The problem with "Instant OFF GCD" abilities makes combat feel less rewarding.

[Marduc]

I found that all this delay you guys are talking about is basically animation delays, basically the animation won't let you begin the next command until the animation is completed.

This is exactly right. I made a GIF about it in beta, others created bug reports, and all we got was "working as intended." I understand if this is working by design, but as I've said countless times, the game does a very poor job of portraying to the player that he/she cannot use an ability because of said "animation cooldown." It's very frustrating when you're trying to stun a mob that's casting the spell but can't because you're locked into an animation that last .8 seconds.

The game is confused about what most modern players view an "instant" ability as. Instant means that when I push the button, the ability fires off. If the abilities are going to be tied to an animation, don't call them 'instant' because MMO veterans will misinterpret the ability as happening the second they push the button. I think it's poor game design. They should change the name of the skills to "Activated Skills", meaning they don't require a cast bar channel, but rather an activation channel that can still be used while moving. Furthermore, other skills should be grayed out while you're locked into this activation channel...at least that's my opinion.