with precision not just throwing attacks around.
Hello
I did that because I didn't have enough firepower. Because I don't have my Transcendent enchants yet since I sold them to upgrade stuff (I'll get them back in a couple weeks.. though). Also I know about Binding Oath, the Paladin absorbs damage in the first seconds.
I'm currently stuck with a lesser soulforged and normal bronzewood for the time being. So that doesn't provide enough burst, especially to bring down a Paladin. If I had my enchants I would've acted differently and pressured you. But at my current state, it was futile. So I pretty much played with a careless attitude.
You are a bit wrong here due, since mod 4, most GWF players (not just PvP players, but PvE players too) asked the same thing for the class: Destroyer as pure DPS damage (which is in the right direction BUT due stacks and some other stupid mechanics and useless passives like "Relentless Battlefury" + "Battle Fury + Takedown + Roar", our nerfed power stat and so on is what make the class not that good for DPS). Sentinel the "off tank" paragon path (this is: while dealing less damage than Destroyer, could be able to kill targets while tanking.... um.... far better than the class is doing right now) and Instigator as the "utility" path (double and triple debuffs on targets with 50% ratio or so of Sent's tankiness and Destroyer's damage) OR PvP Path as it was back on mod 1. So, the problem here is not the "GWF-player base" but devs that still insists on giving us, GWF-players, what we asked and THAT is a problem.
Except in my POV the suggestions are initially flawed in that without the specific request to revise combat mechanics as well as address the inefficiency of the class, ultimately this form, these limitations of the GWF class is probably the best that the devs can come up with.
For example, the PHAIL with the Destroyer path lies in that the stacking mechanics, when coupled with the inefficient attack methods the class has, inadvertently results in a "pure DPS class" requiring passive tanking traits to make it work. This is less evident in PvE where the mobs follow a predictable pattern, but when it comes to PvP the problems become glaringly obvious.
Great damage, yes, but how are you going to deliver the damage? The same "wild goose chase" (BGM: "Yakety_Sax.mpg") happens as you miss and whiff and huff and puff around with your dwindling stamina... being brutally punched around trying to deliver that damage, hence, a DPS class needs to become a "TANK" at the same time.
Actually this faulty design is same with all of the paths, sentinel and instigator alike. With my GWF I've spent most of my time with the Instigator build and.. well, nice and fine and dandy mechanics centered on crits and combat advantage, which is not bad, except nobody ever gets hit with any of my powers no matter how well I close the distance. If I start slotting encounters to make this job easier (like CCs and gap-closers) my damage suffers so bad, if I slot more offensive encounters, there's no way to deliver it, and in both cases with mid-gear range the survivability is quite low that I usually can't even take full advantage of the feats of my choice.
Worse yet, is when devs claims happily to us that their test are showing that the class (this is as i understand it: all 3 paths) "is fine" (talking only about PvP, not PvE)... which is WRONG because even BiS GWF-players still say that this class is underperforming on PvP compared to other classes...
Yeah, because the "fundamental problem" I've pointed out, has never been addressed. Basically the 4.8k IL and negation enchants and all that stuff, is in essence nothing more than a sugar-coating on a rotten product. My guess, the devs don't really see into the "management" aspect of the combat, whether its efficient or not. They probably concentrate on numerical data, as in each different path does X amount of damage if he does this, and receives Y amount of damage when he does that... but the real problem is not that X or Y. The real problem is the "if he does this" or "if he does that" part. This is the real problem. "This" and "that" are so inefficient in PvP that its difficult to make it work.
Even with the best of GWF players much more skilled in maneuvering and landing hits, the same "wild goose chase" still persists. If the opponent evades the charging bull well enough (Olleh!), then basically the GWF has no chance to win at all, so even at BiS levels it's always a fight between the GWF running around (Yakety-Sax, once more) and hoping the 10~20% of his attacks landing, can be decisive enough to finish the fight, whereas in the other guy's shoes, he evades 80~90% of the GWF's encounter attempts easily, and hopes he can KO the GWF before he gets snagged by that 10~20% of GWF encounters landing on him.
Thus, to repeat myself, the current form of GWF being the only answer -- enough <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>-shi* item level to allow the GWF to survive all through out his wild goose chase (final Yakety Sax!) and hopefully land a mega-hit big enough, often enough, to win.
Hence, the "pure DPS" aspect you or many other GWF players want, will always be overshadowed by its need to be able to tank damage, to even have a chance to try bring out the DPS potential of the class. In most cases this fails, and before the GWF has a chance to be the "pure DPS", he'll be killed first.
The GWF needs a redesign from the bottom up. It needs to be less reliant on passive-tanking (pure DR/defense/AC/deflection, etc etc..) traits and receive more active survival traits just like the TR. TR's are poor tankers, frail and weak, but the CCs and AoE disruption, stealth, dodge, powers like ITC, attacks like DF with auto-target homing and CC immunity built into it. These are efficient tools which help immensely in PvP combat. Compared to the general efficiency of TR encounter powers, GWFs are... ugggghh...
[EDIT] The 'changes needed', for example, Mighty Leap needs to be an AoE prone in my book (LOL!) Stuff like Takedown can use a little more range(+5') and around 30% faster activation, bland and uninteresting stuff like Punishing Charge needs longer travel with extra damage components like bleed DoTs and stackable slow effects, the basic Sure Strike needs more advancing allowed per each swing with less strict rooting to make it more fluent and easy to connect. Every other optional at-will powers are total <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> and needs all sorts of boosts in activation speeds or secondary effects, gimpy self-buffing powers need to be revised in their intensity, Dailies like Spinning Strike shouldn't be as useless -- it needs to have that same "homing hit" like the 3rd flurry-strikes of DF has.. etc etc.. yada yada, the GWF deserves so many goodies and fixes into its FUNCTIONALITY and EFFICIENCY, not the raw DPS/tanking numbers.
Comments
you do need equip, thats right but if you have enough deflect/dex and some defence + negation you become a monster (as long as a TR walks along and onehits you with SE, or kills you in few seconds with his daggers
Excuse me?
CW was free frag in mod1-3.
And dies fast against TR, HR and GFs recently.
can only imagine how miserable their lives are when they play like this
Let's face it, PVP will never be balance to where regardless of class, one can take down the other. Now as far as GWFs, they are not in a good spot, esp for malee. My GF can freaking anvil someone and kills on crit. It's ridiculous. Now a gwf, esp the sentinel is so lacking that I'm hitting DCs/OPs with a wet noodle. Lame. I could even argue to give to SWs, hell they are even in the worst place but someone has to be able to take them down. To me, I vote gwf esp being a malee toon holding a **** huge sword and can't deal that much damage while he's in your face? Come on.
Fighting against
TR = SE and pierce from stealth, no chance, this is even worst if they use fire wheel with LM set.
DC = Cannot be killed alone and can still be challenging with 2 vs 1
OP = Cannot be killed alone and can still be challenging with 2~3 vs 1
GF = 95+% of the GF are fine, but for those that are very skilled or uses TARGET-LOCK to block you all the time, it becomes impossible for GWF as you will almost NEVER be able to land a hit from behind him.
CW = 95+% of them are easy kill, but for the really skilled ones, they can really keep their distance and dodge on the right time, it becomes very hard to land any encounter on them, even if you do, you probably wont be able to finish them in a rotation, and they will just keep staying the distance and attack you while healing themselves back....
On top of this, I have came across several (about 5) OP and GF that abuses the aura/feytouch bug, which hits you like 200~300 times within a few seconds, this bug has been reported in bug section but its just sad to see people openly abuse the bug.
This is my experience from a 4.88K ilvl BIS GWF with about 1/10 Death/Kill Ratio consistently taking out on average 2~3 pugs at once (I only do solo queue in DOM and is currently at Page 5 of NCL leaderboard). I can murder 98+% of the people I came across easily, but when fighting equally geared opponents, GWF is definitely disadvantaged. (and yes, even with my gear, there is no chance of me taking down OP/DC of similar gear level)
The only way to encounter those DC/OP is to ensure I can lead my pug team to spread out to cap nodes and then seperate the DC/OP then take them out seperately, however pug teams does not always have the power to take down the DC/OP even with 2~4 of them ganking on one, and things get even worst if its' 2 OP+1 DC+2 DPS combo... 95% of the pug teams would have no chance on that....
Author of GWF Speed Demon PvP Build (Mod 11) <- Click to reveal the Speedy Beast! >:)
...what do I mean by this? You can give the GWF players all they want, and still the GWF players would be extremely in trouble and complaining about it when they meet an opponent that plays his el matador role well (Olleh!). How you gonna land anything when the whole [move to target → activate-melee power → your clunky power self-roots you in an awkward position → your target moves a little → your power misses] routine goes against you?
IMO this is what the GWF players should actually be focusing on.
Why do you think it's only the 4.8k IL guys with huge BiS gear advantage + broken shi* WoE artifact damage boosts that get to kill anything? Why do GWFs always rely on these 1~2 rotation mega-damage builds? Why is the more "technical" type of fighting/builds/tactics like pando's Inquisitor style generally looked down upon and considered not viable by most GWF players?
It's because the general melee mechanics of the GWF, how its melee powers work, activate, initiate, land, take effect, etc etc.. it's because these powers are so INEFFICIENT in-game that you can't expect to land any real, meaningful hist/attacks in prolonged fight.
Against those who know how to bob&weave it's so goddarn difficult to land anything else than one or two attacks, that the GWF players have become to rely on a mega-damage build that concentrates in dealing huge damage to a target in that short, rare opportunity he has to land an attack.
You can immediately recognize the pattern here if you look into it.
The mod2 GWF -- a time when prones were working in PvP, and allowed like 2~3 consecutive chain proning in game. Hence, with also stuff like unlimited Threatening Rush, GWFs rarely had any trouble in closing in to its target, spamming prones. High regen/tough defense/temp-HP + high-damage attacks + chain proning, the golden age of the GWFs with easiest combat management up to date
The mod3 GWF -- few aspects nerfed, but replaced with equally OP mechanic through a bug that persisted with Roar, it wasn't as powerful as mod2, but the AoE disable+root effect on Roar still allowed for generally easy combat management.
The mod4~5 GWF -- the troubles begin here. Threatening Rush is now limited, prones have changed to stuns. For the normal level GWF player, this is when it truly began to be difficult.
For the first time, the GWF faces the fundamental, problematic truth with melee classes in this game -- self-rooting melee attacks are difficult to even graze the target. Most offensive encounter are slow and clunky and difficult to even land in the first place. The only GWFs that can survive these troubled times, are those with gear spec so high enough to stay alive throughout the entire wild goose chase where you chase a target all over in hopes to even land one attack .... and when that one attack lands, the fight is finished. Stuff like "Mega-burping" CAGI builds come out, relying on the power to finish fights quickly within 1~2 shots.The mod6 GWF -- This trend continues. While it has become a bit more lenient for the GWF players as a whole, the main problem is still not fixed. Attacks are slow, unresponsive, clunky, hard to land. Only the 'top bulls' of the GWF, that are well-adapted to mod5 tactics, skilled in following around the
matador to shove the horns through, are allowed to survive.Yeah, you could come up with a more nimble, technical type of fighting using all those nice debuffs or side-effects.. but guess what -- this GWF can hardly kill anything. It provides an interesting fight, but that's all. In the end, with the powers as inefficient as the GWFs, you're gonna go for an all-out 1~2 rotation build.
That's the problem the GWF players should be addressing to the devs. To improve the QOL and the efficiency of those old, clunky-designed powers. Not asking for just more DR, more damage, which does nothing to solve the problem, because, in the end, the only place where the GWF players will be satisfied with this trend is the place where even average players can survive through the wild goose chase and then deal a 1~2 attack that's so powerful as to decisively shift the battle to your favor. If average players can do this, then imagine what the good ones can do --- IT'S MOD2 ALL OVER AGAIN.
That's definitely not the direction I'd want to see NW GWFs go to.
......which must be why it attracts so many players who pay for their gear and than want to be invulnerable while they mash buttons.
Seriously, if sprint (the single worst idea in the game, letting a heavily armored character zoom around on rocket skates), unstoppable and a decent amount of life steal - and significant self-healing feats if you choose them - aren't enough survivability for you, you're doing something wrong. No class on these forums expects more return for less input.
It's one of those things which do not turn up in the numbers or descriptions in the tool tip, the actual troubles and difficulties of managing the powers in real combat, as opposed to just theorycrafting their effects/mechanics or observing from the opposite end.
I've leveled a GWF before I went serious with my CW, just to learn how the mechanics really work. The more time I took with the GWF the more I realized just how dumb, inefficient the class is, and why people want/need the premade level gear to make it work. Like mentioned, things were different in mod2. The 'closing-in' part isn't really a problem. The 'landing attacks to make it work' part is. In mod2 GWFs had multiple prones to attempt to continue with the assault, the GWFs after mod2 don't.
Sure, the GWF also has some utility powers to help with the fight, such as gap closers like P-Charge or M-Leap, or nice, strong slowing attacks like Not-so-Fast. Except these powers aren't really too threatening in terms of damage. If you slot utility encounters, then you have to manage the main, damaging attacks with at-wills -- except you can't, because even if you close gaps or slow enemies with such attacks, it lasts very shortly and maybe you can get in 3~4 sure strike attacks. This is where the 'technical GWF builds' usually fail in PvP -- because even if you use these utilities to make up for the difficulties of fighting, the effects are short and gimmicky, and therefore you don't have a real window of opportunity to make your attacks count.
So, in the end, people inevitably arrive at the non-technical, "mega-damage 1-rotation attacks" conclusion, where your main mode of damage is handled by offensive encounter powers -- except these are even harder to land than going the 'technical path.' So in actual combat, closing in is easy, but your attacks simply won't land. You run around chasing enemies moving about, and by that time your stamina is out. The stamina, for some reason, doesn't recharge like other classes and always "pauses out" for 3~4 seconds before starting to recharge, so what happens is:
...you find an enemy, close up to them, they move away and dodge/teleport, you follow them around, stamina is out, about 90% of your attack misses, and you're battered senseless by enemy retaliation. This is why that much gear is needed -- you need to stay alive all the while you're being hit one-sidedly like a punching bag, and then have enough damage/power to knock off at least like 1/3rd of HP in that 10% of attacks you actually do land.
This is the "secret" behind the GWFs. You don't realize this until you play one yourself. That's why they need that huge HP, that's why they always complain about piercing damage, that's why they're all so inclined towards 1~2shot builds. That's why the GWF players endlessly ask for more DR and more damage.
Like I said, at this rate, when the GWF is manageable by GOOD players as is the current trend, which may be like only 5~10% of the GWF population, the rest 90~95% of average people with lesser gear level basically have no way to make it work unless they start coming near that amount of gear/IL. When the GWF, at this state, is buffed enough that most average players are content with it, that makes the top-level GWFs hopelessly out of control and OP -- just as it was in mod2.
This is basically because the GWF is set-up/designed in a wrong way, and therefore there's no other way to really balance it. It relies on too much passive traits, because the "active traits" of the class --> the manually activated powers, are generally weak and inefficient.
The class needs a new, streamlined design to make it easier for people to fight with, such as allowing moving-attacks with their at will combos, more slows/side effects, and perhaps even return to them some of their prones -- and then, we can start balancing and chopping off some of their over-the-board damage or other areas which may become OP as consequence.
In theory, this at-will power seems just ideally matched with Inquistor path, since a crit-strike from behind will prone(stun in pvp) your targets, and SM Strike does just that -- it conjures up a phantom illusion of yourself and strikes from behind. This actually works in PvE, as this power does not bad damage, and is AoE as well, so the more enemy you have caught in your "lumberjack-swing", the more you can see your phantom illusions appearing behind the enemies and just proning them around non-stop.
In PvP?
Good luck trying to even land this thing. A big, wild swing that is slow to activate, difficult to land. The worst part? Even if it lands, the phantom illusions that show up behind your target often have positioning issues, appearing slightly off the range, so the 'back attack' part doesn't even hit. It's especially evident when fighting in small areas with walls or other LOS inhibitions. Even if it appears at the right spot, its also slow, so the slightest movement of your enemy it misses. The only instance when this tactic begins to work is if the enemy chooses to humour you by standing up to you toe-to-toe into a slugging match, at which point you can engage Unstoppable and back-attack your target into chain-stuns with SM Strike.
Other than that.. no hope of actually landing this power at-all.
So yes, it's inefficient, so then do you have an alternative? What are you gonna use? The slow-<font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> Wicked Strike? The equally slow and repulsively ineffective Reaping Strike? The only useful secondary at-will, at this point, is Threatening Rush, and it's limited in charges now, and you have to change your paragon if you want to use it.
GWF powers are like... abysmal, when you actually experiment and see how much of them can be found a use for PvP.
Exactly what he said. GWF want more and more damage and survivability for exactly these reasons. They are without a doubt the easiest class in the game too kite and poke. With no targetted encounters, and the only gap closers being lackluster / affected badly by rubberbanding. All they can do is build for one rotation burst.
At higher itemlevels you can mix it up a little but (once you get your negation etc) but by doing this you essentially sacrifice even more ability to lock down your enemy. I've found myself walking at / harrassing enemies by making them dodge a lot making it look like i'm going for them, maybe landing a few at-wills here and there. using a few daggers here and there and a daring shout for the DR and mark. then when crescendo is up, sprint at them, wait for the dodge.
Pop crescendo for the lockdowns, then go through my rotation. Problem with this is you don't have all the stacks from your continuous damage, but unless I'm vsing a bad player who facetanks or another melee. building and maintaining those stacks in PvP isn't an easy task. That being said. I usually go too 2 in domination and that way I get to make use of WMS and other aoe damage to build up my stacks. the example above is more of a 1v1 situation (example from when I was fighting a rogue)
If you want gwf to have less OMFG damage, they need more than a little rework. they need basically a redesign.
Drunken Goose of MidNight Express. - 3.3k Paladin , 3.6k GWF , 3.1k GF,
Dunno. How did us TRs receive the goodies at the beginning of mod5?
Many TR players had open discussions about all those ideas between mod2~mod4... and when finally mod5 came it was a big surprise to us that they implemented many of the ideas we've talked about, especially dividing the play styles of the different TRs by Sabo-stealth / Scoundrel-CC / Executioner-burst.
From the shoes of someone not a part of the 'GWF community', to me it looks many GWF players are still very divided about what they want. Some still say they want to return to mod2 days (or suggest changes that would essentially have the same effect), others thinkg they're fine, many don't know what they want, and I don't seem to see a big consensus forming at all, and most of the thoughts of the GWF players, again IMO, are focused at the "more DR and more damage" think I've mentioned above.
It seems most aren't really too interested in why the GWFs fail so much and why it's so difficult, and more interested in "how can we continue to do that big-shot damage we used to deal in stuff like mod5" thing. Most common complaints are, for example, about Destroyer stacks. Which I admit, touches an aspect about the general difficulty and clunkiness of the class mildly, but still way more focused on "we want more/easier damage buffs" than "we want to be able to fight efficiently".
I don't really see a consensus, and my opinions about the GWF class are probably utmost minority. Most high-level players probably wouldn't even be interested in it at all, since its me who is bringing it up, as well as them being good players they probably forgot about just how difficult to handle the GWF is.
IMO the GWF hits like a truck, and handles like one, too.
Hello
I did that because I didn't have enough firepower. Because I don't have my Transcendent enchants yet since I sold them to upgrade stuff (I'll get them back in a couple weeks.. though). Also I know about Binding Oath, the Paladin absorbs damage in the first seconds.
I'm currently stuck with a lesser soulforged and normal bronzewood for the time being. So that doesn't provide enough burst, especially to bring down a Paladin. If I had my enchants I would've acted differently and pressured you. But at my current state, it was futile. So I pretty much played with a careless attitude.
Except in my POV the suggestions are initially flawed in that without the specific request to revise combat mechanics as well as address the inefficiency of the class, ultimately this form, these limitations of the GWF class is probably the best that the devs can come up with.
For example, the PHAIL with the Destroyer path lies in that the stacking mechanics, when coupled with the inefficient attack methods the class has, inadvertently results in a "pure DPS class" requiring passive tanking traits to make it work. This is less evident in PvE where the mobs follow a predictable pattern, but when it comes to PvP the problems become glaringly obvious.
Great damage, yes, but how are you going to deliver the damage? The same "wild goose chase" (BGM: "Yakety_Sax.mpg") happens as you miss and whiff and huff and puff around with your dwindling stamina... being brutally punched around trying to deliver that damage, hence, a DPS class needs to become a "TANK" at the same time.
Actually this faulty design is same with all of the paths, sentinel and instigator alike. With my GWF I've spent most of my time with the Instigator build and.. well, nice and fine and dandy mechanics centered on crits and combat advantage, which is not bad, except nobody ever gets hit with any of my powers no matter how well I close the distance. If I start slotting encounters to make this job easier (like CCs and gap-closers) my damage suffers so bad, if I slot more offensive encounters, there's no way to deliver it, and in both cases with mid-gear range the survivability is quite low that I usually can't even take full advantage of the feats of my choice.
Yeah, because the "fundamental problem" I've pointed out, has never been addressed. Basically the 4.8k IL and negation enchants and all that stuff, is in essence nothing more than a sugar-coating on a rotten product. My guess, the devs don't really see into the "management" aspect of the combat, whether its efficient or not. They probably concentrate on numerical data, as in each different path does X amount of damage if he does this, and receives Y amount of damage when he does that... but the real problem is not that X or Y. The real problem is the "if he does this" or "if he does that" part. This is the real problem. "This" and "that" are so inefficient in PvP that its difficult to make it work.
Even with the best of GWF players much more skilled in maneuvering and landing hits, the same "wild goose chase" still persists. If the opponent evades the charging bull well enough (Olleh!), then basically the GWF has no chance to win at all, so even at BiS levels it's always a fight between the GWF running around (Yakety-Sax, once more) and hoping the 10~20% of his attacks landing, can be decisive enough to finish the fight, whereas in the other guy's shoes, he evades 80~90% of the GWF's encounter attempts easily, and hopes he can KO the GWF before he gets snagged by that 10~20% of GWF encounters landing on him.
Thus, to repeat myself, the current form of GWF being the only answer -- enough <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>-shi* item level to allow the GWF to survive all through out his wild goose chase (final Yakety Sax!) and hopefully land a mega-hit big enough, often enough, to win.
Hence, the "pure DPS" aspect you or many other GWF players want, will always be overshadowed by its need to be able to tank damage, to even have a chance to try bring out the DPS potential of the class. In most cases this fails, and before the GWF has a chance to be the "pure DPS", he'll be killed first.
The GWF needs a redesign from the bottom up. It needs to be less reliant on passive-tanking (pure DR/defense/AC/deflection, etc etc..) traits and receive more active survival traits just like the TR. TR's are poor tankers, frail and weak, but the CCs and AoE disruption, stealth, dodge, powers like ITC, attacks like DF with auto-target homing and CC immunity built into it. These are efficient tools which help immensely in PvP combat. Compared to the general efficiency of TR encounter powers, GWFs are... ugggghh...
[EDIT]
The 'changes needed', for example, Mighty Leap needs to be an AoE prone in my book (LOL!) Stuff like Takedown can use a little more range(+5') and around 30% faster activation, bland and uninteresting stuff like Punishing Charge needs longer travel with extra damage components like bleed DoTs and stackable slow effects, the basic Sure Strike needs more advancing allowed per each swing with less strict rooting to make it more fluent and easy to connect. Every other optional at-will powers are total <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> and needs all sorts of boosts in activation speeds or secondary effects, gimpy self-buffing powers need to be revised in their intensity, Dailies like Spinning Strike shouldn't be as useless -- it needs to have that same "homing hit" like the 3rd flurry-strikes of DF has.. etc etc.. yada yada, the GWF deserves so many goodies and fixes into its FUNCTIONALITY and EFFICIENCY, not the raw DPS/tanking numbers.