Guild Wars 2

Thoughts on warrior’s viability in pvp?

Glassy berserker amulet is gone and a thing of the past. Tanky as kitten is the new fashion now, and a couple of tanky warrior builds are becoming popular in arenas.

Stunlock warriors are strong and viable competitively. In team fights they have the freedom to overextend and survive, and be able to pressure single targets well. The CC support they offer is useful in many team comps. At the very least, these warriors now meet the bare minimum requirement to be viable: having map presence. That’s a start.

Another interesting path that has not become mainstream yet is the tanky condition route. This is the build I have been experimenting and refining with for a few months now. Why Healing Signet? It now heals more than a max adrenaline Healing Surge over 30 seconds. Combined with Adrenal Health and regen, it’s like having a ranger’s Troll Unguent activated but all the time. Why banner? The banner fills up everything that the build is lacking and more: it gives damage, mobility (low CD dash and perma swiftness without having to use Signet of Rage), strong healing through perma regen, and AoE team support. Each bonus from the two rune sets and leeching sigils heal for ~1000 HP each, which compliments the build’s “forever-healing” theme nicely (think: GW1’s Monk).

Healing signet was always pulsing every second.

zone.1073:

Glassy berserker amulet is gone and a thing of the past. Tanky as kitten is the new fashion now, and a couple of tanky warrior builds are becoming popular in arenas.

Stunlock warriors are strong and viable competitively. In team fights they have the freedom to overextend and survive, and be able to pressure single targets well. The CC support they offer is useful in many team comps. At the very least, these warriors now meet the bare minimum requirement to be viable: having map presence. That’s a start.

Another interesting path that has not become mainstream yet is the tanky condition route. This is the build I have been experimenting and refining with for a few months now. Why Healing Signet? Before the patch, the signet healed one pulse every 3 seconds. Now it heals every second, which is a 300% increase in healing output. It now heals more than a max adrenaline Healing Surge over 30 seconds. Why banner? The banner fills up everything that the build is lacking and more: it gives damage, mobility (low CD dash and perma swiftness without having to use Signet of Rage), strong healing through perma regen, and AoE team support. Each bonus from the two rune sets and leeching sigils heal for ~1000 HP each, which compliments the build’s “forever-healing” theme nicely (think: GW1’s Monk).

Thoughts on warrior’s viability in competitive pvp? Please keep feedback on topic with non-hot-join pvp, so only arenas.

Till i was still playing ( 1 day pre last patch) i still used to run a zerker stunlock war.

0-10-30-0-30 with mace/shield and hammer

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNApeSjcOxwpQ2Q4wBE0jvoK4iTBlQ9YO2w4A-TkAg0CnI4SxljLDXSuscNgA ( paralyzation sigils on both weapons).

cleansing ire+ zerker stance+ triple stances + 25% duration on stances: unstoppable beast, with one of the best condi removal/resistance in game, good suppport via banner rest and probably one of the strongest 1vs1 proffs, literally DEMOLISHING spirit rangers and engineers and necros.

With 25% moar damage on hammer, hammer deals MORE DAMAGE than GS by a long shot ( even auto-attack chain has better dps than 100 blades), and you have also good mobility via Earthshacker + warrior sprint.

Imho war is near A tier currently, the only issue is it’s still diffiult to find a “proper” role to the warrior: you need to build a very different comp than usual, and it’s still difficult to do it.

But it’s absolutely viable, i would say very powerful.

If warrior was actually viable now, more top teams would be running them. Warrior isn’t as bad as it used to be, but it is still far from viable. There are a few builds that are alright, such as M/Sh GS, M/Sh H, M/Sh S/M(or A), and LB S/Sh. Really the first two excel more at 1v1 than anything else, and even then are at a disadvantage to many classes 1v1 builds. Healing Signet really isn’t that great imo. Sure, you end up with some decent regen, but you have no burst healing and are weak to spikes and poison. I and many others are still using surge for those reasons.

Scoobaniec.9561:

Healing signet was always pulsing every second.

Thank you, fixed. Confused the signet healing for adrenal health.

Ashanor.5319:

If warrior was actually viable now, more top teams would be running them. Warrior isn’t as bad as it used to be, but it is still far from viable. There are a few builds that are alright, such as M/Sh GS, M/Sh H, M/Sh S/M(or A), and LB S/Sh. Really the first two excel more at 1v1 than anything else, and even then are at a disadvantage to many classes 1v1 builds. Healing Signet really isn’t that great imo. Sure, you end up with some decent regen, but you have no burst healing and are weak to spikes and poison. I and many others are still using surge for those reasons.

Well, it is true we can solve the burst problem in many different ways (Defy Pain/Endure Pain).

Actually some people say it’s a bit over the top. I don’t know, I for once like to feel like this:

XD

However, it’s not the highest HPS skill in the game (engi heals are higher, and I don’t think those are OP).

Well, it’s a nice original build. How do you feel it compares to spirit ranger? Have you considered taking banner elite + banner cd reduction?

Well, it is true we can solve the burst problem in many different ways (Defy Pain/Endure Pain).

Most of the builds can’t afford 30 in Defense for Defy Pain (Hammer does – but generally doesn’t take DP), and while Endure Pain is alright, most of the builds already have a decent amount of toughness and EP does nothing vs conditions. Yes, it will help with the spike damage problem a little bit, but what are you going to do for the 56 seconds it is down? My utility set up is generally X, Balanced Stance, Berserker Stance. X is generally switched based on what I feel I need at the time but I have been using Bull’s Charge a lot lately. It can double as extra cc or an escape if timed well.

Warriors don’t have the sustain to survive TPVP, temp buffs that make you not take damage for a little bit are fine until you realize most classes can just wait until that ticks to 0 and front line you with fear/poison/bleeding/weakness/cripple/chill/burning all at once.

To be able to bunker, you need a way to get something that regenerates your health quickly and lower the damage you take significantly Protection, without it you cannot bunker.

Also, because of how the only way to remove conditions is through actions, a cc and blind can stop our condition removal, while other classes condition removal continues to work just fine, even when they are stunned/cced/crippled/chilled/weakened ect ect.

Now because of this, the warrior has no place in TPVP.

Brigg.6189:

Well, it’s a nice original build. How do you feel it compares to spirit ranger? Have you considered taking banner elite + banner cd reduction?

I feel like spirit ranger is superior in all aspects, but that is no fault of the warrior class. It’s the spirit ranger that sticks out as an outlier compared to all other classes in the game.

I’ve tried to make Battle Standard work but unfortunately its effect is too weak for its 3-4 minute cooldown. The self-stun when casting stability (oh the irony, and why does stability have to be cast?) feels awful, among many other issues with that ability.

Rampage, on the other hand, is actually interesting. You get three 1000 range dashes during Rampage form now (Ranger’s Swoop 3x), which is absurdly good mobility. You can literally travel from one end of the map to the other in Legacy of the Foefire by chaining dashes from skills and Rampage. Lots of reliable CC and 30 seconds of stability on a 2 and a half minute cooldown. It’s an interesting option now.

No, its because the spirit ranger is just a better all around class with better traits and better trait placement. Their utility skills are just better, traits are better, everything is better.

Have you ever seen the warrior tree? We have random stuff thrown around all over the place, our tree is an absolute mess.

I just wish they fixed the warrior and lowered our HP to 15k or something.

We have conditions in our power tree.. and power stuff in our conditions tree… it really doesn’t make any sense.

About 85% of the spirit ranger’s gameplay is automated by 5 sources of evade, NPCs and A.I. (GW2’s A.I. is freakishly good – more useful and stronger than some human players, even). The reason I say spirit ranger is superior than warriors and even most classes in the whole game is mostly due to how passive their gameplay is. They are not reliant on active ability effects, so they don’t have to deal with the RNG that everyone else does. You can blindfold a guy, tell him to start playing spirit ranger, and he’ll still end up killing everyone on the map somehow.

However, just because rangers are an outlier in balance, does not mean warriors are not in a good place right now.

The problem with tanky condition damage dealers is not the warrior but first of all im going to point something:

WARRIOR CANT BE A BUNKER… it has no protection, no matter how much regen, burst will kill you you have no way to mitigate the damage, bunker means to tank more than 1 person, so you cant talk about bunkering if you are only fighting one person, and even with one person, if that person is a zerker thief, you are done for good the burst will kill you.

Now about the tanky condition builds, its not a warrior problem its GENERAL problem of the game mechanics, conditions have no stat or boon that reduces their incoming damage, so you have people that can take a lot of punch dealing at the same time great condition damage, this is not balanced, that is why the meta turned out to be a condition meta, because is the best option to deal damage right now, that is why the necros feel over powered too, this is the source of all the problems right now.

I am very impressed with the warrior play I’ve seen in solo q by nikkle, riippii and Z O N E and Ezra ( plus a few more I don’t remember). At the moment if they are played right in high end games they carry their weight. Could use a couple minor buffs though.

Lux.7169:

I am very impressed with the warrior play I’ve seen in solo q by nikkle, riippii and Z O N E and Ezra ( plus a few more I don’t remember). At the moment if they are played right in high end games they carry their weight. Could use a couple minor buffs though.

More like, if they are played exceptionally better than everyone else, they can sometimes appear good when they outplay people.

The build has a blank utility, what is it?

Ashanor.5319:

Lux.7169:

I am very impressed with the warrior play I’ve seen in solo q by nikkle, riippii and Z O N E and Ezra ( plus a few more I don’t remember). At the moment if they are played right in high end games they carry their weight. Could use a couple minor buffs though.

More like, if they are played exceptionally better than everyone else, they can sometimes appear good when they outplay people.

Wait, don’t people say we are the easiest class to play?

kitten , I fear we overreacted too much on our forum.XD

redslion.9675:

Ashanor.5319:

Lux.7169:

I am very impressed with the warrior play I’ve seen in solo q by nikkle, riippii and Z O N E and Ezra ( plus a few more I don’t remember). At the moment if they are played right in high end games they carry their weight. Could use a couple minor buffs though.

More like, if they are played exceptionally better than everyone else, they can sometimes appear good when they outplay people.

Wait, don’t people say we are the easiest class to play?

kitten , I fear we overreacted too much on our forum.XD

In PvE, yeah.

pot.6805:

The build has a blank utility, what is it?

More info about the tanky condition build here.

zone.1073:

pot.6805:

The build has a blank utility, what is it?

More info about the tanky condition build here.

Thank you, will give this a test later. I have been wanting to see a build using a sha-mmy so definitely interested in this.

Well, it looks like the tanky condition warrior build is catching on. I’m seeing it a lot more frequently in arenas, which is interesting.