Guild Wars 2

Assuming Rev, Engi, Ele & Necro are in question top 4 picks, that leaves

Druid, DH, Mes, Thief, War

Out of these 5, Druid and DH has the best chance of being 5th picks.

• Druids can sustain well enough in a 1v2 but not as well as Ele. Druids can 1v1 a DH and support mid via S&R and certain single target ccs with ‘ok’ single target damages. Any team aoe condi cleanses are irrelevant as everyone can already self sustain and there’s already a Necro absorbing team wide conditions in addition.

• DH can’t 1v1 a good ranger, engi or rev (biggest con) but can sustain long enough to get a +1. DH has better single, aoe cc and better burst damages than druid. It’s enough to turn over a mid skirmish fight if played correctly. DH can also get bursted down a whole lot easier unless DH has an ele/scrapper/necro to support him.

Druid is the safer bet to sustain nodes for a better snowball effect, can 1v1 a DH and is a better point holder in general.
DH is more risky in the above meta considering the only class DH can effectively 1v1 is a Necro. He has a chance to turn over mid fights but is just as susceptible to get bursted down himself.

Thoughts?

Personally, I think Mesmer and Thief both have a better chance that Guardian. Thief can be useful, even stated by a few themselves, it just takes a significant amount more skill than the others.

Condition Mesmer is actually already considered a 5th. Power shatter has died out, but Condi Mesmer was a decently strong player in ESL, and can be rather potent.

DH is great up to a point but they just don’t bring enough to a team that isn’t negated too easily by the enemy having an Ele on their team, and are possibly a bit too predictable. They’re also too vulnerable when they’ve blown their cooldowns.

I’d say they work better than warriors and MOST thieves, but I’m not sure anyone would be rushing to grab a guardian anytime soon, honestly. Their best quality from my perspective is controlling and setting up burst on team fights. I can often shape a team fight, but with any amount of Support, after Maw/Lb5, things become significantly more stale, and you end up mostly just supplying DPS.

You’re right Mesmer and Thief takes a higher skill factor (in the higher tiers) to make work but I didn’t include them because of that reason. They don’t do so well vs guards on point and most teams will struggle to rotate these classes around the map effective, especially if their opponent already has 2 owned points.

Mesmer could work if their moa + focus target is successful and they use their portal rotations across the map to its full effectiveness. Especially on Foefire. Biggest downside with Mesmer is he will always lose side nodes due to his stealth, but mesmer will likely win his 1v1s. A strange trade off.

Thief’s bursts are often unpredictable ( a good trait) and could down any target at 50% assuming at least 1 other Marauder/Dps class is on the target as well. If the push fails then thief could get downed himself or best case scenario, gets pushed off point for another chance to burst/rotate in 5s.

If you don’t or can’t backcap with these classes or burst effectively with moa etc, then their potential is wasted. I was looking at team fights and DH is bettet at that than them both.

If I see a mesmer or thief, I’d likely class switch to a DH to counter them rather than an Ele. Assuming DH can survive the initial thief burst.

Only way I would ever consider using a DH as my 5th over a druid is if the DH were using menders with this build

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJgeTn8cCVDhdDBWdC8DhlGiSe4T+n/aY3yAAbCiguE-TZBFABAcEA6vMQbnAABOEA6s/AA

Its extremely hard to kill, has a ton of self healing and condi cleanse, can put out some decent healing to allies & can swap to bow to easily get 5k crits with true shot.

Sadly however the Ele can still do all that it does better.

I don’t see how DH can be viable in the current environment. It dies far too quickly to focus fire. All it has going for it is trueshot spam from off-point.

Thief, Druid, Condi Mes are all better choices.

• Thief has far great mobility and burst is huge. Has to stay out of team fights.
• Druid is great in small fights and can help out in team fights on the side with SnR
• Condi Mes is great at 1v1 and forcing decaps. The invuln sharing on team fights can be a game-changer when you need to stomp/res.

Dragonhunter’s only strength is spamming traps on a node in a small fight. It can’t handle ranged pressure well, not does it offer amazing support.

Exedore.6320:

I don’t see how DH can be viable in the current environment. It dies far too quickly to focus fire. All it has going for it is trueshot spam from off-point.

Thief, Druid, Condi Mes are all better choices.

• Thief has far great mobility and burst is huge. Has to stay out of team fights.
• Druid is great in small fights and can help out in team fights on the side with SnR
• Condi Mes is great at 1v1 and forcing decaps. The invuln sharing on team fights can be a game-changer when you need to stomp/res.

Dragonhunter’s only strength is spamming traps on a node in a small fight. It can’t handle ranged pressure well, not does it offer amazing support.

This is pretty much how I feel about it. It’s strange to me, a little bit, how squishy DH is. Doesn’t feel super thematic, and the build is fairly selfish outside of control. Most of the base weapons are pretty outdated at this point, and Virtues get totally screwed by random/lucky interrupts.

Hate to say it, but I don’t think we’re totally there while we have to chose between being effective and being able to even stay alive with a tiny bit of focus, which most of the classes except thief/warrior can do significantly better.

ronpierce.2760:

Exedore.6320:

I don’t see how DH can be viable in the current environment. It dies far too quickly to focus fire. All it has going for it is trueshot spam from off-point.

Thief, Druid, Condi Mes are all better choices.

• Thief has far great mobility and burst is huge. Has to stay out of team fights.
• Druid is great in small fights and can help out in team fights on the side with SnR
• Condi Mes is great at 1v1 and forcing decaps. The invuln sharing on team fights can be a game-changer when you need to stomp/res.

Dragonhunter’s only strength is spamming traps on a node in a small fight. It can’t handle ranged pressure well, not does it offer amazing support.

This is pretty much how I feel about it. It’s strange to me, a little bit, how squishy DH is. Doesn’t feel super thematic, and the build is fairly selfish outside of control. Most of the base weapons are pretty outdated at this point, and Virtues get totally screwed by random/lucky interrupts.

Hate to say it, but I don’t think we’re totally there while we have to chose between being effective and being able to even stay alive with a tiny bit of focus, which most of the classes except thief/warrior can do significantly better.

I’m inclined to agree as well. Though, warrior is no where near the performance level of DH or any other class for that matter :p

Rifle berserker can cheese just as hard as DH. However unlike DH, it can’t front-load its damage; it has to build adrenaline first.

Exedore.6320:

Dragonhunter’s only strength is spamming traps on a node in a small fight. It can’t handle ranged pressure well, not does it offer amazing support.

In my experience it handles range pressure as well as any other class does (except for maybe druid).

Indure.5410:

Exedore.6320:

Dragonhunter’s only strength is spamming traps on a node in a small fight. It can’t handle ranged pressure well, not does it offer amazing support.

In my experience it handles range pressure as well as any other class does (except for maybe druid).

I disagree mostly due to aspects of our heal. If our pull is dodged or doesn’t pull all the way like it should (happens often), we are at a bit of a disadvantage in terms of ranged sustain. Not saying it’s impossible, but it’s certainly not great. Also depends on build. Where I was discussing the fact that unlike some of the Meta builds, DH have to chose between survival/focus protection and actual effectiveness, and it’s a fairly significant difference.

Ragnar the Rock.3174:

Only way I would ever consider using a DH as my 5th over a druid is if the DH were using menders with this build

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQJgeTn8cCVDhdDBWdC8DhlGiSe4T+n/aY3yAAbCiguE-TZBFABAcEA6vMQbnAABOEA6s/AA

Its extremely hard to kill, has a ton of self healing and condi cleanse, can put out some decent healing to allies & can swap to bow to easily get 5k crits with true shot.

Sadly however the Ele can still do all that it does better.

Although this build is interesting, it has low team support and is more of a solo build. I think guard will make a good 5th atm( prob not the best), assuming they have some mobility, they can preform very well. Being trained is a weakness of the DH so if you can kite well in those situations, you can have success. Team comp and opposing team comp is very important to take note of, we have a couple builds to choose from and some minor changes you can make to each build that will help you deal with extra condi/burst. Wings of Resolve is my best kiting tool atm. To give one of many examples, at graveyard, you can sit on top of the stairs and shoot down onto the gy, when focused, wings of resolve to the platform to the left where the tombstone jump is. Good luck guys.