Am I the only one who dislikes the GNB changes?

The new GCD combo is cool and all but once you get it, it fundamentally changes your entire opener and rotation, in what is in my opinion a bad way.
GNB has always been kind of a busy tank job, with a number of ogcds and the worry of fitting your big damage cooldowns all into your no mercy window
With the Reign of Beasts combo, this now makes the no mercy window even tighter to the point where it's honestly screwing with my enjoyment of the game
The new standard GNB opener fits 9 GCDs into your no mercy window, but in order to manage this you need to pop no mercy at the very end of your gcd, without clipping, in order to leave enough time to fit the 9th gcd in, and this also requires enough skill speed for a 2.4-2.45s GCD.
Moving along, because Bloodfest now procs reign of beasts, you can no longer just pop bloodfest for cartridges on cd anymore, but you have to make sure you use it for your no mercy window every time, which is every other no mercy.
All of this makes the job feel much busier, much more stressful. It feels like I have no wiggle room.
I think a good change for this would be instead of reign of beasts replacing the bloodfest button when used, it instead replaces burst strike, and acts as a burst strike replacer, using a cartridge and all. Adjust potencies as needed for this change.
Like this, you wouldn't have to worry about fitting an actual normal burst strike into your no mercy window, and can still just do the ol tried and true gnashing fang > bloodfest > double down > burst strike/reign of beasts.

Late weave no mercy has literally always been a thing unless you're playing slowbreaker, which you'll be able to do as soon as we have gear to support it - in which case you won't need to late weave NM any more.

You've been supposed to use bloodfest during no mercy since it was changed to a 2 minute cooldown during Endwalker. This isn't a Dawntrail change.

The GNB changes are objectively good and address the main issue that the job had in Ew, which was cart economy. Making the lionheart combo consume carts would literally just undo all of the progress.

You never had wiggle room. NM, gnashing fang, double down and your oGCDs MUST be put on cooldown as soon as they're available - always. That's just how the job works and has been for years at this point.

i completely agree with OP. bloodfest used to be a button that i didn't feel the need to press off cooldown, just something i had whenever i needed more carts. now it's this awkward button that fundamentally reworks my entire burst, making half my gnashing fang hit out of no mercy and throwing it out of sync with blasting zone, leading to the entire job feeling less fun to play.

Outside of Trajectory I don't mind what GNB got.

Gnb is the only tank that's still worth playing, but not really by much.
But that's more of a Warrior being overpowered problem.

I always thought Bloodfest was also used on cooldown at level 90?

Whenever Bloodfest CD was under 60 seconds meant you could Burst Strike as much as you want, until it perfectly lined up with Gnashing Fang again in the reopener at 2mins, was that not optimal?

GNB has been my main since late ShB and I'm very happy with the changes.

You press Bloodfest exactly like before, spend your 3 ammos then press Bloodfest during your No Mercy for maximum burst.
The difference is that you use Lion heart combo instead of Burst strike.
You're now also free to use Sonic Break whenever you want in your burst window without delaying it.
The interesting part is the ammo management completely changed and the filler window now has 2~3 extra cartridges.

On the surface, barely anything changed from EW GNB to DT GNB, you don't have Rough Divide anymore and the 3 burst strikes in other NM are replaced with the Lion heart combo.
The few downsides I see are the dash animation, dash can't be used on allies, a third charge would be welcome and big potencies can go wild with crit/dh rng.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

You press Bloodfest exactly like before, spend your 3 ammos then press Bloodfest during your No Mercy for maximum burst.
The difference is that you use Lion heart combo instead of Burst strike.

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This change is good, though I do wish I could use the Lion Heart combo outside of Bloodfest AND No Mercy, but that's just me not liking the overreliance of 1-2 minute burst META... Maybe if the devs reduced the cost of Double Down to 1 cartridge and making it a 30 second cooldown, while adding a 1 cartridge cost to Lion Heart combo with 30-60 cooldown, would it feel a lot better.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

You're now also free to use Sonic Break whenever you want in your burst window without delaying it.
The interesting part is the ammo management completely changed and the filler window now has 2~3 extra cartridges.

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You could already do that BEFORE Sonic Break got locked behind No Mercy, and this the one change I don't like as a 30 second cooldown reduction on Sonic Break makes more sense at this point... with Bow Shock also getting a Duration increase to 30 seconds and a cooldown reduced to 30 seconds as well...

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

On the surface, barely anything changed from EW GNB to DT GNB, you don't have Rough Divide anymore and the 3 burst strikes in other NM are replaced with the Lion heart combo.
The few downsides I see are the dash animation, dash can't be used on allies, a third charge would be welcome and big potencies can go wild with crit/dh rng.

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This is true, though not a lot of players like the removal of Rough Divide, Plunge, and Spineshatter Dive(ESPECIALLY that last one because Dragoon is known for jumping A LOT and it makes NO SENSE to get rid of one of their jump skills) and it kinda shows... at least give Gunbreaker at least 4 new Continuation skills during burst.

Yeah thats a point I can get behind. I kinda wish the Lionheart combo had continuations in it. Even if the effective damage was the same as now.

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Originally Posted by DRKoftheAzure

You could already do that BEFORE Sonic Break got locked behind No Mercy, and this the one change I don't like as a 30 second cooldown reduction on Sonic Break makes more sense at this point... with Bow Shock also getting a Duration increase to 30 seconds and a cooldown reduced to 30 seconds as well...

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No, before you couldn't delay your Sonic break otherwise every next use would suffer from that delay.
In EX1 you can delay Sonic break use in a 60s window to have it on the add rather than the boss that is about to disappear.
Next NM window, you'll have Sonic break not delayed and able to use it earlier. And since SB has a 30s dot, it's great to be able to shift it around in your NM window.

Another example: On MCH you can also use Chainsaw on cooldown but hold Excavator to strike both the feather and the boss.
We have more flexibility on tools rather than blindly using them on cooldown or delaying them and having them permanently delayed.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Yeah thats a point I can get behind. I kinda wish the Lionheart combo had continuations in it. Even if the effective damage was the same as now.

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Lionheart exactly exist for the purpose of removing the oGCD bloat GNB suffered.
Remember that in EW, Gunbreaker 120s had 8 oGCDs spread over 8 GCDs during its NM window. When you needed to kitchen sink mitigation, it simply sucked.
In Ultimate it was especially tiring.

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Originally Posted by CoiledLamb

i completely agree with OP. bloodfest used to be a button that i didn't feel the need to press off cooldown, just something i had whenever i needed more carts. now it's this awkward button that fundamentally reworks my entire burst, making half my gnashing fang hit out of no mercy and throwing it out of sync with blasting zone, leading to the entire job feeling less fun to play.

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You were always supposed to use Bloodfest when it came off cooldown though. They even made it line up with the 2 minute buff window. Now it actually gives you a cool new combo rather than just extra burst strikes.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

No, before you couldn't delay your Sonic break otherwise every next use would suffer from that delay.
In EX1 you can delay Sonic break use in a 60s window to have it on the add rather than the boss that is about to disappear.
Next NM window, you'll have Sonic break not delayed and able to use it earlier. And since SB has a 30s dot, it's great to be able to shift it around in your NM window.

Another example: On MCH you can also use Chainsaw on cooldown but hold Excavator to strike both the feather and the boss.
We have more flexibility on tools rather than blindly using them on cooldown or delaying them and having them permanently delayed.

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This sounds like poor cooldown management to me. Alternatively this could also be yet ANOTHER issue with the 2 minute META.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

Lionheart exactly exist for the purpose of removing the oGCD bloat GNB suffered.
Remember that in EW, Gunbreaker 120s had 8 oGCDs spread over 8 GCDs during its NM window. When you needed to kitchen sink mitigation, it simply sucked.
In Ultimate it was especially tiring.

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I can see WHY you came to this conclusion, I just don't agree with, since Gunbreaker SHOULD be a high skill ceiling job when it comes to oGCDs such as more Continuation skills and 3 charges on ALL defensives, but again the 2 minute META kinda makes it hard for Gunbreaker to do that... Also kitchen sinking defensives feels more like poor game design as opposed to a tank buster followed by a raidwide AoE every 30 second intervals, which would make boss encounters feel more engaging as a result, unless they do kitchen sinking every 30 seconds in which case we end up right back where we started...

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Originally Posted by DRKoftheAzure

This sounds like poor cooldown management to me. Alternatively this could also be yet ANOTHER issue with the 2 minute META.

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That's not "poor cooldown management", that's smart cooldown management. In fact, there was no cooldown management for Sonic break, you just used it as soon as possible, it was simply braindead.
We have more leeway and we are more than just "press on cooldown without thinking". Now you can freely move them around to optimize damage without suffering for a permanent drift.

The point is: Unless before, you now have a choice to express your skill and maximize damage.
It's up to you to exploit that choice, maybe when the boss/add is about to die you want to move Sonic break ahead.

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Originally Posted by DRKoftheAzure

I can see WHY you came to this conclusion, I just don't agree with, since Gunbreaker SHOULD be a high skill ceiling job when it comes to oGCDs such as more Continuation skills and 3 charges on ALL defensives, but again the 2 minute META kinda makes it hard for Gunbreaker to do that... Also kitchen sinking defensives feels more like poor game design as opposed to a tank buster followed by a raidwide AoE every 30 second intervals, which would make boss encounters feel more engaging as a result, unless they do kitchen sinking every 30 seconds in which case we end up right back where we started...

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Kitchen sink was a poor design, I agree.
But they can simply have the boss auto dealing a lot of damage

But pressing continuation 3 times isn't skillfull, it's mere execution.
Gunbreaker never was on the high skill ceiling, it was always simple to play just very busy. Not difficult, just busy.
If you repeat that for long hours, it's just draining.

2 min meta has nothing to do with those topics, 2 min meta is boring but it's not responsible for every problems.

My reasoning is far more simple than any of that.

Continuation is sick as fuck and I want to press it more.

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Originally Posted by BigCheez

You've been supposed to use bloodfest during no mercy since it was changed to a 2 minute cooldown during Endwalker. This isn't a Dawntrail change.

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This was even the case before they changed it from 90s to 120s. Before you just ran into the situation where you had to use it outside of burst to make it line up with No Mercy every 3 minutes, but you still used it on cooldown.

It's fine. I hate the sonic break change though it really ruins doing DDs as GNB. I don't really have a strong opinion on lionheart, ever since the introduction of 3 gauges I think GNB burst window has become tight so I'm already over it. I think most people are more happy with its changes considering how DRK got fucked over and PLD has literally not changed at all. Same with WARs I get the impression that them and GNB don't have the opinion of "oh wow these changes are amazing!" It's more like "thank god CBU3 hasn't completely fucked us."

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Originally Posted by Ramiee

It's fine. I hate the sonic break change though it really ruins doing DDs as GNB. I don't really have a strong opinion on lionheart, ever since the introduction of 3 gauges I think GNB burst window has become tight so I'm already over it. I think most people are more happy with its changes considering how DRK got fucked over and PLD has literally not changed at all. Same with WARs I get the impression that them and GNB don't have the opinion of "oh wow these changes are amazing!" It's more like "thank god CBU3 hasn't completely fucked us."

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Pretty much. As a WAR main I wasn't expecting anything because that job was already a resident of stupid town in Endwalker.

So I was pleasantly surprised that the addition of Primal Wrath and Primal Ruination made you at least use one of your remaining two brain cells, even if it was by accident, because you can't completely freestyle your burst window anymore with 0 consequences, it put some rotational restrictions on a job that hasn't had any for the entire last expansion.

Is it some super innovative design? No, but it didn't make the job even dumber. And the new animation for Inner Chaos is very nice I guess, no more reused Inner Beast but with red sparkles.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

That's not "poor cooldown management", that's smart cooldown management. In fact, there was no cooldown management for Sonic break, you just used it as soon as possible, it was simply braindead.
We have more leeway and we are more than just "press on cooldown without thinking". Now you can freely move them around to optimize damage without suffering for a permanent drift.

The point is: Unless before, you now have a choice to express your skill and maximize damage.
It's up to you to exploit that choice, maybe when the boss/add is about to die you want to move Sonic break ahead.

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Were you using Sonic Break before Gnashing Fang or after? Because this COULD POTENTIALLY matter depending on the fight. And after the change to Sonic Break being locked behind No Mercy I still pressed it along with Bow Shock and Blasting Zone before Gnashing Fang, mostly because it looks the LEAST janky but still cool to see out of ALL the GCD and oGCD double weaving combinations, due to Double Down and Sonic Break being 60 second cooldowns and Gnashing Fang being 30 seconds.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

Kitchen sink was a poor design, I agree.
But they can simply have the boss auto dealing a lot of damage

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

2 min meta has nothing to do with those topics, 2 min meta is boring but it's not responsible for every problems.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

But pressing continuation 3 times isn't skillfull, it's mere execution.
Gunbreaker never was on the high skill ceiling, it was always simple to play just very busy. Not difficult, just busy.

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I had to take these 3 quotes out of the order that you put them to address something; ALL 3 of these COMBINED IN THE ORDER THAT I PUT THOSE QUOTES IN MAKE MORE SENSE THAN THE PREVIOUS ORDER, for your to argument about Gunbreaker not being a high skill ceiling job to have any meaning.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

Kitchen sink was a poor design, I agree.
But they can simply have the boss auto dealing a lot of damage

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This is true for not just Gunbreaker, but ALL tanks.

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

2 min meta has nothing to do with those topics, 2 min meta is boring but it's not responsible for every problems.

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The LONGEST defensive cooldowns that aren't invulns are 2 minutes, this is NOT exclusive to DPS META, and when you combine that with kitchen sinking cooldowns, yeah it becomes even more obvious that tanks aren't very engaging outside of dungeons. Though longest healing cooldowns for healers are STILL 3 minutes long and are locked behind ye olde 3 minute META. But that's a different can of worms right there...

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Originally Posted by CKNovel

But pressing continuation 3 times isn't skillfull, it's mere execution.
Gunbreaker never was on the high skill ceiling, it was always simple to play just very busy. Not difficult, just busy.

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Combine this with the previous 2 statements, and yeah, I see WHY you think Gunbreaker was never a high skill ceiling job... but there other factors that also come into play, such as the devs poor leveling design choices from Shadowbringers onward... which makes Gunbreaker in older content feel as the skill floor and ceiling is only as high as either Post-5.x Warrior or Pre-3.x Paladin... The latter of which we should have moved AWAY from when design new jobs but here we are... And it also doesn't help that the devs don't make make content that could potentially make Gunbreaker be that high skill floor+ceiling tank... not without Warrior mains causing an uproar anyway...

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Originally Posted by DRKoftheAzure

Were you using Sonic Break before Gnashing Fang or after? Because this COULD POTENTIALLY matter depending on the fight. And after the change to Sonic Break being locked behind No Mercy I still pressed it along with Bow Shock and Blasting Zone before Gnashing Fang, mostly because it looks the LEAST janky but still cool to see out of ALL the GCD and oGCD double weaving combinations, due to Double Down and Sonic Break being 60 second cooldowns and Gnashing Fang being 30 seconds.

The LONGEST defensive cooldowns that aren't invulns are 2 minutes, this is NOT exclusive to DPS META, and when you combine that with kitchen sinking cooldowns, yeah it becomes even more obvious that tanks aren't very engaging outside of dungeons. Though longest healing cooldowns for healers are STILL 3 minutes long and are locked behind ye olde 3 minute META. But that's a different can of worms right there...

Combine this with the previous 2 statements, and yeah, I see WHY you think Gunbreaker was never a high skill ceiling job... but there other factors that also come into play, such as the devs poor leveling design choices from Shadowbringers onward... which makes Gunbreaker in older content feel as the skill floor and ceiling is only as high as either Post-5.x Warrior or Pre-3.x Paladin... The latter of which we should have moved AWAY from when design new jobs but here we are... And it also doesn't help that the devs don't make make content that could potentially make Gunbreaker be that high skill floor+ceiling tank... not without Warrior mains causing an uproar anyway...

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Was all this deconstructing ever necessary? Same goes for the uppercase, I can feel your emotions but I'm confused by the logic.

It's up to you to use your imagination and think outside the box. I can think about a lot of scenarios where you'd want to use your Sonic Break outside of No Mercy without delaying it. Dungeons are a easy example where you'd rather use your aoes in No Mercy then use Sonic Break on the tankier target. Same goes if you're about to kill the boss, you would want to have Sonic break earlier.

I'm confused by your point about defensive being 2 minutes... I don't understand the point you're trying to make? Healers 180 are tools able to top the party, Tanks 120 are tools to keep yourself alive. If tanks CDs were 180s nothing would change but the mapping around those, you use them when a tank buster is about to happen, nothing more.

GNB will never be a high skill ceiling job for the simple reason that there's no high skill ceiling job in the game. All jobs are meant to be "easy to learn, difficult to master".