Guild Wars 2

Yodelay!

ceimash pls put more vid and your crazy build and spirit build !

Dirame.8521:

Why do you keep focusing on one build? There’s isn’t just one build for the Condi Guard. Also why do you think that you can actually figure out how this build works using just theory? You actually have to play it to figure it out.

And about “Time to Burn”, do you truly believe that no one can evade burst multiple times? Conditions on the other hand, when you apply them in so many ways, will always catch your target. And recently I decided to merge a spirit spec to my condi build, just to see how it would pan out. I have faster TTKs (Time To Kill) now because CC is king.

I could show you buildssszzzzzz that “theoretically” shouldn’t work, but just end up working. One of which is my very crazy version of the condi guard.

Who said I only review and test builds on paper and numbers? I have been actively playing these condi builds this past week or two that they have resurfaced to see for myself, as well as analyzing why they do or do not work from both an effective perspective and a mechanical perspective.

Case in point Messiah’s build, I playedthe 6/2/6/0/0 build he posted and it works, downs people without them expecting it, I even got hate tells from mesmer trolling me to the point I had to block him.

It is effective, but not (I hate to use the words) “optimal”.

Biggest disadvantage are the ones I listed. If these builds had more survival to see out the duration of burning, then I think I would favor them more.

There is something to say about sudden burst that downs someone at key points though, which is why direct damage tends to be (not always) better. On demand damage, versus delayed damage.

I feel if more of our condition damage traits that look like they should synergize together were achievable in unison instead of pick one or the other, we would have a better standing as condition dealers.

Also, I really feel survival needs to be looked at. Yes guardians are “tanky” but no they are not in some regards, especially depending on healing power or lack of it.
We only have so many blocks/blinds/dodges.

Compare us to the thieves and elementalists, who we fall within the same tier of health with. Thieves have an overabundance of dodging and evades, as well as incombat mobility and combat resets. If you lock them down they die, but a good thief will dance in and out when needed.

Elementalists also have a good amount of control via stuns, knockbacks, and mobility. They are good at kiting and waiting on cooldowns for huge instant damage, then go back to mobility, with some huge healing potential.

Guardians are supposed to be the “frontline fighters” who “once engaged in combat stay in combat” (to paraphrase what has been said by the devs). Yet a majority of the opponents are not trying to stay in combat with you. They are kitting you and ranging you. I feel we need more frequent and usable blocks and damage mitigatiors. Our healing potential is situationally dependent, and our damage suffers if we spec for survival.

In comes what I feel should work but does not -> Our bunker spec should damage via conditions.

Our traits have synergies all over, but they are often out of reach or in the same line and overlap as to prevent these potentially great builds.

WE are missing something, and I feel the community is finally starting to see that, as I see a lot of hate talk about how useless guardians are in pvp now.

I wonder how long “guardians are in a good place” can last before we finally get some meaningful changes.

Back to the point.

Burning guardian -works-, but I don’t think it is better than standard damage yet

i agree guardian in bad spot in tpvp (especialy high tier) low and mid tier will used sometime bunker guard thus i would love to see some changes who give the bunker the burning abilities which hurt and turning the tide even in 1v2

but if you compare guard to guard build the hybrid is still better if picked over the medzerk but nit the bunker one. and its big but as ppl choose the meta comp thief, engi ele if they want sustain and dmg

I agree that guardians in pvp are in a bad spot.

I look at a trait like Permeating Wrath: "Virtue of Justice’s passive effect no longer burns your target, but instead burns the area around you each time it activates. "

It sounds like a decent way to do some aoe damage, even if it is only in melee range, but there is no way to make a decent condi build with it.

6 points for Amplified Wrath
6 points because it’s the condi line, (and radiant retaliation?)
0 points leaving you no survivability
0 points leaving you no health
6 points for Supreme Justice and Permeating Wrath

^ that makes no sense, and sadly, most guard builds make no sense.

…and don’t even get me started on all the traits that no one would ever, ever use.

i think permeating wrath made for more wvw zergy situation where you going with the melee train and burn everything around you
in small scale fight its not useful at all

as you see some ppl make useful with it in wvw in roaming dueling and small scale fight as with medzerk

in pvp the situation for the class is in problem due to the cele meta comp which guardian cant bring higher dmg or good bunker support as the ele /engi while holding the point

thus if they could buff up the burning dmg by more ticking /dmg scale or even make the guardian par with the sustain with more blocks heal et then this class could stand against the ele and engi in good spot

sure in 1v1 the guardian should win but in pvp where you need to cap points rotate your locations fast enough or hold points any guardian build as for now bit behind

CMF.5461:

It is effective, but not (I hate to use the words) “optimal”.

Neither is the current DPS Guard from what I hear.

CMF.5461:

Our healing potential is situationally dependent, and our damage suffers if we spec for survival.

Everyone has this issue. Some less than others. It just so happens that Anet also know how effective the Guardian can get if given more survivability without sacrificing damage.

CMF.5461:

In comes what I feel should work but does not -> Our bunker spec should damage via conditions.

What’s stopping you from grabbing a Cele Amulet, Permeating heat, Supreme Justice, a few other utilities, stacking might and burning people with a bunkery/Burning spec?

CMF.5461:

Our traits have synergies all over, but they are often out of reach or in the same line and overlap as to prevent these potentially great builds.

It’s really not neccessary to have Permeating heat or Supreme Justice. You can make a good build without it. It just so happens that you want to have your cake and eat it too but really, it’s quite balanced this way. In other cases though, there isn’t enough synergy to form cool builds (hammer being a prime example of that.)

CMF.5461:

WE are missing something, and I feel the community is finally starting to see that, as I see a lot of hate talk about how useless guardians are in pvp now.

Apart from what you’ve mentioned above (which I think is personal taste), what else do you think is missing?

CMF.5461:

Burning guardian -works-, but I don’t think it is better than standard damage

I think it works very differently and it’s all based on preference. Only situationally, is one better than the other.

the problem is not with the hybrid build or even the full condi one
the problem is ppl try to take it in pvp and work it out in situations which wouldnt worked
its like to take p/d condi thief against bunker guard on a point in tpvp. the thief wont be able to do much while the bunker could w8 for his dd ele or thief to fast taking the p/d out

thus the meta cele comp make it harder for use to shine right now

in 1v1 situation both medzerk and hybrid work nicely (i think the hybrid more)
also in 2v2 the same
but put it against dd ele and engi or bunker guard it will take some time to take them out as both healing and cleanse each other. but also every class will have some problem with this comp.
the word as i see it in tpvp high tier is sustain . dd ele sustain longer, engi the same, thief with evade and dodge the same . you wont see full zerk team as they cant sustain against the cele meta .. etc etc…

in wvw i have lots of fun with his build roaming and even in zerg fights
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAR7dlsApcoVDxbI8DNR8QZ1HUdAkAP61/wMkDA-T1RHABEq+zH7P0kyvAuIAnpboOlgA8EAIFAMjBA-w
better armor better dmg better hp better burning then medzerk

I’m going to avoid falling into the disagreement chain for the sake of disagreements with Dirame/Ceimash. I think you really pride yourself in being different so much that you base your identify on going against the grain even if it may be without reason.

Guardian has been renowned from launch to have a huge sacrifice for damage and survivability with large skews to one side of the scale or the other. This was identified as balanced by the community, which is why we are in “a good place” to this day. Guardian’s are the “most balanced class”.

To the point of celestial amulet attempts, I have tried it and we do not have the same impact as the two/three celestial amulet classes have that engi and ele (to some degree warrior) can achieve. Even with Permeating Wrath.

Again this hearkens back to having to go all out on defense OR offense, not both typically.

What do I think is missing? -Leeway- otherwise known as flexibility in the class. We are so polar it becomes restricting.

The cake and eat it issue is more of a point where, here is a trait that, by itself is pointless, but with other traits it becomes usable…but you can never achieve those traits together. I just want the cake to not be a lie.

I actually agree a lot with messaih. The overpowering ability of sustain that the current meta cele comp can provide is hindering growth across the board for the other classes.

So the question is, do we need a buff or do they need a nerf? We have gone through two years of pseudo buffs/tooltip changes where we are pretty much at the starting line still.

Other classes have advanced and fallen back, then caught up. They grew and developed over time.

I do not think our sustain is truly that overly amazing over other classes. I think this was a player community generated idea based off bias and preconceived notion that guardians are “tanks”…then we found out there are no tanks in this game but we continued to try to shoe horn the guardian as the “tank”.

After it was shown that others can tank just as well, we held on tightly to the idea that guardians are the best “support” class in a team fight. Now we are just kind of on the fringe of the meta. Maybe that is good, because it will open us up to change finally.

I don’t think our damage is amazing either. We arguably have some of the highest or “the” highest dps in pve depending on who you talk to. It is actually really good.

Our pvp effectiveness on the other hand has not showcased this. We have a few flashy videos and short lived stars of the dps limelight, but as a whole it has not really taken off. Why is that? Because either

a) we are limiting ourselves as players based on previous preconceived notions

or

b) we are not as effective in dps as other classes are

If it is b, do we need more damage? more survival? more control? At the moment the community feels damage is fine, survival is fine…so we are left with control.

I do feel that condition builds, are effective in potential damage but lack sustain to see the damage out sometimes.

This is why I feel direct damage builds are more “optimal” in a dps flavor, because they front load the damage. This way if your burst lands you survive to see the damage happen. If you miss the burst, then you are dead anyway, but at least you completed your attacks.

….I tried to not get into it, but I feel this ended up being still confrontational with the previous post…sorry. I was just trying to voice my opinions and perspectives with as much reasons as I could. Not trying to pick fights. I voiced it as best as I could and I will leave it alone from here.

CMF.5461:

I think you really pride yourself in being different so much that you base your identify on going against the grain even if it may be without reason.

I have this to a fault but I do try my best to know when I’m extremely wrong.

CMF.5461:

Guardian has been renowned from launch to have a huge sacrifice for damage and survivability with large skews to one side of the scale or the other. This was identified as balanced by the community, which is why we are in “a good place” to this day. Guardian’s are the “most balanced class”.

To the point of celestial amulet attempts, I have tried it and we do not have the same impact as the two/three celestial amulet classes have that engi and ele (to some degree warrior) can achieve. Even with Permeating Wrath.

I think when people say “balanced” they mean, “nothing annoys me with that class”. And to that end I do agree with them.

I also think it’s a question of CC. This is why the Hammer meta is coming back because players are beginning to realize that CC is king in PvP.

Look at the Cele Engie and the Cele Ele, what do they both have? Crowd Control! The Engie has Overcharged Shot and Magnet Pull, the Ele has Shocking Aura, Earthquake and Updraft. Another thing they have his heals that come off cooldown quickly. The Engie has combos with his heal and the Ele has heals built into their skills which means that those guys don’t have to use a utility slot to gain survivability. Same thing with their CC, they don’t necessarily have to spec for those either. And this also could be said of the Warrior as well.
Now compare this to the Guardian. We have to use the utility slots we have for heals (meditations) and then we don’t have enough CC on some of our Weapons to really shut these guys down. This is the reason why people are running around with Hammers now and even then they still suck because Hammer is such a long CD weapon.
This is why when I switched to using a Spirit Weapon Hammer in my Condi build, my TTKs dropped significantly because 3s knockdown could be the difference between dead or alive. And a hammer that interrupts every few seconds is also a game changer in many cases.

Went on a bit of a tangent there but what we lack is definitely Crowd Control. If anything needs to be buffed it would be our ability to CC as often as Warriors, Engies and Eles do.

CMF.5461:

To the point of celestial amulet attempts, I have tried it and we do not have the same impact as the two/three celestial amulet classes have that engi and ele (to some degree warrior) can achieve. Even with Permeating Wrath.

Again this hearkens back to having to go all out on defense OR offense, not both typically.

What do I think is missing? -Leeway- otherwise known as flexibility in the class. We are so polar it becomes restricting.

I recently gave a celestial build a spin and I think it can work well. May need a few tweaks here and there but it gets a thumbs up from me on the “potentially good” scale.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAR7dlsApaotDxVI8DNR8gUZgEYOt71/CmD-TJBBwASuIAAeCAF3fAcZAA

CMF.5461:

The cake and eat it issue is more of a point where, here is a trait that, by itself is pointless, but with other traits it becomes usable…but you can never achieve those traits together. I just want the cake to not be a lie.

What combinations of traits are you finding this issue with? I know Spirit Weapon traits are all over the place, and Symbols are a bit weird but apart from that, what else is there?

CMF.5461:

I do not think our sustain is truly that overly amazing over other classes. I think this was a player community generated idea based off bias and preconceived notion that guardians are “tanks”…then we found out there are no tanks in this game but we continued to try to shoe horn the guardian as the “tank”.

Our sustain can be quite good in team fights. Merciful intervention can heal you for the same amount Shelter would and it could also heal you from 0-100% if you have enough allies in the area (so turret engies/engie’s elite on your team, spirit rangers or even Minion Masters can take you to full health by just teleporting to them with their pets up.).

CMF.5461:

….I tried to not get into it, but I feel this ended up being still confrontational with the previous post…sorry. I was just trying to voice my opinions and perspectives with as much reasons as I could. Not trying to pick fights. I voiced it as best as I could and I will leave it alone from here.

It’s alright. I think I sounded more confrontational in my last post compared to yours so don’t worry about it. You were fine.

tyvm Ceimash, I appreciated the honest reply and not being offended by my response.

I am going to try out your celestial build over this next week and I’ll attempt to provide some good feedback.

I also agree with your crowd control assessment being a good way to up sustain/damage through active gameplay and not just overbuffing various offensive or defensive stats.

Via CC we can play smart and buy time at the right moments, without making face tanking too strong or making burst guardians OP….hopefully.

regarding dmg
hybrid guard can do only with burning condition 800 dmg which means around 8 stacks of bleeding
or 5 stacks of bleeding and poison and torment

as you can see these are the conditions engi and necro or any condi class can proc in average fight on an enemy in pvp

now the guardian with sigils can proc poison and 3 stacks of bleed which potentially can bring the dmg even higher to 1300 dps

so the dmg lets say is equal to any condi class in the game in average

now what other class have
CC !
necro got chill/fear/cripple so with this chain especially fear those conditions tick nicely
engi got kd and few blocks
and guardian none of them (hammer is hardly a condi weapon with so low speed and long cd attack thus the cc in more passive than active

now take the necro add another life pook hp or the engi with good water filed blast self heal and you got self sustain cc condi spec
while guardian have 3 more blocks and short 2 sec of immunity (not to conditions)

this is why in 1v1 the guardian can excel as his dmg is higher and faster
but in group play the CC and self sustain is lacking
thus group prefer the engi / necro

for me if i group with bunker guard or cele ele even in 2v3 we can hold a point nicely and down 2 ppl at once as the burning proc is amazing while my ally heal me and protect me thus this build truly need specific class and build around you to be effective

Initial response with the build:

While working celestial, there is not a source of might stacking. So I would suggest a combination of empowering might and or sigils of battle to make up for the damage.

Merciful Intervention is a pain to try to land, or maybe I just suck at ground targeting. Moving allies often are out of reach visually unless standing right next to me already. 1200 range, but tpvp has a lot of corners and walls between each cap point, so obstructions limit use.

Symbols on this build are minimal, so probably swap writ of exaltation for superior aria to have more stability from stand your ground. Or even just pick up 3 meditations and take pure of heart for a little bit more healing on virtue refresh via renewed focus.

Right now this build is mostly a meditation dps build with no condition damage, less power and crit chance, but more toughness and vitality.

Lack damage to kill for the gains made in survival stats.

I will continue to play it more throughout the week.

CMF.5461:

Initial response with the build:

While working celestial, there is not a source of might stacking. So I would suggest a combination of empowering might and or sigils of battle to make up for the damage.

Merciful Intervention is a pain to try to land, or maybe I just suck at ground targeting. Moving allies often are out of reach visually unless standing right next to me already. 1200 range, but tpvp has a lot of corners and walls between each cap point, so obstructions limit use.

Symbols on this build are minimal, so probably swap writ of exaltation for superior aria to have more stability from stand your ground. Or even just pick up 3 meditations and take pure of heart for a little bit more healing on virtue refresh via renewed focus.

Right now this build is mostly a meditation dps build with no condition damage, less power and crit chance, but more toughness and vitality.

Lack damage to kill for the gains made in survival stats.

I will continue to play it more throughout the week.

You can activate Merciful Intervention without allies being around and it would give you the 4k heal. Allies in the area being a bonus.

Have you made those changes to the build and seen improvements? Because the Cele Engie also drops in damage but gains survivability. If you ran Carrions instead of Cele with the Engie, the damage output is incredible.

You can run Purging Flames for a Might stacking field, using Shield of Wrath in it and then leap through it. Depending on the speed of the attacker, you should average 10 stacks of might.

You can also take off the Sigils of Accuracy, 31% base crit chance is fine.

Amins.3710:

Keksmuffin.1450:

The builds have been pretty much variations of these two:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQRAsf7dlsApcoVDxbI8DNR8QZ1HUdAkAP61/wMkDA-TJRHwAV2fIwTAAZZAAnEAA

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQRAsf7dlsApcoVDxZI8DNBARlZREhWGARw1hQFsBA-TJRHwABeCAILDA4kAEa/BA

The Better Build is this

I swap between Vigor and Blind constantly. lol

Krait Runes are for Cover and Bleed Duration. I actually like Guardian Runes in this case, as you double up on the Defender Flame Trait.

As Holl stated, it’s HYBRID, not condi. Hybrid… w/ Might Stacking.

The reason people are talking about it is because it is a ~fun~ build: people have to try to take the point, while you can just spam symbols, blocks, blinds and do a really good amount of PASSIVE Damage w/ ~pretty good~ self sustain.

It’s just different and as anyone who has played Guardian knows, we’ve been stagnate for a really….really….REALLY, long time.

I made some condi builds/video’s a very long time ago (mid 2013) but condi/hybrid as a Guardian has been a joke until AW…. which isn’t to say it still isn’t… just playable at least, now in sPvP.

Do you play an engi and go roaming on FA or something like that?

After all that time I pointed out how ruin of the krait was less than optimal, I am going to post a build that utilizes it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAFeAAIOEAp2fwaZAA

Build Structure

• Amplified Wrath opens the door to superior burning over every other class in the game without overly heavy investment into condition damage, this will make your burn ticks happen before anyone else
• While down Zeal and taking burning traits, augment direct damage more by 10% with Fiery Wrath
• Further augment direct damage with either Zealous Blade or Scepter of power….or compromise and pick Binding Jeopardy (this will allow both GS and Sc to do 8% more damage on either weapon after burst setup)

The above choices led me to take Scepter and Greatsword after traiting down Zeal so heavy.

• Poison provides a protective layer that prevents targets from healing up after your burst.
• Bleeding acts as a buffer for cleanses as well as augments burning damage by an extra 300 per tick

The above 2 things combined with the standard whirlwind burst from GS prompted sigils of geomancy and doom on the GS when swapping for a burst kill.

• Scepter is a “ranged” weapon, so on swap aoe sigils are less than optimal
• Vulnerability is inherent in the weapon as well as direct damage
• Auto attack is about one hit every second, so low cooldown runes synergize well with the attacks
• Continued condition damage from burning and bleeding provide pressure between bursts

The above choices led me to take Sigils of Fraility to further establish direct damage burst setup and Earth to help buffer condition damage pressure. I may opt for Sigil of Strength to increase condition AND direct damage instead.

• Bleeding is now a heavy part of the build and I want to maximize stacks and uptime

This sole choice encouraged me to actually take Rune of the Krait after talking negative about it in another post. This is the highest bleed duration increase available with 45% duration to bleeding. Also provides some damage on elite with torment/poison…meh?

Gear and Build

After that everything else fell into place. Meditations are the best self reliant heals available to a dps oriented guard. The build is also still focusing on direct damage with heavy stacks of vulnerability and power orientation. So furthering damage multipliers I took focus and 2 into radiance for more vulnerability on blinds.

Since conditions are now a part of the build I opted for Rampager over Carrion or Rabid.

Carrion and Rabid are pure condition damage amulets and they both lack one attribute or the other that we will need to focus on direct damage. One has power and vitality but no precision, this increases survival but leads to weaker condition application without crits and less direct damage.

The other has precision, but no power or vitality, lower survival and direct damage, but more condition application.

Rampager is a true hybrid amulet that provides direct damage, conditions, and survival. All at lesser amounts but the guardian has conditions built into every build (burning). Also they lack vitality, so this needs to be gained somewhere. Lastly this amulet still allows you to crit and increase direct damage with precision and power.

Damage and Rotations

The build will maintain 3 stacks of bleeds and can ramp up to 6 stacks on weapon swaps. (267 and 534)

Burning is available on demand with JI and/or VoJ active or passive. (744)

Poison is simply there as an anti heal after burst condition, but it still provides some damage. (177)

typical condition damage per second totals up to 1188-1455 damage a second.

WW will only provide an average damage of 3157 damage every 10 second
Combined with Smite doing about 3054 damage every 5 seconds.

On an immobilize burst setup, you should achieve about 6000 damage in direct damage, followed up with the 1188-1455 condition damage trailing after. That should kill a target with 18000 life in about 10 seconds after initial burst, assuming full at start.

After burst, swap back to scepter and ranged/kite targets. This will keep you out of necro wells, engie turrets, elementalist ground fire effects, mesmer boon corruption/condition appliers…and just in general bad things on the ground.

When ready to burst set up with immoblize/blind/SoW, then swap to gs and spin to win.

Long explaination, but try it out and let me know how it feels.

CMF.5461:

After all that time I pointed out how ruin of the krait was less than optimal, I am going to post a build that utilizes it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAFeAAIOEAp2fwaZAA

---

Build Structure

• Amplified Wrath opens the door to superior burning over every other class in the game without overly heavy investment into condition damage, this will make your burn ticks happen before anyone else
• While down Zeal and taking burning traits, augment direct damage more by 10% with Fiery Wrath
• Further augment direct damage with either Zealous Blade or Scepter of power….or compromise and pick Binding Jeopardy (this will allow both GS and Sc to do 8% more damage on either weapon after burst setup)

The above choices led me to take Scepter and Greatsword after traiting down Zeal so heavy.

• Poison provides a protective layer that prevents targets from healing up after your burst.
• Bleeding acts as a buffer for cleanses as well as augments burning damage by an extra 300 per tick

The above 2 things combined with the standard whirlwind burst from GS prompted sigils of geomancy and doom on the GS when swapping for a burst kill.

• Scepter is a “ranged” weapon, so on swap aoe sigils are less than optimal
• Vulnerability is inherent in the weapon as well as direct damage
• Auto attack is about one hit every second, so low cooldown runes synergize well with the attacks
• Continued condition damage from burning and bleeding provide pressure between bursts

The above choices led me to take Sigils of Fraility to further establish direct damage burst setup and Earth to help buffer condition damage pressure. I may opt for Sigil of Strength to increase condition AND direct damage instead.

• Bleeding is now a heavy part of the build and I want to maximize stacks and uptime

This sole choice encouraged me to actually take Rune of the Krait after talking negative about it in another post. This is the highest bleed duration increase available with 45% duration to bleeding. Also provides some damage on elite with torment/poison…meh?

---

Gear and Build

After that everything else fell into place. Meditations are the best self reliant heals available to a dps oriented guard. The build is also still focusing on direct damage with heavy stacks of vulnerability and power orientation. So furthering damage multipliers I took focus and 2 into radiance for more vulnerability on blinds.

Since conditions are now a part of the build I opted for Rampager over Carrion or Rabid.

Carrion and Rabid are pure condition damage amulets and they both lack one attribute or the other that we will need to focus on direct damage. One has power and vitality but no precision, this increases survival but leads to weaker condition application without crits and less direct damage.

The other has precision, but no power or vitality, lower survival and direct damage, but more condition application.

Rampager is a true hybrid amulet that provides direct damage, conditions, and survival. All at lesser amounts but the guardian has conditions built into every build (burning). Also they lack vitality, so this needs to be gained somewhere. Lastly this amulet still allows you to crit and increase direct damage with precision and power.

---

Damage and Rotations

The build will maintain 3 stacks of bleeds and can ramp up to 6 stacks on weapon swaps. (267 and 534)

Burning is available on demand with JI and/or VoJ active or passive. (744)

Poison is simply there as an anti heal after burst condition, but it still provides some damage. (177)

typical condition damage per second totals up to 1188-1455 damage a second.

WW will only provide an average damage of 3157 damage every 10 second
Combined with Smite doing about 3054 damage every 5 seconds.

On an immobilize burst setup, you should achieve about 6000 damage in direct damage, followed up with the 1188-1455 condition damage trailing after. That should kill a target with 18000 life in about 10 seconds after initial burst, assuming full at start.

After burst, swap back to scepter and ranged/kite targets. This will keep you out of necro wells, engie turrets, elementalist ground fire effects, mesmer boon corruption/condition appliers…and just in general bad things on the ground.

When ready to burst set up with immoblize/blind/SoW, then swap to gs and spin to win.

Long explaination, but try it out and let me know how it feels.

I question Focused Mind instead of Defender’s Flame. You essentially lose about 8 burn blocks or almost 6k burn damage, not counting shelter.
But ill try the build later when I have time

Other options are to pick up rune of strength + sigil of strength encourage 5 extra might while auto attacking with scepter.

Or

take sigil of ice + maybe speed or travelers rune to prevent being kited by a target somewhat while auto attacking again with scepter. I feel sigil of earth should remain on scepter to further augment burning and bleeding procs with auto attack. Puts you close to 1k damage a second till burst is ready.

Even further, you could take sigil of agony to get 95% increased bleed duration and allowing up to 5-6 stacks of bleed on auto attack with scepter alone.

CMF.5461:

Carrion and Rabid are pure condition damage amulets and they both lack one attribute or the other that we will need to focus on direct damage. One has power and vitality but no precision, this increases survival but leads to weaker condition application without crits and less direct damage.

The other has precision, but no power or vitality, lower survival and direct damage, but more condition application.

Rampager is a true hybrid amulet that provides direct damage, conditions, and survival. All at lesser amounts but the guardian has conditions built into every build (burning). Also they lack vitality, so this needs to be gained somewhere. Lastly this amulet still allows you to crit and increase direct damage with precision and power.

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i did the math and tested the dmg on golems
carrion does more direct dmg dps over rampager amulet
carrion gives you 2k power over 1.5k power
scepter aa is very slow movement so u need to use them in close range to benefit the bleed on crit as its 3 sec in average proc with 2 sec cd you maybe can proc around 2-3 while in weapon swap you get 3 for 10 sec

still krait runes need an active elite (like ranger,thief etc) and ours is passive one for defense use

In order for the bleeds on crit to persist., we need the precision on rampager. So the question is are the extra 2-3 bleeds worth it. I am on my phone, so don’t have my spreadsheets to crunch numbers atm. Without the crit so would opt for chill on hit instead and possibly might on swap. If it is more optimal to surpass the precision, but I don’t know if that is totally true yet.

Crits increase damage by something like 45-50% averaged out? (Don’t have stats in front of me). And the persistent bleeds to help pad damage. Versus what 300ish power? Maybe but I want to calculate it myself first.

you got 53% crit chance and 20% more with fury traited
so 0.73*1.7 (crit dmg)0.27 =1.5 or 0.53*1.70.47=1.371
base dmg on gs AA is 502*1.5=753 (688) so average direct dmg with crit chance would maybe be bit lower than 700 . 753*20%+688*80%=700

with carrion its 662*(0.09*1.7+0.91)=703
and you lose bunch of burning proc on block
so over time would be lower dps overall
and if you trait for block again the base dmg is 688 lower than 700

ok, so rampager gives 53% crit chance with 170% crit damage

(0.53 * 0.7) + 1 = 1.371 damage modifier on average

Carrion gives 9% crit chance with 170% crit damage

(0.09 * 0.7) + 1 = 1.063 damage modifier on average

looking at these two build calculator links we look at GS auto attack damage.

Rampager does 502 damage with first swing

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAFeAAIOEAp2fwaZAA

Carrion does 605 with first swing

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAQLDU4BAg4QAka/BA

So Rampager damage should be

502 * 1.371 = 688.242 damage or 688 damage

Carrion damage should be

605 * 1.063 = 643.115 or 643 damage

Rampager is doing more damage right? 688 versus 643, or am I missing something.

I was not sure where you were getting the numbers from here:

messiah.1908:

base dmg on gs AA is 502*1.5=753 (688) so average direct dmg with crit chance would maybe be bit lower than 700 . 753*20%+688*80%=700

with carrion its 662*(0.09*1.7+0.91)=703

CMF.5461:

ok, so rampager gives 53% crit chance with 170% crit damage

(0.53 * 0.7) + 1 = 1.371 damage modifier on average

Carrion gives 9% crit chance with 170% crit damage

(0.09 * 0.7) + 1 = 1.063 damage modifier on average

looking at these two build calculator links we look at GS auto attack damage.

Rampager does 502 damage with first swing

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAFeAAIOEAp2fwaZAA

Carrion does 605 with first swing

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApaolDxbI8DNR8QZ1HU9DEAP61/QQkDA-TpRFwAAOBAJOCAQLDU4BAg4QAka/BA

So Rampager damage should be

502 * 1.371 = 688.242 damage or 688 damage

Carrion damage should be

605 * 1.063 = 643.115 or 643 damage

Rampager is doing more damage right? 688 versus 643, or am I missing something.

I was not sure where you were getting the numbers from here:

messiah.1908:

base dmg on gs AA is 502*1.5=753 (688) so average direct dmg with crit chance would maybe be bit lower than 700 . 753*20%+688*80%=700

you are using krait rune which are condition while i am using flame which is power so i got more power with my build so the base dmg on gs is 668 and not 605

but dont forget again you are talking about chances so even with 50% few of your attack may not crit while on carrion the dmg is flat base on enemy armor and boons and also burning proc on blocks which you lack

the numbers where included fury which you got from meditations so buff you crit chance for 4 sec to 73% . i estimate that the fury uptime is around 20% of the fight

also with rampager the burning dmg is lower around 100 per tick compare to carrion

well, that skews the result of the amulet then. we are talking about Carrion versus Rampager amulets, not Carrion with Flame runes and Rampager with Krait.

As far as which rune to use, it is still debateable. I was trying to maximize bleeds, but I may opt to drop that, in turn the reason I went with Rampager is to again emphasize bleed stacks via crit since scepter will not normally be use in close melee range for on swap sigils, thus the only way to maintain bleed stacks on weapon swap.

Carrion lacks crit chance at all, thus losing bleeding on weapon swap.

Rabid will be even worse without any power at all on it.

In the end it will depend on weapon selection, and I opted to take scepter with the greatsword because of heavy traiting into zeal provided more damage modifiers with immobilize, which the scepter excels at…as well as stacking vulnerability innately as well.

providing an essentially 15% damage increase along with 10% from burning targets.

So damage modifiers equate out to (1.1*1.15*1.371)=1.734315

502 damage on gs auto attack turns into

502 * 1.734315 = 870.62613 or 870 damage (not counting fury bursts after meditation usage)

then factor in burn you get 1614 damage.

Ideally though, this build is not about auto attack damage, but on demand bursts with weapon swaps and immobilize/vulnerability setups while keeping condition damage as persistent pressure between bursts. So calculating things out this way is good for pve, but not always optimal in the mobile fight environment of pvp.

I applaud both of yall. The main thing being tested here is how rune of krait is being maximized. Since poison can be cleansed fairly quickly and really only useful against celes sustaining builds, bleed proc can potentially offer higher sustain damage or even “bursty” damage @ higher stacking bleeds.
My question is this: would replacing doom with sigil of earth and using Rabid yield higher damage sustain? The bleed procs may make up the damage lost from Carrion’s power.

Assuming you’re using build 62600, rune of krait and rabids, you’re sitting at 40% crit rate @ a 60% chance of procing sigil of earth. Simple math tells me that’s a 20% chance of procing bleed wich looks really bad. BUT…
-Cleansing flame (x10 hits)
-Zealot’s defense (x8 hits)
-Smite (x16 hits)
You’re looking at a consistent 3 stacks of bleeds with a high burst potential of 8+ stacks w/ rune of krait + geomancy = 824 damage (or more) per tick.

Assuming uncleansed:
Poison can do 205 damage for 7s = roughly 1435 damage with a nice -33% heal debuff.
A stack of 3 bleeds does 315 damage lasting for 8s = 2520

Thoughts?

More bleeding will provide higher damage, but at the expense of mechanics.

The reason for poison is two fold: Damage to a lesser degree, but heal prevention to a higher degree.

Also, on swap sigils when going from GS to scepter assume you will be engaging in mid ranged combat and not melee combat.

so if you get geomancy for scepter as well as earth, you will probably maintain about 6 bleeds, but you have to ensure you are in melee range to do so. Doing that makes you more vulnerable to external sources of damage. Nothing wrong with it, but it wasn’t how I was playing the build.

I intended a “get in, get out” style combat to enhance survivability, mimicking ele and thief. We have a small health pool and limited/long cooldown survival skills, so relying on range and positioning to minimize damage allows us to use those survival cooldowns for survival and not to maintain damage.

Long answer short, yes more bleeds will be more damage, but I didn’t want to risk the returning threat in my play style.

Saiyan.1704:

I applaud both of yall. The main thing being tested here is how rune of krait is being maximized. Since poison can be cleansed fairly quickly and really only useful against celes sustaining builds, bleed proc can potentially offer higher sustain damage or even “bursty” damage @ higher stacking bleeds.
My question is this: would replacing doom with sigil of earth and using Rabid yield higher damage sustain? The bleed procs may make up the damage lost from Carrion’s power.

Assuming you’re using build 62600, rune of krait and rabids, you’re sitting at 40% crit rate @ a 60% chance of procing sigil of earth. Simple math tells me that’s a 20% chance of procing bleed wich looks really bad. BUT…
-Cleansing flame (x10 hits)
-Zealot’s defense (x8 hits)
-Smite (x16 hits)
You’re looking at a consistent 3 stacks of bleeds with a high burst potential of 8+ stacks w/ rune of krait + geomancy = 824 damage (or more) per tick.

Assuming uncleansed:
Poison can do 205 damage for 7s = roughly 1435 damage with a nice -33% heal debuff.
A stack of 3 bleeds does 315 damage lasting for 8s = 2520

Thoughts?

the problem with full condi spec is in the meta comp. most the class/buid can handle nicely conditions thus unless you can assure your AA or combos to do good pressure . the conditions themself wont do much ehile they can do to you

rabid will put your hp to 10k which is way too low against any condi spec (engi/ranger/cele ele) so even with 3k armor it will be hard for you to say around doing dmg

krait again proc every 72 sec while flame runes give you 7% more dmg and burning proc thus making better choise (for me)

the poison is mainly to pressure the enemy to cleanse and not about the dmg tick as the burning is pretty much eual to 8 stacks of bleed . so add another 3 stacks from sigil is equal to 11 stacks of bleed which is very nice now add it to direct dmg and BOOM you got yourself hybrid working build

so far had much success in tpvp in any 1v1 and sometime 1v2 as i manage to down 1 or 2 if they used all their cleanse and even if i get down my team can stomp fast enoughf

messiah.1908:

Saiyan.1704:

I applaud both of yall. The main thing being tested here is how rune of krait is being maximized. Since poison can be cleansed fairly quickly and really only useful against celes sustaining builds, bleed proc can potentially offer higher sustain damage or even “bursty” damage @ higher stacking bleeds.
My question is this: would replacing doom with sigil of earth and using Rabid yield higher damage sustain? The bleed procs may make up the damage lost from Carrion’s power.

Assuming you’re using build 62600, rune of krait and rabids, you’re sitting at 40% crit rate @ a 60% chance of procing sigil of earth. Simple math tells me that’s a 20% chance of procing bleed wich looks really bad. BUT…
-Cleansing flame (x10 hits)
-Zealot’s defense (x8 hits)
-Smite (x16 hits)
You’re looking at a consistent 3 stacks of bleeds with a high burst potential of 8+ stacks w/ rune of krait + geomancy = 824 damage (or more) per tick.

Assuming uncleansed:
Poison can do 205 damage for 7s = roughly 1435 damage with a nice -33% heal debuff.
A stack of 3 bleeds does 315 damage lasting for 8s = 2520

Thoughts?

rabid will put your hp to 10k which is way too low against any condi spec (engi/ranger/cele ele) so even with 3k armor it will be hard for you to say around doing dmg

krait again proc every 72 sec while flame runes give you 7% more dmg and burning proc thus making better choise (for me)

the poison is mainly to pressure the enemy to cleanse and not about the dmg tick as the burning is pretty much eual to 8 stacks of bleed . so add another 3 stacks from sigil is equal to 11 stacks of bleed which is very nice now add it to direct dmg and BOOM you got yourself hybrid working build

so far had much success in tpvp in any 1v1 and sometime 1v2 as i manage to down 1 or 2 if they used all their cleanse and even if i get down my team can stomp fast enoughf

Rabid vs Carrion performances
I’ve been using rabids + sigil of earth. Performance wise, I don’t notice a huge difference. As expected, melee damage is reduced to about 20%. Turns a normal 6k backstab to about 4800 damage.
I do like the fact that I can heal to full health when all medi’s are used but 10,905 health is still very ridiculous… but for now i’ll continue to use it and test the amulet.

Most condi builds can 1v1 and 1v2 easily. Flame Legion would make a difference if you had a build with higher burn proc rate + 100% burn duration. The duration increase is about 4 to 5s, assuming they take the full duration of Justice Intervention, Virtue of Justice and Purging Flames. If they take these full burn durations, then they will also take rune of krait’s full duration.
TL/DR
The performance difference between these runes are actually very small, with Flame Legion almost always being a better amulet if you’re trying to reach 100% burn duration.

messiah.1908:

The poison is mainly to pressure the enemy to cleanse and not about the dmg tick as the burning is pretty much eual to 8 stacks of bleed . so add another 3 stacks from sigil is equal to 11 stacks of bleed which is very nice now add it to direct dmg and BOOM you got yourself hybrid working build

If higher teams will cleanse conditions pretty easily, wouldn’t a higher proc sigil be more favorable? I never look at my conditions to spot poison, but I do keep a lookout if there’s high amounts of stacks.

for me when i see poison i know its bad if i need to use heal skill thus i will use cleanse . i guess other will too so its nice cleanse bait

gerarding runes
the burning duration is between 50% (support guard or ele) to 90% uptime
also i get 30% more burning duration thus the +7% dmg is hitting nicely as you dont need 100% up time to proc it just to get 5 sec burning with JI and burst with aoe and cleaves etc
krait – using rune which give bleeding duration which you dont nned and again to use elite skill to proc 1 torment 1 poison 1 bleed (even in aoe) .. the concept for me is worng as i use elite for defense and not offense thus i can proc it in the worng time like my enemy still got cleanse unused

rabid – 10k hp …. as you say 1 bs from a thief take almost 50% of your hp … and lets not talk about conditions pressure

what i have noticed that the enemy dont use cleanse when they see only 1 condition on them like burning unless they are below 50% hp , but when they see 3 stacks of bleed and poison and burning they will cleanse asap
thus make the hybrid guard more tricky as ppl dont got used to burning condition alone untill it may be too late

I was doing more Rabid Amulet vs Carrion Amulet testing.

I attacked the Guardian NPC in hotm, using a stop watch and starting it at first hit.
For Rabid the fight lasts for about 12-13 seconds. Carrion the fight lasts 12-14s
Give or take a second per amulet, I still expected Rabid to last noticeably longer but the two amulets did virtually the same performances. Even IF Rabid got luckier crit damage from the Guardian NPC, skewing up the results, the amulet’s performance compared to Carrion was still terrible.

I think Anet expected Rabid to proc things like Vigor… which could explain the poor defense to toughness ratio… even if that was the case and you spec’d for higher vigor uptime you’d still have poor defenses against condis.

Higher health pool = better condi resistance making Carrion a sure winner.