Guild Wars 2

I’ll soon have my Saphir’s (asceneded assassin’s) gear finished, and am wondering what rune set to take.
First, my playstyle:
I hate and rarely use grenades (mostly on the eye turrets and the Melandru boss).
I camp bomb kit most of the time (swapping to rifle for skill 3 & 5, and in some cases elixir gun).
my other utilities change from boss to boss (elixir b and utility goggles for my dps default – fury uptime), elite is either supply crate or mistfire wolf, depending on the fight.
I mostly run Arah, and sometimes Aetherpath and fractals, but have been trying to go do other dungeons every once in awhile for the dungeoneer title.
I run a 55400 build most of the time
I know what the meta is ankitten ot looking for advise beyond rune/armor choice.

As for the runes I’m currently considering (cost isn’t an issue):
Flame Legion – bomb kit has near 100% burning uptime and 7% is higher than 5% damage boost. It is the rune set I currently use. However, there are a couple cases where I don’t use bombs in my personal playstyle (Lupi and hunter/crusher) and that 7% will be worthless solo.
Ranger – mini still counts as companion, right? its also 7% boost, but gives precision and ferocity instead of power.
Strength – benefits are well known. I usually have some amount of might on me, but it is rarely the focus of my build. Is the extra might uptime worth it if I don’t stack it very high? (vs 7% dps increase from other runes).
Rage – near 100% fury uptime and 5% dps boost. I’m thinking this might be ideal for soloing, but is it better than Ranger runes, which give 7% and ferocity instead of fury (higher crit damage, but less likely to crit)?
note – scholar runes are not a viable option for me because I’m rarely above 90% and will sometimes solo.

Lastly, gear talk:
Should I be going for full assassin’s (Saphir’s incase filter blocks it) or mix some berserker in too (keep in mind, I’m an engineer)? Right now, I’m going for Saphir’s armor and rifle, with berserker trinkets (maybe assassin’s where available). I know that, for things that can’t be crit, berserker’s is better. But for other stuff, what is the point at which the power loss overrides the crit chance? For example (random numbers): a 100% crit chance with a base damage of 100 is worse than a 50% crit chance with a base damage of 150 (200 average damage vs 225 average damage). I know those numbers are an extreme difference, but they are to show my point.

Thanks in advance for any advice. I’ll be going to work soon and will check up on the thread later.

Assassins is the way to go I believe, lots of stuff on crit, plus apparently the numbers for Engi’s work out better even without that… but that’s talking meta build math so can’t say for sure if it’s the same for you.

Personally I’d go scholar, we have one of the best heals in the game once you learn to use it (took me a while lol, I feel embarrassed I asked on here what to use instead of the turret) So you can maintain that pretty well.

Strength may be worht if it you’re really focusing on might stacking for your group but outside of that I can’t see it really winning out, 5% and ferocity vs just better might uptime, even best bet we’re talking like what 6-12 stacks of might from an engi?

I’ve been having fun with Lupi on my engi, actually just got my first lupi solo a week or so ago, I was full health through almost the whole thing, when I wasn’t, healing turret, detonate, shield4 blast, oop, full health again

I guess you could go ranger and really up that crit chance, there is plenty of room on engi, but personally I went with my full assassins getup with weapons, and an accuracy sigil in my dps rifle, which puts me right up to the cap with food, banner, and Fury. So I’d imagine if you went with rangers you’d not need to go with accuracy sigil and could go something more specialized.

Ovearll I don’t see why you wouldn’t go scholar though, i mean that big burst potential we have right at the begining of a fight before we can even get hit is enough to convince me it’s worth having scholar to maximize that in many situations.

My main issue with scholar’s is that I don’t want to have to focus on keeping my health over 90%. This isn’t just an issue when soloing (which I sometimes make videos of), but also because I usually join random pugs on the lfg, or make an anyone welcome (just no exploiters) post and I can’t really rely on always getting a good group. I might one day make an extra set of armor with scholar’s runes, but for now I’m looking for something with a more guaranteed/constant dps boost. I’m mainly split between ranger and rage runes. Another note I forgot to mention in my original post: I currently run with blood and force sigils, but that could change.

As far as the healing turret goes, I’ve been trying to get into the habit of blasting it in my fire field when I don’t need the extra blast healing and don’t think I’ll need the turret on reduced cd from picking it up. Sometimes I purposely waste the heal for might (such as at the abom in arah2). In that case, do you think 3 might stacks are worth not using an attack for – that is, will the dps from 3 might make up for not using the bomb AA? Although I’m not interested in running the meta, there are things that I’m experimenting with to figure out my best options, so I guess I’ll override what I originally said about not looking for advise – just not looking for anyone to tell me to run the meta (I know and understand the benefits, I just don’t like how grenades work).

Can anybody confirm if minis still count as companions for the ranger rune dps boost? Also, any info about at what point power from berserker’s is better than precision from assassin’s? – Guang, you around? I know you like this type of math

Isn’t kind of known if you don’t like scholar runes, you use strength or vice versa?

And if you’re poor you use ranger runes or pack runes?

Ehh, I don’t think it’s that cut and dry, no point to strength if you’re not stacking much might, you get a higher % damage and more overall stats from ranger. And Ranger is meta for Mesmer as I understand it because of so much potential in crits on reflects.

Overall I’d still say scholar, but ranger wouldn’t be all bad, just might have to use sharpening stones instead of Maintenance oils in non potion situations. And no point to using accuracy sigil for instance. According to the build editor with your 55400 build and all assassin gear except trinket stuff being zerk you’ll be at 67% crit chance, 72% with best precision food (not recommending you use that just saying) leaving you at 70% with say candied dragon rolls.

So ranger should work fine I’d think.

I would probably look into swapping out the blood sigil, I would say accuracy but not in this case as you’re already loaded with crit chance (72 = capped with banner + Fury, no reason to go higher base IMO). I might look at Battle, if you’re in PUGs and rarely finishing out the full stacks of might that’s an extra 6 might for you as likely you’ll be kit swapping enough to use it on cooldown more or less. Night would be an ideal pickup too for night dungeons though I imagine you want to make 1 ascended rifle? Personally I did ascended general use rifle, since we now know scaling kills the whole ascended bonus and most night dungeons are lower level. COE would be the only thing you’d be missing out on that I can think of.

I guess nobody likes rage runes. I’ll think about using scholar runes in the future. But for now, ranger runes it is. Thanks for your input.

Rainmaker.7594:

I guess nobody likes rage runes. I’ll think about using scholar runes in the future. But for now, ranger runes it is. Thanks for your input.

Your fury options are only for yourself and would require dropping kits to take (Elixer B and Utility Goggles) 30% extra would make them both 13s vs 10s. Getting hit for fury would likely be the biggest benefit.

I just see them as having the same limitations as Strength Runes but without much of the benefit. You’re losing a lot of base stats for the enhancement of a boon, but in this situation unlike might it’s only for yourself and would require a loss of DPS to even use.