Guild Wars 2

So, I’m starting to prep some gear for my eventual Revenant, and I’m trying to figure out what stats to go after

By default, Zerker is the strongest for PvE, however with the taunt and survivability of Jalis, and the Condi damage potential in Mallyx, would Celestial be an even better bet to go for?

you dont know if zerker is going to be the meta in HoT also hard to say if revenant is going to be useful at all as you cant test what so ever where it would stand currently based on what information we know about the revenant

depends on 2 things;

1) Do they fix condition? (signs point to it getting better)
2) Do they make the fights hard enough to make mitigating/defensive stats worthwhile?

If 1 is fixed it might change, 2 determines whether there will still be an ‘all offense’ meta or not.

Depends on things we don’t know about yet. mostly, will zerker be the meta at all when HoT comes around?

Windsagio.1340:

depends on 2 things;

1) Do they fix condition? (signs point to it getting better)
2) Do they make the fights hard enough to make mitigating/defensive stats worthwhile?

If 1 is fixed it might change, 2 determines whether there will still be an ‘all offense’ meta or not.

well I could see 2 being a little rough, simply based on what we’ve seen with the wyvern, as long as you are coordinated enough to know when you need to defiance break the boss, you won’t have to suffer trying to dodge and mitigate his damage while he’s flying in the air breathing fire all over the place

when he was on the ground, it seemed that there were plenty of tells of when to get out of something that was going to hit hard, so I don’t think fights are going to get any harder anytime soon

Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.

Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.

I think your best bet is to look at Silverwaste.

-Will Zerker remain the strongest DPS? I am sure as hell it will still.
-Will Zerker be a bit harder to play one? It does seem so. It seems the new content really design to kill you now.
-Will Condition replace Zerker? It won’t and it shouldn’t. If anything, it should add to the table but not to replace something from the table. The same go for Cele.
-Will Revenant be a thing in HoT? It certainty should. Why would Anet design a new class to be useless in their new contents?

spoj.9672:

Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.

Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.

I’m not willing to call Condi out yet, it depends not only on how far they go with systems changes (increasing the stack is likely only part of it), but also on any possible skill and trait changes (which are also very possible)

Windsagio.1340:

spoj.9672:

Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.

Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.

I’m not willing to call Condi out yet, it depends not only on how far they go with systems changes (increasing the stack is likely only part of it), but also on any possible skill and trait changes (which are also very possible)

Agreed with the trait part. An awful lot of traits designed to help condition builds in the first place are better used in direct damage builds.

I’m looking at you “target the maimed”; “target the weak”; “attack of opportunity” etc…

Not only condition damage is backloaded (which is expected) but the max dps achievable by condi builds is still lower than the max dps reached by direct damage build (which is unacceptable).

Any real fix to condition damage will increase the maximum dps of condi above that of power builds like it should be. Direct damage is supposed to be lower since it is instant and front loaded. DoT are slow build up, cleansable, and need constant pressure to keep them high and should therefore have a higher theoretical dps. This has been backwards since launch which always confused me.

I suspect that will make rampagers/sinister/assassins/zerker the new meta.

They should in theory balance out for different fights. Zerker/assassins being superior for short high intensity fights with rampagers/sinister doing more dps on longer more drawn out fights.

This would also put carrion and rabid equal to soldiers. That would give us 4 meta/3 second meta gear sets instead of 2/1.

People are being very optimistic about the zerker meta changing. A lot would have to change. As long as the community can cheese “dungeons” with zerker gear, the meta won’t change one bit.

Alex.9268:

People are being very optimistic about the zerker meta changing. A lot would have to change. As long as the community can cheese “dungeons” with zerker gear, the meta won’t change one bit.

This would only apply to those who are dungeon fanatics. It looks like a lot of the rewards from HoT will be in the jungle itself and is designed to break out of the general zerg mentality as well. Right now, zerker rules both dungeons and other PvE. The optimism is that after HoT, you might at least break it out to have a dungeon meta and PvE meta different (and if conditions are really worked well, that could even become more effective or as effective in dungeons as well. It is all a matter of DPS).

Invictus.1503:

This would only apply to those who are dungeon fanatics. It looks like a lot of the rewards from HoT will be in the jungle itself and is designed to break out of the general zerg mentality as well. Right now, zerker rules both dungeons and other PvE. The optimism is that after HoT, you might at least break it out to have a dungeon meta and PvE meta different (and if conditions are really worked well, that could even become more effective or as effective in dungeons as well. It is all a matter of DPS).

The meta applies only to those dungeon fanatics. The so-called zerker meta exists only in dungeons and only those who run it to farm money are under its benevolent effect. Everyone else plays whatever they want.

VodCom.6924:

Windsagio.1340:

spoj.9672:

Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.

Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.

I’m not willing to call Condi out yet, it depends not only on how far they go with systems changes (increasing the stack is likely only part of it), but also on any possible skill and trait changes (which are also very possible)

Agreed with the trait part. An awful lot of traits designed to help condition builds in the first place are better used in direct damage builds.

I’m looking at you “target the maimed”; “target the weak”; “attack of opportunity” etc…

Not only condition damage is backloaded (which is expected) but the max dps achievable by condi builds is still lower than the max dps reached by direct damage build (which is unacceptable).

i would not call it unacceptable, because condition builds are easier to play than direct damage builds and it wouldnt be fair if you can deal the same amount of dps with little effort.
other than that, with the removed condition cap condition builds will be almost as strong as normal damage builds.

My ascended zerk+scholar gear is already ready to go for my Rev, which is my sober armor. I’m currrently getting together my wupeup+travelers gear, my drunk gear, by running lvl 50 fractals.

NoTrigger.8396:

VodCom.6924:

Windsagio.1340:

spoj.9672:

Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.

Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.

I’m not willing to call Condi out yet, it depends not only on how far they go with systems changes (increasing the stack is likely only part of it), but also on any possible skill and trait changes (which are also very possible)

Agreed with the trait part. An awful lot of traits designed to help condition builds in the first place are better used in direct damage builds.

I’m looking at you “target the maimed”; “target the weak”; “attack of opportunity” etc…

Not only condition damage is backloaded (which is expected) but the max dps achievable by condi builds is still lower than the max dps reached by direct damage build (which is unacceptable).

i would not call it unacceptable, because condition builds are easier to play than direct damage builds and it wouldnt be fair if you can deal the same amount of dps with little effort.
other than that, with the removed condition cap condition builds will be almost as strong as normal damage builds.

I’m not sure where you got that notion from, but conditions tend to be more difficult for people to play correctly. Trying to balance which of your condition application skills are on cooldown with the remaining ticking conditions on the enemy is no small task, on top of losing your conditions on an enemy that dies and needing to make sure they all get reapplied to the next target. Conversely, merely using your powerful skills when they come off of cooldown is all a power build requires, so it’s quite the opposite.

I know this example is not perfect, but back when I played WoW I was a Feral DPS (the cat) which primarily relied on the heavy application of bleeds, not dissimilar to GW2 bleeding conditions. It was rarely played because of how difficult it was, but it’s output was really high if you were able to nail the rotation. GW2 doesn’t exactly have that, but it’s somewhat the same.

in gw2 condition builds are easier to play. just compare condition engi to power engi in PvE.
and you cant compare gw2 condition damage to wow. each class in wow has a more complex rotation than gw2.

Rotation management isn’t super crazy hard in GW2, for sure.

That being said, rotation mistakes hurt condition users more than dd users because you have to keep hitting your condition refreshes. Since it’s a continually refreshing sustain, having a miss hurts more (you’re in essence going back a step in your windup time).

Optimally, it should be something like this:
Melee has the highest damage in general, but has meaningful risk (right now we have the former but not the latter)

At either melee or range, condition should have higher potential balanced via the warmup time and the fact that time lost hurts their output more. If damage is being dealt sporadically, direct damage should do more.

That would pretty finely balance the ‘glass’ classes, depending on encounter length. Of course, it’s intensely hard to get that kind of fine tuning down, and any slipup or error will be not only pounced upon by the players but will have it’s importance massively hyped.

MiniEquine.6014:

I know this example is not perfect, but back when I played WoW I was a Feral DPS (the cat) which primarily relied on the heavy application of bleeds, not dissimilar to GW2 bleeding conditions. It was rarely played because of how difficult it was, but it’s output was really high if you were able to nail the rotation. GW2 doesn’t exactly have that, but it’s somewhat the same.

Comparing GW and WoW condition system is rather a mistake. A big one probably.
Additionaly cat was – mangle, rake, 5CP Rip, shred spam, use CP, shred spam+rake use cp again.. just keep up rake + 5cp rip and occasionaly mangle which was 1min debuff when I played :P If You knoww your class there is no complex rotation. My friend always stared at me pushing 6342792834 buttons on lock, dk or any other class cuz he played retri pal.

The content in HoT might not be zerker friendly. We don’t know yet, wait and see.

Condition builds in GW2 are either very simple rotations or ranged. Sometimes both. This makes them easier for PvE. Either because the danger you are in is less or because the rotation is simple so its easier to focus on active defence.

The most complex condi rotation ive found is signet mastery necro, You have to swap weapons and use signets to maintain might, use scepter skills and time DS 2 and 5. And remember to fire off one life blast for dhuumfire. It gets even worse if you have to use scepter 3 to maintain lifeforce for defence. Its a total headache to do this consistantly in something like a lupi solo. But in a group you can be ranged and you have less real danger. So it can be considered easier and deserving of less damage.

Anyway necro condi damage is one of the lowest in dps and its also the most complex. I wouldnt trust anet on balancing condi damage that well if i were you. All the other class condi builds are pretty simple rotations (mostly auto attacking).

I don’t see condis becoming meta for the old content (dungeons and fractals), so probably berserker or assassins as spoj pointed out earlier. As for HoT content, who knows… There haven’t been any instances announced yet and in open world you can generally do w/e you want, so there might not even be a “HoT meta”.

cranos.5913:

I don’t see condis becoming meta for the old content (dungeons and fractals), so probably berserker or assassins as spoj pointed out earlier. As for HoT content, who knows… There haven’t been any instances announced yet and in open world you can generally do w/e you want, so there might not even be a “HoT meta”.

If there’s not a ‘meta’ people will claim one.

Windsagio.1340:

cranos.5913:

I don’t see condis becoming meta for the old content (dungeons and fractals), so probably berserker or assassins as spoj pointed out earlier. As for HoT content, who knows… There haven’t been any instances announced yet and in open world you can generally do w/e you want, so there might not even be a “HoT meta”.

If there’s not a ‘meta’ people will claim one.

So? There’s a tequatl ‘meta’ too, but no one cares. It’s open world where everyone can truly play how they want.

cranos.5913:

Windsagio.1340:

cranos.5913:

I don’t see condis becoming meta for the old content (dungeons and fractals), so probably berserker or assassins as spoj pointed out earlier. As for HoT content, who knows… There haven’t been any instances announced yet and in open world you can generally do w/e you want, so there might not even be a “HoT meta”.

If there’s not a ‘meta’ people will claim one.

So? There’s a tequatl ‘meta’ too, but no one cares. It’s open world where everyone can truly play how they want.

Well there’s a point that dungeons are actually the same way, but that’s been done a ton. The only difference is that one is somewhat enforcable.

Windsagio.1340:

cranos.5913:

Windsagio.1340:

cranos.5913:

I don’t see condis becoming meta for the old content (dungeons and fractals), so probably berserker or assassins as spoj pointed out earlier. As for HoT content, who knows… There haven’t been any instances announced yet and in open world you can generally do w/e you want, so there might not even be a “HoT meta”.

If there’s not a ‘meta’ people will claim one.

So? There’s a tequatl ‘meta’ too, but no one cares. It’s open world where everyone can truly play how they want.

Well there’s a point that dungeons are actually the same way, but that’s been done a ton. The only difference is that one is somewhat enforcable.

They are, in a way. But there you are in a 5 man group, your contribution matters. Your choices have an actual extremely obvious impact on how smooth a run goes. In a 100 man zerg your 1% won’t rly make a difference. What a meta needs more than enforcement is actual challenge and contribution, if changing your build doesn’t have an impact, no one is going to give a kitten.

We have only seen three trait lines out of five, and only half of the traits in the lines we’ve seen are available. We have only seen two weapons so far, and they have all been ranged/support/condi.

There is no enough information to draw conclusions.

Though if I was a betting man, my guess is the Revenant will be full berserker with 62006 trait allocation. The GM trait in the last line that gives 50% more crit chance when affected by Fury will eliminate the need to go deep into the Precision line. The only chance this won’t be the case is if there is a very powerful Precision trait for direct damage builds we haven’t seen yet similar to Forceful Greatsword in importance.

I’d hate to see them add a condition heavy class and not fix conditions. That would be a shame.

Actually all there is to do is implement more non-critable mobs and boost scaling for healing power. They already are removing the 25cap of condiitons as was tested in demo.

If I’m not mistaken Condi can actually be better in solo scenarios. It’s simply that condi’s don’t gain from synergy as much. So even without the condi cap you’re still missing 25% extra damage from Vuln and Prec/Fero won’t help as much so you’re relying on a single stat. So I’d imagine Power builds will still be meta even without the condi cap, though I’d be curious if Sinister might make a play for a possible spot for maybe Engi?

Its very unlikely unless they buff condition damage. The stack limit removal is just a QoL fix to make condition builds not completely useless in open world.

But i really doubt they will buff condition damage because it will break PvP. And i dont think they will create a split that big between PvE and PvP. I would be pleasantly surprised if they did. Although i still think having mostly direct damage should be better in most cases in group content (just not to the same extent it is now).

spoj.9672:

Its very unlikely unless they buff condition damage. The stack limit removal is just a QoL fix to make condition builds not completely useless in open world.

But i really doubt they will buff condition damage because it will break PvP. And i dont think they will create a split that big between PvE and PvP. I would be pleasantly surprised if they did. Although i still think having mostly direct damage should be better in most cases in group content (just not to the same extent it is now).

Aye, in general I’d agree, just really curious on Engi mainly, last I saw even current meta with assassin gear you’re looking at ~20% being condition damage.

I guess the safe bet is to go ahead and get exotic zerker gear now before the price goes up, and then hold off on ascended atm and wait it out for a bit in HoT to see how the new meta settles in. I have most of the ingredients to make an ascended set, so we’ll see.

Or just save up mats, if the changes are bigger than we think and people are wrong, they’re gonna be annoyed.

Im almost completely certain it will be assassins or berserker. But im still recommending people save up mats and wait. Would be pretty annoying to craft berserker and find out assassins is considerably better for Rev. It also saves you if the meta somehow becomes other very unlikely options.

Long live for ZOJjA
Zojja forever
Zojja all the way

rotten.9753:

Invictus.1503:

This would only apply to those who are dungeon fanatics. It looks like a lot of the rewards from HoT will be in the jungle itself and is designed to break out of the general zerg mentality as well. Right now, zerker rules both dungeons and other PvE. The optimism is that after HoT, you might at least break it out to have a dungeon meta and PvE meta different (and if conditions are really worked well, that could even become more effective or as effective in dungeons as well. It is all a matter of DPS).

The meta applies only to those dungeon fanatics. The so-called zerker meta exists only in dungeons and only those who run it to farm money are under its benevolent effect. Everyone else plays whatever they want.

indeed, well or badly.

So I’ve been looking at the Traits for the 3 release trait lines, of course it’s all subject to change, but i think that the Revenant will use some sort of precision based gear at least for PvE.

It seems like every trait has something to do with critical hits, and there is even a trait that lets fury give you an even bigger crit chance.

Now, whether that is Zerker, Assassin, or Sinister has yet to be seen

the more and more i think about it, Sinister seems like it’s going to be the go to, simply because most of the chance on critical hit put a condition on the enemy

however, brute force Zerker will probably work just as well

the more and more i think about it, Sinister seems like it’s going to be the go to, simply because most of the chance on critical hit put a condition on the enemy

warrior currently have a trait that gives them 33% chance to apply bleed on crit. they do not use sinister.

maha.7902:

the more and more i think about it, Sinister seems like it’s going to be the go to, simply because most of the chance on critical hit put a condition on the enemy

warrior currently have a trait that gives them 33% chance to apply bleed on crit. they do not use sinister.

you do know that that is not exactly warrior specific, EVERY SINGLE class have something very similar most is identical with a few exceptions (like mesmer get so that clones always apply bleed on crit (but the mesmer itself doesnt), necro got a 66% chance etc)), revenants seem to have SEVERAL of that kind of traits though at different spots so they can be used together

GummiBear.2756:

maha.7902:

the more and more i think about it, Sinister seems like it’s going to be the go to, simply because most of the chance on critical hit put a condition on the enemy

warrior currently have a trait that gives them 33% chance to apply bleed on crit. they do not use sinister.

you do know that that is not exactly warrior specific, EVERY SINGLE class have something very similar most is identical with a few exceptions (like mesmer get so that clones always apply bleed on crit (but the mesmer itself doesnt), necro got a 66% chance etc)), revenants seem to have SEVERAL of that kind of traits though at different spots so they can be used together

That’s not really how theorycraft works.

Fact 1: We only have like 40% of the revenent traits, so making any conclusions based on that is pretty preliminary.

Fact 2: The GM trait that gives 50% crit chance when under Fury means in organized groups with permanent Fury and Banner of Discipline the Rev can get to 100% crit chance without going deeper than 2 into the Precision Line.

Let’s look at the Precision line so far. Based on the traits revealed so far, is there anything that would be so beneficial to a direct damage build that we would want to go 6 into that line rather than get the Crit damage GM trait granting super-Fury? Not right now.

That being the case we can say gear will be Full zerker with XXXX6. Since We can eliminate the Toughness or Vit lines we are locked in at XX006. Since we know the second line is going to be irrelevant that means we will likely have a heavy investment in Power. 62006 is the conclusion.

Ofcourse that is subject to change. There could be some new GM trait in the precision line that is a 20% damage modifier or whatever. Or the Power line could be made up of completely terrible traits, but that’s unlikely. Assuming they dont radically revamp the system, 62006 seems pretty likely.

Do you guys think going full Zerker will waste some precision with that super-fury trait though?

No. I dont see how you can have too much precision unless you have 100% crit chance with no buffs.

Im assuming you are hinting at using valkyrie. But that would be a bad move just like it is on DS necro. You would have really low crit chance in some situations and you would have extra unwanted vitality which would reduce your effective healing. Toughness is a better stat. And rev has a medium sized health pool so there really isnt any reason to go for more vitality.

NikeEU.7690:

Fact 2: The GM trait that gives 50% crit chance when under Fury means in organized groups with permanent Fury and Banner of Discipline the Rev can get to 100% crit chance without going deeper than 2 into the Precision Line.

Wrong fact there, the trait does NOT give 50% crit chance for fury, it gives 50% MORE crit chance and since fury is standard 20%, that mean you get another 10%, ie fury will give 30% crit chance

GummiBear.2756:

NikeEU.7690:

Fact 2: The GM trait that gives 50% crit chance when under Fury means in organized groups with permanent Fury and Banner of Discipline the Rev can get to 100% crit chance without going deeper than 2 into the Precision Line.

Wrong fact there, the trait does NOT give 50% crit chance for fury, it gives 50% MORE crit chance and since fury is standard 20%, that mean you get another 10%, ie fury will give 30% crit chance

That isn’t how it worked in the beta. But nice try.

NikeEU.7690:

GummiBear.2756:

NikeEU.7690:

Fact 2: The GM trait that gives 50% crit chance when under Fury means in organized groups with permanent Fury and Banner of Discipline the Rev can get to 100% crit chance without going deeper than 2 into the Precision Line.

Wrong fact there, the trait does NOT give 50% crit chance for fury, it gives 50% MORE crit chance and since fury is standard 20%, that mean you get another 10%, ie fury will give 30% crit chance

That isn’t how it worked in the beta. But nice try.

If it really gives 50% MORE crit then there is really no point is rolling any class other than revenant. Might as well just remove them at that point.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

If it really gives 50% MORE crit then there is really no point is rolling any class other than revenant. Might as well just remove them at that point.

Not gonna lie, that comment made me giggle a bit.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

If it really gives 50% MORE crit then there is really no point is rolling any class other than revenant. Might as well just remove them at that point.

Because pretty much all profession can reach 100% in dungeon group anyway?

Because we would still need stealth, group might, group fury, vulnerability and we don’t know if Revenant can provide all of that (probably not).

Because we don’t know if Revenant have more Raw damage than a Elementalist.

Because in some situation we still need the defensive utilities of a guardian, thief, mesmer like blind, aegis, reflection, etc…

Because record run would still need the utilities of a mesmer like Portal.

For now I don’t see any advantage yet to running a Revenant over any other profession. We’ll see when we have a complete picture of the profession.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

NikeEU.7690:

GummiBear.2756:

NikeEU.7690:

Fact 2: The GM trait that gives 50% crit chance when under Fury means in organized groups with permanent Fury and Banner of Discipline the Rev can get to 100% crit chance without going deeper than 2 into the Precision Line.

Wrong fact there, the trait does NOT give 50% crit chance for fury, it gives 50% MORE crit chance and since fury is standard 20%, that mean you get another 10%, ie fury will give 30% crit chance

That isn’t how it worked in the beta. But nice try.

If it really gives 50% MORE crit then there is really no point is rolling any class other than revenant. Might as well just remove them at that point.

Necromancer already has an identical trait (50% crit chance boost in Death Shroud) and it has done wonders for them in the PvE meta.

…

I think it just meant 50% more benefit from fury (making fury go up to 30%) rather than making fury itself go up to 50%.

It’d be nice to shake up the meta and free people to explore other builds, but the trait would be too powerful and thus mandatory.