Guild Wars 2

CMF.5461:

Ok lets look at that then, think you will pull ahead on damage again with damage mods as in the last example.

30% damage mod then 269% crit damage on 1000 damage

1000 * 1.3 = 1300
1300 * 2.69 = 3497

50% damage mod then 239% crit damage on 1000 damage

1000 * 1.5 = 1500
1500 * 2.39 = 3585

Actually that shows that the damage mod is before or after, doesn’t matter, but it is a little higher than crit damage in value. They are very close though, and having the survival from valor I contest is a good trade off for 100-200 damage loss.

Either way, I admit the mistake for putting critical damage and modifiers together, didn’t know the sequence which I am sure is a common mistake so I am not ashamed of that one.

30 in valor and critical damage is not “pointless” for a damage build, but not “as” optimal for damage as getting more damage modifiers.

Again, you gain a good chunk of survival and you don’t drastically dip down in damage by going down valor.

Damage multipliers scale multiplicatively so your damage modifiers are wrong.
10/25/0/25/10: 1.5972(1.1*1.1*1.1*1.2)
0/0/30/30/10: 1.32(1.1*1.2)

Furthermore your calculations doesn’t take into account about the offensive stat bonuses from the trait line. A 10/25/0/25/10 will have 100 power more over your 0/30/30/0/10 but 50 precision less and 30% critical damage less)

So average damage done by a 10/25/0/25/10 assuming 1000 base : 0.51*1000*1.5972*2.2+0.49*1000*1.5972=2574.6864(1.08x of other built)
Average damage done by 0/30/30/0/10 because I read wrongly the other time:
0.53*1000*1.32*2.5+0.47*1000*1.32= 2369.4

The correct way to look at it that the 10/25/0/25/10 out damage the other built by approximately 8%. And this translates to more dps loss as your damage gets higher and higher with max might stacks.

Edited because of wrong trait distribution as pointed out by CMF on the post below.

the trait setup I was suggesting was 0/30/30/0/10 so max precision/crit damage and then the damage mod from aegis, not 0/0/30/30/10, that would have no precision and sacrifice your crit chance, thus lowering the value of crit damage drastically.

Also Kelnis kindly pointed out that it was multiplicative as well

So lets go back to my original mistake with crit damage and damage modifiers and see the difference

0/30/30/0/10
damage modifiers (132% or 1.32)

• 10% conditions
• 20% aegis

critical damage (269% or 2.69, these are additive though right?)

• 150% base
• 89% gear/food
• 30% valor trait line

so 1000 damage will be:

1000 * 1.32 = 1320
1320 * 2.69 = 3550

5000 damage will be:

5000 * 1.32 = 6600
6600 * 2.69 = 17754

10/25/0/25/10
damage modifiers (159% or 1.59)

• 10% burning
• 10% conditions
• 10% low endurance
• 20% aegis

critical damage (239% or 2.39)

• 150% base
• 59% gear/food
• 30% valor trait line

so 1000 damage will be:

1000 * 1.59 = 1590
1590 * 2.39 = 3800

5000 damage will be:

5000 * 1.59 = 7950
7950 * 2.39 = 19000

This creates a 250 low end damage disparity and a 1246 high end damage disparity.

Just trying to do the math for mine and the people’s sake. Any errors?

The problem with your calculation are that u dun take into account strikes that do not crit which greatly favors the built with higher critical damage.

What i mean by favoring the built with higher critical damage is that it shows it performing better than it should and i wasnt aware that u were assuming 100% critical chance.

Edited: To explain what i mean

We are assuming 100% critical hit chance with gear and fury. Realistically the there will be gaps in 100% to 80% critical hit chance, but just theory crafting here.

But as they pointed out, the damage modifiers still do better overall damage than the critical damage build, based on multiplicative and that modifiers are calculated before the critical damage.

So it does not favor the critical damage build, but in realistic game play the critical damage build will fall behind without max crit chance.

For reference, this is a build calc showing what i was comparing

Crit Damage
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQFAREChTIZFKQrHAAAUQXPoIAAAA-jQyAYLAiAQyrIasVNgiKjGruGT5SEVb5XWtpPQCBMaBA-e

Damage Mods
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQFAREChUIZFKQbGAAAUVIewZAAAAA-jQyAYLAiAQyrIasVNgiKjGruGT5SEVb5zqpfIyCBMaBA-e

Although, now going back and looking at it, not putting points into valor creates a 5% crit chance loss, putting the damage mod build into the 95% crit chance rating instead of the 100%.

This would affect the outgoing damage as noted with some hits not landing, as you said, putting the critical damage set up slightly higher in some cases.

Although outside of theory crafting the 10/25/0/25/10 build is ridiculous and probably wont get you anywhere useful.

edit: in response to your edit sutcliffe, we are relying on an external source of fury that is not inherent with the guardian.

We could put in save yourselves or fury on burning, but too many what if’s in this example. Thus we are just assuming 100% crit chance in optimal conditions.

Most of the time you will have the fury last the duration of the fight and it will result in the theoretical 100% crit chance.

In a realistic PvE setting, i think the 10/25/0/10/25 built is the best dps if u dun use one handed weapon or 10/30/0/0/30 with one hand weapon. If u insist on getting 30 in valor , then 10/30/30/0/0 should be the best dps . Unscathed contender is very hard to maintain outside of theory crafting. I will take a relatively active 10% bonus over a 20% bonus which only works like 20~30% of the time realistically?

Oh for sure, I never take unscathed contender since you lose so much by not having aegis up.

Also if I am going all the way down radiance I typically take 1h strength for 15% crit chance on 1handers and put that left over precision into something else like power if I need to.

Again, this is all just theory crafting and trying to break down what we “can” do via mechanics, not what we should do in actual game play.

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/83822-guardian-greatsword-dps-build-guide/

Please refrain from posting threads from different forums when we’re discussing things here. It provides nothing to the conversation, if you want to bring up info regarding something in particular, sure, reference the link, but simply putting a link to info elsewhere without context is pointless.

Wukunlin.8461:

GSSBlunaspike.4153:

Dead dps deal no dps. Survival> any damage, and the current meta is just more proof of that.

I’m guessing you are talking about pvp?

Pretty much always. If you see a post by me I am generally always talking about spvp/wvw. I rarely address PvE because I’m not that great at it. I can apply similar principles, but I don’t have the same experience as most of these guys in PvE.

I’m pretty much a huge advocate of making PvE more challenging by making it more like PvP. The idea is that through smarter AI, and involving more interesting enemies you can avoid the whole blizzard route of “more hp/more damage”. That seems to be the path Anet is taking though, and it’s aggravating because I think the game is capable of so much more than that.

I am still experimenting with my guardian best -FOR ME- weapon. I think GS + Scepter&Torch are very effective combination.

GS – good for melee – high dmg.
Scepter&Torch – good for range – kiting.

You don’t need to range. “For me” is not an excuse to use bad weapons either.

Take a focus instead of a torch for the few encounters you do need to range.