Rift Barrier: Go Get Some!

[Brooks]

Without coming off as pompus and "leet," I would like to enlighten the people who are downplay an ability thats is very useful and has a very distinct situational-purpose.

Rift Barrier adds an absorption shield that last 15 seconds after you use ANY plane shift ability, while Rift Guard adds an absorption through combo points.

So instead of alway having to use combo point to activate Rift Guard, having Rift Barrier allows you to use Shadow Blitz and Shadow Stalk to add a shield without doing anything extra. It like getting and extra buffalo wing from *insert your favorite wing place here*.

Furthermore, Riftstalkers should being using Shadow Blitz and Shadow Stalk/Rift Disturbance throughout the fight to distribute threat and AOE damage anyways.

In the end, like Rift Guard, Rift Barrier help mitigates damage.......you're a tank.....go get some! Who knows, it may save your butt more times than not

[Carthoris]

Except it costs 4 valuable talent points that only have an effect when you *don't* have Rift Guard up. It's strictly inferior all the time, and since you can easily just pull with cadence to throw up an early Rift Guard, then use blitz/disturbance, I'm not surprised people want to skip it. The shield will not apply if RG is active, even if it has 1 second and 1 point of absorption left.

It would be a whole lot better if it could apply on top of RG, and just add a little to the shield pool, or if there was any sort of synergy between the two skills at all.

[Rhyveth]

Sorry, but until I stop falling through the world after shifting rift barrier is pretty much useless to me. I do agree with your general statement, but right now I can't justify the risk to a group I am tanking for.

If shifting is fixed then rift barrier will be worth it.

(Honestly I fall through the world every time I shift in Scarwood and Scarlet Gorge. Odd as in Beta 5 I never fell through the world and now I can't use my shifts for fear of visiting the nearest respawn point.)

[JonathanTheBlack]

Except it costs 4 valuable talent points that only have an effect when you *don't* have Rift Guard up. It's strictly inferior all the time, and since you can easily just pull with cadence to throw up an early Rift Guard, then use blitz/disturbance, I'm not surprised people want to skip it. The shield will not apply if RG is active, even if it has 1 second and 1 point of absorption left.

It would be a whole lot better if it could apply on top of RG, and just add a little to the shield pool, or if there was any sort of synergy between the two skills at all.

It is not inferior. The planar shift barrier is worthwhile because it keeps you alive while you build up combo points on the pull to use Rift Guard.

[Smags]

(Honestly I fall through the world every time I shift in Scarwood and Scarlet Gorge. Odd as in Beta 5 I never fell through the world and now I can't use my shifts for fear of visiting the nearest respawn point.)

I actually changed roles out of main Riftstalker because I just got so frustrated with falling through the world. I've tanked a couple times by swapping back to it, and each time I use a shift I cross my fingers and pray I don't vanish on my group.

TRION has been really, really slow to respond to issues like this. Not liking the support they're providing so far, sad to say.

[Absalon]

Except it costs 4 valuable talent points that only have an effect when you *don't* have Rift Guard up. It's strictly inferior all the time, and since you can easily just pull with cadence to throw up an early Rift Guard, then use blitz/disturbance, I'm not surprised people want to skip it. The shield will not apply if RG is active, even if it has 1 second and 1 point of absorption left.

It would be a whole lot better if it could apply on top of RG, and just add a little to the shield pool, or if there was any sort of synergy between the two skills at all.

Yup, and on top of that Rift Guard scales (with Imp Rift Guard) as you put more points into Riftstalker. I use Rift Guard for my tanking role and Rift Barrier for PvP.

[Brooks]

Except it costs 4 valuable talent points that only have an effect when you *don't* have Rift Guard up. It's strictly inferior all the time, and since you can easily just pull with cadence to throw up an early Rift Guard, then use blitz/disturbance, I'm not surprised people want to skip it. The shield will not apply if RG is active, even if it has 1 second and 1 point of absorption left.

It would be a whole lot better if it could apply on top of RG, and just add a little to the shield pool, or if there was any sort of synergy between the two skills at all.

4 valuable points? I'm not saying it's the first thing you need to buy when its available, but why would you skip it if you have more than enough point?

And Rift Barrier is INFERIOR ALL THE TIME! So your saying the ability has absolutely no purpose, pretty much? That's a big statement, seeing how the game has JUST been released and we have no clue about end game content or mechanics yet.

It's clear it doesn't fit you rotation or play style, but don't say that it's inferior and disregard it because of that.

[Absalon]

It is not inferior. The planar shift barrier is worthwhile because it keeps you alive while you build up combo points on the pull to use Rift Guard.

You can use Cadence to build points for Rift Guard (assuming you take Bard as one of your other souls). On melee mobs, you'll get 3 combo points before they get to you. Or you can phase to the mob and put up a 1 point Rift Guard, and then build points for Guarded Steel or a better Rift Guard. A 1 point Rift Guard is more effective than Rift Barrier.

It isn't worth 4 points in Rift Barrier for 1 extra second of protection after phasing.

[popsicledeath]

So instead of alway having to use combo point to activate Rift Guard, having Rift Barrier allows you to use Shadow Blitz and Shadow Stalk to add a shield without doing anything extra. It like getting and extra buffalo wing from *insert your favorite wing place here*.

I wouldn't say spending 4 soul points is "without doing anything extra."

It's more like getting "extra" buffalo wings when you pay $1 for them individually instead of just getting 6 for $4 in a full order.

Except in the case of Rift Barrier, you're paying $4 for 1 wing.

[Punisheer]

lol pull with cadence

Anyway both skills are important and a good tank know how to use both. Also riftstalkers get more endurance bonus from improved guadian phase with more points spent in the soul.

[Carthoris]

4 valuable points? I'm not saying it's the first thing you need to buy when its available, but why would you skip it if you have more than enough point?

And Rift Barrier is INFERIOR ALL THE TIME! So your saying the ability has absolutely no purpose, pretty much? That's a big statement, seeing how the game has JUST been released and we have no clue about end game content or mechanics yet.

It's clear it doesn't fit you rotation or play style, but don't say that it's inferior and disregard it because of that.

I just tried to make a spec, and I didn't have 4 throwaway points to put into a skill that doesn't help me outside of the first 5 seconds of a fight - the most I had was 1.

It is always inferior because there is never a time that Rift Barrier will absorb MORE than Rift Guard, unless you explicitly skip Rift Guard. That's what I mean by "inferior" - it is never a more powerful skill. I never said it had no purpose, I said it wasn't ever the better of the two skills, which is always true. I personally don't think it's worth spending the points on.

I *want* RB to be worth the points, I think it's a great mechanic, but right now it's a niche skill at best. Pulling faster so the previous fight's RG is up, or pulling with Cadence to throw up a quick RG (RG can be cast at range, and a 3 pt RG > RB), makes the talent points 100% wasted AND makes you a more effective tank.

[popsicledeath]

I actually changed roles out of main Riftstalker because I just got so frustrated with falling through the world. I've tanked a couple times by swapping back to it, and each time I use a shift I cross my fingers and pray I don't vanish on my group.

TRION has been really, really slow to respond to issues like this. Not liking the support they're providing so far, sad to say.

I've been disappointed too. They seem to respond really fast to the high-profile issues, but absolute game-breaking bugs like this seem to get ignored just because it's not high profile enough. Just like how many 'beta' tests were re-named awkwardly and in the end just ended up being marketting ploys (imo), so too many bug fixes seem to be more about the 'look how fast we respond' and I actually haven't been impressed with their ability to fix massive bugs in general, just the ones that will make them look the best.

See also: if you died at the end of a warfront, but haven't hit respawn, you'll STILL end up back in the open world with no health. This has been a bug for a very long time, and is a pretty critical one, but happens relatively rarely and you don't see people ranting on the forums about it, so seems to have been ignored.

But yeah, there are a lot of bugs I've reported every phase of beta and now in head start, that aren't high profile on the forums, but when the DO happen are game breaking or have severe consequences, that continue to go unfixed.

Riftstalker being the most severe.

Now, were there a similar bug with Rangers or Bards, there would be forum posts 100 pages long and it would be fixed ASAP to the cheering multitude who proclaim Trion are fixing every severe bug with such speed, which isn't the case, obviously.

I guess the good news is shifting as a RS is a soul-defining ability, and I've learned it's pretty much unnecessary to a tanking build... so yay, soul-defining ability useless? :/

[Brooks]

I wouldn't say spending 4 soul points is "without doing anything extra."

It's more like getting "extra" buffalo wings when you pay $1 for them individually instead of just getting 6 for $4 in a full order.

Except in the case of Rift Barrier, you're paying $4 for 1 wing.

LOL

I like how you continued with the "buffalo wing" analogy.

I'm using "without doing anything extra" loosely. I have more than enough points to pick up EVERY single tank-related spell the RS tree. But then again, I don't put points into DPS talents. AT ALL! So that may explain why I'm so frugal with my points.

[Carthoris]

I actually changed roles out of main Riftstalker because I just got so frustrated with falling through the world. I've tanked a couple times by swapping back to it, and each time I use a shift I cross my fingers and pray I don't vanish on my group.

TRION has been really, really slow to respond to issues like this. Not liking the support they're providing so far, sad to say.

Jump right before you phase-shift and you won't fall through the world. Works for me.

[popsicledeath]

And Rift Barrier is INFERIOR ALL THE TIME! So your saying the ability has absolutely no purpose, pretty much? That's a big statement, seeing how the game has JUST been released and we have no clue about end game content or mechanics yet.

Look, you dun goofed and people pointed out flaws in your brilliant plan. It's okay, you can just look at things how they are, no need to go to the "we don't know how things will be in endgame" that is obviously more about saving face than discussing honestly.

I mean, we could go into every thread and dismiss people with such inane arguments. And just because something is good in a raid, doesn't mean it justifies it being bad anytime else.

Wait, I got it: omgz stopp QQing about falling through the world, the game JUST released and we DON'T know if this bug will persist in endgame content!!!!

There, did I do that right?