Return of Reckoning

I think we have to have some historical perspective here. There are general and specific problems with the current iteration of the class's abilities and stances, widely and repeatedly pointed out by SW mains both ingame and in this forum, and also the common perception among the playerbase that SW is one of the (if not the most) underperforming classes in the entire game. But, those of us who have been around for a long time now, since live, and have had SWs rr70+, know that the class was in an even worse shape before, for many years, and the devs have done a great job of improving the state of SW. Maybe we don't agree with all the changes, but it was tall orders to try and make the jack of all trades and master of none viable but not overturned.

SOME GENERAL ISSUES:

1- Making BHA and SFA AoE but reducing range to 65ft has condemned the SW to be extremely vulnerable to pulls and dmg both from melee and range. With low wounds, high % to be crit if you take the Bullseye tactic to desperately try not be too far behind the firepower of other range AoE classes, toughness next to zero, cloth armor, low resists, tanks being in the frontline bestowing their guard on slayers (as they should), that's not viable. Other range classes can apply their AoE from 80ft or increase their range from base 65ft.

SUGGESTED SOLUTION: Split Arrows reduces range to 80ft, not 65ft. other AoE abilities also 80ft.

2-Skirmish ST viability was sorely diminished by SS being stuck at low range and not being able to cast Eye Shot on the move. Also, SS is most of the time unavailable to Scout snipers because of reduced range.

SUGGESTED SOLUTION: SS 100 ft range just like BHA or SFA, and Eye Shot castable on the move WHEN IN SKIRMISH STANCE. Also, to be fair, Takedown only castable on the move in skirmish, not in Scout stance.

3- Assault spec is grieviously AP starved, and needs many tactics to perform at a good enough level, AP tactic taking up a vital tactic slot and not being entirely the solution.

SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS:
-Lower AP cost of some assault skills
-Make Sweeping Slash return a small amount of AP to the SW for every enemy hit, similar to WP/DoK AoE cleave returning RF/SE. In this way this useless ability can become useful without being OP.

4- Assault spec is especially vulnerable to CC as a melee character without snare/root removal.

SUGGESTED SOLUTION. Add a root break feature to some Assault only skill.

SOME SPECIFIC ISSUES:

- Even with the tactic, Brutal Assault is like a very very poor man's Torment/AW, and with other tactics being even more needed, usually SW has to go without the ignore armor quality of Brutal Assault. Make it ignore armor by default and you can save a tactic slot.

-Hunter's fervor needs to be reworked into something more useful, it is very underwhelming and the cd is overlong. Make the effect last for 20 secs instead of 9secs or maybe turn it into the SW’s ONLY self heal or absorb or some kind of panic button that isn't based on avoidance (like Shadowstep) but on mitigation.

ALTERNATIVE SUGGESTIONS FOR SWEEPING SLASH

Another alternative way to make the ability useful is to make it provide a dmg reduction effect similar to the one that is achieved with SM's Dragon Talon with the Raking talons tactic.

Yet another one would be to make Sweeping Slash an armor debuff similar to the Zealot tactic, which would make aSW more desirable in group or even warbands and would make up for Acid Arrow being not worth using with no points spent in scout and having to stop to cast for assault SWs.

FINALLY, SHADOWSTEP

Shadowstep is great for self defense, but not very good for catching a fast running enemy, and you can't make use of the superspeed of the melee channel when because of lag or server delay or whatever you can't connect with them in the first place due to Shadostep leaving you where the enemy was, not where he is. That can't be fixed, I think, but you can add an element of snare like SM's morale 1 jump on landing, or a brief speed buff like for WL's pounce after using it.

One last consideration, SHADOWSTEP was a great step in the right direction, of making Shadow warriors worthy of the shadow in their name, but to make it real, you need to add something to the skill: Just like with WE/WH speed disappear, enemies will lose their target when SW goes into Shadowstep.

I mostly agree with all your suggestions here, looks like not overtuning SW but somehow making the class more viable in various builds.

The access to 100 ft Shadow Sting is vital for viability of scout spec (otherwise you dont have enough ranged burst to reliably kill even a squishy target), while 65ft range is greatly gimping aoe spec.

Sweeping slash indeed need some utility, in current state the skill could just be removed entirely, as 20s cd is a very bad joke, without any buff/debuff component it's a wasted GCD.

Hunter's fervor got low self-utility as it only regains 25 AP for ourself, but 45 AP to party is about one or two more skills and can be helpful some times. Not much better than slayer's AP reduction tho. Still a 60s cd is way too much, and the skill utility is most of the time overshadowed by KotBS aura or healers AP tactic. Still not a good use of GCD.
This skill could be free, as it should be its initial purpose (AP gain), there is already too much skills or tactics only working for either self OR group ; having one AP free skill would not be a big deal, and a far better use of a GCD for everyone.

Brutal assault is mostly fine, as it's probably the highest base damaging skill of any mdps (even WH's Repel Blasphemy is not hitting over 700).
But I agree considering the 5s cd + conditional, it could use a bit more kisscool effect.

Shadowstep could indeed use a "shadowing" effect and/or a small speed buff, especially since assault stance got no access to a snare.
Still, I find Shadowstep the key-skill of assault spec ; it allows greater mobility, very good defense buff, and make aSW a very evasive class to deal with, being able to teleport every 20s to backline/frontline as needed to pressure healers or quickly help ours against mdps, or just disrupt and scare rdps while being very resilient to magic.

I dont feel my aSW too sensitive to snares, as we still get M1 (mandatory) to cleanse everything, allowing healers to be free for heal instead of struggling against dozens of DoTs and debuffs, good mobility (shadowstep, whirling pin) and multiple snares if needed (takedown, whirling pin, ambush) to kite a bit more.

All on all, I find the aSW gameplay ultra satisfiying, even compared to Slayer or WH, since I find he got both good defenses (4k armor, shadowstep bonus), good dps (twice of skirmish mode), and good mobility (jump, backdash, snares) allowing to move like no other mdps can in the melee.
ALl of that without feeling papermade as others (who need constant heal and guard), and still being capable of packing a punch from 65+ft away when needed.

Still, skirmish feels a bit lacking, both range and punch, even with added crit damage (wich is nice), since you dont have same resilience and dps.