Having previously played the revenant, this weekend finally allowed me to get my hands on Shiro alongside all of the revenant trait lines. We also had the opportunity to put the newly added weapon swap to good use. The revenant is, without question, a profession I want to love but at the moment it’s not quite where it needs to be and it took a considerable amount of time and effort to find a build that was functional rather than optimal or truly viable. Similarly to my reaper caveat, it’s important to remember that Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns is very much in Beta and ArenaNet genuinely seem receptive to making changes based on community feedback. 

Shiro

After Roy Cronacher detailed how the revenant would be receiving a significant buff to its damage output, across all of its weapon sets, I was expecting Shiro to not only ramp things up further, but offer a playstyle that was agile, mobile and to be feared if the revenant got close enough. Although Shiro partially fulfills this role, he’s still in desperate need of several things if he’s to fit comfortably between a thief and mesmer in terms of speed and utility.

Shiro damage, even with berzerker items, is still too low. For a legend focused around killing enemies and players quickly (or one presumes it is designed to) its relatively poor at doing it. The damage across all the skills is really rather low, especially when compared to the likes of the warrior, thief or mesmer. ArenaNet have certainly nailed the flavor of Shiro and the animations are particularly satisfying (who doesn’t like wielding 2 swords?) but the damage numbers definitely need another kick in the rear to ensure the legend (and profession) doesn’t feel weak. There were many times in PvE and sPvP where I grew tired of attempting to kill things due it taking so long.

As far as Shiro’s skills are concerned, I’d have to say it’s a mixed bag. On paper they all appear fine and for the most part, cover all bases when it comes to an engage, a burst skill, a stun break and utility but in practice, they’re all missing some key components to give the revenant survivability and true potential to burst opponents down. Certainly when it comes to structured PvP, most of my early matches were spent lying on the floor dead (in several seconds) and the players I did manage to kill were either away from their keyboard or so low on health that an ant could have comfortably killed them. When I did encounter players of a certain skill, the revenant became a free kill - every time.

Partially this is down to its lack of boon/condition mitigation (such as protection or blind) but also because it lacks evasion and outright immunity (such as Signet of Stone or Endure Pain). The result of all this is that Shiro is a predictable and easy Hero to counter because he has no means of surviving, outside of his heal, once he’s engaged in combat.

To point out individul skills, Unrelenting Assault is a perfect example of one that desperately needs evasion for the duration. As it currently stands, having enemies or players able to damage you when you’re stuck in such a protracted animation more often than not results in you instantly dying. Even Rift Slash (if you’re lucky enough to reach the third in the attack chain) is in need of providing the revenant a mist barrier or evasion (ala Blurred Frenzy).

Although you can certainly use Riposting Shadows to avoid damage as a means of masking skill limitations, your opponent then knows you’ve nothing left in your arsenal to survive. If you switch legends, Mallyx won’t save you (though I’ll speak more about him soon) and Ventari is cumbersome. It’s only Jallis who offers some survivability but the likelihood of having 40 energy to use Rite of the Last Dwarf, after using Riposting Shadows, is something I found near impossible. Sure you can trait to break stun when changing legends, but that - more often than not - leaves you in a legend stance that does something you don’t necessarily need at that time. Having to then wait to return back to say, Shiro, tends to guarantee your death because you lack mobility or further stun breaks.

Unlike another profession that can comfortably pack two stun breaks or load up with utility skills that offer protection, a blink (or teleport) or even full mitigation, the revenant lacks this flexibility across all its legends, not just Shiro. For a legend focused on damage, its inability to avoid damage results in the revenant being unable to deal any. Obviously much of this criticism applies to structured PvP because in a PvE environment, besides killing things slowly, Shiro is more than functional.

My other bugbear with Shiro and this is largely as a result of the energy mechanic, is that use of Impossible Odds is so infrequent due to its cost. It’s relegated to being a glorified buff rather than one that significantly increases your damage. Perhaps it’s just me, but I’ve also lost count at the amount of times stomps against enemy players fail when using this skill (this could be a wider issue of quickness and stomps failing). Considering the revenant starts combat with 50 energy and needs to remain in combat to acquire it, sustaining Impossible Odds for more than a second or two is incredibly tough to the point where it becomes a burden rather than a skill of value. Depleting your energy through Impossible Odds leaves you even more vulnerable because you then can’t use anything else due to energy acquisition being so sluggish.

Admittedly and like any quickness based skill it’s never supposed to be on for long, but, when you look at Quickening Zephyr that provides a flat 6 seconds of quickness and a stun break, without the compromise, it doesn’t seem entirely fair (especially Quickening Zephyr can be traited to remove 2 conditions, grant fury and have a 48 second cooldown).

Finally, I have to say that I absolutely love Phase Traversal and Jade Winds as both are well designed, powerful skills. Where Phase Traversal is concerned, the one thing I would like is for it to cripple a target for 2 seconds on arrival and if necessary, slightly reduce the unblockable duration. Shiro desperately lacks a reliable means of keeping people in place, and this would allow you to at least achieve some damage without someone instantly running away from you. As for Jade Winds, it looks incredible and is valuable in both PvE and sPvP.

Energy

At this point in time, I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the revenant having energy. On one hand, I love the fact that my skill cooldowns are a lot lower as a result of it, on the other it’s at times confusing and difficult to manage. Combined with the fact that you have to remember the cooldown and energy costs for each skill, and that energy gain is set as opposed to allowing the revenant to manipulate it, makes for a juggling act that becomes exhausting when also legend swapping. I’ve thought a lot about the thief whilst playing the revenant and admire the simplicity of initiative. Perhaps my memory is failing, but as I understand it initiative was implemented on the thief weapon skills to allow it to burst effectively but to also limit that burst potential. When playing on the revenant, energy and cooldowns across all skills feels like a compromise as opposed to one that’s directly benefiting the profession.

If energy was removed entirely, would the revenant be a worse profession if it had standard cooldowns? Alternatively, would the revenant be a worse profession if it had only energy? I don’t think so and with preference, I’d rather the profession had just energy but a means of increasing its gain. When you do find yourself with a mass of energy in a combat situation (rarely) the revenant truly shines and it’s so incredibly satisfying to rattle through your skills at a swift pace.

Rigid Roles

If there’s one thing that stands out with the revenant is its rigid design across its legends, weapon skills and traits. Every trait line and weapon clearly represents a specific legend. The problem with this is that they’re so restrictive in their design that there’s no natural cohesion between any of them when trying to build the revenant for any area of the game. One of my most successful builds was using mace and axe, combined with rabid gear, Mallyx and Shiro. The problem was that my second weapon set was almost always redundant because there is no other condition based set and no trait lines worked together as well as I'd like. I often found that I needed the engagement of Shiro and the condition survivability of Mallyx but then I had no mobility (I couldn’t take Jalis to blast swiftness) and had no real access to stability or cleansing. There’s such a constant compromise with legend choice that’s it’s frustrating, especially when I look at an elementalist and the ease at which their attunements blend together to form a cohesive and powerful blend of damage, protection and utility. There’s somewhat greater flexibility with the revenant if you pursue a power based build but the damage being so low, conditions are a far stronger choice.

As for traits, I think many of the lines need reworking because most are weak (hello, Close Quarters), particularly stingy (Eluding Nullification) or there’s only one or two good ones in an entire line (Diabolic Inferno). I also think some of the trait lines and their theme need loosening so that they appeal to two or more legends as opposed to just one. I found real difficulty in choosing a third traitline that complimented my setup and ended up choosing Invocation purely for the legend stun break. There is some synergy (Soothing Stone on Jalis works great with Empowering Vengeance) but just not quite enough.

Legends

There’s lots to discuss when it comes to the revenant legends but overall, similarly to Shiro, they all just need minor tweaks. The first is that I cannot believe Jalis, who’s arguably the “tanky” legend, provides no protection. I find this absolutely bizarre and even though it’s possible to reduce the damage you take from the elite or when taunting, it’s so odd to have so little access to a basic defensive boon. As for Mallyx, I have to say he’s undoubtedly my favourite and is incredibly powerful when played right. Embrace the Darkness is incredibly strong, especially if you’re covered in conditions because you can quite comfortably transfer all these back to enemies. Yes it means you still have them on you, but if you time the use of Pain Absorption, you can usually outlast most conditions, kill those around you, and then heal up to near full with Empowering Mastery. If I were to make any changes to Mallyx, it would be to make Pain Absorption a stun break (I think each legend should have one) but to also remove the self cripple from Unyielding Anguish. It’s totally unnecessary and one of the few engage skills available to the revenant is needlessly neutered because of it.

Finally, I find Ventari only truly viable in PvE as opposed to sPvP or World versus World. The tablet is slow, difficult to manage (alongside your legends, energy, cooldowns and weaponswap) and I fear you’d have to be an octopus to truly get anything out of it in a fast paced environment. The (relatively) leisurely pace of PvE at least allows for some management of it, without too much stress. Perhaps we could have a trait that allowed the tablet to follow the revenant, similar to how Spirits were?

Final Thoughts

You might think that by reading the above that I didn't enjoy my time with the revenant but it’s quite the opposite. I thoroughly enjoyed enjoyed it and it performs very well in PvE if you pursue conditions. However, it desperately needs some tweaks if it’s to have a place in sPvP and WvW. I don’t believe much of what I’ve suggested above would make the profession too strong and most of my suggestions, I believe, are minor fixes that wouldn’t take very long to implement. As it currently stands the revenant is incredibly challenging to play well outside of PvE, to the point where most players laughed at me for taking him into a match (only to then die to Mallyx - haha!).

If we can see greater refinement of the energy mechanic, some key improvements to certain skills to bolster the revenants defensive capabilities but also weave in greater access to common boons, I think the profession would be one I’d stick to. Oddly, I’m also missing it already despite my niggles and that has to be a very good thing (as you can probably guess, I'm a picky person). Here’s hoping Roy and his colleagues are listening to player feedback as much as they have been because this profession has all the potential to be one of the best in Guild Wars 2.

A Little Extra

If you're struggling to find a viable revenant build, here's mine for your next Beta weekend. It's awesome.

1. Shiro and Mallyx

2. Mace, Axe and Hammer

3. Rabid Amulet and/or items

4. Superior Rune of the Necromancer

5. Mace: Superior Sigil of Energy

6. Axe: Superior Sigil of Torment

7. Hammer: Superior Sigil of Energy and Superior Sigil of Strength 

Enjoy!