Guild Wars 2

I recently put some practice into setting off a combo of 8 Blast Finishers in a Smoke Field for stacking Stealth. I’m definitely getting them all off consistently within the Field’s 4-second window, now, but whenever I’m done with the combo, all I end up with is 12 seconds.

When doing the combo, I’m using Healing Turret (1 Blast), Elixir S (simply a different source of Stealth, not relevant to the combo itself), Thumper Turret (3 Blasts), Bomb Kit (1 Blast and the Smoke Field), and traited Mortar (2 Blasts).

I’m aware that Turret overcharges typically only trigger their effects when attacking an enemy, but I read (and verified in-game) that Thumper Turret’s Overcharge will add a second Blast Finisher when it’s detonated.

No other fields are being placed, and I’ve gotten this result consistently.

It’s possible that one stack’s falling off by the time the combo is finished (there’s typically 11 seconds remaining by the time I get my mouse over the buff icon to check), but even if I am managing to get it to 15 seconds, that’s 9 more seconds that are unaccounted for.

Doing the same combo in Bomb Kit’s Fire Bomb yields 21 stacks of Might; since the Field only lasts 3 seconds instead of Smoke Bomb’s 4, the second hit of Orbital Strike isn’t coming into play. So, it’s nothing to do with the Combo system itself, such as a limit to how many times one Field can be Blasted.

According to the Wiki, only 9 stacks of a Duration-only Boon can be applied at once. I know that Stealth isn’t a Boon, but I would have imagined it functions similarly in regards to stacking.

So, what’s going on, here? Is there a cap to the number of stacks of Stealth one can have? Is there some other limit getting in the way? Is there anything at all that I can do to get the full 24 seconds I’m after?

Stealth caps at 5 stacks, so the maximum you can get from blasting is 15s (the highest you’ll see on hover over is 14s due to the way the countdown works). I’m not entirely sure, but I think stealth may also function differently than normal boons in the way that it treats stacks gained when you’re at the cap already, so instead of replacing the lowest duration (currently ticking) stealth stack it would replace the last stack you received. I need to do some tests on that though.

If you want to get over 15s, you’ll need longer duration stealth stacks. For example, if you had 5 engi’s all toss elixir s you could get 25s, or 30s if all were traited for HGH.

Stealth stacks don’t overwrite. So taking 4s to finish your rotation is taking 5s off the last stack while giving you nothing for the last 3 stacks as as prisoner said 5 stacks is the cap.

Personally I typically just drop my HT, drop BoB, hit traited Orbital (2 blasts), then drop the smoke bomb, swap flamethrower when smoke bomb bursts your getting your BoB/Orbital almost instantly, I detonate HT and flame blast, basically a 1s window of blasting then I run, so I’m sitting at 13-14s on the timer as I start to run (again as he said 15s is something you won’t see due to how the counter works). Playing with Thumper Turret I find to be kind of annoying but it can save your HT, you can also swap to shield which I find easier since I hate accidentally activating the turret rather than swapping the skill when I change.

Elixir S is something you want to save, while you’re running after you’re down to the blinking stealth timer you toss it to extend your stealth duration as stacks have fallen off and you’re no longer capped.

Personally I usually have Toolkit, FT, Bomb set up, do the rotation I said above, swap FT to my Elixir S while I run, toss that down once stealth is blinking, and have toolkit on the ready for when stealth is off and I can block through any other obstacle. If for some reason I need it I have Elixir S to invuln in a pinch, but generally don’t need it and I can swap back to my normal setup when I clear the skip.

Again what Prisoner said is correct, to get a 24/29s (visually) stack you need 5X engi tossing elixir S at the same time (traited for 29). But, you can effectively get an extra few seconds and be at around 20 if you just delay the Elixir S.

Well, that’s pretty disappointing. X) But, good to know. Thanks, you two.