Guild Wars 2

After seeing too many people needlessly die from Claw’s ice waves, fear, and ice bombs, I felt compelled to post here.

First off, when Claw first lands, Charrzookas become available at the barrels near the Pact camp on the hill. These barrels are marked on the minimap by orange gears. Many people do not take/use these Charrzookas, feeling instead that their Legendary GS/Bow or whatever do more damage to the ice wall or the Claw itself. These are frequently the people who get downed by the ice bombs, or swept and downed by the ice waves, and complain about the Claw’s fear spam, requiring others to help get them up and slowing the DPS progression vs. the ice wall or the Claw. This is completely unnecessary!

Anet devs have been kind enough to give free access to the Charzookas, and even better, have made the ‘zookas the ultimate defense against ALL of the Claw’s nastiness. Skill 5 on the Charrzooka protects the player from the ice bombs, fear spam, and ice wall. “But it has a 30 second cooldown, and Claw spams fear faster than that!” you say? No problem! While using the skill 5 shield to protect you, you can self-interrupt the skill by moving forward, back, or sideways right after said danger passes. The skill then goes to a 3.5 second cooldown after self-interrupt, allowing you to spam it just as fast as that nasty dragon spams his fear. About to be bombed by falling iceballs? Skill 5 until the bombs fall and you see the words, “Invulnerable!” in white, then move to self-int, hit 1 again to autoattack. Claw has a tell for the fear- both front legs on the ground, big inhale. Hit skill 5, then self-int for the quick cooldown. He may do it again, up to 3 times in a row. If you time it right, you can block all 3 without using any utilities on your bar to cleanse or avoid it. Ice wall about to blow you back to the Pact guns? Same thing- skill 5 till the wall passes, self-int for the quick cooldown, and you’re still in the same spot while everyone around you gets wiped away.

Keep your Charrzooka going in to phase 2, after he’s been hit by the guns and goes to the second area. Here’s where it gets trickier. If you get downed and drop your ‘zooka, pick it up right away when you rally/get rezzed. If you didn’t bring your ‘zooka to phase 2 and want to grab one from a downed player, YOU CANNOT, and further, MUST NOT! During phase 2 the Charrzookas are no longer available, and if you try to pick one up from a downed player, it disappears. PLEASE let the downed player pick up their own Charrzooka! If you don’t have one, get a flame thrower and use it to rid the field of Ice Pillars, clearing the way for the bomb carrying golems. I’ve been at Claw with 15 others, and yes, we beat it by concentrating on clearing the ice pillars, then attacking Claw when he’s stunned.

If you’ve benefitted from this, please share this in map chat before or while fighting the Claw.

Always nice to see these. Sad part is most of the people who do die from those easier attacks die because of 2 things. Lag from the major events (quite common I hear) and the lazy zerg mindset who can’t be bothered to dodge because that requires work. even if this thread can only safe 1 poor soul from a fate of eating snow its worth it.

I used to find this event soo boring until I started using the charrzookas in phase 1 and switching to flame throwers in phase 2. Now I only do this event for the fun of using these weapons!

Another ‘hint’…

At the beginning of phase 2, just after the Claw lands do not run up to the darker blue section in front of the Claw. You will only get downed from the frost waves.

Wait about half way between the cannons and Claw until you hear the npc say, “the wall is down”. Then run forward to attack and make sure you break off the attack and get out of the dark blue section when you see Claw shift the front foot.

Then the fun begins flaming all the ice bits that pop up!

Chaotic Storm.2815:

Always nice to see these. Sad part is most of the people who do die from those easier attacks die because of 2 things. Lag from the major events (quite common I hear) and the lazy zerg mindset who can’t be bothered to dodge because that requires work. even if this thread can only safe 1 poor soul from a fate of eating snow its worth it.

Most people I see die, die because they run onto the bad ice. No matter how many times you tell them why they died, even link the condition, they just keep running into it. Or they run around all crazy attracting mobs to themselves. It’s a strange fight when you’re new to it and most people just have to do it a few times.

What also most people don’t know is that in Phase 1 when you can attack Claw, you should use your melee weapons between his Head and Claw, because then you do double damage.

If you have difficulty with the Charzooka skill 5 and get hit sometime because you are not fast enough don’t worry. Use skill that are break stun and condition removal or skills that are break stun and give you stability. Use these skills for the fear and keep your chazooka skill 5 for the Ice Bomb and Wall of Ice which can down you.

All these advices are wonderful. Thank you very much!

Don’t use the charrzooka’s in phase one. Ferry bombs instead. IIRC a charrzooka shot will hit about 1.5K damage while a bomb will hit 7-9K if thrown and double that if you run all the way up and plant it. Provided you aren’t being focussed by too much agro and are using mobility skills you can ferry the bombs quite quickly.

As soon as the icewall in p1 is down, grab a bombkit run to the claw and place it between his legs and head, if you did it right you’ll deal 30k damage to him.

good advices from the various posts

but the main problem is jorLAG

Thank you Thank you Thank you!
I never had any idea what to do there. Usually spend all my time helping rez others (until I die).

Thanks for the great feedback and additional suggestions! I had no idea running a bomb could do so much damage. Gotta try that on my guardian next time.

i usually use my bow since it hits 3x than a charrzooka. However, i didn’t know it saves you from fear, i’ll give it a try.

After seeing SOOOO MANY people get downed by ice bombs at Claw yesterday, I felt this post needed a bump.

In case people don’t know (or want) to use the charrzooka skill 5; there are always PTV-Altruistic healing-guardians around with condition removals
Yes..you’re welcome

Good guide.

In the final phase, there are two fairly safe spot for rangers to shoot him from. When you’re facing him there are 2 ledges that ppl usually attack from. However, on the right side, there’s a slightly higher ledge where you can stand and if you trait for 1500 range you can hit him. The other spot is down the bottom of the plateau to his right. You can set up shop there and shoot him. With spirits, you can keep pumping out the damage.

However, in both spots you will be out of range or blocked when he gets stunned by the exploding golems.

I emphasise, these two spots only work for 1500 range

Azrael.4960:

The other spot is down the bottom of the plateau to his right.

I emphasise, these two spots only work for 1500 range

That spot also worked with a warrior and bow. Only auto-attack doesn’t work, so in that case you really needed to spam the #1 button. But that was the only way to kill him at the time where we had this bug with the broken mob respawn and no Golems at the event.

Here’s a tip:

Keybind your “walk mode” toggle.

If you turn on walk mode, you’ll only take 2-4 steps back from the fear, which means you’re still in zooka/bow range.

If you have a bow, you should probably use that instead of a zooka if you are good at dodging as it attacks much faster (even the slow Ranger longbow) and typically does more damage. Again, that’s assuming you don’t need the defense and movement skills that the zooka offers.

Theres one thing I didnt see you metion. When Claw fly up from 1st phase to 2nd you can still attack him. If fair amount of ppl do it you can get 10%+ of his hp before you need to run

Uleq.4351:

Theres one thing I didnt see you metion. When Claw fly up from 1st phase to 2nd you can still attack him. If fair amount of ppl do it you can get 10%+ of his hp before you need to run

that’s a good reminder. You can actually get the double damage positions while he’s in there air as well.

I wonder if it’s possible to do enough damage to him then to kill him?

You would need everyone to know it. Tons of buffs and high burst characters. So I bet chances are low

Uleq.4351:

You would need everyone to know it. Tons of buffs and high burst characters. So I bet chances are low

I’m willing to bet they have programmed in limits so that he will ALWAYS survive into stage 2 with some minimum HP value. Just guessing, but I’m pretty sure if was possible to kill him before step 2, some Guild or other organized group would have pulled it off and advertised it as a “thing”.

This is a great post….while I was aware of the power of the Zooka #5 skill, I was unaware it can be halted and put on quick CD. I’ve got to think that is not a “workin gas intended” feature of that skill…..but I’ll certainly try it.

For the first part, find an Ele with a staff in fire attunement is the best consistantly high dps. Even in full soldier gear, autos do more damage as Charzookas and, because the icewall (and possibly the dragon champion itswlf) is considered a structure, damaging ticking aoes are truly devastating! It’s been a while since I’ve done it so I’ll try it again tonight to see if it still holds true.

Bumping again, since I saw dozens of dead and downed at Claw again earlier today.

There are 3 spots on the LEFT side of the phase one path that are completely invulnerable to all but the fear spam, you have to stack in the EXACT same spot (not 1 pixel to the left, right, front, or back cause you’re uncomfortable touching each other), the exact spot. You will not take damage from the ice drops or ice pushers but the fear will affect you (unless you take the above fear spam prevention methods). Charrzooka’s are required there but there is another spot within 1500 range slightly to the north-west that can be attacked using normal 1500 range skills.

If you see my characters Alanna (shadowmist/fireborn), she’s always standing on that spot and calling nodes between 9:30pm-4:00am pst during Claw/Jormag.

Note: it doesn’t matter if you ‘technically’ killed Claw at phase 1, it resets to 50% health and goes to phase 2. It would be pretty sweet if you could kill it during phase 1 if it gave you something truly awesome as reward though.

Note: All dragons have the double damage spot – claw is between his left foot and neck hit spots, shatterer is at the back left corner of the chest spawn – between his right foot and neck hit spot, teq has one too but I forget where but it should be somewhere between his right foot and neck hit spot. Many other bosses have a double damage spot as well. However, double damage requires melee ‘cleave’ weapons. My necro dagger/dagger used to be able to do double damage, but now she can’t – Thanks ANET! >:P

In phase 3, there is a very safe spot for rangers. Head towards the right ledge but before you get there, there is a small overhang with a very small ledge. From there, with 1500 range, you can shoot him in the head. During his stun phase you need to creep forward a little bit, use walk mode, and you should be able to still keep hitting him. Strangely, barrage is out of range, but you can hit the ice crystals that form.

The other safe spot for rangers is down the cliff to Claw’s right. Again with 1500 range, you can pew pew him from there in perfect safety. You’ll be able to reach him during his stun phase as well. The only skills you can use are Long range shot and rapid fire. Barrage doesn’t reach because you can’t see the top of the plateau.

Great jungle wurm has a double damage spot right if you stand at the one of his ridge of spines.

Golem mark 2 has a double damage spot if you stand at any of the corners of its block.

Tequatl’s one is like Claw and Shatterer. Somewhere between his neck and front paws. It can take a bit of shuffling to get it. Each triple headed wurm has one as well. It’s a bit tricky to find but usually you’ll hit it by stacking on the commander tag.

Azrael.4960:

The other safe spot for rangers is down the cliff to Claw’s right. Again with 1500 range, you can pew pew him from there in perfect safety.

That works also with warriors longbow, even if it shows out of range and autoattack
doesn’t work so you really have to spam your #1.
We did that at the time when we had the respawn bugs in Frostgorge where also no
Golems spawned at the event.

I think i heared that even thieves were able to hit from there .. but not sure.

Beldin.5498:

Azrael.4960:

The other safe spot for rangers is down the cliff to Claw’s right. Again with 1500 range, you can pew pew him from there in perfect safety.

That works also with warriors longbow, even if it shows out of range and autoattack
doesn’t work so you really have to spam your #1.
We did that at the time when we had the respawn bugs in Frostgorge where also no
Golems spawned at the event.

I think i heared that even thieves were able to hit from there .. but not sure.

Stuff like Shadow Behemoth and the dragons have weird hitboxes.
A thief can actually use a shortbow in phase one at the double damage spot and all bounces seem to hit until it flies off.