Guild Wars 2

Hi,

I am new to WvW and DH, and I prefer group match than solo. Therefore, burst damage isnt mine priority, but long sustainability fight plus some ability to support to group is my preferable style.

I want to ask was there anyone tries a pure Dire build before – all weapons, armors and accessories are in Dire stat, plus 6x Superior Rune of Undead. If yes, what are your comments?

Thanks.

Edit:

Below are my proposal:

Weapon 1: Dire LB + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Weapon 2: Dire Scepter / Sword + Dire Touch + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Armor: Dire full set with rune of undead + Malign WvW infusion
Accessories: Dire full set + Malign WvW infusion

Specialization:
Zeal: Mid – Low – Low
Valor:- Mid – Top – Low
DH: Top – Top – Mid

Skills: Shelter – Test of Faith – Retreat – Judge’s Intervention – Dragon’s Maw

Well everything is possible.

But is it effective and fun?

I honestly dont think so. I have played it in periods over the years (including regular burn guard) and its always the same. You can stack an insane amount of burns and can go nuts tagging things but at the end of the day you are relying on a single condi type. Meaning, people in general will have no problems cleansing it if they have a lick of sense. With the current balance a reaper is 10x as effective in comparison due to the ability to completely overload foes – and it can bring better heals for a small group, lol.

IMO the marauder DH is much less dull to play.

Thanks for the feedback.

The purpose I do this proposal is that I am not a good malee class player. I prefer to snipe from behind to injure the opponent and let my teammate do the killing job. Thats why I choose condition damage plus long bow – burn them from long range / distant.

I know many complain DH with LB is suck. But I guess this build suite my playstyle most. I just want to hear opinion from others before I go ahead.

Oh yes, I am playing Marauder DH now, Scepter + touch and sword + shield. Quite fun, but I am having a headache when comes to malee with others.

ive played full dire but got bored. Now i amm double Melee, marauder Greatsword, Sword/Shield DH.

You’ll get ate alive without stability in some form.
If you want team play think https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Permeating_Wrath

Redleaf.4759:

Hi,

I am new to WvW and DH, and I prefer group match than solo. Therefore, burst damage isnt mine priority, but long sustainability fight plus some ability to support to group is my preferable style.

I want to ask was there anyone tries a pure Dire build before – all weapons, armors and accessories are in Dire stat, plus 6x Superior Rune of Undead. If yes, what are your comments?

Thanks.

Edit:

Below are my proposal:

Weapon 1: Dire LB + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Weapon 2: Dire Scepter / Sword + Dire Touch + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Armor: Dire full set with rune of undead + Malign WvW infusion
Accessories: Dire full set + Malign WvW infusion

Specialization:
Zeal: Mid – Low – Low
Valor:- Mid – Top – Low
DH: Top – Top – Mid

Skills: Shelter – Test of Faith – Retreat – Judge’s Intervention – Dragon’s Maw

Burn guard does work well in groups and dire performs well, i would highly recommend swapping to trailblazers eventually though. I can only say for bigger groups, as i haven’t done any smaller group play with it recently. But here are the changes i would make if you plan on following a commander.
(also as a side note others have pointed out issues with no stab, but preferably you should be in a dps role in the party, and have 2 other guards fulfilling that role of stab and support.)

For weapons take staff over longbow and scepter/torch. take one of the sigils of corruption off, you only need one. Replace with superior sigil of fire. Staff will give you more f1 passive procs which will give you more burning application than the symbol on longbow will. Keep a focus handy, burn guards melt ac’s and the focus helps with that. Your commanders will love you.

For traits.
Get rid of zeal and valor, burn guard fills a condi dps role.
Radiance – top,mid,top
Virtues – bottom,mid,top
Dragonhunter – bottom,bottom,top

For skills. I would keep shelter but change your utilities to wall of reflection, purging flames, and then the 3rd utility take either stand your ground if you’re in a party with only 1 other guardian, or procession of blades if you’re in a party with 2 other guardians. Take renewed focus as your elite skill.

On your armor, i would change to rune of the guardian, just because it works so well on burn guards.

One last thing, your food is important, since you’re filling a dps role with burn guard go for rare veggie pizza, and toxic focusing crystal. If you eventually switch from dire to trailblazers, take master tuning crystal instead.

High Condi duration is wasteful, especially in a zerg.
Better off with additional durability

LetoII.3782:

High Condi duration is wasteful, especially in a zerg.
Better off with additional durability

No its not, higher duration will give you more dps overtime, as the fights go on and people lose resistance and get boon stripped or can’t get condi clear. The more burning you can keep on people, which duration helps you do, the more damage you’ll do to people as the fights go on. You’re already incredibly durable in either trailblazers and dire, the extra duration just makes you more effective at dealing damage.

GrahamW.5397:

LetoII.3782:

High Condi duration is wasteful, especially in a zerg.
Better off with additional durability

No its not, higher duration will give you more dps overtime, as the fights go on and people lose resistance and get boon stripped or can’t get condi clear. The more burning you can keep on people, which duration helps you do, the more damage you’ll do to people as the fights go on. You’re already incredibly durable in either trailblazers and dire, the extra duration just makes you more effective at dealing damage.

I’ve never seen a person make it to a fifth tick.
Either they cleanse or they’re dead.

Redleaf.4759:

Hi,

I am new to WvW and DH, and I prefer group match than solo. Therefore, burst damage isnt mine priority, but long sustainability fight plus some ability to support to group is my preferable style.

I want to ask was there anyone tries a pure Dire build before – all weapons, armors and accessories are in Dire stat, plus 6x Superior Rune of Undead. If yes, what are your comments?

Thanks.

Edit:

Below are my proposal:

Weapon 1: Dire LB + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Weapon 2: Dire Scepter / Sword + Dire Touch + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Armor: Dire full set with rune of undead + Malign WvW infusion
Accessories: Dire full set + Malign WvW infusion

Specialization:
Zeal: Mid – Low – Low
Valor:- Mid – Top – Low
DH: Top – Top – Mid

Skills: Shelter – Test of Faith – Retreat – Judge’s Intervention – Dragon’s Maw

Problem with playing a condi guard is that the guardian (especially DH even more so) traits and gear, lack the synergy that power builds + support has. Guards in WVW are staple of any group, be it pug or organized and everythign else inbetween due to stab, cleanses, prot, aegis, reflects, empower, etc. etc.

When you go condi you lose too many of those, you can kinda go medi / consecration for some burns, but you will not be traited for full group support because you have to allocate your traits to condi. Often times while playign in group content you get stuck in the thief/ ranger / ele group, because you do not provide enough to help keep up the core players or you yourself require a 2nd, power based guard to keep you up. So its kinda bad.

Also, don’t go for pure dire. You will do much better if you make around half your gear dire, then the other half kinda mixed to various degree between Shaman’s, Carrion, Rabid. And of course the tat weights on Trailblazers, Vipers outweigh the 3 combo stat pieces and you do need some decent duration as well.

There is the AC killer build:
https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Dragonhunter_-_Condi_AC_Killer
I realize it isn’t rated high but going to discuss it a bit as I think a few variants can help it a lot. Before I knew of it, I asked a similar question as you and I had the extra gear to waste. I wound up stumbling into the AC kill build without realizing it although I do have some variants. First off, it won’t replace a Necro nor a traditional guard on your team. It’s only for zerg fights with necros already corrupting resistance/unorganized enemies. It tags stuff like crazy though. Here is my build.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNAT7elsAhmhYvQwVIwPELDElVAsArpc4n9jf2PsgPIA-TFiAQBJ4CAAgnAQMVC6Q1f8nuBrs/gHV+BtDCApAUUaE-w

There are 3 main ways to burn people.
1) Proc the passive F1 like crazy. (there are ways to “break” the 5 target limit)
2) Purging flames (no target limit for a zerg that runs through it).
3) Rune of the guardian.

While people are saying condition duration doesn’t matter, rune of the guardian and the passive F1 have 1-2 second burn durations. This makes the high/100% burn duration important in that your burns will likely tick 2-4 times unlike other condition builds that have longer base duration conditions that won’t ever hit their full potential. Also needed for maximum AC killing. For condition diversity, DH is necessary with the traits I picked. Middle, middle, X for DH gives you cripple and vulnerability on passive F1. While not damaging, when resistance is stripped this will overload people’s condition cleanses because it applies 3 conditions in an AOE every time you proc the F1 passive and that will happen a lot. Again, this doesn’t replace the Necro, it just helps overload enemies with more conditions constantly while tagging noobs for bags. Wall of reflect is the magic F1 passive procs vs noobs. More projectiles reflected means more F1 procs and it scales up really well because it doesn’t have a target limit!. Purging flames also doesn’t have a limit in that if a zerg runs through it, an entire zerg is on fire! Rune of the guardian also doesn’t have a target limit in the sense that if you time your F3 at the front of a zerg and block a lot, you will burn a lot. These three are why I love this build for just tagging loot because it “break” the 5 target limit that most other builds have. Not just tagging though, damage is nice if the enemies don’t have resistance.

Longbow 4/5 and Scepter 2 are the main passive F1 procs when it comes to weapon skills and gives you the backline feel although weapon choice is really open to whatever you feel like. Torch 5 is for wrecking noobs and clearing conditions on allies if you can tank the 30 retal procs, or more so if the enemies don’t have retal, you can proc F1 10 times for 10 stacks of burning in an aoe that lasts 4 seconds. GS2, especially in purging flames, is great damage and GS3 gives some nice mobility but again, retal. Staff can tag stuff in melee and proc F1 well while bringing some more “traditional” support and CC. Purging flames is of course also condi clear on meta builds. Stand your ground is for the traditional guardian support people expect. Signet of Wrath for more condition damage could also be brought for AC killing.

When you need to swap to AC killing mode, swap DH middle, middle, X to middle, Bot, top. Longer F3 means more rune of the guardian procs vs AC to kill them. Rotate the F3, heal and elite to recharge F3 for constant rune of the guardian procs against siege.

TLDR, doesn’t replace a traditional guard but great for tagging zergs and killing AC when needed.

Tongku.5326:

Redleaf.4759:

Hi,

I am new to WvW and DH, and I prefer group match than solo. Therefore, burst damage isnt mine priority, but long sustainability fight plus some ability to support to group is my preferable style.

I want to ask was there anyone tries a pure Dire build before – all weapons, armors and accessories are in Dire stat, plus 6x Superior Rune of Undead. If yes, what are your comments?

Thanks.

Edit:

Below are my proposal:

Weapon 1: Dire LB + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Weapon 2: Dire Scepter / Sword + Dire Touch + Sigil of Corruption + Sigil of Smoldering
Armor: Dire full set with rune of undead + Malign WvW infusion
Accessories: Dire full set + Malign WvW infusion

Specialization:
Zeal: Mid – Low – Low
Valor:- Mid – Top – Low
DH: Top – Top – Mid

Skills: Shelter – Test of Faith – Retreat – Judge’s Intervention – Dragon’s Maw

Problem with playing a condi guard is that the guardian (especially DH even more so) traits and gear, lack the synergy that power builds + support has. Guards in WVW are staple of any group, be it pug or organized and everythign else inbetween due to stab, cleanses, prot, aegis, reflects, empower, etc. etc.

When you go condi you lose too many of those, you can kinda go medi / consecration for some burns, but you will not be traited for full group support because you have to allocate your traits to condi. Often times while playign in group content you get stuck in the thief/ ranger / ele group, because you do not provide enough to help keep up the core players or you yourself require a 2nd, power based guard to keep you up. So its kinda bad.

Also, don’t go for pure dire. You will do much better if you make around half your gear dire, then the other half kinda mixed to various degree between Shaman’s, Carrion, Rabid. And of course the tat weights on Trailblazers, Vipers outweigh the 3 combo stat pieces and you do need some decent duration as well.

do we as guard players have sinergy on anything else besides medi trapper? :P

Well, you shouldn’t be running meditrapper while zerging either

Ghotistyx.6942:

Well, you shouldn’t be running meditrapper while zerging either

thats true but, but it works well compared with the almost AFK staff 1 builds that only know empower and purhing flames skills… and hit like a potato while they stil take a ton of damage if get hitted… since guard has no trade off if sacrifices damage.

imo ANet killed the guard class to make DH trapper being accepted :\, everything else outside medi and meditrapper is very very underwhelming, for WvW mobitlity and Consecrations are a waste they are mor for choke points than anything elses, and static wars, wich never happens on WvW due the huge kitten of mobility ANet gave to the classes.

»Guardian was fully designed for pve and since pve is static combat… guardian skills and utilities are easy to avoid and overwhelm on pvp…
Overall the class has one problem that ANet never cared to fix, the class is damage if not in a power creep in its favour cant do nothing, if support cant do much, and other classes can do better, if go bunker its still easy to kill it…. overall the class has to many counters… and that makes guardian fall behind very fast no matter how many buff ANet gives cause the issue is how the class works and the messy/weak traits and weak utilities that besides meditation and traps… got nothing, we only have one elite…. as well, others not worth to take…

LetoII.3782:

GrahamW.5397:

LetoII.3782:

High Condi duration is wasteful, especially in a zerg.
Better off with additional durability

No its not, higher duration will give you more dps overtime, as the fights go on and people lose resistance and get boon stripped or can’t get condi clear. The more burning you can keep on people, which duration helps you do, the more damage you’ll do to people as the fights go on. You’re already incredibly durable in either trailblazers and dire, the extra duration just makes you more effective at dealing damage.

I’ve never seen a person make it to a fifth tick.
Either they cleanse or they’re dead.

High condition duration is NOT wasteful dependent on a given classes access to conditions as a whole.

When you shoot for high durations it not necessarily to boost the burns, poisons or bleeds for damage but to ensure the other conditions such as Chill, weakness, immobs and cripples keep running for as long as possible. This ensures there always cover conditions for those damaging conditions along with that conditions own benefit.

While I am not overly familiar with the Guardian condition build, having durations of 50 percent just as example means the immobilize coming off Zealot’s Embrace in Hammer is 3 seconds rather than 2 and that is a significant difference.

When I am fighting a guardian on one of my own Condition builds, I rely on those long lasting cover conditions to both diminish said guradians own combat ability and to cover the damage coming from my bleeds and the like. The Guardian has lots of cleanses but little in the way of directed cleanses (Ie getting to CHOOSE which condition to remove)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJATRn8ABtCh9CBedC8DhlAiKbIewJ0KAeg3Uu87+0H-TFyCwAn2fIwRAQsSwX6CocJA+q8DwDAIu6PkCAmlVA-w

ive been having some success with this if I have another core guard in my group with f3 stab. burn duration is absolutely necessary with permeating wrath, it does tons of damage. reflects can get you some great damage against certain groups, purging flames is usually taken tho. save your greatsword burst for after the enemies first push / bomb since most of their cleanses will be down. don’t expect to bomb a meleetrain and have this work tho, even tho it can sometimes if you time it right. if you wanted to change to full dire then that would be fine. I find the balance of cele to be good tho.

babazhook.6805:

High condition duration is NOT wasteful dependent on a given classes access to conditions as a whole.

While I am not overly familiar with the Guardian condition build, having durations of 50 percent just as example means the immobilize coming off Zealot’s Embrace in Hammer is 3 seconds rather than 2 and that is a significant difference.

Hammer Condi guard….

Nuff said

LetoII.3782:

Hammer Condi guard….

Nuff said

If that’s what you think he meant, I have some bad news for you

If you think giving input on a class you’ve never played is “advice”
I also have disconcerting information