Spotlight on Skills #2
Originally Published by Sausaletus Rex
Every so often this column will shine the spotlight on a particular skill or set of skills for an in-depth analysis of just what that skill can do for you and the best ways to make it work. Keep in mind that Guild Wars is still under development and the information in this column is subject to swift and drastic change.
This time we again shine the spotlight on a Warrior elite. This time, however, it's a bit different as this elite offers an instant recharge ability that few other skills can match. Behold :
“If you have a sword equipped, all of your attack skills become recharged. You gain 5 Energy for each skill recharged by Flourish."
Flourish, a skill from the Warrior profession, is a generic “skill”, the miscellaneous catch-all category for skill which don’t go elsewhere. Although it has no variables tied to any attribute it does require a sword in order to use. When used, your character will wave their sword, any attack skill that’s recharging instantly becomes ready to be used again, and you’ll gain energy for every skill that Flourish so recharges.
Only certain skills will be charged by Flourish, however. Only those with a recharge timer. Skills that recharge instantly or are already recharged won’t care about all your sword waving. Those skills that are already capable of being used won’t uncharge then recharge giving you that bonus energy it’s only those skills that are still cooling off. Also, adrenal skills aren’t affected by Flourish because they, too, lack recharge timers. Skills that require adrenal strikes are charged not over time but by attacking an opponent. Flourish doesn’t act as a supercharger to your adrenal gain it does as much for an uncharged adrenal skill as it does to an already recharged skill. Furthermore, Flourish will only recharge those skills that are classified as “attack skills” – skills that use your character’s weapon in order to make an improved attack upon a target. Recharging spells, shouts, stances, signets, and anything else you’d care to name aren’t affected by Flourish only attack skills. The only skills on your bar that Flourish cares about are those attack skills that cost energy not adrenaline and have been used or are otherwise recharging. Fortunately, the Warrior skill line is full of such attack skills. But Flourish will work on the attack skills of other professions as well.
What Flourish will do, effectively, is to take that attack skill you’ve just used, make it instantly reusable, and give you the energy you’d need to use it again. Flourish itself has a recharge time so it’s not something you can do each and every time you use, say, Power Attack, it’s limited to the recycle time on Flourish itself. Likewise, Flourish has a discrete casting time, like any skill with anything but an instant activation time, so when using it you’re taking some time away from chaining together your attack skills. Still, it lets you increase the amount you can use your attack skills.
However, Flourish works best, like any skill which affects recharge timers, when it’s working on skills that have especially long recharge times. Using Flourish to recharge the skill that has 1 second left to recharge isn’t as much an advantage as using it on the skill that has 60 seconds to go. Since Flourish will recharge any number of skills on your bar that are still cooling down it’s also best when you have not just one but several skills to recharge. The more skills you recharge at once with Flourish the more energy you’ll get and the more skills you’ll be able to use once again.
But most Warrior attacks have low recharge times and still more have adrenal charge times. And that’s before even considering what those skills actually do. Finding several attack skills which are energy-based, have lengthy recharge times, and actually have an effect that your character would like to have in order to get the most from Flourish can be difficult. You’ll also want to avoid having too many of such attack skills because recharging more skills and, thus, gaining more energy, beyond your ability to use them is counter-productive. You don’t want to recharge seven attack skills, assuming you could get seven skills to be recharging all at once, on a Warrior’s energy pool, for example, because in such a case you’ll have eight skills to reuse but only twenty energy with which to use them and in the best case scenario - that you’re used Flourish at the bare minimum of five energy – you’ll have gained forty energy and thrown away fifteen of it. What’s best, then, is to have a good number of skills to recharge but no more than your energy pool could bear to use.
Taking advantage of Flourish in such a manner means that you’re going to have to pay close attention to the casting and recharging of all your skills to be careful that your Flourish will be used before they recharge on their own and you miss out on the Flourish boost. Flourish itself takes time to cast and you don’t want the skills you’re trying to recharge to recharge while you’re in the middle of waving your sword around. Therefore, it’s best to time your skills so that the skills that will take the longest to recharge are the ones you’ll cast first. If you have skills that take 10 seconds, 8 second, 6 seconds, and 5 seconds to recharge respectively and each will take just over a second to activate, including Flourish, then you don’t want to cast that 5 second recharge skill first. You want all of them as far from recharging as possible and that takes a bit of finesse. Still, done correctly and with the proper care and sense of timing it can be of good advantage to your character.
Using Flourish only requires you to have a little energy and to be holding a sword at the time you activate the skill. This means that swapping a weapon to a sword in order to use Flourish is certainly possible. And since Flourish is a skill unlinked to any weapon attribute you can certainly use it even though you have no attribute points put into that sword. All you’d need to do is to carry around a starting sword in your inventory to switch to when you need to recharge your attack skills. Since Flourish has an appreciable casting time it can be interrupted. Not, perhaps, by spell interrupts but by skills which will interrupt any action, such as Distracting Blow. As it also needs a bit of energy for casting, too, any technique that denies your character their energy can also hamper your ability to cast Flourish – although proper use of Flourish to manage your energy can be an effective counter to such schemes in its own right. Otherwise, it’s difficult for an opponent to counter-act your ability to recharge your attack skills.
Flourish, then, is an extremely powerful elite, in the right hands. It’s got a lot of strategic and tactical uses that open up possibilities for your character that wouldn’t be there without Flourish. If your character can place themself in a situation where either recharging their attacks or gaining energy for recharging their attacks is a good thing, then Flourish will earn its place on your skill bar. The main difficulty, though, is to put your character in those situations in the first place, so it’s not a skill that any build can easily work in. Those who can will be happy with it. Those who can’t are better off looking for something else.
Below you’ll find a list of where to find Flourish as well as some builds which make use of it.
This time we again shine the spotlight on a Warrior elite. This time, however, it's a bit different as this elite offers an instant recharge ability that few other skills can match. Behold :
Flourish
“If you have a sword equipped, all of your attack skills become recharged. You gain 5 Energy for each skill recharged by Flourish."
Flourish, a skill from the Warrior profession, is a generic “skill”, the miscellaneous catch-all category for skill which don’t go elsewhere. Although it has no variables tied to any attribute it does require a sword in order to use. When used, your character will wave their sword, any attack skill that’s recharging instantly becomes ready to be used again, and you’ll gain energy for every skill that Flourish so recharges.
Only certain skills will be charged by Flourish, however. Only those with a recharge timer. Skills that recharge instantly or are already recharged won’t care about all your sword waving. Those skills that are already capable of being used won’t uncharge then recharge giving you that bonus energy it’s only those skills that are still cooling off. Also, adrenal skills aren’t affected by Flourish because they, too, lack recharge timers. Skills that require adrenal strikes are charged not over time but by attacking an opponent. Flourish doesn’t act as a supercharger to your adrenal gain it does as much for an uncharged adrenal skill as it does to an already recharged skill. Furthermore, Flourish will only recharge those skills that are classified as “attack skills” – skills that use your character’s weapon in order to make an improved attack upon a target. Recharging spells, shouts, stances, signets, and anything else you’d care to name aren’t affected by Flourish only attack skills. The only skills on your bar that Flourish cares about are those attack skills that cost energy not adrenaline and have been used or are otherwise recharging. Fortunately, the Warrior skill line is full of such attack skills. But Flourish will work on the attack skills of other professions as well.
What Flourish will do, effectively, is to take that attack skill you’ve just used, make it instantly reusable, and give you the energy you’d need to use it again. Flourish itself has a recharge time so it’s not something you can do each and every time you use, say, Power Attack, it’s limited to the recycle time on Flourish itself. Likewise, Flourish has a discrete casting time, like any skill with anything but an instant activation time, so when using it you’re taking some time away from chaining together your attack skills. Still, it lets you increase the amount you can use your attack skills.
However, Flourish works best, like any skill which affects recharge timers, when it’s working on skills that have especially long recharge times. Using Flourish to recharge the skill that has 1 second left to recharge isn’t as much an advantage as using it on the skill that has 60 seconds to go. Since Flourish will recharge any number of skills on your bar that are still cooling down it’s also best when you have not just one but several skills to recharge. The more skills you recharge at once with Flourish the more energy you’ll get and the more skills you’ll be able to use once again.
But most Warrior attacks have low recharge times and still more have adrenal charge times. And that’s before even considering what those skills actually do. Finding several attack skills which are energy-based, have lengthy recharge times, and actually have an effect that your character would like to have in order to get the most from Flourish can be difficult. You’ll also want to avoid having too many of such attack skills because recharging more skills and, thus, gaining more energy, beyond your ability to use them is counter-productive. You don’t want to recharge seven attack skills, assuming you could get seven skills to be recharging all at once, on a Warrior’s energy pool, for example, because in such a case you’ll have eight skills to reuse but only twenty energy with which to use them and in the best case scenario - that you’re used Flourish at the bare minimum of five energy – you’ll have gained forty energy and thrown away fifteen of it. What’s best, then, is to have a good number of skills to recharge but no more than your energy pool could bear to use.
Taking advantage of Flourish in such a manner means that you’re going to have to pay close attention to the casting and recharging of all your skills to be careful that your Flourish will be used before they recharge on their own and you miss out on the Flourish boost. Flourish itself takes time to cast and you don’t want the skills you’re trying to recharge to recharge while you’re in the middle of waving your sword around. Therefore, it’s best to time your skills so that the skills that will take the longest to recharge are the ones you’ll cast first. If you have skills that take 10 seconds, 8 second, 6 seconds, and 5 seconds to recharge respectively and each will take just over a second to activate, including Flourish, then you don’t want to cast that 5 second recharge skill first. You want all of them as far from recharging as possible and that takes a bit of finesse. Still, done correctly and with the proper care and sense of timing it can be of good advantage to your character.
Using Flourish only requires you to have a little energy and to be holding a sword at the time you activate the skill. This means that swapping a weapon to a sword in order to use Flourish is certainly possible. And since Flourish is a skill unlinked to any weapon attribute you can certainly use it even though you have no attribute points put into that sword. All you’d need to do is to carry around a starting sword in your inventory to switch to when you need to recharge your attack skills. Since Flourish has an appreciable casting time it can be interrupted. Not, perhaps, by spell interrupts but by skills which will interrupt any action, such as Distracting Blow. As it also needs a bit of energy for casting, too, any technique that denies your character their energy can also hamper your ability to cast Flourish – although proper use of Flourish to manage your energy can be an effective counter to such schemes in its own right. Otherwise, it’s difficult for an opponent to counter-act your ability to recharge your attack skills.
Flourish, then, is an extremely powerful elite, in the right hands. It’s got a lot of strategic and tactical uses that open up possibilities for your character that wouldn’t be there without Flourish. If your character can place themself in a situation where either recharging their attacks or gaining energy for recharging their attacks is a good thing, then Flourish will earn its place on your skill bar. The main difficulty, though, is to put your character in those situations in the first place, so it’s not a skill that any build can easily work in. Those who can will be happy with it. Those who can’t are better off looking for something else.
Below you’ll find a list of where to find Flourish as well as some builds which make use of it.
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