Guild Wars 2

yup, i said it.

The problem with conditions is:

1- bosses don’t last long enough for conditions to do their thing.
2- the 25 bleed cap
3- not so great scaling with party buffs.

Well, i’ve been pugging fractals for the past month (levels 30-40), and i noticed that:

1- bosses do last long enough. Mostly, because people are afraid to melee them (i often melee the bosses with my guardian, only to be told to get away from the boss). Sure, bosses can one hit you but i melee only if i have aegis up. The rest of the party don’t do it, so they end up trying to burst a boss with direct ranged damage, which is far from optimal. Since we are all ranging and it’s not even `possible to keep dpsing the boss all the time because you are busy running for your life, doesn’t condition damage come in handy, ticking while you cannot hit?

2- as nobody runs condition builds, the bleed cap is a one man thing, and a properly tuned hybrid build should be able to output good damage till the bleeds drop again to 20.

3- sure. you get power, not condition damage, from party buffs, but again, when pugging, people rarely blast firefields, so this shouldn’t be such a big issue.

The only thing that keeps me from trying fractals with my sinister necro (wip) is how handy the aegis, stab and reflects from guardians are. The only reasonable utility my necro could bring would be the well of darkness for surviving the OP trash packs, but it looks pitiful when compared to the guardian.

Thoughts?

You’ll be surprised to see that out of 4 PUGs that range the boss, 2 are at least condition or hybrid.

pugs are pretty clueless in general in fractals. throw them 1 curve ball and 90% cant handle it. especially if you arent running 40 or 50, and its really bad at 9/19/29.

they know most of the stack spots cuz most have done it 40+ times, but to be successful you have to carry them with both game knowledge and dps and you have to know and roll with what they expect even if theres a better way. because the better ways require coordination they just arent gonna understand without doing it themselves and you arent gonna feel like explaining it and failing at it once to “save” a minute.

Only condi build that can even remotely compete with dps builds is sinister engineer and even that only works in Molten facility and dredge fractal thanks to their perma protection.

And debating between a guardian and a necro is pointless. Guard can do way more a necro can ever do. Specialisation might change that to some degree but before that just say on your guard.

Aenesthesia.1697:

2- as nobody runs condition builds, the bleed cap is a one man thing, and a properly tuned hybrid build should be able to output good damage till the bleeds drop again to 20.

The problem here is that most classes, warrior specifically, apply bleed stacks even when specced fully DPS. Right now the conditions are FIFO I believe, and so warriors will be able to quickly replace all your high ticking bleeding stacks with low ticking bleeding stacks.

Aenesthesia.1697:

3- sure. you get power, not condition damage, from party buffs, but again, when pugging, people rarely blast firefields, so this shouldn’t be such a big issue.

Might also gives condition damage, and will also boost your direct damage, so its only favorable te receive buffs.

The condition caps and damage has been a topic since beta, but appearently its a hardware-issue.

Taku.6352:

Only condi build that can even remotely compete with dps builds is sinister engineer and even that only works in Molten facility and dredge fractal thanks to their perma protection.

And debating between a guardian and a necro is pointless. Guard can do way more a necro can ever do. Specialisation might change that to some degree but before that just say on your guard.

i know guardian >>> necro for any reasonably hard content. I mean, my worst guardian runs are a walk in the park compared to the worse runs i had with the necro (with no guardian in the party, of course)

But, for pure damage, don’t compare conditions vs berserk while hitting a sitting duck. Do it in a boss fight where you have to stop attacking to dodge, revive pals, cast whatever you need to cast, heal and generally running for your life…. while doing all those things, berserkers do 0 damage. Conditions meanwhile keep ticking and that’s why I ask if they are not superior in that situation.

I’m with OP on this one. It’s a casual game for the most part, the “hardcore” community is minimal in GW2. If you want a party to look a certain way, then advertise the party yourself. Otherwise bring whatever you want into a dungeon/fractal, just make sure to know what your class does best to support your team. Melee dps builds (war/thief/etc), remember your banners and do a kittenload of dmg. Guardians do your guardian thing, keep us all alive. I play mesmer mostly, and as long as I know my supports and utilities (which is the main purpose of a mesmer in dungeon runs) my team has never cared if I came in with my zerker gear or my condition gear.

Having a sinister engineer is useful against dredges due to perma protection.

Aenesthesia.1697:

But, for pure damage, don’t compare conditions vs berserk while hitting a sitting duck. Do it in a boss fight where you have to stop attacking to dodge, revive pals, cast whatever you need to cast, heal and generally running for your life…. while doing all those things, berserkers do 0 damage. Conditions meanwhile keep ticking and that’s why I ask if they are not superior in that situation.

Your conditions may keep ticking damage but while you are dodging/reviving/whatever just like the zerker you are not hitting and therefore not applying new conditions. You lose damage just the same as the zerker you just don’t see the effect of it until a little later due to the delayed damage nature of conditions.

I wonder if they will rework condition damage in the next expansion, brain of ice.

oxtred.7658:

Having a sinister engineer is useful against dredges due to perma protection.

having that same engi go zerk/sin and take throw mine instead of eg in the 3 kit meta build is even better

I’m talking about a pug situation where the dredges will be alive long enough to reapply it.

oxtred.7658:

I’m talking about a pug situation where the dredges will be alive long enough to reapply it.

lv50 pug yesterday. 1 warrior, 2 ele, 1 guardian, 1 bombkit engineer. Dredge melted anyways without use of conditions. We didn’t even stealth at any point (though an engineer can stealth you, that engineer didn’t show the initiative to do so and the run went smooth anyways).

The damage scaling of berserker can pretty much brute force anything in this game, and when you throw in conjures and projectile deflect it gets stupidly easy.

Too much of the damage in this game is so polar. You either bring tools/class skills that completely negate it, or you face the pain train with a pug that doesn’t bring enough damage (seriously, even with pvt the survival gains are marginal versus the damage mobs do, you kill things way, way, slower but you still go down in 3 hits instead of 2; there’s no reason whatsoever to not go full damage).

I look at my D/F ele when standing on one of the switches for the dredge panel. Swirling winds, arcane shield, mist form, magnetic aura, obsidian flesh. I can last a lifetime holding that switch for the group.

There’s no way in hell my ranger or Necromancer can do the same. Not even my mesmer. And what my ele does a guardian can do as well, and even a warrior though you don’t have as good reflects (only with shield) you still have endure pain and shield stance to last a good solid seconds for the panel to be done.

Condition heavy specs are virtually worthless in most content. Some classes don’t even bring much in the way of utility to the group and nothing gets close to fire fields and the amount of blasts some classes bring, so right now a few classes can have all group needs covered while bringing the highest damage potential.

oxtred.7658:

I’m talking about a pug situation where the dredges will be alive long enough to reapply it.

so am i

Despite me messing around with a PvP build, Condi can be really sweet sometimes ~