Guild Wars 2

I recently came back 2 weeks ago after a long break due to the nerfs, and finally have the time to play again. I was able to try the Fresh air build and it was actually not too bad, maybe I won’t reroll to a guardian after all hehe.
But I believe its finally time to drop the classic 2x Superior monk runes, 2x Superior water and the other 2x monk runes which gave a total of +60% boon duration. Would the divinity or scholar runes be best now? And if the boon duration runes are still best, please let me know! May save me alot of gold. ty

I would like to know everybody’s opinion on this as well, both for pve and pvp. Seems like dropping boon duration would cause fury uptime to drop significantly and in longer fights I wouldn’t be able to keep up 20+ stacks on might on everybody around me. That’s one of the problems I have with my elementalist’s builds, since I always roll with friends, it feels like dropping aura share and/or boon duration is too big of a dps loss for my whole team while I gain a decent but probably not comparable amount of damage.

With S/D Fresh Air build I got rid of the boon duration runes, currently I prefer the wurm runes, giving me some vitality and dmg. Works quite well for pvp, pve and wvw. I can still easily stack up might and fury, but having 30 points in arcane. Without these it’s not possible.

I have 10 points in Arcana and 2x sup runes of water/monk. I like the boon duration for the might/fury and regen. It’s a playstyle preference.

Can’t speak to scepter fresh air, but D/D Fresh air doesn’t actually benefit from boon duration all that much given that your big spikes are all coming right after a swap, so you’ll have fury anyways given the 2 seconds from arcane fury.

Recommending runes of the thief. PBAoE and the updraft combos guarantee you hefty uptime on that 10% damage boost.

For all these new air builds, yes, u dont need that much extended boon duration.

For yall that are like me, and havent changed traits from the classic build(do i really need to state them hahaha) since 1956 , you need the boon runes.

I like the boon duration for the extra protection, regen, and might stacking. And because I’m too lazy to get new runes.

Boon duration because almost perma regen/protection and 25 stacks of might is win! You don’t need a whole lot extra boon duration after spending 30 points in arcana to keep perma fury/swiftness in combat if you run auras.

NdranC.5107:

I would like to know everybody’s opinion on this as well, both for pve and pvp. Seems like dropping boon duration would cause fury uptime to drop significantly and in longer fights I wouldn’t be able to keep up 20+ stacks on might on everybody around me. That’s one of the problems I have with my elementalist’s builds, since I always roll with friends, it feels like dropping aura share and/or boon duration is too big of a dps loss for my whole team while I gain a decent but probably not comparable amount of damage.

By the way, I don’t know if I interpreted that part of your statement correctly, but do know that boon duration on allies are determined by their +boon duration even if you applied the boon to them (i.e. if you have 60% boon duration and you apply a 10 second buff, it will last 16 seconds on you but still only 10 seconds on an ally that has +0% boon duration).

Therefore, dropping your boon duration runes will affect the boons on you but will have no effect on boons you apply to allies (in this case, “your whole team”).

AtoBoss.2906:

I recently came back 2 weeks ago after a long break due to the nerfs, and finally have the time to play again. I was able to try the Fresh air build and it was actually not too bad, maybe I won’t reroll to a guardian after all hehe.
But I believe its finally time to drop the classic 2x Superior monk runes, 2x Superior water and the other 2x monk runes which gave a total of +60% boon duration. Would the divinity or scholar runes be best now? And if the boon duration runes are still best, please let me know! May save me alot of gold. ty

I dropped boon duration for runes of divinity.

I still run the classic 0/10/0/30/30 D/D build because I like D/D but I think glass D/D builds are bad. I dropped them after I stood naked in SM one day to see if I could keep perma fury up and I was able to.

Might stacks no problem you can’t keep them up like boon duration runes because might stacks from lingering elements, sigil of battle etc have a long base duration to begin with so they benefit from +60% duration better than say your 5 secs of prot when you go into earth.

By going with divinity I have more damage upfront with boon duration you have to build up your damage.

5 sec protection with 60% boon duration = 8 secs

5 sec of protection with 30% boon duration = 6.5 secs

thats the same for every attunement swap besides might from fire swap.

even sigil of battle is slim difference 3 stacks of might for 26 secs or 3 stacks of might for 32 secs.

Really the best way to get a visual you can see is look at all the boons you get that matter to you most and and look at their base durations.

For me the one that mattered to me the most was stability and prot from armor of earth. I run cantrip mastery now so it wasnt that hard for me to decide.

spalt.6938:

NdranC.5107:

I would like to know everybody’s opinion on this as well, both for pve and pvp. Seems like dropping boon duration would cause fury uptime to drop significantly and in longer fights I wouldn’t be able to keep up 20+ stacks on might on everybody around me. That’s one of the problems I have with my elementalist’s builds, since I always roll with friends, it feels like dropping aura share and/or boon duration is too big of a dps loss for my whole team while I gain a decent but probably not comparable amount of damage.

By the way, I don’t know if I interpreted that part of your statement correctly, but do know that boon duration on allies are determined by their +boon duration even if you applied the boon to them (i.e. if you have 60% boon duration and you apply a 10 second buff, it will last 16 seconds on you but still only 10 seconds on an ally that has +0% boon duration).

Therefore, dropping your boon duration runes will affect the boons on you but will have no effect on boons you apply to allies (in this case, “your whole team”).

I’m pretty sure this is incorrect. You made me doubt myself so I went in game and tried. My friend with 60% boon duration started buffing me (while i had 0% boon duration) and all of the boons he gave me had 60% extra duration on me as well as himself.

My points is, I’m not sure that by changing to Runes of the Scholar I would gain enough personal damage to offset 20+ stacks of permanent and reliable might/fury for my whole team. I know we can stack a lot of might without boon duration, but (without thoroughly testing it) in real boss battles they don’t seem to stack as high at all, specially when you have to dodge or avoid boss mechanics while at the same time staying in air or lightning hammer to maximize dps.

It seems that the jump from 20 secs to 36 secs of might is enough to go from 10-15 to 20-25 stacks of might no problem. Taking into account that for most people, 25 stacks of might represent 35% damage increase for the whole team without even taking into account condition damage.

I would have to test it more in different scenarios and with different builds, I really want to change out of them but man I feel like the math doesn’t let me.

PS: I also feel we seem to forget that Superior Sigil of Battle is a big source of self might, and perhaps it’s misleading us to think that our team at any give time is enjoying as much might as we are, this is not true most of the time.

If your sole intent is to support by might stacking, I’d go with the might duration runes over water/monk anyway, since they add power instead of healing (more damage).

That said, I feel it’s better to spread blast finishers among party members builds if possible. A warrior with a horn and a banner can eliminate the need for you to run boon duration runes and waste damage skills such as churning earth just to provide might (or an engi with any number of builds, or a bow thief, or anyone that knows how to pick up a banner and press 5).

For PvE it really shouldn’t be an issue at all. The abundance of warriors and guardians in dungeon runs should allow for spamming “great justice”, empower, all manner of blasts, etc. There’s no reason you should be pigeonholed into an aurashare build focused on increasing other’s dps unless that’s the way you want to play.

For OP:
I wouldn’t replace the boon duration runes, they are good for some situations, get an entirely new armor set for a damage build. If cost is at all a concern, don’t bother with the high end runes. Ruby orbs offer nearly the same dps (more in reality due to time spent below 90% hp and limiting factors of condition damage in groups) and cost very little.

NdranC.5107:

I would like to know everybody’s opinion on this as well, both for pve and pvp. Seems like dropping boon duration would cause fury uptime to drop significantly and in longer fights I wouldn’t be able to keep up 20+ stacks on might on everybody around me. That’s one of the problems I have with my elementalist’s builds, since I always roll with friends, it feels like dropping aura share and/or boon duration is too big of a dps loss for my whole team while I gain a decent but probably not comparable amount of damage.

AFAIK, boon duration for PvP (spvp) is only really good on powerful boons or long duration ones. That is because you only get 20% duration from the Monk/Water unlike the 40% from PvE (60? with the majors as well). I’m currently running a Prick Protection uptime build so I’m using the Forge Runes (20% prot duration, 10 sec of prot under 50%) but 20% of 3 seconds isn’t all that much (.5 seconds), it is an extra 2 seconds every 3 sets of protection I use (if the game works of small percentages in the first place).

Rune of the Forge (x6):
4x = 20% prot duration, 6x = 10 sec of prot for 60 sec cd (only activates at 50% health)

Rune of Earth (2x):
2x = 15% prot duration

Protection from Forge runes =
3 secs x 5 sources = 15 seconds + 5 seconds (earth swap) + 10 seconds (forge 6x) = 30 seconds total + (10% (10 arcane) + 20% (forge)) = 39 seconds on a 60 sec cd (to combine all of these skills at once). 39/60 = 0.65 protection per second, however 10 seconds is a conditional based whereas all other sources are not.

Prot per skill recharge. I think this is the right calculation, basically I’m trying to work out if I have 100% protection (a number greater then 1) could just be stabbing in the dark though. I basically take how much protection I have, find its duration relative to the skill that grants it’s recharge then add all skills that grant prot together to find the total ratio of protection. If it is over 1 then (if my calculations are correct) I should have 100% protection duration.
3/25 (heal) + 3/16 (fire) + 3/24 (earth) + 3/24 (air) + 5/12 (earth swap) + 10/60 (forge) = 0.12 + 0.195 + 0.125 + 0.125 + 0.42 (rounding) + 0.17 (rounding)
1.155 + (10% + 20%) = 1.5015 if you can keep the sources up (eyeballing forge x 6)
= (0.12 + 0.195 + 0.125 + 0.125 + 0.42 (rounding)) + 30% = 1.2805 this is more realistic to keep our prot up as 10 sec at 50% hp is conditional thing.

Protection from Earth x2 + Forge x4 runes =
3 secs x 5 sources = 15 seconds + 5 seconds (earth swap) = 20 seconds + (10% (arcane) + 20% (forge) + 15% (earth)) = 29 seconds on a 50 seconds cd. 29/50 = 0.58 protection per second.

Prot per skill recharge rate:
3/25 (heal) + 3/16 (fire) + 3/24 (earth) + 3/24 (air) + 5/12 (earth swap)
= 0.12 + 0.195 + 0.125 + 0.125 + 0.42 (rounding)
0.985 + (10% + 20% + 15%) = 1.42825 this is more realistic to keep our prot up

Protection from Earth x4 (4 sec of prot every 30 seconds, 25% activate chance when hit)
3/25 (heal) + 3/16 (fire) + 3/24 (earth) + 3/24 (air) + 5/12 (earth swap) + 4/30
= 0.12 + 0.195 + 0.125 + 0.125 + 0.42 (rounding) + 0.13r
= 1.115 + 25% = 1.39375
or 1.115 + 35% (with 2x water for e.g) = 1.50525

Results:
Forge6 = 1.5015 v Earth2 Forge4 = 1.42825 v Earth4 Water2 = 1.50525 (Earth4 = 1.39375)

Effectively Foreg6 is more 1.5015 rate for the first set of skills if your forge x 6 pops at the right time.

Again, the ratio of protection calculations could be completely wrong, just stabbing in the dark really. I also may have gone of tangent here. Bascially what I’m trying to say is that if you have boon duration, the shorter boons don’t benefit to much unless you have high access to them. The long boons benefit a lot more.