Guild Wars 2

I’m playing in WvW as a 30 fire, 30 arcane, 10 air (25% run speed), 100% Berserker gear, full-on glass cannon build. And it is FUN. I have four level 80 Exotics so far.

My favorite thing to do is immobilize someone with the signet, place a Lava Font, Flame Burst, and Arcane Blast all at once on someone and watch them die in seconds. Lava Font and Meteor Shower (with Blasting Staff and Persisting Flames) when defending/attacking keeps/towers is also fun and extremely helpful to manage enemies (or even kill a few) and gives my teammates some breathing room.

Now, I’m also reading a lot about how people are stacking condition instead, or vitality/toughness, and I’m just wondering, am I doing it wrong? Aside from dying fast, is there anything else I’m not aware of that I’ll kick myself for spending dozens of more gold on more Berserker Exotics? As I said, I do enjoy it (even when taking into account dying fast in 1v1), but thought I’d ask before investing so much more gold. Any other glass cannons out there enjoying it too?

Yeah , its fun for awhile…

until u get tired of dying to 2 hit KO thieves in stealth ( backstab + steal combo ).

have fun.

10 air for Zeypher boon is worthless. You can get perma swiftness in air without that trait and since it doesn’t stack with swiftness and only works in air, what good is it doing you?

With such a squishy build you’re better off spending those 10 in water for the extra vitality and the condition removal upon water attunement. That’d increase your survivability by more than you think. You will not miss the 4% critical chance you’ll lose.

I also don’t think full beserker is worth it. Your damage is still below a thief’s and you don’t have damage mitigation mechanics like stealth and evasion to make it realistically viable in skirmish fights where you will certainly be focus fired. I suggest beserker amulet, accessory and rings, and either valkryie (sp) or power toughness vitality gear.

I also started with a berserker set + berserker jewels. The damage was good but with very low defence and health.

The condition damage for staff is just useless. We just do a stack of burn and 6 stacks of bleed which they won’t do serious damage no matter how condition damage you have.

I’d suggest you the same as Eclipses suggested. I bought a Power/Toughness/Vitality set and saw a big difference. The damage is still there, there’s less critical chance but it’s still good but you now have more defence and health to cause them a headache cause with 3 dodges(2 + 1 from fire), arcane shield, magnetic aura(for ranged attacks) and the + in toughness and vitality you won’t die so easily.

For the traits as Eclipses said Zeyphyr’s Boon is useless. I personally have it 30/20/0/0/20 with quick glyphs and inscription (for double boon on heal).

Eclipses.7152:

10 air for Zeypher boon is worthless. You can get perma swiftness in air without that trait and since it doesn’t stack with swiftness and only works in air, what good is it doing you?

With such a squishy build you’re better off spending those 10 in water for the extra vitality and the condition removal upon water attunement. That’d increase your survivability by more than you think. You will not miss the 4% critical chance you’ll lose.

I also don’t think full beserker is worth it. Your damage is still below a thief’s and you don’t have damage mitigation mechanics like stealth and evasion to make it realistically viable in skirmish fights where you will certainly be focus fired. I suggest beserker amulet, accessory and rings, and either valkryie (sp) or power toughness vitality gear.

How do you get permanent swiftness without 10 in Air??

[Edit]: Ahh, I just checked. I think you’re thinking of the 5 in Air automatic trait, Zephyr’s Speed (Move 10% faster while attuned to air.).

I’m talking about One with Air (You move 5% faster every 10 seconds you are attuned to air. Maximum of 25% bonus movement speed.). Permanent 25% speed bonus.

Does that change what you were trying to say?

And again, is there another way to get permanent swiftness without 10 in air? (With a staff.)

JohnnyRockets.7593:

How do you get permanent swiftness without 10 in Air??

Via Combos.

Care to elaborate?

And I edited my post. I meant One with Air (permanent 25%), NOT Zephyr’s Speed (10%).

Start in Earth. Eruption > Air > Static Field on Eruption > Arcane Wave in Static Field > Windborne Speed > Equip off hand Dagger > Updraft. More than enough swiftness to get you where you’re going.

^I don’t bother with swapping if I’m using staff. If I still need more swiftness after all that (I also use Elemental Attunement trait) I just burn my glyph heal in air.

JohnnyRockets.7593:

Care to elaborate?

And I edited my post. I meant One with Air (permanent 25%), NOT Zephyr’s Speed (10%).

That 25% does not stack with swiftness though which is 33% – For staff all you need to do is be in air, use your heal glyph in air, your AoE swiftness then place your static field and use Arcane Blast while inside of it to grant AoE swiftness, I do it all the time as it is great to upkeep AoE swiftness for the zerg and if I’m soloing when I’ve done that combo I’ll equip an off hand dagger for RTL and Updraft.

Also I found that all out damage is not worth it, most of the time you’re in a zerg and will be hit my countless AoE’s and usually it’s about outlasting either another zerg or a points defenses, I mean a dead ele is a useless one and will only contribute to you loosing so you need to have some form of defense so you can last longer.

I have full on berserk set, i top 100 kills an hour in wvw with a group(i’m useless alone if i’m fighting a thief/warrior), but like some people said it’s quite annoying dying to thieves in 1-2 shots.

my build is

30 fire
10 air
10 water
20 arcana

it’s actually quite fun since my #2 water skill can drop 8k crits max against 60% of players i encounter in wvw, on average my #2 water skill crits 3-6k however.

sad thing is my only survivability comes from all util spells, mist + teleport is pretty awesome but once you pop those skills and then go back into battle and then chit goes wrong, you’re basically dead already.

Sorry Johnny, I had the wrong name. I described the trait correctly but I used the incorrect name. The “One With Air” trait is the one I meant. It’s useless. Even if you were specc’ing into air: it’s useless. You’d have to stay in air ridiculously long just to get it to its max speed and as we’ve already said, perma swiftness is already possible without it.

Heal Glyph in Air attunement + Windborne Speed + Static Field + Arcane Wave = renewable perma swiftness. While this is easier with the air cd trait, it’s not needed at all. This simply highlights the stupidity in our traits but that’s just imo and neither here nor there.

All of that is with Staff btw, yes. Again, while the pretty numbers are definitely nice, you need some staying power. Unlike thieves who can wear full beserkers due to their innate mitigation mechanics, you must be able to take a hit.

I also am a staff, berserker build elementalist. Yeah the damage is nice but I am very very squishy. I find that my character is strongest as a part of a large group where I am not so easy for thieves to pick out. In small group skirmishes I tend to die before I can reach my full damage potential. So stacking some vitality/toughness probably isn’t a bad idea.

This is my build. It’s a standard Staff/Cantrip build.

I rock full Berserker armor with Ruby gems slotted with full Berserker Jewelry (mostly Exotic still finishing up Jewelry). Damage wise my staff auto crits for around 1700 or so currently with 40% crit and 63% crit damage. I think I’m soft capped on critical damage (it doesn’t seem to be going up anymore even tho I added 5 rubies to my armor) so I am thinking of swapping out to Coral gems in my armor for the extra precision and a bit of condition damage.

Survivability wise I’m usually pretty good. The build has a lot of regen (Cantrips all grant regen) and a boatload of condition removal. It also can double a bit as a back up heal support with powerful water AOEs with a smidge of healing power and again more condition removal. You also get the basic blast combo (Eruption → Geyser) to help out in that situation as well.

To obtain perma swiftness simply be in Water Attunement → Air Attunement (Swiftness) + Glyph (Swiftness) + Windborne Speed (Swiftness) which all stacks duration. Swap back to Water (best for passive regen) then again repeat when Air Attunement comes back up. You can do the same with the Scepter/Dagger combo and still get the powerful Ride the Lightning as well.

I don’t do much 1v1 as I tend to stick with the crowd in WvW. Even then anything short of some ultra high burst class (think thief or something similar) I usually survive or am able to escape. Usually if I am solo I swap in the Scepter/Dagger instead. Really it don’t bother me too much. Thieves are good in the roaming role and can take most classes 1v1 just like Elementalists really dominate the whole keep siege/defense scene with the AOE. If I wanted something a bit more roamer oriented I’d probably play my Mesmer anyways.

I also like this build because in PvE I can swap in Conjurer for Lightning Hammer. You may think this is nuts, but the attack speed will keep most things perma blind so you’ll be fine once you fall into that groove. I leveled up like this and had no problems (other than people stealing my weapons) to the point it made me play my Ele over my Guardian.

Soulblazer.3105:

The condition damage for staff is just useless. We just do a stack of burn and 6 stacks of bleed which they won’t do serious damage no matter how condition damage you have.

I’m rocking full Carrion exotics and 30 fire/earth and I can assure you, those six stacks of bleeds hurt. A lot. If I land two eruptions (not the most difficult task in the world during sieges), that will typically lead to a dead enemy, or close to. One alone is enough to back them off. Additionally, when someone is downed I can generally keep them downed, provided they’re within range.

Rodriguez.7682:

I’m rocking full Carrion exotics and 30 fire/earth and I can assure you, those six stacks of bleeds hurt. A lot. If I land two eruptions (not the most difficult task in the world during sieges), that will typically lead to a dead enemy, or close to. One alone is enough to back them off. Additionally, when someone is downed I can generally keep them downed, provided they’re within range.

Yea I really wanted to pull off some kind of Fire/Earth mix style build (30/0/30/0/10 or something) with signets in the mix. Could get crit/condition from Rampager gear/signet, toughness from spec/signet, HP/Crit/condition from Carrion/Valkryie Jewelry (replace gems) and everything gives power. Even without any condition damage stacking 2 Eruptions on someone is enough to make anyone back up so I can only imagine what would happen if you stacked up condition damage out the yang.

I still might do it one day when I’m rich, bored and looking for something to throw my money at and just craft up all the exotics.