[Great Weapon Fighter] Destroyer spec/reaping strike feedback

ioannides5 · June 2013

A big concern I have with the balance patch regarding great weapon fighters, is that all the changes were geared towards the instigator and sentinel trees. Sentinel I can understand, due to that spec being useless pre-patch, however, I do not understand the instigator buffs. Instigator pound-for-pound was already out-performing the destroyer tree in terms of damage (both are intended for producing damage), and all the patch did was further separate the two in instigator's favor. I personally love the play style and setup of destroyer, but I find my self further and further itching towards that respec button just because I know I will be far more efficient using instigator, and I fear a lot of the remaining destroyer GWFs have very similar mindsets, until eventually destroyer becomes unused.

A big issue regarding this patch, is that the 2 at-wills geared towards destroyer (weapon master's strike and reaping strike) did not get buffed, meanwhile both instigator and sentinel got their intended at-wills buffed (sure-strike, and wicked strike). I can understand why weapon-master's strike did not get it's damage buffed, as it is more of a utility at-will to make it's partner at-will stronger, however, it boggles my mind that reaping strike was not even touched, meanwhile it was the 1 at-will that needed the most attention. Without a reaping-strike change, Instigator will always be far ahead and more efficient then destroyer tree.

Here are the biggest issues surrounding reaping-strike:

-The overall charge speed is too slow. It doesn't need a damage buff, however, it does need a charge speed buff. It's incredibly long charge makes it undesirable by 90% or more of GWFs, as it doesn't seem all that rewarding for how long it charges for, not to mention it becomes VERY easy to dodge, or for your charge to cancel due to knock backs and such, etc. It needs roughly half a second off it's cast time to actually make it feel useful.

-A bug regarding unstoppable/reaping-strike really needs to be addressed. First off, only the cast bar goes faster when under unstoppable, the "charge sounds" do not change, which is really discouraging when trying to get a full swing. The charge sounds need to go faster while under unstoppable, to be on par with the cast bar. Now onto the bug, currently the very first reaping-strike we use after using each unstoppable, does NOT get the speed buff, it still uses the charge sounds rather then the cast bar (a.k.a. unstoppable does NOTHING for this reaping-strike hit towards attack speed). This really needs to be addressed as it serves as a big dps loss for destroyer GWFs, more specifically those using reaping-strike

-Last but very important issue surrounding reaping strike is it's paragon upgrade, "executioner style". GWFs are an AoE-dps oriented class. Why on earth, do we have this paragon feet that increases single-target damage? Especially since reaping-strike is an AoE oriented at-will, AND, 99% of dungeons are AoE-fests where hitting a single target with reaping-strike is almost never going to happen. Not to mention, the feet is completely useless and broken... most of the time you finally catch a target in single target (which GWFs should NEVER be doing anyways), some random mob will get in the way and get hit. Everything surrounding this feet is counter intuitive of what a GWF should be doing in a dungeon. This feet needs a complete re-work... It should be doing something similar to "group assault" in the instigator tree, where as it does bonus damage to each enemy hit, not buffing single target damage which is not what a GWF should be doing.

I really hope this thread gets out to the devs' attention, as I would really love to see the destroyer paragon path become as strong as instigator, and would love to see some much needed changes to reaping strike.

ioannides5 · June 2013

going to bump this. Destroyer tree/reaping strike really need some adjustments.

chudovishye · June 2013

I play as a Destroyer with a little Instigator thrown in for special tricks. RS is worthless, will always be worthless until the charge time is adjusted, but because of how it works you probably won't see that. Just don't use it. The Destroyer tree is fine, I go Unstop every 4-8 seconds and do awesome damage with a GS of only 10.2. Just avoid all RS buffs and feats and you'll do fine. Keep in mind you don't have to max everything in the Destroyer tree, you can use some from both Instigator and Sentinel if you like, depends what you're doing.

ioannides5 · June 2013

chudovishye wrote: »

I play as a Destroyer with a little Instigator thrown in for special tricks. RS is worthless, will always be worthless until the charge time is adjusted, but because of how it works you probably won't see that. Just don't use it. The Destroyer tree is fine, I go Unstop every 4-8 seconds and do awesome damage with a GS of only 10.2. Just avoid all RS buffs and feats and you'll do fine. Keep in mind you don't have to max everything in the Destroyer tree, you can use some from both Instigator and Sentinel if you like, depends what you're doing.

Spoken like a true inexperienced person. Listen, I know how to play the GWF, unlike most of these forumer kiders, I'm fairly experienced with the GWF. Point is, destroyer is severely lacking behind instigator, and it shouldn't be this way. I'm not saying destroyer isn't viable, it's just not worth using when you can do the same role as instigator (dps), and pull much higher numbers with the same effort. A lot of this has to do with the destroyer tree being geared around WMS and RS, and with RS being severely "worthless" as you would put it, the tree is by default gimped behind instigator.

asdfasdfgf · June 2013

Destroyer was and still is fine. This patch adjusted it to be on par in the pvp aspect.

Instigator needed it's changes so that WS could actually compete with RS.

Sentinel needed it's changes so that threat could be maintained on an add-tank level.

aradari · June 2013

i never use RS, it sucks. I use WMS and sure strike as my att wills. I'm destroyer i've never gauged my damage against a instigator GWF but i can tell you i've never had any problems with the spec. Given i don't do much pvp but pve wise i can keep up with a GWF with 2k GS more then me. and i its rare that i see a TR or CW who can keep up with my damage output against adds in a fight. which is what the class is built for.

tyr216 · June 2013

Considering that Destroyer was pretty much the only viable spec before the patch, it makes sense that Instigator and Sentinel got buffed. Instigator is the AoE DPS spec. That's where it shines. Destroyer is the single target DPS spec. You can say the GWF is an AoE centric class, and while this is primarily true, it can also provide some respectable single target damage if you properly build for it. That's what Destroyer is for. If you try to make Destroyer's AoE just as strong as Instigator's, you're taking away the identity of both specs. You'd have to make Instigator a strong single target spec too. That makes things difficult to balance. If you don't like building for single target damage, if you don't like Reaping Strike, maybe you don't like Destroyer.

theliethesame · June 2013

Reaping Strike is the worst choice for Destroyer imo after patch. Sure Strike with double hitting last attack does the job for me,without having to worry for a second target or mobility. And your Aoe with WMS weaving isn't bad. Suprisingly, I don't see a great gap with Instigator ,on the other side sometimes I can pull more overall dmg now as Destroyer. I don't know about your Reaping Strike experiences (I hated that skill from the very start), but my Destroyer spec with SS/WMS now works fine, and as a matter of fact most of the times nowadays I am the n1 in overall dmg. CW is no match (edge pushing or not), and I am always pretty close with TRs. I don't know if other GWF out there are lazy with weaving, but I always get compliments from my groups for my dps (yes I only run T2 DD speedruns, pugging CN runs isn't viable for us)

faredy1 · June 2013

I never used RS even before patch and have always been Destroyer. I use WMS/WS. Use WMS for 1-2 mobs and WS for anything more than that. So if I don't change anything, all I get is a DPS INCREASE from using WS. I never thought that Destroyer GWF's were "supposed" to use RS. I agree with you that RS needs its bugs to be fixed, but I disagree that Destroyer is a useless spec, or that you should respec to Instigator because your dps will go up. I think the patch was pretty decent. Sentinel is not totally useless anymore and Instigator is on par with Destroyer.

spacejew · June 2013

I think the issues with Reaping Strike are compounded by Wicked Strike being easier to glitch out for superior damage. Unless of course animation cancelling is intended, in which case it's still easier to cancel Wicked Strike that Reaping Strike. When you absolutely must abuse game mechanics to be considered 'on par' it's easier to exploit on Instigator than Destroyer, and Instigator relies less on a competent CW to pair yourself with.

That being said, Reaping Strike still needs to execute it's lowest power attack on-click instead of after a second of charging. You should never be able to make an attack that does no damage, even if the developers are only looking at Reaping Strike as a determination generator. (Which Reaping Strike excels at. You will pop unstoppable from Empty during the time it takes RS to charge if you have any aggro at all.)

Even Storm Pillar in the CW class does a low-power attack on it's lowest charge. Why on earth doesn't Reaping Strike?

[Great Weapon Fighter] Destroyer spec/reaping strike feedback

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