Guild Wars 2

As the title says I would like to ask the PvP team to consider the addition of the commanders stat combination to PvP.

The Commanders stat combination is Power Precision Toughness and Concentration with Power and Precision being the primary stats at equal levels and Toughness and Concentration being the secondary stats at equal levels.

It is a stat set with a focus on Offensive stats. One raw Defensive stat. And a Utility stat.

The builds I can see getting the most use from this stat combination are builds on the lines of Self Reliant style builds. Or builds with an emphasis on self buffing.

Things like Scrapper/Engineer, Shout Ranger/duid, And Tempest, are builds that I see getting the most benifit out of it. With Warrior and Chronomancer builds being just under those. While thieves could develop builds with this stat set in mind. I don’t feel it would be equal to their current options due to the way there traits are setup. And Reaper builds that could utilize this stat set efficienctly are currently out of style. Though self might reaper builds (Reaper/Necro shroud focused builds for example) could very well benefit from it as well. I do not feel that dragonhunter would significantly benefit from this stat set in the current meta.

I have been testing this stat set as a shout ranger in wvw for a long period of time now (Because quite honestly its the only place I CAN test it. Sadly PvE is still zerk meta so I can’t exactly try it out there.)

What my time using it has shown me is that this stat set has a couple key strengths are weaknesses.

Strengths

First: It allows Potentially high damage through long lasting boons. An increase in duration of defensive boons also affords a buffer to its low health pool.

Second: It can extend the duration of a players “burst dps phase” increasing the window with which you can pressure through an opponents active defense.

Weaknesses: No ferocity. As any build that utilizes this amulet will ultimately be a power build. The lack of ferocity has a couple interesting effects.

A. Your Damage is tied to the boons you can produce with your build. Your dps will be focused less on activating x Multiplier and more on cooldown management and the production of boons at critical times. I.E Copying might through heal as one as a shout ranger from your pet to yourself in order to prepare for a burst phase. Increased boon duration means you have a wider window of opportunity for boon transfer as well as a wider opening with which to attack. Meaning your build is on less of a time leash as to WHEN you attack after prepping.

B. Your dps will be significantly lower with this amulet when you are NOT producing boons. Either if your cooldown rotation was interrupted or thrown off sync. Or if your stack of boons has been removed. Which leads me to my second weakness.

Second: A weakness to “boon hate”. Because this amulets damage and survivability relies on the production and maintenance of boons. Builds that can either remove those boons. Or punish you for having boons will have more potential for shutting you down.

For example on my ranger it is possible to temporarily self might to 25 stacks of might. What that means is that if a thief steals those boons from me. Im probably about to get shafted unless I can pressure the thief off of me. Likewise a necromancer can corrupt those boons. Completely shutting down my primary source of damage until I can’ build them back up. Meaning said necro has the tools to even out the advantage I had due to my boon uptime.

My Primary reason for asking for this amulet to be included is that I find it an incredibly fun playstyle and I wish that I could use it outside of just roaming in WvW.

My other reason is that I feel it would be good for the PvP scene as a whole if dpsers had more choice in how they got there damage. A commanders stat build would be less reliant on crits and the ferocity it requires. But would be more vulnerable to other mechanics. I feel giving players more choice in HOW they plan out their damage would go a long way towards making the games gameplay more engaging. As fighting a boon focused build versus a ferocity focused one can be very different experiences.