Feedback talk:User/Dark Morphon/Primal Rage

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Dark, the fact that all of these tactics still work on either a frenzy build or a PR build is my point. You can apply the same counters to either type of build. The differences between the builds are effectiveness in various situations. PR has a 15 second recharge which means people will be less likely to want to cancel it and will take the extra damage forcing monks to burn more energy. If they do cancel it, they are without an IAS for x amount of seconds, whereas frenzy warriors are never without their IAS. That's the tradeoff, that's the balance.

PR you can claim to be more of a spiky skill than coward, but Eviscerate is more of a spike skill than either because it fits in better with a spike focused team. If you are going to try and focus on the team spike more than pressure you will take eviscerate. If you are focused more on pressure you'll take take PR or Coward because you close distances much better than other options. If you want better pressure and split ability you will take PR. If you want better pressure and shutdown you will take coward.

Hammer warriors are better for guarenteed prolonged knockdown, but they don't have the kind of pressure an axe build can apply.

PR doesn't add more damage than frenzy, it adds positioning advantage. They are not the same thing. The goal of positioning advantage is to gain a damage advantage, but remember they are different. Like I said, Coward has a greater impact on positioning advantage than PR. When we compare and axe build, both skills simply take the place of another so the functionalities are very similar. So since coward offers a greater positioning advantage still with an IAS, it too is (according to you) spiky meta supporting. The same would have to be said of cripslash, which adds 2x the positioning advantage PR does without the problems of downtime in an IAS just like coward.

Coward is better for pressure and AD charging than PR because of the greater positioning advantage Coward has on PR. While, PR lets you move 25% faster with an IAS, Coward makes it so the target isn't moving at all while you use an ias. Even though it costs 1 AD to use, you aren't dealing with kiting at all, and it's recharged by the time you change targets. You knockdown at a range and put the foe in a situation where they don't want to kite, because of the shutdown. So, the target isn't moving or does and gets a KD while snares on yourself irrelavent, because the target didn't get to move anywhere. Whereas with PR, kiting is still viable (though tricky bcs you want to avoid crits) and snares are still effective. Coward is trickier to run than PR, but I playing coward in an optimal fashion out does playing PR in an optimal fashion in combat. For example with coward you have rush and coward charged at the exact same time, so before you change targets if you want coward to still be charged you have to cancel frenzy with rush right before you land a hit so you are in rush with coward charged.

A good prot monk hears a diversion call and thinks hex removal first, because he may have to clear up the healer so Infuse or WoH is saved from Diversion. Not that a single hex removal does much to Diversion, with wastrel's worry being so prominent in combination with diversion recently. Diversion is a 1337 power skill, it can be used for any number of reasons. So, if you are smart and don't play the same tactic over and over the backline and midline can't lock something down. Or you can play the same tactic several times to where the backline thinks they know whats going on, but you surprise them with something else you can accomplish the desired goal. Be that trap a warrior in a stance, disable a healer, or catch a spam build. As for blackout, it's a touch skill and it's use is limited, as well as limiting (Although since, RtL doesn't have an aftercast it could be a good way to set up a spike).~>Sins WDB 20:28, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

A good prot monk will also realise that if he doesn't Spirit bond that target it will die.Because you know in the meanwhile the opposing team is actually doing something so there is no time for hex removal Lilondra 06:02, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Prot comes second on a divert call, but it's still a valid point when veil isn't available. That doesn't change the fact that when Veil is available you cast it on heal if it's not already maintained when you hear a call. Like I said the trick is to remove the veil before wastrel's is applied in that second in between the aftercast + cast of wastrel's (not always possible, especially vs hexway or hex heavy teams when the heal monk already is hexed so you can't rely the purple arrow popping up as an end trigger). There's time to apply a 1/4 cast prot after that (not necessarily SB all the time it just depends on the spike design you are playing). What's with the bigs by the way? ~>Sins WDB 07:19, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Ok I'm going to ask you this just answer the question and nothing else.How much of your wall of text -that wasn't captain obvious - did you actually learn by play.If you just invented it then how many players confirmed it to be awesome,Who and wich format ? What makes you think that Veil is always available and never shattered or drained ? Lilondra 11:25, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how we're on monking. But 100% of the stuff that isn't captain obvious I learned from own experience players helping me out in the 3 main team formats, HA, GvG, and TA. TA is gone, so that's irrelavent I guess. I took up notes, because I was crap when it came to dealing with diversion. I still have them saved actually. So, since you're so pro why don't you go over them and tell me what was wrong with how I played backline. Laugh if you want, it was when I cared way too much.

Averting a Diversion

General Guidelines

• Maintain Mesmer as a target by one on the team.

• Determine is T targeting can be used on Mesmer for quick target referencing in between team spikes.

• Runner and Prot are the primary Mesmer targeters, see if midliner will call while runner is off radar and prot is casting.

• Assume target is heal monk, but all should be wary. Rangers, warriors, prot, and spam especially.

• Say when a FC Divert, when an HCT occurs.

• Keep track of who has been targeted.

• KEEP PAYING ATTENTION TO THE FIELD ON TOP OF THE SKILL ACTIVATION BAR

Specific Instances (Divert Calls)

• Maintain Veil on Heals

• RoF cover on Drain (probably coming after a divert cancel)

• Use end cast as end trigger while veil is up.

• While target isn’t mes use purple arrow as end trigger

• While target isn’t mes and veil is not up cast on heal and remove with arrow trigger

o If heal is already hexed, remove upon cast.

If It’s Applied

• Watch for spike, non affected backline pull save.

• Kill Hex Breaker or D-Stance if necessary to pull save.

• Kill Infuse if necessary to pull save.

• Bide time if necessary.

• Let it fade on targeted backliner when not removed immediately.

~>Sins WDB 16:59, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

You are too detailed. Guild Wars isn't an overly complicated game: Ranger on Mesmer, Monk on Esc button, burn the least useful skills on your bar. Complicating issues detracts from micromanaging more important stuff like field awareness in general.Pika Fan 17:10, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

I could be too detailed oriented. It's my playstyle though, at least it was. I like processing lots information to influence my decisions. I apply the same type of thing in life. The more I can train my mind to process in a set amount of time the faster I can make decisions. Anyways I'm glad they nerfed resolve, because ranger on mesmer can actually work again.~>Sins WDB 19:43, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Man, this discussion is getting like looong. I'm gonna archive some stuff. It's also getting more and more complex. Maybe we should categorise the parts of the discussion? I dunno. I don't have time to do all these kinds of things today so I guess I'll do it tomorrow. Dark Morphon 17:00, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Right, I'll list the points of discussion here:

• Head point 1: Obviously, whether Primal Rage is overpowered or not.
  • Easy counters being around or not and the relevance of that.
    • Forcing your opponent out of his Stance with a team-spike: Requires you to position yourself for the spike, usually not a possibility. Also is generally better used to destroy the backline. The 15 recharge gives therefore only a very small downside on this aspect.
    • Diversion: Requires a team-spike to be effective and even if you have that and get to pull off Diversion, it's better to put it on the Infuser. Rush being disabled furthermore is always bad, no matter what elite you're taking. (Roughly) equal effect for every elite and therefore not relevant.
    • Empathy: Broken skill and therefore not relevant.
  • Snares: Affects every Warrior bar equally much (In fact, it affects "Coward!" more as that skill is adrenaline-based and thus gets through more the more adrenaline you can build. No such thing applies for Primal Rage). Thus, not relevant.
  • Other anti-melee: Same as above, not relevant.
  • Slightly more pressure from minor damage outside of spikes such as bow damage from poison spread/Crippling Shot, outside of spike damage from Mirror of Ice, damage from Winter's Embrace and damage from Shatter Storm. Pressure from Conditions obviously remains equal. Counter-argument: This is damage you wouldn't cancel your stance for anyway, unless you Rush to follow a fleeing opponent. Barely any extra damage and thus, barely relevant.
  • "Coward!" actually being more powerful than Primal Rage.
    • "Coward!" doesn't provide additional running speed outside of battle and is therefore inferior for splits.
    • "Coward!" does provide your team with an additional snarer every so often, alongside with some shutdown, which is beneficial for your fellow Warrior/other frontliner.
    • "Coward!" provides a knockdown which depletes your adrenaline every time you use it (minor downside) instead of an IMS on top of your IAS. Very hard to tell which one is better for positioning relative to that of your opponent(will dedicate my next post to this). For now I'll say that you greatly overestimate the time a Warrior can linger on one target (you basically assume that you can do so forever). I think this is the most interesting part of the discussion left.
    • Primal Rage makes it far more easy to position yourself for a spike than "Coward!" does. "Coward!" only weakens the opponent's positioning.
    • Don't forget that if you cancel Frenzy and Primal Rage alike, you have to be careful about immediately using it again, which takes away a few seconds on Primal Rage's recharge in which neither can be activated. As long as Rush is not charged, using either of them is dangerous.
• Head point 2: Is IMS+IAS broken or not?
  • Greatly reduces Stance switching, an important piece of Warrior strategy. Strategic use of Stances is almost completely negated as you always have an IMS, the only choice you need to make is whether the damage you're taking is manageable or not, but this also applies to skills like Frenzy.
  • Promotes spike play. Like you pointed out, so does every other Warrior skill, however, there is a difference. Ride the Lightning (completely ignores positioning) and Primal Rage (and IMS+IAS in general) (speed boost make it a lot easier to switch to a target you want to spike) both make the positioning easier and Primal Rage also makes building adrenaline easier. "Coward!" doesn't decrease the time in which you run to your opponent, Ride the Lightning and Primal Rage do, unless you use Rush increase your movement speed but this is not okay as it costs you one adrenaline and makes you predictable. I'd say Primal Rage's IMS part is like a prolonged sligtly less explosive Shadow Step, which is something that's kinda broken to begin with on a Warrior.

This all together, even if I can't convince you that "Coward!" is slightly inferior to Primal Rage or even if you can convince me that it actually is the other way round, should be enough to end this discussion. IMS+IAS is simply a broken functionality and while it can come close to being balanced (just like Shadow Steps can) it will always reduce strategic play as it simplifies positioning and (for this skill specifically) Stance switching. Conclusion? I'm still feeling that Primal Rage needs a rework. Dark Morphon 13:21, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Concerning "Coward!" vs. Primal Rage, I'll dedicate this post to that. You basically assume that you can linger on one target indefinitely. If you do so, the Monk will simply cast Guardian on your target and your pressure will be severely hampered. Even worse, if you attack a Monk like this, he will activate Bonetti's Defense and actually get a lot of energy for it. It simply doesn't work. You can't train a target until your "Coward!" is charged, you have to change earlier than that. And because of that, "Coward!" will be charged a lot less than you make it out to be. "Coward!" will be available for some of your targets, Primal Rage will be available for all of them. Hard to calculate what's better over-all, but it's quite obvious that they aren't much apart. Also adding the fact that using Frenzy right after Rush before re-accumulating adrenaline for Rush is dangerous, you can say that Warriors using Primal Rage will deal more damage and accumulate adrenaline more efficiently in most cases as you don't have to cancel PR to catch up with a target. I would say that "Coward!" and Primal Rage are roughly equal in "normal" situations because "Coward!" also helps your fellow Warrior while Primal Rage makes it easier to position yourself to spike a specific target. Also adding the Sprint you basically get from using Primal Rage and I'd say Primal Rage is slightly superior to "Coward!" at the very least. Crippling Slash is obviously not relevant to the discussion as it is a Sword skill but if you really want to involve that skill, just like "Coward!" it will only affect one target and is thus worse for your own positioning and better for that of your allies. Dark Morphon 10:37, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Still want this?

Skill is updated, but your suggestion is still very different, so I'm not going to mark it for deletion, just figured you'd see this ping and be reminded if you wanted to update yourself or mark it for deletion. -- FreedomBound 15:38, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

I still think either the IMS needs to be replaced by something else or this skill needs to be reworked. The last update slightly weakened the skill, but the concept IAS+IMS is still wrong and this skill is still overpowered. Morphy 13:16, 10 March 2010 (UTC)