Guild Wars 2

Wondering if condition damage isnt a fool’ kitten
Somehow I get the feeling its not really a winning pick with condition removals available.
Also getting your stacks up might take time depending on class.
Duration seems rather low and before you got enough stacks no doubt a removal pops up.

Crit has the obvious instant damage that seems to make this worth tons more rather than conditions?

I used search mode but somehow I havent found a topic about this allthough I would love to see what others think. Any links from older threats perhaps?

Conditions are not softened by armor, which is a plus in my view.

miniL.7361:

Wondering if condition damage isnt a fool kitten
Somehow I get the feeling its not really a winning pick with condition removals available.
Also getting your stacks up might take time depending on class.
Duration seems rather low and before you got enough stacks no doubt a removal pops up.

Crit has the obvious instant damage that seems to make this worth tons more rather than conditions?

I used search mode but somehow I havent found a topic about this allthough I would love to see what others think. Any links from older threats perhaps?

i assume you mean crit dmg, and yeah condition and crit are different playstyles. Conditions are less bursty, but also dont have as much mitigation, they proc even while you arent attacking (depending on class and condition duration) Its really a very different playstyle so comparing them isnt that accurate. But in terms of raw damage, if you could just wail on something with no response, direct damage is going to be higher.

The effectiveness of conditions change drastically depending on where you play. PVE solo, can work quite well, especially a big stack of bleed or a maintained burn. But head into a PVE group situation, never mind WVW or SPVP where enemies are intelligent enough to equip condition removers, and they quickly hit a wall.

This because there is a hard limit on how many conditions can be stacked on a single target, be it a boss or trash mob. This result in reduced individual effectiveness if multiple people apply the same conditions, something you do not see with direct damage.

In my view conditions are awesome in PvE as most mobs can’t do anything about them. However in the various PvP modes they aren’t worth taking because of the removal skills players bring. A lot of people say that conditions are a problem in PvE groups on account of multiple people possibly using them, and this resulting in one player not contributing because his conditions are being overwritten constantly.

This is….dumb. But I can see how it could happen when dealing with the players who don’t know what they’re doing. I prefer to always build my characters with access to a “backup condition” so that doesn’t happen. This way if I see a player in my party using a lot of, for example, bleeds I just swap to poison. That way we are both doing damage because our conditions are not competing. This requires actual coordination with your party however, and a willingness to not just play a rotation. You’d be surprised how rare both of those things actually are, especially among the players always complaining about how dungeons are just graveyard zergs that don’t need coordination.

well clearly he needs to state PvE or PvP as there is a huge difference. However, I stand to stay Crit damage is clearly superior in PvE than condition damage.

Source/Proof: COF P1 Farm = Not condition damage DPS.

Thanks for the oppinions so far, and Im interested in the comparison in general so PVE & PVP both.

Perhaps I should rephrase the question a little bit, because what I am interested in is the reason to run a condition build except for some dungeons perhaps.

Single target beside bosses I would want nuke power or p/t/v (tanky) builds to either get my enemy down fast, or to get a lot less damage while working on them.

When killing a lot of pve numbers isnt it still the same to just pop aoe with crit, rather than using condition aoe’s because again, you kill them faster so less damage.

Obviously crit has its upsides, no doubt its downsides, and a tanky build for example is usefull to kill totems in cof (like the one just before the boss in p1) doing the maximum damage as crit and conditions are useless, and just taking the damage from the flamethrower a lot easier.

Now in PVP and WvW it was already mentioned, you dont play mindless stuff, so people will run at least with some condition removal, again making crit or toughness/vitality or something hybrid in between ofcourse, a lot more viable.

Now the actual question is, not just between crit and conditions so to speak: Are conditions viable in any way? Because the way it currently works, I dont see why I should run conditions except for the awesome effect of seeing numbers fly over my screen =[

PS: well thats at least something dinominator, but with all the condition removal I do you think its worth it?

Depends on if your class is able to stack up conditions well. Considering all the limitations that exist, like the stack limit or ineffectiveness against fortifications, it’s often not as efficient as a power build. I’d never go that way in PvE, and in WvW actually only when aiming for high survivability.

It really comes down to what profession your playing and such.

If your playing someone who only gets access to the one condition at a very slow rate then its definitely not worth it in any situation.

Once you start getting access to 2 or more in a way that allows you to keep them up it starts becoming more viable.

In pve if you compare Crit to Condition, you basically deal direct instant damage which is great, everyone likes that, no real downsides (other than lack of crits on objects but thats the same for conditions) like stacking issues.

However a good condition build can end up doing the same if not more damage over time if stacked well and utilizing gear that also boosts their direct damage when applying the conditions with the added advantage of freedom of movement, once your conditions are up you don’t need to be stood still attacking you can run around avoiding stuff while your still doing a good portion of your damage.

That said in PvE there really isn’t a great deal of difference between the two, you’ll still get the enemies down and most likely in roughly the same time.

Though conditions do have the issue of not stacking from multiple people very well, if your hitting over 13 stacks of bleeds each you’ll end up both doing less bleed damage once you hit 25 total and start replacing each others bleeds, if you both have poison with a permanent uptime whoever has the high condition damage will deal the damage the others wont etc.

Arkham creed touched on this but they used single condition condition builds as an example which don’t exist…. they also worked on the assumption that applying poison instead of stacking your bleeds offers the same sort of damage…. which it really doesn’t, if there is more than 1 condition dealer using the same conditions unless you will both end up doing less damage than if there wasn’t another person.

In PvP crit and condition both take a different roll, crit is generally about the bursting targets down while conditions are for spreading among the enemy group to weaken and kill over time, yes condition removal can be an issue but if your running a condition build you should be able to keep applying all your conditions regularly until they run out of removal.

Sure a steady supply of conditions can be applied, but untill the numbers get actually high it doesnt do much damage it seems. By then the heals and condition cooldowns are probably ready to be used again and the damage you do drops again in PVP for example.

Another example I ran across was BAKED KOMALI with guild missions. He doesnt really take any conditions at all making condition build useless again (I presume though its only when you cant get him debuffed).

Also in general de condition fights seem to take much longer on say a single mob, or in PVP a single player, and before you get done whats needed, in PVP or WvW friends will come along helping the player get rid of the conditions or just helping them up when they are downed, and killing you if you hang around to long.

The other way around is possible, that you yourself get backup, but still that way the 1vs1 didnt end in a 1vs1 because your conditions simply dont work out.

Im interested though, does komali take crits when he has his buff up?

Because in most reactions about all the limitations to conditions im starting to feel like rerolling my condition chars to crit or support/tanky characters
I like the condition play style, but Ive seen trouble in group chat when PUGing and there is more than 1 player with conditions as well which kinda gives me a lot of negative thoughts about the whole conditions idea.