Guild Wars 2

PVE Build: Fresh Air + Arcane for lots of 40% Protection

Purpose:
PVE Fractals/Dungeons. Probably more for LFG groups where you want to ensure some breathing room.

With the recent trait changes making the meta Dagger/Warhorn Fresh Air rotation less fluid, I went back to the Arcane line to see what fun could be had. Frankly I always thought Fire was a bit of a waste when you’re barely in it anyway. And ideally I like to provide something more than just damage to a party.

Here’s the build: Tempest / Air / Arcane

Arcane is all about the minor traits. Elemental Enchantment is nice for boon duration and faster attunements/overloads. The big one is Elemental Attunement for a ton of protection (6.5s) just for swapping to Earth and back immediately. Toss in using Sand Squal on cooldown and you have almost full uptime group protection at 40% effectiveness (due to Hardy Conduit). Since it’s preventative there’s no need to sacrifice any DPS stats like you would with a healing build. Range on the Elemental Attunement is only 240 but you’re in melee with dagger.

Rotation:
Start in Air Attunement
Cast Overload Air
Use Glyph of Storms
Switch to Earth Attunement
Use Sand Squal if up
Back to Air Attunement
Use Lightning Whip and Lightning Orb until Overload Air is charged and repeat

Rotation is same as Fresh Air but swap to Earth instead of Fire, maybe use Sand Squal if it’s up, then back to Air. If you’ve got enough protection or don’t feel the need, mix in swaps to Fire for Burning Speed and Heat Sync.

Thoughts on viability for LFG groups? Nothing we didn’t already know here, been available since the Tempest release. I just find it fun going back to Arcane after so long running Tempest / Air / Fire due to “meta guilt”.

I have the gear so i tested this on the low health static golem with 0 buffs, was looking at it from a rotation perspective and wasn’t looking at all on the damage since i was looking more for fluidity in the build than raw damage output.

From a support perspective i guess it gets the job done, would zephir’s boon be better instead to bump up your damage by 4%? as i said i was looking more at fluidity and it feels a bit clunky to use, it works, just feels a bit weird.

I wanted to be a bit more supportive as well but still keep more fluidity in my rotation so i went for water.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJBIhdSfJ00AW2A4zAwhJWaAMicQRYQKUACAfQ3Lbnd0C-ThRBABUq+zVK/A4EAYmSwHeAA4pHAA-e

Instead of signet of fire you can use aftershock or arcane wave for group reflect or extra blast finisher.
Tidal surge+frozen burst is a nice aoe heal combo together with wash the pain away.

It offers decent enough healing to the melee next to you as well as provide you with a nice fluid rotation.

Rotation is simple enough for damage:

Overload Air>glyph of storms> switch to water>Cone of Cold>switch to air>Lightning Whip until overload air is off cd>>>>repeat it all over again.