Guild Wars 2

I’ve been mostly playing trapper ranger, power ranger and medi guardian before HoT, but found dragonhunter and power druid tricky to learn. I tried out a build that had worked well during betas (and made me one of the few who seemed to believe in overloads, I’ve not understood why there’s so much discussion about daggers) – staff, shouts, celestial amulet, fire attunement. I run earth instead of water attunement this time. It gives crazy amount of kills, like over 10 per match, but unlike a power ranger I can choose where to make a stand. It’s as if enemy players just enjoy basking in the heat while my toon screams ‘inferno!’… I’m still surprised how easy it is to catch people in the lingering whirlstorms after overloading.

Anyway, try staff+shouts in PvP, it’s easy to pick up and play.

I felt like I had less 1v1 capability with staff tbh

I don’t think staff is particulary bad, but D/F just provides more stuff. I accidentally left my staff on and couldn’t switch back so had to play staff and it wasn’t horrible. I think it’s pretty good for aoe cleanse, but Obsidian flesh, projectile destroy and magnetic wave alone with the cc just outclass staff.

Staff has better support and better onpoint pressure so I don’t think it shouild be wholly overlooked in comparison to D/F, especially since you still have magnetic aura from it and you have more CC in fights, and with cleansing water, torrents, and shout runes you yell off a ton of condis on allies. Its not really my playstyle though.

You could always tack on earth shield for the invuln, though that cast time will be a kitten to deal with.

Most of DF tempest I fought against on point with staff lost the cap because of obsidian flesh, so it is a double edged sword. Same with all invis/invulns, you should only use it for support if you have a teammate on the point or if you are sure to get the kill in time. I have been playing DF for a long time, but I find staff so much more glamourous. And aesthetics is what matters. I agree with nearlight, staff has better support and on point pressure + ranged cc though their reliability could be reworked (looking at you gust).

The EU tempest meta has shifted towards staff tempest. I mean who needs obsidian flesh when chronocancer bunkers and infuse light Rez procs will instantly Rez you in the unlikely chance you even go down?

MyPuppy.8970:

I agree with nearlight, staff has better support and on point pressure + ranged cc though their reliability could be reworked (looking at you gust).

Yeah. You can jump over Gust to avoid it (test it yourself; you’ll see).