Slayer and his current state

[Gunlinger]

I would like to talk about some serious issues of the current state, the class called Slayer is in. With all the changes that got introduced into the game lately, I find it more and more challenging to keep up my mood while playing my slayer(rr70+) in the open RvR.
And that’s because the mechanics of that Class force some tradeoffs onto the Player. Yes, the Slayer has a great dps potential. But that comes at some costs!

It takes 5 seconds of fight before the Slayers main mechanic changes into Furius! state.
That means 5 Seconds without any dmg boost or CC aside from a single target slow. 5 Seconds of having almost nothing to react to a threat.
Being able to use a knock down to interrupt an enemy that uses a channel or tries to kite requires the slayer to be in combat for 15 seconds to reach Berserk! State first. And while boosting his dmg by 25% at Furius! And 50% at Berserk! His Armor and Resistances are getting reduced by 50% too.
His ‘’big’’ abilities set back his rage so that means there is a delay between the possibility of using said abilities of 15 seconds, where the AP costs of those abilities themselves are already hindering the usage of them in most situations.
The detaunt of Distracting roar got changed recently to no longer drop rage while using the tactic to not loose rage on Exhaustive Blows. That change narrows down the variety of playable builds for the Slayer, since now it is no longer viable to use Power Trough in any Aoe Build.
It means that you are forced to not be able to get rid of the debuff from your rage in fight, for the benefit of being able to detaunt every target in a range of 30 feet. Detaunting every enemy in a range of 30 feet has the benefit of reducing their dmg against you by 50% for 5 seconds. But it reduces your damage dealt to them by 50% too until you hit them with an attack. So being able to detaunt without loosing rage when using Power Through, in reality means that you get 50% less dmg in for dealing out 50% less dmg on your next attack. And if you hit someone in that area with Inevitable Doom before that detaunt, it will brake as soon as ID procs a dmg tick. So, you instantly loose the detaunt.
Most Exhaustive Blows got their dmg reduced so hard in the past, that they are mostly useless, because they deal less dmg than a normal core attack ability like spine crusher.
Rampage got its duration and strikethrough reduced, resulting in effectively getting placed into a state where you are only able to focus your dmg on demand in a warband for a small-time window of 10 seconds every 30 second after being in combat at least 5 to 15 seconds before. And because of the reduction of the Strikethrough down to 20% you are now getting a great deal of dmg dealt right back to you if you use Retribution in a basic melee focus against the enemy melee train, because you are triggering the enemies Riposte tactics for sure.
Procs got changed to no longer be affected by his class mechanic. That means that Reckless Gamble is no longer having any benefit from being in Furius! or Berserk! State, while still applying the damage backslash. On top of that it is currently not procing on Cleft in Twain and Onslaught at all.

So, in conclusion it is fair to say that for a longer time now, the Slayer got his damage output potential reduced bit by bit, to a point where the scale between his Output and the Price he pays for it by lowering his own survivability was tipped to hard onto the side of payment. In fact, it was tipped so hard that he now falls behind other classes that not even have to deal with such a scale mechanic.
Something needs to be done SOON. Either buff the output or LOWER the self debuff!

[Dackjanielz]

Yep.
Basically hoping for the next patch to do something but who knows.

Personally i hate the new rampage, i much preferred it when it got rid of my rage so i could stay alive longer than 2s, should of just made it single target only rather than the changes it got i think.

Because that's basically been its problem all along is because its spammed in AOE which made it OP.

[Fey]

As a destro main I love seeing double slayer premades weekend after weekend during the event scenario. I know it's a guaranteed win because they're so bad you see.

[Rotgut]

Slayers are a great in SCs and bad in oRvR because they take time to pop off. Yeah their dmg got gutted with Rampage nerf, proc nerf, Accuracy being bugged, ID being bugged and Retribution nerf - the only "buff" being the current unpredictability of Rampage compared to Old Rampage but that only matters in competitive SCs - but they can still stack IDs with Short Temper, if on Red, which is the only reason they ever were worth anything.

Two IDs, Retri/Shatter Limbs/Flurry (no Accuracy so only 3 targets)/Spine Crusher, a ticking Onslaught, Auto Attack, Jagged Edge and the two proc triggering spells in the combo, and thats a lot of instances of damage blowing up at the same time. You can reliably do that in SCs.

But in oRvR that doesn't matter, it takes too long and TTK is too low nowadays.

In a blobby meta, classes that can dish out a lot of dmg on contact will outperform. Atm those are only WLs, Choppas, BWs and Sorcs. We can change oRvR to incentivize spreading, which i think most players agree would be the best thing to ever happen to this game and it would enable a lot more classes and specs along with the Slayer, or maybe try going back to 9 targets on most AoE spells (tho i wasn't around when that was a thing so i don't know why it got changed).

[Moonbiter]

The detaunt of Distracting roar got changed recently to no longer drop rage while using the tactic to not loose rage on Exhaustive Blows. That change narrows down the variety of playable builds for the Slayer, since now it is no longer viable to use Power Trough in any Aoe Build.
...

So, in conclusion it is fair to say that for a longer time now, the Slayer got his damage output potential reduced bit by bit, to a point where the scale between his Output and the Price he pays for it by lowering his own survivability was tipped to hard onto the side of payment. In fact, it was tipped so hard that he now falls behind other classes that not even have to deal with such a scale mechanic.
Something needs to be done SOON. Either buff the output or LOWER the self debuff!

Me agree wiv dat.
Detaunt changes just killed whole bunch of builds.

[bw10]

Slayers are a great in SCs and bad in oRvR because they take time to pop off. Yeah their dmg got gutted with Rampage nerf, proc nerf, Accuracy being bugged, ID being bugged and Retribution nerf - the only "buff" being the current unpredictability of Rampage compared to Old Rampage but that only matters in competitive SCs - but they can still stack IDs with Short Temper, if on Red, which is the only reason they ever were worth anything.

Two IDs, Retri/Shatter Limbs/Flurry (no Accuracy so only 3 targets)/Spine Crusher, a ticking Onslaught, Auto Attack, Jagged Edge and the two proc triggering spells in the combo, and thats a lot of instances of damage blowing up at the same time. You can reliably do that in SCs.

But in oRvR that doesn't matter, it takes too long and TTK is too low nowadays.

In a blobby meta, classes that can dish out a lot of dmg on contact will outperform. Atm those are only WLs, Choppas, BWs and Sorcs. We can change oRvR to incentivize spreading, which i think most players agree would be the best thing to ever happen to this game and it would enable a lot more classes and specs along with the Slayer, or maybe try going back to 9 targets on most AoE spells (tho i wasn't around when that was a thing so i don't know why it got changed).

so choppas do a lot of damage on contact but slayers dont? enlight me how. especially when FS is just worse ID, and gtdc ticks every two seconds and prevens any other action being taken

[Rotgut]

so choppas do a lot of damage on contact but slayers dont? enlight me how. especially when FS is just worse ID, and gtdc ticks every two seconds and prevens any other action being taken

Of course, no problem dude.

What both classes can do is stack multiple sources of dmg to tick at the same time. Both can have an AoE DoT (Onslaught/Yer All Bleeding Now), Jagged Edge, ID/FS, and a 2nd spell ticking at the same time. Lets look at base tooltip damage because a lot of times people just assume that because a Spell is similar, they do the same damage.

Onslaught and Yer All Bleeding Now are the same.

ID explodes for 121 dmg and FS "explodes" for 171 dmg, so FS on its own is 1.4 IDs. The difference is actually a bit higher because they both trigger Tactics, but Slayers can't afford to run two "extra dmg" tactics that Choppas can.

2nd instant dmg spell varies a bit. Retribution/Bring It On is the same. Their 360º AoE dmg spell (that doesn't reset Rage, which is a bigger issue to Slayers atm) are Shatter Limbs and GTDC, where ST does 105 dmg once and GTDC does 207 dmg every 2seconds for 6 seconds.

And finally, Tactics. Jagged Edge is the same. Slayers have to use Short Temper to be able to pull off their combo, Choppas can choose between Flanking or Stab You Gooder to complement JE, and neither should use Accuracy/Extra Choppin' cuz its bugged rn. So thats a Dmg Cost Slayers have to pay that Choppas don't.


So a Choppa can run in and AoE DoT, FS, GTDC and he'll achieve the most DPS the class can do. He can then follow up with Bring It On (FS won't be exploding tho) for continuous high damage, or just use it to replace GTDC if it gets interrupted. They can do that on contact. If everything goes perfectly he will then have 18seconds of lower DPS while FS is on CD.

Slayers can only ID Spam if on Red, which takes 15 seconds to get to. He then have to apply two IDs and do a Shatter Limbs to get one instance of similar dmg that a Choppa can do with FS + GTDC for 6s (FS blows on usage then three more times, lining up with GTDC for its full duration), back to two IDs, Retri Channel, back to two IDs, a single target dmg spell now cuz all your stuff is on CD, two IDs, re-apply AoE DoT, two IDs, and so on.

If you make a DPS graph, Choppas will get to their max 4.5sec after using their first spell and will stay there for 6 seconds, goes down when FS stops blowing but is sustained high while Bring It On is channeling, then go down further when he is stuck doing single target dmg or re-applying the AoE DoT for 18 seconds, assuming nothing got interrupted, then comes back up to their max with FS coming out of CD.

Slayer's DPS graph look different. 15 seconds of low dmg till Red, 18 seconds till they can have two IDs + ST/Retri to reach their max, where it wobles on the high end being sustained by 2 IDs, and varying with Shatter Limb/Retri CD while they are forced to single target dmg when those two are on cooldown. This works great in small scale, where its easier to stay on Red - which is a 15 second reset on their dmg if they are forced to Detaunt - and where single target dmg matters more. Its garbage for oRvR where fights are essentially over before you can even reach Red most of the time.