With the second expansion to Guild Wars 2 flying fast towards us – launching Sept. 22 – Arena Net is rolling out the red carpet for players to experience some of the new content new. As hype roars in the ears of the player-base, tomorrow GW2 clients will make available the nine new elite specialization classes in the World vs. World game mode.
Players who want to test out the elite specs need not do anything. A client patch will take care of that and two beta slots will appear. Just pick one, make a character and then roll into WvW to test it out.
In a developer livestream published today, Anet employees talked about what players can expect from these specializations. Keep reading for the thoughts of the voces about how these new character class changes will affect everyone.
The Holosmith is a different type of engineer who uses a sword and the power of light to construct light-based weaponry and objects (…not at all a Green Lantern.) With the power of a photo-forge, Holosmiths will gain an entire new kit that allows them to mimic a number of different weapons and control the battlefield. Some of their powers include a light-made sword, a heavy-gun and even an arena that empowers the Holosmith and her allies. Worrisome for Holosmith players, as they operate they gain a resource called heat – to much heat and they explode.
The Spellbreaker is a new elite warrior specialization using daggers that counter-balances the Berzerker by slowing players down a little and putting them into face-to-face combat. The focus of the elite specialization is to strip boons from enemies and provide a sort of one-on-one control with stuns, dazes and other effects. Spellbreakers are an echo of the Guild Wars 1 class Magehunter. They operate by making it harder for boon-based enemies to operate and even have a trait that makes it difficult to escape (by linking the Spellbreaker to a foe with a chain).
The Scourge is a desert necromancer with a torch, calling upon the sands and the dead to become a bulwark from evil. At its heart, the Scourge will be about battlefield control, using sand shades to create deadly areas that injure and cripple enemy forces (by corrupting boons) and empower friends when nearby. Since shades cannot be stacked on top of each other, Scourge players will be encouraged to spread the love. Also, Scourge is getting an interesting portal-mechanic that allows them to teleport to an area and leave behind a portal that friends can use. New jumping puzzle helper?
The Firebrand brings a new guardian with an axe who is heavily support-based. Firebrands are librarians and book geeks who use tomes and mantras to defend their friends and set their foes aflame. By calling upon their knowledge of the literary arts, Firebrands can shift the tide of battle by applying boons to friends and inflicting terrible damage on attackers. Their primary mechanic is built on a type of ammunition that allows them to rapidly fire off abilities, if needed, or spread out support and firepower during longer engagements.
The Deadeye is the much-awaited sniper class for the thief, someone who operates at long range with a rifle blasting away at the enemy. The Deadeye introduces a new mechanic: Malice. The longer the Deadeye is trained on a target the more damage and capability they gain. The Deadeye also uses a special stance (kneeling) to use longer-ranged rifle skills, which makes them vulnerable to charging melee attackers. This means that Deadeye players may need to pick their targets and work with their skill to ready for close-range.
The Renegade is a revenant elite specialization that now uses the short bow and gives access to the legend of Kalla Scorchrazor, a charr renegade who snuffed out the Flame Legion. Calling upon Scorchrazor, Renegades will be able to bring her warband into the field and summon ancient artillery to the field. As a result, players will be seeing ghostly charr harassing their enemies, firing volleys of sky-blackening arrows and providing much-needed infantry support in fights. Also, with the short bow powers, players can open up portals through which arrows fly behind enemy lines or multiply. We can also imagine that player with The Dreamer legendary will now be able to produce on-rushing rainbow-pooping unicorn stampedes. (Prepare for a tidal wave of whinnying.)
The Mirage is a mesmer specialization bringing an axe and all the effects of illusory pools of water and the fata morgana. The Mirage changes the way that the mesmer fights by making every illusion into a clone – this makes it far harder to tell where the Mirage player is hiding – and furthermore also allows them to shuffle between their clones. This will make playing a Mirage just as weird as fighting against one. Also, the Mirage’s dodge ability has been replaced with a “just stand there” mechanic, where instead of rolling to the side, attacks just pass through them as if they’re not even there.
The Soulbeast is a ranger specialization that brings dagger? Rangers already can use daggers in their off-hand, so now daggers for main-hand. The big thing Soulbeast will do is that now rangers can merge with their pets and take on some of their traits. Although this takes the rangers pet from the field, it opens up a bunch of new opportunities for the Soulbeast. Ranger pets will all have particular sets of skills and abilities that will open up for the Soulbeast when they merge giving them a sort of battlefield versatility.
The Spellweaver is the upcoming specialization for the elementalist that gives them a sword and the ability to attune to two elements at once. This change adds a ridiculous number of new weapon skills to the mesmer as the third skill will always be a hybrid of the two attunements. Unlike their core class, Spellweavers will often look to engage heavily in front-line combat by swapping between attunements and using them to leap in and out of combat. Like their core class, Spellweavers are still somewhat fragile and a “glass cannon” of a class, but with enough skill and fancy footwork will be able to do extreme damage.
Pfew. We are out of breath!
Be sure to join us voces this weekend along with the MMO Anthropology krewe at 9PM AZT (GMT-7) on the MMO Anthropology livestream where we will discuss these upcoming changes and play Guild Wars 2. It will give us a chance to go over the elite specializations, the upcoming Path of Fire expansion and how that is expected to affect the community.
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