Valewalkers, Stronger but more Boring

[Zakoraya]

Right, the new patch with the changes to valewalker has been really hyped up and talked about, and now that its happened a lot of people have been trying their new shiney things out

I'm one of these people, and i can say they are in lots of ways more powerful than they were, but definatily more boring.

Firstly, Arboreal Fire, the valewalker evade chain has been rendered entirely useless. It hits for the same damage (a little bit less even) than Grasping Roots, the frontal style, and gives no defence bonus (grasping roots gives a high defensive bonus.) The 4.5 damage add it procs overwrites the group buff valewalkers get, isnt as powerful as even the blue one (which is a 5.4 dmg add) and lasts only 30 seconds, whereas the buff lasts 10 mins.

This encourages me to just spam the frontal style and the chain off it (Conflagration) for more effectiveness, even though i loved the firey effect around my toon Its just not worth it.

The parry chain... another reactionary style which hits for less than the frontal style. Procs a supposed slash resist decrease on your enemy (and has a cool effect like the evade chain), although i have gone through about 17 levels testing it in instance dungeons and i can safely say even though the message comes up (your enemy looks vulnerable to slash or something) it makes 0 difference to the damage i do on mobs. No idea if it does anything in RvR, havent tested it yet. The chain off it is only nice for a temporary damage shield, so i do still use it though.

Consequently, solo valewalkers should only bother doing boring frontal style and chain off it im afraid, if they want to be effective.

I like it when classes are given attention, but when the skill required to play a character is diminished and their effectiveness increased, then its not very fun anymore.

Food for thought.

Zakoraya Wildcat, playing Tigercat the Valewalker currently level 44 (20-44 with a 2 level break solo in instance dungeons)

 

[Enli]

try talking to frozensolid or blizzardblade
they'll be able to give comment i would believe/trust

also the overwriting dmg add thing, report it to mythic (yes mythic as they do the actual testing and adjusting) should be logical to adjust it all

 

[Samaroon|Terracotta]

The damage shield from Arboreal Fire stacks with the castable damage add And Sawgrass effect doesn't make a difference in PvE, only RvR But agreed, sucks you only need to use 2 styles to use a vw to its full potential atm :<

 

[Bugz]

"Samaroon|Terracotta
One of the mods..."

h4x

 

[Kaun_IA]

i stoped playing my vw after next patch

dunno... didnt find it intresting enymore .... was alot more fnt to play whit old styles where u HAD to get reactionaris off to be rox but now just spamm Grasping Roots and chain

love playing my druid more atm couse its lot more challengeing

 

[Meradesh]

Just don't use frontal style =)

 

[Ceraniel]

Well lets all mailbomb goa to not implement the hole patch.....

 

[Teraka]

Sadly I agree with the original poster about the relative effectiveness of the styles. Once a bard is running End there is absolutely no real reason, save nice variation in graphic effects, to spam anything but Grasping Roots plus the Conflagration follow-up.

As for the damage adds co-existing? Well sometime in the last week they have stopped stacking. Up until a few days ago you could certainly have multiple DAs running (thus giving a little reason to use the Evade chain) but sometime recently that has changed to the Evade style over-writing the castable DA. I have already submitted a bug report to GOA with the following response:

"Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We are working with Mythic on closing all reported bugs in the game and this will be added to the list of issues to deal with.
Thank you once more for your assistance."

I'm not holding my breath for it to be fixed which is a shame because it was nice to occassionally have 3 DA's running when grouped with a Warden

Teraka

 

[Mirt]

Firstly, Arboreal Fire, the valewalker evade chain has been rendered entirely useless. It hits for the same damage (a little bit less even) than Grasping Roots, the frontal style, and gives no defence bonus (grasping roots gives a high defensive bonus.)

Defence bonuses only affect the passive Hit/Miss chance, which is pretty high vs a lvl 50 target. They really don't do anything in RvR.

This encourages me to just spam the frontal style and the chain off it (Conflagration) for more effectiveness, even though i loved the firey effect around my toon Its just not worth it.

True, although the parry chain has some merit. The slash debuff only works vs players.

In solo PvE, with a catacombs scythe, you can chain reactionary styles with zero end usage which is kinda nice.

In RvR the main VW styles have always been side and rear stun, the changes allow VW to not strafe, and still be viable. Realistically some strafing to land a stun is almost always a good idea if you can pull it off!

 

[Zakoraya]

Sadly I agree with the original poster

He has a name

As for the damage adds co-existing? Well sometime in the last week they have stopped stacking. Up until a few days ago you could certainly have multiple DAs running (thus giving a little reason to use the Evade chain) but sometime recently that has changed to the Evade style over-writing the castable DA. I have already submitted a bug report to GOA with the following response:

"Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We are working with Mythic on closing all reported bugs in the game and this will be added to the list of issues to deal with.
Thank you once more for your assistance."

Teraka

Thanks for doing that - i didnt realise it was a bug. I had a suspicion i had seem the damage add off Arboreal Fire (Its not a damage shield by the way Samaroon - thats the chain off Sawgrass ) stack with the castable one, but i thought i was just imagining things. If they reinstate that then it will have some value after all (though not that much)

Well lets all mailbomb goa to not implement the hole patch.....

Please explain, it sounds like it could be useful information

Have to agree with Kaun too, it made it unpredicatable and fun when you *had* to get that evade chain off, and if they survived long enough for the first three parts, the last part was sure to drop whatever it is that was hitting you.

Still, i think a little bit has to be done to add some 'fun factor' to the class which's main appeal was the fun which came from the sheer diversity of it - the Valewalker is like no other class