Guild Wars 2

Ever since Beta I’ve seen some players who have this hardline idea that if you’re a Dagger/Dagger Thief or a Greatsword Warrior or a Staff Mesmer that that’s your focus. I see it now with the discussion on Guardian Greatsword, Backstab builds, etc.

What I’m wondering is how many people actually look at their builds as more than focusing on a weapon set. Sure, I have a primary weapon set I prefer, but I actively swap in the middle of combat because sometimes the situations work for it. They don’t demand it, sure, but it opens up options. It can change an encounter.

As an example, I know the Shortbow for Thieves is upheld as a mandatory mobility tool, but I prefer to run with Sword/Pistol with my Dagger/Dagger. I’ll see comments that D/D doesn’t offer the utility of a Pistol…well, it does, if you use the Pistol in your second set. And I get my mobility and Dazes from the Sword. Or I’ll mix up other MH/OH combos. Recently on my Guardian I’m learning to love the Torch and Scepter with my Greatsword – Even with the GS changes I know have extra things to drop (Smite, the fire breath, setting myself on fire) in between the GS cooldowns, as opposed to just waiting on the attack chain.

Does anyone else operate like this, or do you prefer to just focus on one weapon set and only swap between pulls or situations?

I swap the weapons a lot. In fact so much that I’d like to see the cooldown between swaps lowered. It’s a lot of fun to jump between play styles.

However, I’m looking at getting my weapon master achievements done so I’m swapping much less now that I’d like to. Making final blow kills with shield is tough as hell on Guardians.

Your playing the game right:) you have to switch in order to use different abilities in certain situations. If you stay with one weapon the whole time for instance your greatsword chances are youll be dead. You have to know when to fall back and go ranged especially if your close to dying to give you time for your heal to go off cd. This is one of the reasons why people would like tanks and healers in the game because they havent figured this part out..

On my guardian I am a constant weapon swapper. I go currently GS and Sword and Torch. I cannot say how much I love to switch weapons it’s important to my rotation. You get multiple blinds in that way (which is a great way to keep the damage down) and it gets you more dps in my opinion. Torch is one my favorite weapons now. I used to be sword and board but torch just kicked board to the curb for now. I am going to start playing around with focus too and see if it works as well for me as torch.

If you only use one weapon (unless you are an ele or an engineer) you are losing out on some dps rotation.

I play Ranger and I swap a lot. Each set brings a different set of utilities and skills and it’s quite handy to be able to swap from say, a ranged attack (longbow) to something more helpful when getting mobbed up close (sword/axe). I find that swapping weapons is huge strength for all professions and, until you understand that, you’ll never unlock your full potential.

Are you talking about PvE or sPvP? I would think there is less swapping in PvE (Dungeons might be a different issue).

On my thief I don’t swap as often, I use the short bow when I’m moving around the map, but once I get to an event or a heart I generally stick to my S/P unless it’s a group event in which case I’ll switch for the combo fields and finishers.

On my mesmer though, I am constantly changing between the GS and S/P while leveling because you need to if you want to kill things fast. It’s actually way more fun to swap and use all your skills. It might also be because mesmers are weaker then thieves when leveling (I hear mesmers get awesome at 40, but im still 35). It feels really dynamic to use GS to get the phantasam up, use the toss to get an illusion up, switch to s/p get the phantasmal duelist out, use the gap closer then go into blade flurry and if the health of the mob is low shatter. It feels very dynamic and fun. Especially when soloing veterans or champions.

In sPvP I don’t have rotation, but I’m swapping weapons based on sigils and what’s needed in the team fights. If you want to learn how to weapon swap at the right times, I highly suggest sPvP, it will give you a much better understanding of your profession and you’ll also be much faster at playing. You’ll also dominate in WvW if you ever encounter a 1v1 fight (unless the other person is just as good).

My favorite thing to do in WvW is to do what Ras Al Ghul says in Batman begins," you know how to fight 5 men, I can teach you to engage 50". I will purposely kitten off a large zerg then using shadow steps, shortbow steps etc., I’ll just keep them running after me for a couple of minutes till they get bored.

Never.

Don’t have a weapon swap :P

Engineer is great for swapping with kits. I go from pistol/pistol to flame thrower for a knockback and blind, plus the ground fire that I can fire my pistols through. Then I can swap to the grenade kit for another blind and slow plus aoe damage, or switch to the toolkit and throw nails everywhere to slow things, smack a mob with a pry bar, then backflip out leaving a mine on the ground and switch back to pistols.

I swap freely all the time, especially on my Mesmer.

I get more damage if I set up phantasms from two different weapon sets, and switch between getting in for heavy damage/kiting when I need to heal. This applies for both PvE and PvP, although I switch much more actively in PvP.

With my Ranger my choices are axe or shortbow, and I just swap depending on whether I’m fighting a single target or aoeing.

Kits are one thing.

Weapon swapping is another.

I use weapon swap mainly for range, try to keep a melee weapon and a ranged one at all times.

On my guardian I use mainly the great sword, I switch to a scepter (still undecided about which offhand I preffer) when for range against hard hitting mobs or event bosses, whereas my ranger will use a longbow primary and switch to a great sword if swarmed.

I swap a lot and I mean a lot.
My main is a GS/Staff Mesmer and I learned to swap weapons as soon as I could because it just makes your life so much easier.
Now that I have a Guardian alt that habit carried over and I play my Guardian mostly as a Scepter/Torch, GS.
I also want to try the focus to see if it is as cool as the torch

Lyuben.2613:

Kits are one thing.

Weapon swapping is another.

Yeah if you want to argue semantics, it’s still swapping out all of your skills for another set of skills, which happens to be from another weapon. (Unless you don’t consider a flamethrower a weapon)

Pretty much every 5sec

I weapon swap pretty often. I go from shortbow to greatsword on my ranger to alternate play styles.

Also certain tasks (The Howling King, for instance) really are made for melee.

Constantly, a lot of times my combat tactics for fighting groups of monsters rely on weapon swapping – soften em up from range, leap in and do some hard and fast burst damage, then leap out and finish with some more range. This is especially important with mixed groups of melee and range enemies where some are weak to one kind of attack and some another. I even have a sword that does a special attack when I swap into it during combat, if I needed any more encouragement.

If yer not weapon swapping (or kit swapping for those classes) then you’re really limiting yourself – sometimes even crippling yourself – in this game.

Stevoli.8795:

Engineer is great for swapping with kits.

This is one of those things I’m really lookin’ forward to with an Engineer alt down the line; I can see having tons of fun kit swapping and your little scenario here just proves it.

as a warrior, im always trying out new weapons and retraining my traits to fit those weapons. keeps the game feeling fresh even at level 80. right now im using hammer/longbow and i think its the most fun so far. i love being able to be the first one to jump into the enemy army wvw and knock the front line down while my guild tears them to pieces shortly after :p

I don’t swap as often as I would like. Necromancers don’t really stuff that works well with weapon swapping. I’m running Staff right now for the AOE, and switch over to Dagger/Horn when I want to travel far for the Swiftness buff (with Horn + Spectral Walk, you can have swiftness on permenantly). Other than that, Dagger, Scepter, and Axe don’t really do as much damage as I would like for being in Melee range in light armor.

Icelandica.6320:

Are you talking about PvE or sPvP? I would think there is less swapping in PvE (Dungeons might be a different issue).

Both, whatever players’ experiences are. I find myself swapping as a Thief farming in Orr – there’s a lot of mobs running into you, so while I may prefer to farm with Dagger, I need to break out the Sword every now and again. I mainly swap in non-dungeon PvE just to get a handle on a situation or play around.

If kits are weapon swapping.

Then the necromancers plague, lich form and death shroud are weapon swapping.

Funny I just referenced weapon swapping in my previous post. I’d say about every few battles. When I’m low enough on HP and really need to keep my distance, or when something has a PBAoE or another attack that would be neutralized by going ranged. For example, one would be crazy to fight a krait with a knockback on one of those vista towers as melee. Those aren’t fun at all, as you can’t dodge and poison AoE is everywhere. And one may materialize just as you attack one =(

I use it almost as often as the cooldown allows, either for accessing new field/finisher combos, or just to wait out the cooldowns on my first set.

Plus, the little boons we get from traits for things like dodging, weapon swapping, pet swapping, etc are great. When I 1st started this game I was like “ok, who cares about 2s of protection with a dodge roll or 4s of swiftness with weapon swap?” Now I realize how great it is.

I swap pretty much every 10-15 seconds between shortbow/longbow on ranger. Not so much on my thief.

Not too much swapping in PVE since it’s so easy to faceroll through the PVE game. My warrior GS/rifle not much need to swap since GS is so dominant, but at times I’ll GS 1hb then right to dual axe #5 aoe, pretty nasty for taking groups down. I switch a ton with engineer, but mostly kits, I’ll go between bombs and grenades depending on the situation, even during some fights. Ranger I rarely switch out of shortbow as I find it’s plenty damage to kill a mob very quickly.

The only time I really find myself swapping a lot in PVE is if I’m trying to solo a champion and really trying to do a certain condition or CC, otherwise I don’t find much of a need for it.

I switch very often on my Warrior, I am running S&B and Longbow so I build up adrenaline then switch to longbow for the fire combo field launch 3 for blast finisher and switch back to S&B and leap in for aura. works great at taking down mobs and my S&B is a toughness vitality build so I can take lots of hits and wait for adrenaline to do the damage

Drunken Mad King.8193:

Torch is one my favorite weapons now. I used to be sword and board but torch just kicked board to the curb for now.

YES!
Another fellow burner. I always seem to be the only one around.

And yes, switching is a given.
Currently I favor Staff and Mace/Torch. Staff is just too good a mobility boon to pass up for us slowkitten Guardians.

Though I´m gona miss the torch when I finally have my 2-hand cooldown reduction.

HawkMeister.4758:

Drunken Mad King.8193:

Torch is one my favorite weapons now. I used to be sword and board but torch just kicked board to the curb for now.

YES!
Another fellow burner. I always seem to be the only one around.

Though I´m gona miss the torch when I finally have my 2-hand cooldown reduction.

But but but…. the warhorn’s birdies are so cool… =( The dive bombing and crunching. I love when the mob is dead and they are still feasting on it’s dead body. =)

krojack.4920:

The dive bombing and crunching. I love when the mob is dead and they are still feasting on it’s dead body. =)

Heh, yeah love that too on my Ranger. Guardians only have them ghost weapons for pets.

Katai.6240:

I don’t swap as often as I would like. Necromancers don’t really stuff that works well with weapon swapping. I’m running Staff right now for the AOE, and switch over to Dagger/Horn when I want to travel far for the Swiftness buff (with Horn + Spectral Walk, you can have swiftness on permenantly). Other than that, Dagger, Scepter, and Axe don’t really do as much damage as I would like for being in Melee range in light armor.

I’m swapping all the time on my Necro. In PvE, when I’m actually in melee range, even more so than in PvP. Scepter + dagger or dual daggers are my primary set, the AoE slow ( scepter ), channeled dagger mainhand attack and both of the dagger offhand skills are great – just slap Blood is Power on the mob, put the poison field down and transfer both the weakness and the bleeding to the mob with “4”. Drop the Aoe bleed “5”, swap to staff and put marks down, pretty much everything around you will drop dead by now. In PvE Necro is one of the easiest classes to play tbh.

In PvP I’m using the staff as primary weapon. Going into melee range with dual daggers is often not a good idea and the non-damage effects of marks are much more useful than in most PvE scenarios, having 1200 range over scepter/dagger’s 900 helps too of course. The dagger offhand skills and the scepter 2 ( the area slow ) are still great though and I use them regularly.

I play my thief mostly melee style, so I tend to only switch out to my pistols when fighting in a group or with my friend against tougher mobs, or ones that drop a lot of AoE. Except when I accidentally hit the swap button and then things end up getting shot in the face at melee range (and I probably look stupid…XP. I have butterfingers, what can I say?).

I’m always swapping. My playstyle revolves around it. It’s not quite the same depth as Stance Dancing in WoW, but it’s a similar concept.

As a Warrior I generally swap just before my Adrenaline hits max because I want to use the Burst skill on my Longbow for Fire Field self-combos.

I could really go for a third weapon slot to be honest.