Guild Wars 2

I figured I would ask the people that actually know what they are talking about.

various levels of debate going on within the various circles I am in. Concerning the gear sets. Mostly people having done math and throwing numbers that just don’t make sense to me. That being said.

How does Damage work?
In relations to Bezerker gear, vs Knights gear, Vs PvT gear etc.

Soldier Gear offers more Power than Knights. yet knights is known to fit into the Damage Meta for the “learning phase”

I am under the impression that it is a combination of crit chance and crit damage. but could one of you that know more than me explain it a bit better.

This again is for PvE and dungeons… What makes the big numbers happen? because I have seen some really high “power” numbers in other gear sets yet they still hit like wet noodles. ?

is there actually a formula that I can reference?

Someone made a solid analytical comparison in the Guardian forums, and the basic conclusion was that Soldiers (PVT) and Knights are essentially equivalent from a damage standpoint. See https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/visualized-dps-difference-between-specs/3202862. There were some critiques of the methodology, but its the best comparison I’ve seen.

For better or worse, this data doesn’t support the long-held theory that Knights is the better “training wheels” armor. They are about equal. By corollary, both PVT and Knights are equally bad as compared to full Berserker. However, old misconceptions die hard, and people cling tightly to the notion that Knights is somehow better than PVT.

Ironically, between the two (Knights and Soldiers), PVT is far and away the more useful set. For the world bosses against who you cannot crit (e.g., Teq, Shatt, Golem, SB, etc.) PVT is the optimal armor selection. So when you do graduate to Zerk (and you absolutely should, as quickly as possible) the old PVT set still has a decent amount of value. Knights — not so much.

Many useful traits proc on crit so Knights gear is an obvious choice if compared to soldiers.

Thanks Berner, I will have to look more closely into that read.

Frifox. THAT statement makes more sense. as yes thinking on it a little more many traits happen “on crit” so having the precision that Knights offer over PvT would make more sense.

So as to the pther part of the question. How does damage proc? is it the combination of crit and crit damage?

One of the situations I am faced with is that I have another warrior in a group I run with. they run Soldiers with ruby orbs. and my war runs zerk scholar. Her power is only 1k higher than mine, and my crit chance is about 6?? percent higher? than hers (I forget the actual number off the top of my head. but it was rather close. ) And yet, for easy referencing, my 100 blades easily does 30k and hers only get to 20k if she is lucky.

thanks for the help so far. just trying to understand better so when I get asked I have a more solid base to answer from.

I was just curious to see what would be the differences between 100 pt in pwr vs 10% increased of precision between the 2 gears so I just whipped a quick spreadsheet to compare raw damage of my guardian using 10/30/10/x/x. All weapons (berserkers, sigils, ruby orbs) and trinkets (ascended) stay the same. The numbers are followed:

PVT power 2380. Knight power 2290. Both weapon set report ~100 difference in power.
Critical chance for PVT 65.42%. Crit chance for Knight is 76.39%. Crit Damage both at 76%.

Using 10 swings to calculate the raw damage of both set using the wiki formula.

Total Damage by PVT is 36,649 and 39,737 for Knight. Remove the 10 pts (precision toughness) from valor doesn’t make much different (PvT’s damage 34,185 and Knight’s damage 36,651).

The 10% difference in precision causes higher damage w/o taking in consideration of what frifox has said above.

link to guardian build
link to crit hit
link to calc damage

I think my premise is sound but you never know.

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Yup Nemesis is filled with good info. just checkout his guardian build:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Discussion-about-Nemisis-Smite-Build/first#post3463167

Good that you asked, I’ll try my best to explain:

• When you want to hit hard, power is probably the most important stat. The damage calculation involves enemy armor, but you can’t change that; that means more power = more damage

• There’s another way to boost your damage: critical hits. Criticals deal 150% of base damage, and you can get more crit damage to hit even harder. If you have +30% crit damage, your critical hits will deal 180% of base damage
  And finally you have crit chance. Pretty straightforward, it’s the odds of dealing a critical hit

• Berserker vs PVT: both have the same amount of power, but berserker armor can help you deal more damage because it has precision – increases crit chance – and crit damage. If you had no crit chance, it’d be better to get PVT (you don’t crit, why make it stronger if you can’t use?)

• Same rule for Knight vs PVT: Knight has precision, so you have chance to deal more damage even without extra crit damage – don’t forget that crits deal 150% damage

And those formulas to check how much damage you will deal… I just don’t like that. The imprecision is big since you don’t deal a fixed amount of damage, it has a “damage window” – that’s why weapons have “x – x+y” damage

Hope I explained everything, and sorry for the big text

Berner.7289:

Someone made a solid analytical comparison in the Guardian forums, and the basic conclusion was that Soldiers (PVT) and Knights are essentially equivalent from a damage standpoint. See https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/visualized-dps-difference-between-specs/3202862. There were some critiques of the methodology, but its the best comparison I’ve seen.

For better or worse, this data doesn’t support the long-held theory that Knights is the better “training wheels” armor. They are about equal. By corollary, both PVT and Knights are equally bad as compared to full Berserker. However, old misconceptions die hard, and people cling tightly to the notion that Knights is somehow better than PVT.

Ironically, between the two (Knights and Soldiers), PVT is far and away the more useful set. For the world bosses against who you cannot crit (e.g., Teq, Shatt, Golem, SB, etc.) PVT is the optimal armor selection. So when you do graduate to Zerk (and you absolutely should, as quickly as possible) the old PVT set still has a decent amount of value. Knights — not so much.

Wrong. Knight does yield more damage than PVT. However, as frifox already pointed out, damage alone is not the only relevant thing in this case. Constantly having Vigor due to the on crit traits (knight) or lacking it (soldier) is a giant difference, especially for starters.

As for the rest, who cares for gear in an open world zerg? Tequatl is the only one where you’d notice some usefulness of PVT and even that can be done easily in zerker.

Not only does knight more damage, and benefit from a survivability standpoint that doesn’t compare to PVT (what is better, one more dodge or slightly more HP? Perma vigor is the best thing you can get in this game..) but when we’re talking about training wheels there’s also the fact that a newbie in knight will benefit immediately from the first pieces of berserker gear he puts on, because of the high crit chance, all the crit damage he adds is worth something. Which can hardly be said for a mix of soldier/zerk.

PVT isn’t transition/training wheels, it’s zergonzerg gear for players who enjoy PVD.

Thanks you guys for the replies. I have more of a solid base to be able to answer the questions of my people.

random side not though. Why would PvT gear be the Meta in WvW? over knights? or do I just not know enough about the meta there? given that you could have the better damage but still retain survivability?

or is it the vitality people are after to buffer against conditions as well as the direct hits?

No idea but i dont really have a problem in zerker in WvW. Possibly is to do with condis for the lower hp classes. Meh what do i know im just a pve scrub.

agree with you Spoj, I run my Zerk in WvW.

what can I say I am to cheap to buy a whole new set of gear and am a PvE scrub too.

Ropechef.6192:

Thanks you guys for the replies. I have more of a solid base to be able to answer the questions of my people.

random side not though. Why would PvT gear be the Meta in WvW? over knights? or do I just not know enough about the meta there? given that you could have the better damage but still retain survivability?

or is it the vitality people are after to buffer against conditions as well as the direct hits?

It is because of the combination of vitality and toughness giving buffer against both direct damage and condition specs. And high dmg isn’t as important in large scale battles as long as you can spam staff #1 to keep the lootbags rolling in.

The ‘good’ WvW players are usually just as bad as the PvE bads. Berserker Gear not being viable is some weird myth such people set up. Even in PvP, Berserker is almost always preferable to other non-bunker/condition damage variants. Teams use 2-3 people with berserker gear and none with soldiers/knights/whatever. Berserker gear offers a much higher damage output for no loss in survivability against conditions and only a minor one against direct damage. However, in WvW zerging Soldiers might be your choice, just keep retaliation up. The amount of times I saw warriors using Axe 5 in WvW makes me sad, I usually just take those hits and lose 3k health, while the opponent takes about 12k damage meanwhile.

Dub.1273:

The ‘good’ WvW players are usually just as bad as the PvE bads.

^ Maybe. To be honest, coming from WvW, I have little to no individual skills. All I know is using my staff and fulfill my role in the zerg. As far as I know, the WvW zerg meta in early to mid 2013 required an organized zerg to stack and move efficiently like bots, dishing out CC to gain favorable ground against enemy, cutting through the enemy group, and rolling it several times while rallying the down. The key is not to get downed by cumulative hits from the enemy zerg and win in the CC fight even before the real damage get kicked in. So, PVT is always required for water ele (to heal the zerg), staff guardian and fear necro (to control points). It is even more effective when we fight in Stone Mist and have like 2s skill lags. All the real damage usually comes from Arrow Carts and Ballistae anyways.

Some examples of WM, a pro-PVT guild in WvW and GvG: WM circa Feb, 2013 and WM in GvG

However, Berzerker always find itself into the mixture and it’s different from zerg to zerg. A guild group may prefer stronger finishers and have more damage dealers that wear Knights and Berserker. It’s also much better in a skilled roaming team or ninja teams. I think the meta has evolved into a smaller-size zerg which hits harder for a better mobility, as a lot of skilled guilds have been leaving WvW since then.

TL;DR: PVT is for survival in a massive battle, to fulfill a certain role, mostly not for dealing damage.

Knight is meant to be mixed with zerker great piece by piece until it’s totally phased out. You can’t do that with pvt because your crit chance will be too low to see any appreciable benefit from the extra crit damage.

Also knight tends to be more useful in general because you get more crits and thus more procs and thus more damage.

Berserker gear is most definitely not the be all, end all in WvW. You need to have either very high burst potential or a good line of secondary defenses to be able to survive against a good player, especially one in defensive gear that can outlast you in combat otherwise.

Black Box.9312:

Berserker gear is most definitely not the be all, end all in WvW. You need to have either very high burst potential or a good line of secondary defenses to be able to survive against a good player, especially one in defensive gear that can outlast you in combat otherwise.

This advice is very useful because the title “PvE, Dungeons, and Damage gear.” is most definitely referring to WvW.

I believe, the OP at some points ask about the usefulness of PVT, Knight and Berserker in a WvW setting as well here

Yeah that was my bad for the slight derailment. but it was still a valid question I thought.

None the less, thank you all again for your help.

Bottom line then. Big damage comes from Critical chance and Critical Damage. And your ability to create that situation.

Ropechef.6192:

Yeah that was my bad for the slight derailment. but it was still a valid question I thought.

None the less, thank you all again for your help.

Bottom line then. Big damage comes from Critical chance and Critical Damage. And your ability to create that situation.

And a high power stat to to base crit damage from. Thankfully Berserker gear has the trifecta.

Dont forget damage modifiers. They are better than crit damage. Which is why dps guard has no points in crit damage traitline.

spoj.9672:

Dont forget damage modifiers. They are better than crit damage. Which is why dps guard has no points in crit damage traitline.

But Ah has such high crit damage. It brings da dps!

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

spoj.9672:

Dont forget damage modifiers. They are better than crit damage. Which is why dps guard has no points in crit damage traitline.

But Ah has such high crit damage. It brings da dps!

We actually established that you can do respectable dps with AH (close to par with meta). It’s the fact that you have to sacrifice all utility traits when you do that, which makes traiting for AH detrimental.

I just watched some guides of Nemesis. That perfected tutorial guide counting hits on target dummies. One, two, three, four, six.

And strong WvW action, killing non-attacking sub 80’s only, preferably in 3v1’s.

@Cookie, the 21% is just 0.16% off (it is actually 21.16% weaker than 10/25/0/10/25 under the assumption that unscathed contender has 100% uptime). The 50% support loss was just what I thought might fit. Losing 20% recharge on consecrations, longer duration on consecrations and losing the possibility to go for Absolute Resolution, 20% Shout Recharge combined with that tiny bit of boon duration (lol, went to type healing power) and the might/regen/protection from virtues is what I’d consider about 50% of a guardian’s support, since you still are able to use consecrations, clean conditions and fulfill the most important guardian tasks.

@Lilith: We’ll have to play some Asura Ball matches on EU, make sure to get your (insert profession in here) to 80. I’ll buy you pro ascended sentinel’s stuff.

I’m not advocating it; simply pointing out that one can DPS with AH. Not sure how accurate those Dub numbers are though

AH – DPS – Support

Pick two

I support dub’s numbers. He let me leech a dungeon

There is a formula you have to run numbers from Dub through first, before you have the true result.

x=3(Pi/y^2)+1

The Mexican Cookie.3690:

There is a formula you have to run numbers from Dub through first, before you have the true result.

x=3(Pi/y^2)+1

Well, I just put 80085 through my calculator first….

Dub.1273:

The ‘good’ WvW players are usually just as bad as the PvE bads. Berserker Gear not being viable is some weird myth such people set up. Even in PvP, Berserker is almost always preferable to other non-bunker/condition damage variants. Teams use 2-3 people with berserker gear and none with soldiers/knights/whatever. Berserker gear offers a much higher damage output for no loss in survivability against conditions and only a minor one against direct damage. However, in WvW zerging Soldiers might be your choice, just keep retaliation up. The amount of times I saw warriors using Axe 5 in WvW makes me sad, I usually just take those hits and lose 3k health, while the opponent takes about 12k damage meanwhile.

Most condi specs are bunker.

There are no condi spec bunkers.

Bunkers are constructs immune to conditions.

CptAurellian.9537:

Wrong. Knight does yield more damage than PVT.

Comparing the Effective Power of a 10/25/0/10/25 build between Knights and Soldiers, you are correct that Knights does more damage — about 7%. The point about crits is worth noting as well. By contrast, Soldiers gives a lot more room for error, both from direct and condition damage. So it really depends on how big you want/need your training wheels to be.

By the way, Valkyrie gear has about 14% better EP than Knights in the same build. So if all you really need is the smallest set of training wheels possible, Valks would be the way to go.

CptAurellian.9537:

As for the rest, who cares for gear in an open world zerg? Tequatl is the only one where you’d notice some usefulness of PVT and even that can be done easily in zerker.

Anything can be done in Zerk. Anything can be done in Soldiers. Anything can be done in Clerics too. But if you’re going to spend the money/tokens on training-wheel armor, Soldiers gear has the most usefulness outside dungeons.

Idk much about the WvW meta, maybe it doesn’t even have a meta. But your gear depends a lot on your class and the way you play it

A backstab thief spends a lot of time roaming and stealthed, so berserker might be better for hard-hitting. Control warriors make a good frontline, and they have a huge hp pool, so power+toughness is better imo

Clumsy.6257:

Black Box.9312:

Berserker gear is most definitely not the be all, end all in WvW. You need to have either very high burst potential or a good line of secondary defenses to be able to survive against a good player, especially one in defensive gear that can outlast you in combat otherwise.

This advice is very useful because the title “PvE, Dungeons, and Damage gear.” is most definitely referring to WvW.

Well then, I’m glad you read the posts that were discussing gear in WvW to avoid any sort of confusion with what I was talking about.

Oh wait…

Dub.1273:

There are no condi spec bunkers.

Can’t tell if sarcastic or ignorant.

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Hahahaha saw what you did there, nemesis’ smite guard new meta AHAHAH…

Teckos.1305:

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Hahahaha saw what you did there, nemesis’ smite guard new meta AHAHAH…

That thread is actually getting a 5 star rating for entertainment value at least imo.

J Eberle.9312:

Teckos.1305:

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Hahahaha saw what you did there, nemesis’ smite guard new meta AHAHAH…

That thread is actually getting a 5 star rating for entertainment value at least imo.

Link?

Lilith Ajit.6173:

J Eberle.9312:

Teckos.1305:

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Hahahaha saw what you did there, nemesis’ smite guard new meta AHAHAH…

That thread is actually getting a 5 star rating for entertainment value at least imo.

Link?

One does need only ask and one shall receive. <3

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Discussion-about-Nemisis-Smite-Build/page/2#post3469852

J Eberle.9312:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

J Eberle.9312:

Teckos.1305:

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I suggest you ask Scion Storm Gaming and Nemesis or whatever his name is because they. Are good and really know how. To play

Hahahaha saw what you did there, nemesis’ smite guard new meta AHAHAH…

That thread is actually getting a 5 star rating for entertainment value at least imo.

Link?

Ask and you shall receive <3

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/guardian/Discussion-about-Nemisis-Smite-Build/page/2#post3469852

Ty!!!

Mirsa.1628:

Dub.1273:

There are no condi spec bunkers.

Can’t tell if sarcastic or ignorant.

You know what a bunker’s task is, right?
Now tell me how condition damage fits into that role.

I sometimes get the feeling the internet is full of kittens. More often, I see it confirmed.

Now I desperately want to know the… erm.. real “meaning” of kitten.

Dub.1273:

Mirsa.1628:

Dub.1273:

There are no condi spec bunkers.

Can’t tell if sarcastic or ignorant.

You know what a bunker’s task is, right?
Now tell me how condition damage fits into that role.

I sometimes get the feeling the internet is full of kittens. More often, I see it confirmed.

Longbow + S/x is a pretty common bunker build for warriors that uses conditions. Pretty powerful because you only need to invest in condition damage for your damage output while burst builds need to invest in PPC. While this isn’t a traditional mid-bunker like a guardian, it still has the ability to out-sustain opponents while holding nodes, which is the function of a bunker.

http://mistpedia.net/index.php/List_of_Bunkers

Indeed full of condition bunkers, I count… zero?

The Mexican Cookie.3690:

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

spoj.9672:

Dont forget damage modifiers. They are better than crit damage. Which is why dps guard has no points in crit damage traitline.

But Ah has such high crit damage. It brings da dps!

We actually established that you can do respectable dps with AH (close to par with meta). It’s the fact that you have to sacrifice all utility traits when you do that, which makes traiting for AH detrimental.

When did we ever establish that?

The only setup that does remotely competitive damage with 30 points in Valor is 10/30/30/0/0 which has pretty much nothing that actually procs AH. If you want to get any healing out of AH you need either Empowering Might or a hammer with Writ of Persistence, and you’re not going to get either of those things and still have any DPS if you have 30 in Valor.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

The Mexican Cookie.3690:

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

spoj.9672:

Dont forget damage modifiers. They are better than crit damage. Which is why dps guard has no points in crit damage traitline.

But Ah has such high crit damage. It brings da dps!

We actually established that you can do respectable dps with AH (close to par with meta). It’s the fact that you have to sacrifice all utility traits when you do that, which makes traiting for AH detrimental.

When did we ever establish that?

The only setup that does remotely competitive damage with 30 points in Valor is 10/30/30/0/0 which has pretty much nothing that actually procs AH. If you want to get any healing out of AH you need either Empowering Might or a hammer with Writ of Persistence, and you’re not going to get either of those things and still have any DPS if you have 30 in Valor.

We never agreed it was good; we agreed it did damage. Damage and good are not mutually inclusive.