Guild Wars 2

Before we go into this build, it is very heavy on Pet Micromanagement and this build does mainly utilize bear/bow. ‘Bear/bow, what the kitten are you thinking?,’ hear me out before you decide to cast aside this build. I will now answer and mention anything that I believe may come up.

*This build is meant to be for pug fractals, where coordination isn’t all too great
*I have only meant for this build to be used for Mai, so I do not have experience outside of it with this build
*This build is very heavy on pet micromanagement compared to the usual F1-F3 commands, so may seem a bit tedious to some
*Too much thought shouldn’t be put into the gained condition damage from Wilderness Survival, trait adjustment is to complement build
*This build was heavily modified from the Zerker/Ranger Rune set-up for Ranger, thus explains the similarity in gear between these two builds (feel free to modify to personal comfort, I only have 1 set up ascended armor for my Ranger, so yeah :T)
*This build is meant for all fractal levels, so lower leveled fractals, swapping out a for a drake with minor trait tweeking is viable

Now that is out of the way, I will now share the build so you can see what traits and skills are utilized.

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-F;4wEVu-b2JDF-0;9k5R;3551;415A25B2;05cX0e;1zxrUzxrUm-FiIkoH;3HbH6IbI6JbJ62o-G-2ii

Some eyebrows have been raised, and that is too be expected. The mechanics to Mai are pretty easy really once you get the hang of it, so it ends up coming down to surviving through out the fight and the tedious cannon phases. That is the purpose of this build, to help promote group survivalbility and thus making the Mai Trinn Fractal easier to accomplish.

This is how the bears comes into play. The purpose of this infamous pet is to use it for its real and only purpose really, to be a damage sponge due to its tanky stats. Each Bear adds to the parties group utilities with a condi clear from the Brown Bear and the Black Bear’s 10 second weakness debuff. Idealy, the weakness debuff should be used when Mai has low or no shield stacks at all, since you want the longest duration possible for your weakness debuff for when you go in for the dps phase; longer duration possible, easier time to melee during dps phase. Due to the time in between cannon phases and time to drain Mai’s shield stacks, you shouldn’t have to worry about the cooldown for Black Bear’s F2. With minor co-operation from the party by giving a small heads up, ‘Please stay near/behind the pet to kite Mai easier’, the bear shines amongst the other pet families. With proper play, this build is a full up-time Rock Elemental basically, so it greatly reduces the pressure given by Mai. Assuming everyone is co-operating (from my experience, I have had little cases where people didn’t listen to the tip, but there is always the outside factor of someone(s) not willing to co-operate), ridding Mai of her shield stacks is fairly easy due to the high agro control through the bear. Through the use of this agro control, kiting becomes alot easeir and through the use of making the Bear a center point; where you all are staying near enough to help pin-point the next electric aoe placement. The Ranger placement is highly preferred to be behind the Bear so if the agro adjusts to you, either Longbow 3 or continue to kite her until she adjusts back onto the bear since NPCs will tend to agro on the nearest thing near them. Rinse and repeat this process to drain her shields and then force her into the cannon phase.

Properly timed crowd control skills; such as your Longbow 4, Axe 4, and Entangle (Axe 4 is generally better for ccing Mai because it is easier to position her with the pull apposed to the knockback on Longbow); greatly help in draining her shields by either forcing her into or keeping her withing the electric aoe placement. When the opportunity arrives, use yourself as bait to draw Mai into the aoe; this is a very effective way to keep her still since you can use Signet of Stone to negate the damage the aoe’s and Mai’s damage while you keep her still in the aoe. If you are experiencing condi overload, either waiting it out in Healing Spring or Brown Bear’s F2 will help relieve pressure; if you have a tolerable amount of condis, they should be pulled from pet through Empathetic bond since you want to save the F2 for when the group is suffering from condi overload. If you manage to lock down Mai through your agro control, you should plop Healing Spring under the Bear while it’s tanking for healing from the initial skill and regen, as well for the condi cleanse since Mai is gonna be stacking those condis on the focused Bear. Also, be sure to pet swap when either Bear gets low on health to avoid the 60sec cd to better maintain the damage sponge.

Here is where the two questionable shouts included in the build come into play, during the cannon phase. Not much players know of this due to low usage of the skill, but Search and Rescue is able to rez dead players. In order to execute this, you have to make sure that you use Search and Rescue BEFORE the downed player dies; if the character was being rezzed before, the pet will continue to follow through with the command until said person who is now being rezzed from the dead is finished. Search and Rescue is a life saver as well when Mai decides to play Baby Guard on a downed body, having a rez bot on the downed body gives you some time to deal with the situation until she moves or gets cced off; I do find the dead state pet rez to be a nice alternative to logging out since the pet usually restores 60-100% health when rezzing, shaving off alot of time compared to loading in and out of LA and then to wait to be rezzed by the Ellen. Guard is used during the cannon phase to stash your Bear in a corner; since it is stealthed, it will usually dodge the aoes. It won’t be guaranteed to not get hit since some players may run buy it while dodging the aoe spam or will just get unlocky with aoe placements; if the Bear is near death, switch pets and stash the next Beat again with Guard. The Guard shout is also a high uptime of protection for the Bears since the utility gives 11 seconds of protection with a 12 second cooldown, very spammable to keep that damage sponge tanking. Spamming of Guard Shout is heavily encouraged for the protection uptime, as well for the regen and swiftness given through Nature’s Voice.

Healing Spring
*Steady counter to condi pressure for both group and self
*Outgoing regen to group, self, and pet (max duration of 45 second regen, 2340 health)
*Source of vigor to group and self
*Water field for blasting (show me da Shortbow Thief!)

Search and Rescue
*Pet rez the dead to either full or 60-99% (situational based off of cannon aoes) to then be hard rezzed by allies later to avoid time used for Ellen rez
*Dedicated rez bot on downed player when Mai is playing Baby Guard

Signet of Stone
*To negate damage during the cannon phase when caught in a pinch, or any other situations involving Mai
*Use of utility to negate damage during pet rez on downed player
*Improvise self as bait drain shield stacks off of Mai, when the agro is shifted to you

Guard
*Using Guard during the cannon phase helps keep the pet alive since you can place it in a corner somewhere. Since it is stealthed, the odds of it dying are slimmer, helping you maintain the 100% damage sponge uptime; if it gets low on health, just pet swap and stash them in a corner again.
*Guard keeps a high protection uptime on pet since the boon duration will last 11 seconds with a 12second cooldown

Pet Micromanagement
*Utilizing the F2 actives to help relieve damage dealt and condi pressure: weakness for close range encounters, idealy during when Mai has low or no shield stacks; condi cleanse to help maintain pet or to remove any condi stacks on allies
*Creating a situation where agro is in favor to the Bear by having players using it as a center point to help predict electric aoe
*Positioning and re-positioning when kiting Mai and during the cannon phase to prevent pet entering down state
*Rez botting to prevent player deaths and rez after death
*Maintaining each Bear’s life span with upkeep of regen, condi cleanse, and protection to keep ‘Ring Around the Bear Strategy™’ in action
*Uses Bear to body block Mai’s projectile attack that teleports her to you, proper placement of allies and self determines the probability of successful outcome

I really like this build because of the increase in Pet Micromanagement feels as if I have more personal control over the pet rather than the simple 3 commands we have at the moment with just F1-F3. This build is mainly meant for Pug Quality of Life, however, with an organized group it is even more effective with proper crowd control management; buddies and I always use this strategy for Mai and clean sweep the Boss Fractal in the end. It wasn’t mentioned before in the initial summary for the skills, but I decided to include the idea of using the bear to body block Mai’s shots in the Pet Micromanagement *’s since it is very useful but difficult to sustain due to constant shuffling of players, I felt it should be mention to a degree. The build mainly uses bow to help with kiting, but shouldn’t be fully relied on for everything; you should always be on sword/axe for the dps phase when Mai has no shield stacks and during the cannon phase for the extra dodges.

Thank you for both viewing and reviewing my post, and I look back to your feedback.