Guild Wars 2

Which weapon set is better for might stacking?
What’s the optimal skill rotation for might stacking?

D/D, because of the reduced cooldown on the firefield (#4).

Assuming you are in combat, and that you don’t want neither to waste time (Churning earth), nor precious cooldown (earthquake), this is what I find to be the most optimal rotation (SPVP wise) for might stacking and attacking.

Fire #2 → Fire #3 → Fire #4 → Water #3 → Dodgeroll inside the firefield while attuned to Earth → Earth #3 → Earth #2 → Air #2 → Air #1 → repeat.

It MUST vary, of course, depending on the situation.

From a purely PvE perspective, S/D is better than both D/D and D/F.

The off-hand dagger is terribly bad for might stacking! :O

D/F > D/D

Hat trick pre stack 25 is best.

Ill only talk about a PvE/Dungeon-Perspective here:
To the Fire-Field: u got burning speed(fire 3) on both sets, with 15 Seconds Cooldown anyway, so CD alone is not important.
The relevant parts here are: Shape and Duration of the Field. Dagger Offhand field has only 5 seconds duration, but pretty large round shape and even pugs can see it and u can abuse it for bad warriors.(cast ist when u see their banner cast coming, so u can get their blast).
Focus Offhand has a 8 seconds Field(plenty of time for u to use the FA buffroation if u cant do the quick rotation yet), with a wallshape(from m Experience PuGs do less Finishers here than in Focus field).
So for the Team Focusfield is a bit harder to hit and has a bit higher CD, but has longer duration, while Dagger can use it more with less duration (if ur Rota is quick it doesnt matter), but is better to hit for PuGs.

Now for the Blasts:
Both weponsets have 2 Blasts with the Offhand:
Dagger has Earth 4/5 and Focus Water 5 and Earth 4.
Focus Finishers have 25 Seconds CD and u can use both.
For Dagger they have 40 and 30 seconds CD, but can use only 1.
Cause Churning Earth (Earth 5) has long Casttime. So u should only use it at certain bosses, which get Vulnerable after like 2 seconds u being there(Alpha 2/3 e.g), where u can precast it in a FireField from somebody else, cause else the mightstacks u do yourself will be gone pretty soon and casting it in Fight is a DPS-loss.

So for Blasts Focus is better.
Exceptions here are: Team is able to stack 25 stacks might without that additional blasfinisher and can maintain them over the 25 more seconds, that earth 4(40 Secs cd) needs to be up again in comparision to the Focus one(if Team can get to 25 with 1 Blast u can vary and use 1 of ur 2 blasts every 15 secs for better mightuptime) .
OR: 25 Stacks are blasted at start and fight is finished, before u need to blast again.

Overall: if u wanna stack Might alone u should go D/F and only with the right Team u should go D/D.

PS: Sry for my bad English ^^

Guardians and warriors usually give me might.

D/F, its firefield lasts longer but its harder to blast in it because its smaller. You also have the flame aura.

fire→45 earth dodge into firefield→4 water 3 and 5 when target is in the firefield which you can set up with earth 3. Then you can switch to air for the air auto.

S/D, D/D, D/F ,S/F can all stack might well. Figure out which weapon combo you like to play in the most. That is key. For instance, I can only play Ele as D/D. No other weapon combo is fun for me. I have tried it all and for me, personally, it was just blarg. D/D, however, is just so amazingly fun. The skills i have available just fit my personality and my preferred play style.

Everything can up to 25 sustainable might, it’s just play-style preference. I prefer D/D.

Rialen.1524:

Everything can up to 25 sustainable might, it’s just play-style preference. I prefer D/D.

No no no!

Read the sticky called “guide dps ele in pve” by dekeyz. She explains it all in detail with actual numbers, not just opinions. And personally from a PVE standpoint, D/D is the worst set you could pick.

S/D and S/F in combination with the lightning hammer conjure are the most potent mightstacking weapon sets.
In my opinion S/F is better for in combat might stacking because the longer duration of your fire field (flamewall) enables you to stack more might with your lightning hammer chain + obsidian flesh ensures you won’t have to interrupt your rotation to dodge an attack. The advantage of S/D in combat is higher damage, which also results in you being less useless if you happen to lose your LH. The various S/D and S/F DPS rotations and builds can be found in this video made by DEKeyz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LJOEvCO0DA
For pre combat might stacking S/D is a lot easier to use since it’s quite hard to land dragon’s tooth and comet on top of your flamewall without a target. The common combo is: dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during arcane brilliance channel)->earthquake->churning earth-> during churning earth channel change to offhand focus and cast magnetic wave

If you want to tryhard prestack here are some more combos:

24 might: start S/F->dragon’s tooth->flamewall->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during arcane brilliance channel)->magnetic wave->change to dagger offhand->earthquake->churning earth->water attune->change to dagger mainhand (during channel)->frozen burst

25 for the lolz: start S/D->dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during channel)->earthquake->churning earth->switch to offhand focus (during channel)->magnetic wave (during channel)->water attune->switch to dagger mainhand->conjure flame axe->ring of fire->explosive lava axe->drop flame axe->frozen burst
@train: is this the hat trick prestack you mentioned or is there another way? :p

Although S/F and S/D are superior for mightstacking, in fractals and arah it might be better to use D/F instead. You sacrifice DPS and might, but you gain extra utility and surviveability. Everything is explained in another vid by DEKeyz: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Sr5tJKLfZk

The staff is another option since it’s the highest dps weapon in the game, however you cannot stack as much might compared to the other weapon sets. That’s why in group play you shouldn’t use it unless you want to be lazy or when you aready have another ele in the party. DEKeyz vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_H0HI_OdQtQ

staff prestack combo where you end in fire attunement so you can cast lava font and meteor immediately: start with staff->eruption->fire attune->lava font->arcane brilliance->arcane wave->switch to S/D->dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix-> switch to staff. Normally there should be no occasions where you use this in group play but it has it uses if you’re looking into soloing some dungeons.

Don’t use D/D in dungeons because it’s inferior to the aforementioned weapon sets in every way. Unless you ‘want to play it because it’s fun’ or roleplay.

I’m not that expirienced in playing ele, but … isn’t the dps loss of an ele for picking S/F, S/D, D/D, D/F, w/e for stacking might instead of picking a staff much higher than for any other class that cloud stack might? Like warrior, guard or engi? They all can stack might and I’m pretty sure nothing beats the fire attunement of the ele staff in dps.

Sauzo.6821:

Read the sticky called “guide dps ele in pve” by dekeyz. She explains it all in detail with actual numbers, not just opinions. And personally from a PVE standpoint, D/D is the worst set you could pick.

The problem with numbers is that you always have to make assumptions, and when assumptions aren’t correct, nor is your results.

One assumption made is that you always perform perfect rotations. L/H is higher DPs and more might than d/ when that’s true, but however, what if you can’t stay in 150 melee range to the boss all the time? What if someone takes your hammer?

On d/d vs d/f, I think the playstyle matters. I tend to pug mostly, and pugs don’t kill stuff in 5 seconds, so there’s an actual fight happening for a lot of encounters. D/f’s rotation is a bit fiddly for me, it distracts from the flow of the fight, so I end up playing better with d/d because simply it feels less awkward.

My rotation of sorts is kinda old, but whatever. I start in water attunement and right before the fight change to Air, Air 3 4 5…maybe some auto’s, change to fire 3 4 5… sometimes 2, Earth 4 3 2 (second 2), water 4 3 2 5, just really depends on the situation

petyr baelish.9675:

S/D and S/F in combination with the lightning hammer conjure are the most potent mightstacking weapon sets.
In my opinion S/F is better for in combat might stacking because the longer duration of your fire field (flamewall) enables you to stack more might with your lightning hammer chain + obsidian flesh ensures you won’t have to interrupt your rotation to dodge an attack. The advantage of S/D in combat is higher damage, which also results in you being less useless if you happen to lose your LH. The various S/D and S/F DPS rotations and builds can be found in this video made by DEKeyz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LJOEvCO0DA
For pre combat might stacking S/D is a lot easier to use since it’s quite hard to land dragon’s tooth and comet on top of your flamewall without a target. The common combo is: dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during arcane brilliance channel)->earthquake->churning earth-> during churning earth channel change to offhand focus and cast magnetic wave

If you want to tryhard prestack here are some more combos:

24 might: start S/F->dragon’s tooth->flamewall->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during arcane brilliance channel)->magnetic wave->change to dagger offhand->earthquake->churning earth->water attune->change to dagger mainhand (during channel)->frozen burst

25 for the lolz: start S/D->dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix->earth attune->arcane brilliance->arcane wave (during channel)->earthquake->churning earth->switch to offhand focus (during channel)->magnetic wave (during channel)->water attune->switch to dagger mainhand->conjure flame axe->ring of fire->explosive lava axe->drop flame axe->frozen burst
@train: is this the hat trick prestack you mentioned or is there another way? :p

Although S/F and S/D are superior for mightstacking, in fractals and arah it might be better to use D/F instead. You sacrifice DPS and might, but you gain extra utility and surviveability. Everything is explained in another vid by DEKeyz: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Sr5tJKLfZk

The staff is another option since it’s the highest dps weapon in the game, however you cannot stack as much might compared to the other weapon sets. That’s why in group play you shouldn’t use it unless you want to be lazy or when you aready have another ele in the party. DEKeyz vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_H0HI_OdQtQ

staff prestack combo where you end in fire attunement so you can cast lava font and meteor immediately: start with staff->eruption->fire attune->lava font->arcane brilliance->arcane wave->switch to S/D->dragon’s tooth->ring of fire->phoenix-> switch to staff. Normally there should be no occasions where you use this in group play but it has it uses if you’re looking into soloing some dungeons.

Don’t use D/D in dungeons because it’s inferior to the aforementioned weapon sets in every way. Unless you ‘want to play it because it’s fun’ or roleplay.

Seems about right, can’t currently go in-depth with it anyway as i am on vacation mode.
Offhand dagger can be used, as long as you make sure you to swap out of it before locking in combat. (1)Staff one can be carried by a different weapon set and compensated by end stacks to stay capped it’s a bit trivial and show-boaty though…

(1) as shown you in the Video i recorded for you.

Xyonon.3987:

I’m not that expirienced in playing ele, but … isn’t the dps loss of an ele for picking S/F, S/D, D/D, D/F, w/e for stacking might instead of picking a staff much higher than for any other class that cloud stack might? Like warrior, guard or engi? They all can stack might and I’m pretty sure nothing beats the fire attunement of the ele staff in dps.

Engis, probably, since their max DPS setups happens to also stack 12 stacks of might, so if you got 2 engis in your party, you might be better off going staff. However, whether it’s worthwhile taking 2 engis is up to debate.

Warriors, idk, all I know is that they take a much bigger DPS loss to stack might than eles, and their might isn’t as good because it takes longer to build up and errodes better sources of might. Great for pugs though, because the chances are that no one else is stacking might.