[Weaver Feedback] Sword autoattack discussion

[Agent Noun.7350]

I wanted to create a new thread for this because I think it's an issue that deserves detailed discussion on its own.

 

Weaver sword's autoattack chains are fairly clunky. They're slow and not impactful enough (as of the last available beta numbers) for that slow speed to feel satisfying. However, I don't think just making them stronger but keeping their animations how they are would be a solution because of another issue that I want to focus on: **autoattack chains clash with attunement swapping**. To be more specific, Weaver heavily encourages frequent attunement swapping, unlike Tempest. But the slow speed of sword autoattack chains means that you'll frequently interrupt your chain before the biggest, most impactful third hit, which is really unsatisfying and defangs those finishers.

 

I have a couple of suggested solutions. One strikes me as the "simpler" of the two (though I admit I'm ignorant of the technical aspects that would go into it), while the other is the more interesting.

 

1. **Speed up the autoattack chains.** Just make them faster so you're more likely to complete an autoattack chain before swapping attunements. Obviously the damage would need to be adjusted to account for the faster attack speed, but I think this would go a long way towards improving Weaver sword's fluidity.

2. **Allow autoattack chains to persist through attunement swap.** Again, I have no idea if this is even technically feasible, but I think it's a cool idea. It lets the autoattack chains stay slow--my guess is that's an intentional design choice for Weaver sword to have a certain "bruiser" feel to it--while eliminating the issues with autoattack chains being interrupted by attunement swaps. I thought about any potential abuse this might allow--for example, performing the first two skills of one attunement's chain before swapping to another for a more desirable third hit--but I don't think that's as much of an issue as I thought it might be at first. For one thing, the shared cooldown for attunement swapping means that's a difficult situation to set up. But aside from that, each attunement's autoattack serves such a different purpose that I can't think of too many situations where I'd really get a disproportionate benefit for swapping for a specific final hit. And even if that is possible, and even if there's a situation where it provides a benefit, that seems like the kind of technical, timing-focused gameplay that should be rewarded.

 

What do other people think? I think option 1 is much more likely to be feasible--obviously we've seen attack speeds adjusted many, many times in GW2's history--but option 2 seems pretty cool and I'd love it if it were possible.

[Kahrgan.7401]

I concur, the autos are clunky.

[Xaylin.1860]

> @"Agent Noun.7350" said:

>... To be more specific, Weaver heavily encourages frequent attunement swapping, unlike Tempest. But the slow speed of sword autoattack chains means that you'll frequently interrupt your chain before the biggest, most impactful third hit, which is really unsatisfying and defangs those finishers.

 

I think this can be argued both ways. From a more conservative standpoint you're right. The AA might be considered a hinderance to common rotations. However, without being too attached to current rotations, you might as well consider the whole AA as part of your rotation. Yes, it plays differently and hasn't been like that on Elementalists so far. But isn't it supposed to be different, especially when compared to Dagger?

 

On a different note: Air and Earth don't emphasize the third hit as much as Fire and Water. I feel like the burning on Fire is the offender here...

 

In the end, numbers will decide wether it is worth using or not. But I don't see this as a design issue.

 

 

 

 

[npmis.7860]

 

Other classes have to take care to not interrupt the AA-chain all the time and now Ele as well. I don't really see a problem in general, though the fire AA could use a bit more love on the first two hits. Spread the power of the chain a bit more between the single attacks and it should be fine imo.

 

[Agent Noun.7350]

> @Xaylin.1860 said:

> On a different note: Air and Earth don't emphasize the third hit as much as Fire and Water. I feel like the burning on Fire is the offender here...

 

That's very true. In fact, fire's sword chain is the biggest offender of all, at least going by the beta numbers. The first two hits are almost comically weak and don't apply any burning, but the last hit is strong and _does_ apply burning. Air and earth's first two hits are worth using on their own, though, and I don't think anyone's really worried about water's damage.

 

> @Xaylin.1860 said:

> In the end, numbers will decide wether it is worth using or not. But I don't see this as a design issue.

 

You could be right about that, and I'm definitely interested to see what the release numbers are.

 

> @npmis.7860 said:

>

> Other classes have to take care to not interrupt the AA-chain all the time and now Ele as well. I don't really see a problem in general, though the fire AA could use a bit more love on the first two hits. Spread the power of the chain a bit more between the single attacks and it should be fine imo.

 

I think my issue is about how it interacts with attunement swapping more than anything. Playing Weaver, you're likely to want to swap attunements roughly every four seconds, which is more often than you can swap weapons with other professions. Interrupting chains is something that'll come up more in that context, I think.

 

That said, you're right that evening out the power distribution with some of the chains, especially fire's, will help a lot, too.

 

 

[Razor.6392]

I'm not exactly against having an autoattack chain (though it feels inconsistent with every other autoattack for ele), but the range... please increase it.

Also speed up ofc. I mean, people barely autoattack (other than staff fireball spam) as an elementalist, and now we're given a sloooow autoattack chain?! I think it won't work out :#

[Erebus.7568]

think if we are to have auto-attack chains on the ele it would seem right that the skill got severely stronger for each "tier" of the chain we are on. as having to auto attack through a chain is a big "handicap" for the class.

when that is said i think it could be quite cool if done correctly (would be like "long channel" skills which got stronger in the intensity the longer you kept it).

if its not to allow for something like that i think its a negative to go in that direction ^^

[FrownyClown.8402]

The auto attack speeds are the same as every other profession with a sword. I'd rather they did worthwhile damage

[PainbowBrite.3785]

I completely understand the speed of sword aa . It's bigger than a dagger and hence, slower. What I can't wrap my head around is why the range is so much lower. Right now, it can be hard to hit the whole aa chain on moving targets. It also feels strange given larger weapon should mean larger range, not smaller. The 3rd aa will never do much in PvP if we can't stay on target.

[Xaylin.1860]

> @PainbowBrite.3785 said:

>What I can't wrap my head around is why the range is so much lower. Right now, it can be hard to hit the whole aa chain on moving targets.

 

That's the common melee range, though? It's not like an Elementalist is actually wielding its Dagger so the length of the weapon doesn't really matter. Plus: Magic. ;)

 

But yeah, it will make Sword less attractive for PvP.

 

 

[PainbowBrite.3785]

> @Xaylin.1860 said:

> > @PainbowBrite.3785 said:

> >What I can't wrap my head around is why the range is so much lower. Right now, it can be hard to hit the whole aa chain on moving targets.

>

> That's the common melee range, though? It's not like an Elementalist is actually wielding its Dagger so the length of the weapon doesn't really matter. Plus: Magic. ;)

>

> But yeah, it will make Sword less attractive for PvP.

>

>

 

Right, but if we can shoot magic out of a dagger, why are we just slashing and splashing with a sword?

[Mithos.9023]

> @"Agent Noun.7350" said:

 

> 2. **Allow autoattack chains to persist through attunement swap.** Again, I have no idea if this is even technically feasible, but I think it's a cool idea.

 

I like that idea. It would underline the concept of weaver, mixing different elements. So you could "weave" different autoattacks.

 

 

[Xaylin.1860]

> @PainbowBrite.3785 said:

> > @Xaylin.1860 said:

> > > @PainbowBrite.3785 said:

> > >What I can't wrap my head around is why the range is so much lower. Right now, it can be hard to hit the whole aa chain on moving targets.

> >

> > That's the common melee range, though? It's not like an Elementalist is actually wielding its Dagger so the length of the weapon doesn't really matter. Plus: Magic. ;)

> >

> > But yeah, it will make Sword less attractive for PvP.

> >

> >

>

> Right, but if we can shoot magic out of a dagger, why are we just slashing and splashing with a sword?

 

Sure. But then we'd have to discuss the purpose of Sword vs. the already existing Dagger - or to say it differently: How to distinguish them.

 

I personally don't like everything being same same and think that ANet found a way to reasonably set those two weapons apart.

[Tanuk.7961]

Hopefully, come next Friday , we will see that they have made tweaks or changes to sword.