What's the deal with this class? I want to really like it but....

[Zexanima.7851]

Bit of a rant here, trying to convince myself this class will be worth my time. I'm returning to the game currently trying to find my profession and I want to like revenant but despite the seeming potential for lots of role diversity it seems to be a super pigeon holed class for builds. I can get over the lack of raw numbers right now, buffs come and go. I feel more restricted than the warrior I'm playing choices though, which doesnt seem right. I tried warrior and I love the survivability potential and damage, but it lacks the kind of team support I want and the theme isn't really interesting. Revenant has those things I'm looking for, but even with the two specializations unlocked I dont seem to have many ways to go with it. Not that many weapon combos, locked utilities, limited viable spec options compared to other classes, and to top it off lower numbers. Am I missing something? Other than the awesome theme and cool 'idea' behind the class what does it have going for it? I dont want to be another drop in the warrior bucket, but I don't feel like revenant is going to be worth it.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

Personally I have 3 different equipment sets (and marauder trinkets for WvW) that I use for just as many builds, all of them viable. The term "build" here is used loosely, since I change out legends and traits as I see fit. I don't adhere to any rigid structure.

 

It is true that the rev isn't as customizable as other classes. That's not necessarily a problem, though. We get two sets of utilities, so the sheer volume of skills we get make up for any perceived inflexibility. As far as weapons go, we have a nice medium going, where we have enough weapons to have options but not so many that they're just useless copies of each other. Probably the only real restrictive thing on the rev is energy requirements, but this can add a lot of flexibility if used right.

 

As far as what rev has going for it:

 

(1): Assassin's Presence is a good unique group buff

(2): Some excellent CC in Surge of the Mists and Darkrazor's Daring

(3): The strongest heals in the game with ventari's tablet and SoulCleave's Summit.

(4): The only other class that can stack alacrity, and do it well.

(5): The longest lasting projectile destruction bubble in the game

(6): The ability to cap might, fury, protection, and swiftness for the entire team

(7): Excellent bombing potential in WvW with the Hammer.

(8): Boon removal

(9): SoulCleave is so good that it can be used as a group heal skill in non-healing builds.

(10): Good chase skills in WvW with Shiro

(11): A pulsing stability field in Jalis

(12): The ability to maintain long-term self retaliation in WvW

(13): The ability to become a walking resistance bot with Mallyx

(14)The self sustain built into the power builds is quite large.

 

Revs aren't really inept in any way. The only problem they suffer from right now is low overall power damage, but even then it is well high enough to complete any content in the game.

[yiksing.9432]

Revenant is definitely not as good as warrior but

1. Love the staff #5 for breakbar

2. 25 might stacks easily with double sword yummy damage

 

Anet just need to make the energy u accumulated in one stance doesn't get reset to 50% when you swap stance if the current one is more than 50%

 

[Zexanima.7851]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> Personally I have 3 different equipment sets (and marauder trinkets for WvW) that I use for just as many builds, all of them viable. The term "build" here is used loosely, since I change out legends and traits as I see fit. I don't adhere to any rigid structure.

>

> It is true that the rev isn't as customizable as other classes. That's not necessarily a problem, though. We get two sets of utilities, so the sheer volume of skills we get make up for any perceived inflexibility. As far as weapons go, we have a nice medium going, where we have enough weapons to have options but not so many that they're just useless copies of each other. Probably the only real restrictive thing on the rev is energy requirements, but this can add a lot of flexibility if used right.

>

> As far as what rev has going for it:

>

> (1): Assassin's Presence is a good unique group buff

> (2): Some excellent CC in Surge of the Mists and Darkrazor's Daring

> (3): The strongest heals in the game with ventari's tablet and SoulCleave's Summit.

> (4): The only other class that can stack alacrity, and do it well.

> (5): The longest lasting projectile destruction bubble in the game

> (6): The ability to cap might, fury, protection, and swiftness for the entire team

> (7): Excellent bombing potential in WvW with the Hammer.

> (8): Boon removal

> (9): SoulCleave is so good that it can be used as a group heal skill in non-healing builds.

> (10): Good chase skills in WvW with Shiro

> (11): A pulsing stability field in Jalis

> (12): The ability to maintain long-term self retaliation in WvW

> (13): The ability to become a walking resistance bot with Mallyx

> (14)The self sustain built into the power builds is quite large.

>

> Revs aren't really inept in any way. The only problem they suffer from right now is low overall power damage, but even then it is well high enough to complete any content in the game.

 

Thanks for the great response! I'll stick with it since I just don't seem to have a full understanding of the class. Would you be willing to give examples for some of your points? I'm not exactly sure of where you get some of the effects from.

 

> (3): The strongest heals in the game with ventari's tablet and SoulCleave's Summit.

^ Would I need to invest in healing gear for this to be the case? Without it the heals feel weak to me.

> (4): The only other class that can stack alacrity, and do it well.

^ Ventair heal->Renegade F4 right?

> (6): The ability to cap might, fury, protection, and swiftness for the entire team

^ I know this would probably be using Glint but how would I cap it?

> (8): Boon removal

^ Don't know the skill

> (12): The ability to maintain long-term self retaliation in WvW

^ Where does this come from?

> (13): The ability to become a walking resistance bot with Mallyx

^ Where does this come from?

[starlinvf.1358]

3. No duh..... they've been trying to force people into investing into healing power the last several updates. All classes are feeling this, especially druid.

6. Turn on the Facets.... Aside from Might interacting with traits to gain stacks, the other 3 get 100% uptime from facets pulsing them.

8/12/13. Look at Mallyx's skill set.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

(3): For Ventari, yes you'll need healing power. For SoulCleave's Summit, no you don't.

 

(4): Yep. Ventari does it if you have the salvation line equipped, and renegade just has the f4 skill. Most pure DPS specs can't output that much alacrity, just enough to fill the holes from a chronobuffer. But, if you have gear that gives boon duration, then the alacrity can get quite high.

 

(6): The exact mechanics can get a bit weird. Glint can give everyone swiftness, fury, and protection permanently, but only gives around 12-15 stacks of might. The Renegade with lasting legacy can cap might, even in a pure DPS build. They do this by spamming Heroic Command, and also Mace 3 is a blast finisher that blasts in mace 2's fire field, giving everyone 6-9 more might. Overall this caps might. If you need a wholly dedicated might + boon bot for a team, you can run a condi herald set, using facets for boons and also blasting might with the mace. If you're wearing gear that gives boon duration, you can easily cap all boons just by camping facets alone.

 

(8): There are two sources of boon removal. First, Banish Enchantment in Mallyx. It's spammable and removes 3 boons on use. Second is the trait Opportune Extraction, which automatically removes a boon every 10 seconds if the enemy has at least 4 torment stacks. This is pretty easy on the condi build.

 

(12): Jalis and the Retribution line. In WvW there's a skill to gain retaliation when struck by a guard. If you have the traits Vicious Reprisal, Retaliatory Evasion, and this WvW ability, you'll end up with 20 seconds or so of continuous retaliation, which keeps amping up as you dodge and use Soothing Stone to heal. It isn't a common build, but its a trick I figured out while roaming on the herald, and it's quite useful for dealing with other roamers.

 

(13): Pain absorption in Mallyx. It has no cooldown, it cures everyone's conditions while giving them to yourself, and it pulses out Resistance whenever you use it. Good in WvW zergs, and also certain enemies in PVE that do mostly condi damage become utterly trivial with this ability.

[Rysdude.3824]

It seems like a mallyx build with boon removal and resistance would be great for roaming. All ive ever seen are power heralds though.

[Zexanima.7851]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> (3): For Ventari, yes you'll need healing power. For SoulCleave's Summit, no you don't.

>

> (4): Yep. Ventari does it if you have the salvation line equipped, and renegade just has the f4 skill. Most pure DPS specs can't output that much alacrity, just enough to fill the holes from a chronobuffer. But, if you have gear that gives boon duration, then the alacrity can get quite high.

>

> (6): The exact mechanics can get a bit weird. Glint can give everyone swiftness, fury, and protection permanently, but only gives around 12-15 stacks of might. The Renegade with lasting legacy can cap might, even in a pure DPS build. They do this by spamming Heroic Command, and also Mace 3 is a blast finisher that blasts in mace 2's fire field, giving everyone 6-9 more might. Overall this caps might. If you need a wholly dedicated might + boon bot for a team, you can run a condi herald set, using facets for boons and also blasting might with the mace. If you're wearing gear that gives boon duration, you can easily cap all boons just by camping facets alone.

>

> (8): There are two sources of boon removal. First, Banish Enchantment in Mallyx. It's spammable and removes 3 boons on use. Second is the trait Opportune Extraction, which automatically removes a boon every 10 seconds if the enemy has at least 4 torment stacks. This is pretty easy on the condi build.

>

> (12): Jalis and the Retribution line. In WvW there's a skill to gain retaliation when struck by a guard. If you have the traits Vicious Reprisal, Retaliatory Evasion, and this WvW ability, you'll end up with 20 seconds or so of continuous retaliation, which keeps amping up as you dodge and use Soothing Stone to heal. It isn't a common build, but its a trick I figured out while roaming on the herald, and it's quite useful for dealing with other roamers.

>

> (13): Pain absorption in Mallyx. It has no cooldown, it cures everyone's conditions while giving them to yourself, and it pulses out Resistance whenever you use it. Good in WvW zergs, and also certain enemies in PVE that do mostly condi damage become utterly trivial with this ability.

 

Thanks a ton for the explanation, that helps a lot.

[otto.5684]

Rev is currently the worst performing class. They have the least build diversity of all classes. They only have 1 viable sPvP build and 1 viable PvE build. Both are med tier. On the bright side, power rev is great in open world PvE.

[Ertrak.9506]

> @"otto.5684" said:

> Rev is currently the worst performing class. They have the least build diversity of all classes. They only have 1 viable sPvP build and 1 viable PvE build. Both are med tier. On the bright side, power rev is great in open world PvE.

 

You should see the latest invocation dps benchmark. It *almost* competes with Condi berserker when with allies (~38k dps estimated; the benchmark was 36.5k without allies)

 

I really wouldn't call that med tier anymore.

[Aeolus.3615]

i'm using Glint/Vent in pve(solo play once in a while since i dont pve that much here), on WvW i use Glint/jalis.

 

Jalis and demon, are great on group do fiht the 20-30 scourges the enemey has.

Rite of the great dwarf + harmonize contuinity(heral trait) makes jalis a team stun breaker that reduces damage by 50% and can be also traited to reduce condi damage by 50%.

Kinda feels like a protective monk from gw1, with adition of the FIrebrand on the team has the healer monk.

The same goes for pain absortion, it is a stun breaker that with the herald trait will make a stunbreaker that makes your team imune to conditions, maybe it is best to get gear with boon duration on this one.

[otto.5684]

> @"Ertrak.9506" said:

> > @"otto.5684" said:

> > Rev is currently the worst performing class. They have the least build diversity of all classes. They only have 1 viable sPvP build and 1 viable PvE build. Both are med tier. On the bright side, power rev is great in open world PvE.

>

> You should see the latest invocation dps benchmark. It *almost* competes with Condi berserker when with allies (~38k dps estimated; the benchmark was 36.5k without allies)

>

> I really wouldn't call that med tier anymore.

 

Not after the last patch. Also, only on large hit boxes. And only in raids. Not to mention long setup. It is viable, but trying to put in top tier is a far stretch.

[Celldrax.2849]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> (8): There are two sources of boon removal. First, Banish Enchantment in Mallyx. It's spammable and removes 3 boons on use. Second is the trait Opportune Extraction, which automatically removes a boon every 10 seconds if the enemy has at least 4 torment stacks. This is pretty easy on the condi build.

Goes to show how little experimentation I've done with condi Rev. I completely forgot about that boon removal.

 

All those times I've done Zohaqan on different builds thinking Rev didn't have that ability...

 

[SWI.4127]

It feels that way because skills are linked with legends, and traitlines are basically linked with legends too. Hell, the Rejuvenation traitline has baseline traits that are literally worthless if you don't use Ventari. I love Revenant, but it feels really restrictive sometimes. I really wish they'd create 1 or 2 extra skills for each legend and give us a bit of choice.

[Diesel Stelar.3709]

It really depends on what mode do you play. The guys above make valid points..but for pve and wvw(which for me is another mode of pve). Many of the advantages of rev mentioned above are bogus.

Highest healing output? who cares... a healing rev in pve is used only on deimos raid, absolutely no other reason to go for it in pve. In WvW it's laughable and for spvp ventari is pretty much a node holder in 1v1(unless you are dueling a good mes) and can kite for a time 2 probably.

Alacrity is fine, but again you'll only use it when there's no chrono mes on the team.

The Retaliation and resistance uptime can work only in WvW at best if you are at a max distance, to keep the meter going, in spvp believe me I've tried over many seasons to make them viable, but the last time Mallyx build was viable, was also about 1-2 years ago. Renegade is way too squishy and again the usability of the utilities depends on your and team's ability to attack, they don't do much on their own if they even survive for more than 2 seconds.

The main reason one will want a rev in his group is the pulsing boons of glint. Renegade is used here and there in raids, but not a preferable class and you still have to play with the mace to stack might, not with bow.

Rev needs more weapons, both main hand and offhand. You wanna play power? You HAVE to play swords to get max dps output. You wanna play condi? You HAVE to play mace, unless it's open world content, where it doesn't really matter.

What is actually a nice advantage of rev over other classes(in spvp) is the aoe CC spammability. With HeraldShiro and Invocation you pretty much can spam Jade Winds, Chaotic Winds and Staff 5. That going along with potentially up to 4 stun breaks, makes the rev a tankier thief, whose focus is mostly team fights. Also despite going for a power build you have a nice healing output. I usually get about 200k healing score at the end of the game.

[starlinvf.1358]

> @"SWI.4127" said:

> It feels that way because skills are linked with legends, and traitlines are basically linked with legends too. Hell, the Rejuvenation traitline has baseline traits that are literally worthless if you don't use Ventari. I love Revenant, but it feels really restrictive sometimes. I really wish they'd create 1 or 2 extra skills for each legend and give us a bit of choice.

 

It is restrictive by design. But it used to make up for this by having higher output potential with fewer requirements. But since they were overshadowing other classes when it shared a role, they got nerfed into near oblivion, and are still try to crawl their way out of it. The original push back to Rev was a lack of general flexibility, but got nerfed on the grounds of too much performance without also opening flexibility to make up for it. As a result, the class's builds are either too situational- causing people to over invest into it, and getting nerfed in response. Or is too mediocre are a generalist, and gets excluded from things because of it. Renegade is riding on the fact that Condi damage is kind of OP general when it comes to raids, and Raid content doesn't challenge its weaknesses. Because in PvP and WvW, Kalla is incredibly awkward, where the high energy cost and vulnerability of the spirits really stand out, along with both Condi weapon sets (Mace/Axe / ShB) having zero defense skills.

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

> @"starlinvf.1358" said:

> > @"SWI.4127" said:

> > It feels that way because skills are linked with legends, and traitlines are basically linked with legends too. Hell, the Rejuvenation traitline has baseline traits that are literally worthless if you don't use Ventari. I love Revenant, but it feels really restrictive sometimes. I really wish they'd create 1 or 2 extra skills for each legend and give us a bit of choice.

>

> Renegade is riding on the fact that Condi damage is kind of OP general when it comes to raids, and Raid content doesn't challenge its weaknesses.

 

Renegade isn't really riding on the fact that "condi damage is OP in raids." Condi Damage is only meta on 50% of raid encounters, and the majority of those encounters are mostly condi classes due to how powerful Epidemic Scourge is. If Epidemic ever gets nerfed significantly there will be a grand total of two to three raid encounters that completely favor condi classes. It would be more fair to say that Renegade is "riding on the fact that Citadel Bombardment gets stronger and stronger the bigger the hitbox gets."

[Dace.8173]

> @"SWI.4127" said:

> It feels that way because skills are linked with legends, and traitlines are basically linked with legends too. Hell, the Rejuvenation traitline has baseline traits that are literally worthless if you don't use Ventari. I love Revenant, but it feels really restrictive sometimes. I really wish they'd create 1 or 2 extra skills for each legend and give us a bit of choice.

 

I actually don't mind the lack of skill choice and I don't think adding an extra 1 or 2 skills would actually fix anything, let alone the things people see as problematic. Unless they were to do away with the concept and how Legends work there really wouldn't be a real benefit to adding additional skills. I think it will be easier for them to address current issues if the profession remains the way it is and they just buff up the current skill set some. An additional skill or two would give you the illusion of choice as odds are strong that there would be one or two skills that most of the community would agree are weak anyway and thus not real choices. That and the inability to mix and match outside of your Legends would still keep the same issues that many people have.

 

Overall, Revenant is a love/hate profession. It is a really strong break from how the rest of the game works and that makes it hard to pick up. The lack of skill choice is not an easy adjustment. I think the biggest problem for the profession isn't how powerful it is but that people try to force themselves to like the profession (not directed at the person I quoted. I'm just branching off from the quote). A lot of people love the background for it but the way it actually works really isn't for them. But because they love the background so much they force themselves to like and play a profession that isn't for them. This, in turn, creates frustration and negative feelings which in turn bleeds into how powerful the profession feels (though I'm not saying that everyone who feels it is weak is forcing themselves to like the profession). I have a couple of folks in my guild who complain about how stressful and unfun the profession is for them but they won't give it up because they just love the background. Thus they keep saying that they are just missing something and that missing factor is why it's not fun. The reality though is that it likely isn't a missing factor. It's more likely that despite the profession having a relatively cool background it isn't for them. Not every profession is for everyone, no matter how cool you think it sounds.

 

I think that if the profession would be easier to address in regards to fixing it if people weren't forcing themselves to like it so much. Personally, I find the profession to be fun and challenging. There are definitely easier professions to do well with while playing WvW and PvP ( I rock PvP with my Weaver :) ). I don't see the profession as good as a few folks in this thread indicate. But flipside I also don't see it as bad. I feel Revenant is a work in progress. I think given enough time that the profession will make it to where it needs to be.

[LucianDK.8615]

Revenants just needs a buff in damage to be more competitive. Though I wonder how things would look for the OP classes currently if epidemic got nerfbattered. Weavers, mirages and scourges does way too much condi damage

[Game of Bones.8975]

Are you playing for fun or are you a serious number-cruncher? Revenant/Renegade is a fun class to play once I maxed it out.

[SunTzu.4513]

>Are you playing for fun or are you a serious number-cruncher? Revenant/Renegade is a fun class to play once I maxed it out.

This. Many of my mates asking me, why the hell you play rev, you are already a necro guy? The answer is just simple: It's fun. I like the fluid shiro/glint/jalis gameplay. Kalla/Mallyx is fun too. Sure SB is not a effective weapon but for me it's pretty much fun. That's the most important thing to me is just having fun in a video game.

[Buran.3796]

^ That's also the reason nobody plays Renegade in PvP: having skills that doesn't work when your enemy has a brain is unfunny.

[Dace.8173]

> @"Buran.3796" said:

> ^ That's also the reason nobody plays Renegade in PvP: having skills that doesn't work when your enemy has a brain is unfunny.

 

I play Renegade in PvP. I find Renegade fun and sometimes it feels awesome to just summon a barrage of artillery from a portal. There's more to PvP than just winning. There is also just having fun while competing. I win some. I lose some. But I am having fun. I'd play an underpowered fun profession long before I'd play a meta unfun profession.

[Buran.3796]

> @"Dace.8173" said:

> > @"Buran.3796" said:

> > ^ That's also the reason nobody plays Renegade in PvP: having skills that doesn't work when your enemy has a brain is unfunny.

>

> I'd play an underpowered fun profession long before I'd play a meta unfun profession.

 

Rev isn't meta, but at least Herald won't make people in your team instantly leaving the match.