Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Fighter Phase 1 Alpha Review/Suggestions
Dolyem
Member, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
RESOURCES
MOMENTUM
Momentum management is more or less pretty bad. Most of the time it is better to just utilize through one of the forms, while all of the abilities that utilize it for damages or buffs burn through it rapidly, while building it up seems painstakingly slow compared to how fast fights end up being. The only saving grace for fast Momentum build up is Battle Cry and that's exclusively in very large groups of enemies. Momentum management should be a focus for fighter abilities, but it shouldn't cripple the fighter prior to the engagement. Any time I am in a group PvP engagement I have to use ranged basic attacks to build up momentum before I even consider engaging melee, I am a fighter not a ranger. If you're going to make fighters rely on momentum, you need ways to build it up quickly if you're going to have it spent quickly as well.
HEALTH
Hard to say how the survivability for fighter feels due to the state of high tier gear. Though in PVE it feels about right, and in PVP with low tier gear against low tier gear it also feels very good.
MANA
I am not even sure why a fighter uses mana. But I will say they use A LOT of it quickly, to the point where I would expect the same from a mage just throwing everything they've got at something. If there isn't a bard, your mana goes bye bye. I would rather have ways to build up and spend momentum fluidly than have to worry about mana as a melee class.
SKILLS
FORMS
Form of Ferocity- Effective in PVE, but mainly when farming large groups of enemies while in a group. BLEEDS FEEL VERY WEAK IN PVP and the only reason to pay attention to bleeds is to apply hemorrhaging with Rupture and then the only reason to apply that is to maximize Lethal Blow. Otherwise Bleeds aren't really even a threat.
Form of Celerity- Overall seems like the weakest form. Movement speed is nice, but its really just for running down a single target. In PVE its pretty pointless. In PVP it is really only useful if you're chasing in a 1v1, and even then Fluidity still seems better to deter CCs. The HP talent feels pretty pointless considering the state of TTK in phase 1 Alpha. Brings little to no extra survivability to the table considering how momentum starved fighters are in solo fights, and how much momentum they end up burning to do damage.
Form of Fluidity- Probably the best Form for big PvP fights. Anti CC and applying shaken seems to be the best setup when dipping in and out of big groups. Even though that playstyle feels bad for a melee "in your face" class like fighter. Also transfers well to PvE with the mana talent. Momentum is still a very limiting factor for forms considering how long it takes to build up without a large group of enemies to Battle Cry immediately.
There really feels like no need to "stance dance" through forms, especially when it costs 5 talents to make it "viable"
ATTACKS
Overpower- Momentum Generator, fine but becomes pretty pointless once you get Brutal Cleave
Brutal Cleave- Overpower but better
Blitz- Great feeling charge, but should grant Momentum as a default as opposed to having to put a talent point into it.
Crippling Blow- Ability feels ok when it actually works. Doesn't feel like its snaring the target most of the time. Also it feels like a waste to even attempt to utilize this ability as a snare when you can save it to trip someone who is staggered.
Lethal Blow- One of the best feeling abilities. But the Consuming Lethal Blow talent seems pointless to spec into once you get into high tier PvP situations due to both extremely fast TTKS and the inability to even see the enemy players actual health to time the ability for the benefit.
Whirlwind- Feel and visual is great. Damage display should be each individual hits damage, not an accumulative total. Climactic whirlwind talent seems lackluster and mostly pointless. Overdrive is fine and extremely powerful when facing large groups of mobs in PVE, while in PvP it can be beneficial to spend the momentum to stay CC immune if needed or canceled if not.
Rupture- Just used as a setup for Lethal Blow. Bleeds don't feel great outside of massive PVE groups of mobs, and that's just because it feels good to see lots of ticks.
Maim- Great ability overall. Didn't really use the talent for the ranged bit, but as long as it doesn't get rid of maims original function in its normal range and just adds the projectile, that seems fine.
Lunging Assault- Useful at times but only really with the additional charge talent for closing small gaps. Also a bit buggy as far as whether it gets hung up on a target it hits or completely passes through them.
Wallop- Useless and a waste of momentum
Knock Out- Useless for anything that isn't solo PvP. And still useless considering bleeds and swinging in melee distance. Would be much better to just have a Trip instead for a melee dps.
Leap Strike- Great ability, but when it comes to leaping to ledges you should really only see the area marker on spots you can actually reach.
Cataclysm- Amazing ability, but the wind up is pretty much a death sentence in large scale PvP with the current TTK at high tier gear engagements.
BUFFS
Battle Cry- Pretty much the only thing that allows a fighter to get their momentum up quickly, but only in large enemy group engagements. But currently every moment counts when jumping into a large PvP group so adding this to any other ability once you charge into the fray makes you that much more vulnerable with the way TTK currently is.
Blood Fusion- Fantastic in PVE. Not terrible in PVP since it more or less lets you get off another ability in a large scale fight before you die, and its solid in small scale PvP.
Berserk- Great and terrible at the same time. Great because of the effects. Terrible because it takes momentum to activate and then proceeds to drain whatever momentum you have in a near instant. In the end I only ever use it when I have massive groups of mobs to counterbalance the drain with sheer numbers of hits, or as a CC break in PVP which ends up usually being a negative due to making whatever form I have useless with no momentum. Also is a must to fully upgrade with the 2 talent options to be viable.
PLAYSTYLE
PVE
In PVE fighter feels phenomenal. I get up into the monsters face, I beat the crap out of them with cool looking abilitiee. The melee dream.
PVP
Small scale PVP (not including legendary tier gear) is exceptional. The survival times feel good. The damage feels good. Solid TTK all around. Theres time to utilize abilities. Small scale PvP with Legendaries is more or less a quickdraw match of who hits who first, and a fighter who relies on momentum build up and melee tends to lose that, so it feels like crap.
Large scale PVP with low end gear all around feels amazing. You can stay in the mass of players and get off several abilities before needing to disengage, allowing you to get that "in the thick of it" feel that you want from a melee warrior type of dps. But in Large scale PVP with high tier gear, you have to jump in and out of the fight constantly, barely getting an ability or 2 off with full Cooldowns. It feels more like rogue or ranger due to how guerilla it feels, and how squishy you feel from the amount of damage you take. In these fights I am doing exponentially more ranged basic attacks than I am doing any melee engagements (which tend to be a 1 way ticket to death after dropping damage). And to even get to that point I have to maintain ranged attacks to just keep my momentum up to even stay feasible for an engagement.
OVERALL
Fighter feels good when you actually get to play as a melee warrior type class. Momentum needs work. And gear needs tweaked more than the fighter itself. But if gear remains the same, fighters need to be able to survive in the fray better so they can actually play like a fighter in largescale PVP. Everything feels great about it in grouped PVE.
MOMENTUM
Momentum management is more or less pretty bad. Most of the time it is better to just utilize through one of the forms, while all of the abilities that utilize it for damages or buffs burn through it rapidly, while building it up seems painstakingly slow compared to how fast fights end up being. The only saving grace for fast Momentum build up is Battle Cry and that's exclusively in very large groups of enemies. Momentum management should be a focus for fighter abilities, but it shouldn't cripple the fighter prior to the engagement. Any time I am in a group PvP engagement I have to use ranged basic attacks to build up momentum before I even consider engaging melee, I am a fighter not a ranger. If you're going to make fighters rely on momentum, you need ways to build it up quickly if you're going to have it spent quickly as well.
HEALTH
Hard to say how the survivability for fighter feels due to the state of high tier gear. Though in PVE it feels about right, and in PVP with low tier gear against low tier gear it also feels very good.
MANA
I am not even sure why a fighter uses mana. But I will say they use A LOT of it quickly, to the point where I would expect the same from a mage just throwing everything they've got at something. If there isn't a bard, your mana goes bye bye. I would rather have ways to build up and spend momentum fluidly than have to worry about mana as a melee class.
SKILLS
FORMS
Form of Ferocity- Effective in PVE, but mainly when farming large groups of enemies while in a group. BLEEDS FEEL VERY WEAK IN PVP and the only reason to pay attention to bleeds is to apply hemorrhaging with Rupture and then the only reason to apply that is to maximize Lethal Blow. Otherwise Bleeds aren't really even a threat.
Form of Celerity- Overall seems like the weakest form. Movement speed is nice, but its really just for running down a single target. In PVE its pretty pointless. In PVP it is really only useful if you're chasing in a 1v1, and even then Fluidity still seems better to deter CCs. The HP talent feels pretty pointless considering the state of TTK in phase 1 Alpha. Brings little to no extra survivability to the table considering how momentum starved fighters are in solo fights, and how much momentum they end up burning to do damage.
Form of Fluidity- Probably the best Form for big PvP fights. Anti CC and applying shaken seems to be the best setup when dipping in and out of big groups. Even though that playstyle feels bad for a melee "in your face" class like fighter. Also transfers well to PvE with the mana talent. Momentum is still a very limiting factor for forms considering how long it takes to build up without a large group of enemies to Battle Cry immediately.
There really feels like no need to "stance dance" through forms, especially when it costs 5 talents to make it "viable"
ATTACKS
Overpower- Momentum Generator, fine but becomes pretty pointless once you get Brutal Cleave
Brutal Cleave- Overpower but better
Blitz- Great feeling charge, but should grant Momentum as a default as opposed to having to put a talent point into it.
Crippling Blow- Ability feels ok when it actually works. Doesn't feel like its snaring the target most of the time. Also it feels like a waste to even attempt to utilize this ability as a snare when you can save it to trip someone who is staggered.
Lethal Blow- One of the best feeling abilities. But the Consuming Lethal Blow talent seems pointless to spec into once you get into high tier PvP situations due to both extremely fast TTKS and the inability to even see the enemy players actual health to time the ability for the benefit.
Whirlwind- Feel and visual is great. Damage display should be each individual hits damage, not an accumulative total. Climactic whirlwind talent seems lackluster and mostly pointless. Overdrive is fine and extremely powerful when facing large groups of mobs in PVE, while in PvP it can be beneficial to spend the momentum to stay CC immune if needed or canceled if not.
Rupture- Just used as a setup for Lethal Blow. Bleeds don't feel great outside of massive PVE groups of mobs, and that's just because it feels good to see lots of ticks.
Maim- Great ability overall. Didn't really use the talent for the ranged bit, but as long as it doesn't get rid of maims original function in its normal range and just adds the projectile, that seems fine.
Lunging Assault- Useful at times but only really with the additional charge talent for closing small gaps. Also a bit buggy as far as whether it gets hung up on a target it hits or completely passes through them.
Wallop- Useless and a waste of momentum
Knock Out- Useless for anything that isn't solo PvP. And still useless considering bleeds and swinging in melee distance. Would be much better to just have a Trip instead for a melee dps.
Leap Strike- Great ability, but when it comes to leaping to ledges you should really only see the area marker on spots you can actually reach.
Cataclysm- Amazing ability, but the wind up is pretty much a death sentence in large scale PvP with the current TTK at high tier gear engagements.
BUFFS
Battle Cry- Pretty much the only thing that allows a fighter to get their momentum up quickly, but only in large enemy group engagements. But currently every moment counts when jumping into a large PvP group so adding this to any other ability once you charge into the fray makes you that much more vulnerable with the way TTK currently is.
Blood Fusion- Fantastic in PVE. Not terrible in PVP since it more or less lets you get off another ability in a large scale fight before you die, and its solid in small scale PvP.
Berserk- Great and terrible at the same time. Great because of the effects. Terrible because it takes momentum to activate and then proceeds to drain whatever momentum you have in a near instant. In the end I only ever use it when I have massive groups of mobs to counterbalance the drain with sheer numbers of hits, or as a CC break in PVP which ends up usually being a negative due to making whatever form I have useless with no momentum. Also is a must to fully upgrade with the 2 talent options to be viable.
PLAYSTYLE
PVE
In PVE fighter feels phenomenal. I get up into the monsters face, I beat the crap out of them with cool looking abilitiee. The melee dream.
PVP
Small scale PVP (not including legendary tier gear) is exceptional. The survival times feel good. The damage feels good. Solid TTK all around. Theres time to utilize abilities. Small scale PvP with Legendaries is more or less a quickdraw match of who hits who first, and a fighter who relies on momentum build up and melee tends to lose that, so it feels like crap.
Large scale PVP with low end gear all around feels amazing. You can stay in the mass of players and get off several abilities before needing to disengage, allowing you to get that "in the thick of it" feel that you want from a melee warrior type of dps. But in Large scale PVP with high tier gear, you have to jump in and out of the fight constantly, barely getting an ability or 2 off with full Cooldowns. It feels more like rogue or ranger due to how guerilla it feels, and how squishy you feel from the amount of damage you take. In these fights I am doing exponentially more ranged basic attacks than I am doing any melee engagements (which tend to be a 1 way ticket to death after dropping damage). And to even get to that point I have to maintain ranged attacks to just keep my momentum up to even stay feasible for an engagement.
OVERALL
Fighter feels good when you actually get to play as a melee warrior type class. Momentum needs work. And gear needs tweaked more than the fighter itself. But if gear remains the same, fighters need to be able to survive in the fray better so they can actually play like a fighter in largescale PVP. Everything feels great about it in grouped PVE.
2
Comments
I only got to lvl 13 but agree where I have experience.