Guild Wars 2

Disclaimer: Glass Cannon tactics ahead, support guardians beware.

Do you like Badges of Honor?
Do you hate Scepter, and feel we have no good ranged options?
Do you like killing people? Lots and lots of people? Potentially defenseless people? (Cmon now, you know you do)

If you answered “yes” to any of the above, it’s time to get your Staff out.

I know what you’re thinking. It’s probably “Brig, why the hell would I use a staff? That kitten is support guardian only, and the skills on it SUCK. It’s practically useless!”, but I am here to tell you that you are wrong.

Prepare to have your kitten ruined. Enter Glass Cannon Staff Guardian.

Being a kitten that gets off on seeing huge numbers, I decided to deck my Guardian out in Exotic Berserker’s EVERYTHING, threw in some Divinity runes (I know there are probably better, but I figured a bit of balance wouldn’t be too bad), and got all Berserker Jewelry. I even got the Berserker backpiece with the sick kitten crit on it. I would roll in WvWvW with Greatsword and Sword/Focus, and usually do pretty decent with my couple buddies, but dying so quickly got old and I was getting frustrated. Then I equipped a staff (Berserker’s, obviously) to grief some invaders trying to take one of our towers from inside the gate. I had heard you could get a few kills that way.

Holy kitten, suddenly I see 2500 crits everywhere.

The sky started to darken, the lightning began to flash, and the rumble of thunder was heard. There could be no doubt…

I was getting aroused.

End Sarcasm

First, while this may not apply to hardcore PvPers in sPvP, in WvWvW as a Guardian, when you crit someone a couple times and take them down by half, they usually GTFO. Survival instinct just kicks in, and 99% of the time you will see this happen. Then begins the whole game of Leap of Faith or trying to shadowstep your way on top of them again. Take other opponents into account, and you usually look like an idiot chasing someone down while everyone else beats you down. Guardians are so easy to kite it’s not even funny, in fact it’s infuriating.

This instinct to run from a damaging Guardian is exactly what makes Staff so awesome, especially with a super high damage build. Staff has good range, it has a super wide attack area, no targeting is required, and the key feature is it hits multiple enemies at once. In case you haven’t made the connection yet, this means after you crit EVERYONE a couple times, EVERYONE runs, leaving you practically untouched.

Me and two friends began to experiment with this extensively over the past week. All 3 of us are glass cannon Guardians with staff. At least 10 times now with just the 3 of us we have destroyed groups as big as 30. We get close, shadowstep in and start spamming #1 on all of them, and they always run like hell. We pop retreat and chase them with staff #1 until they die, then trek back a couple miles picking up all the loot bags we leave behind. It doesn’t matter how much they roll or zig zag around, they simply can’t maneuver away from you and get away.

Anyone else with a glass cannon build care to try this out? Right now I am running it with 10/30/30/0/0 and making more badges than I know what to do with, but I would like to see if anyone else can come up with some more awesome ideas for it.

EDIT: I forgot to mention, it also rules for fights so packed that nobody can see who they are fighting. Just run around with staff til you see a damage number, then just zone in on them until they are dead. They probably can’t see you either, so there’s no danger of death. You get sweet badges and the satisfaction of knowing you destroyed some poor guy who couldn’t even see you.

I’m not gonna lie, that sounds pretty kitten funny!! XD

Post a video

Been mention on forums and videos a few times. The only problem is: its kitten boring with all that one button to rule em all.

Running the same build in WvW with Staff/Scepter-Torch (for annoying those players at the walls with Smite). I have to agree that this build, with the Staff, only shines in a group where other players are focusing on other players.

I suggest to always use Orb of Light and don’t detonate it as it does a lot of damage and crits . It also makes players spread out allowing you to hit more players with Wave of Wrath, as I noticed that staff sometimes doesn’t hit the players at the back. Don’t forget to place Symbol of Swiftness as well to cause additional damage.

It sounds like fun and kudos to you for making it work for you, but I’m not buying the 3 vs. 30 boast. 3 glass cannons would drop like rocks if even 1 person started AoEing you guys down.

That being said, I think it is awesome that people are trying these builds and making them work. Keep it up!

Interested in trying this out, could you post the full build? including skills?

Also where do you buy the bezerker items from?

Thanks.

I get 2500 dmg in 2 hits with greatsword while wearing my bulky armor. I also don’t have to worry about longbows killing me before I even reach the wielder.

Ok I’m gonna try this just because I’ll try anything at this point to get my kill count up and my death count down in WvW. I kinda like the staff anyway.

But seriously I’m an MMO noob, what’s up with this use of the word kitten? I see it all over the forums. I’m trying to find an MMO jargon primer but since the internet is a series of tubes and we all know those tubes are filled with cats google just pipes icanhazcheezburger strait to my browser when I try to look it up.

That’s arenanet’s profanity filter for these forums

oh, well that clears that up thank you.

MastaNeenja.1537:

But seriously I’m an MMO noob, what’s up with this use of the word kitten? I see it all over the forums. I’m trying to find an MMO jargon primer but since the internet is a series of tubes and we all know those tubes are filled with cats google just pipes icanhazcheezburger strait to my browser when I try to look it up.

I lol’d

This build does sound like alot of fun and lols. I’ll try it out later.

Interested in trying this out, could you post the full build? including skills?
Also where do you buy the bezerker items from?
Thanks.

I am using the Berserker Draconic crafted exotic gear. It has power/precision/crit dmg, and can be bought directly off TP. I have 6/6 Superior Divinity Runes in it (though, I am sure there are more pure glass cannon type runes, if you want). I also have all the Berserker crafted jewelry, and the power/precision/crit dmg back piece from the 80 story mission. Some Butternut Squash Curry is nice too, if you don’t mind the cost.

As for the skills and traits, you can see them here: Click

My traits are pretty much set up for maximum sword damage with emphasis on crit rate. I have 30 in Valor because of the 30% crit dmg (the +300 toughness helps too…), the bonus to precision, and the ability to heal myself with meditations. I have Retreat set when I feel like I am gonna be playing chase down (i.e., keeping up with them while they try to do everything possible to get out of my staff cone of death), but against groups or defending a fort I might swap in something more appropriate. Elite skill is a matter of preference.

It sounds like fun and kudos to you for making it work for you, but I’m not buying the 3 vs. 30 boast. 3 glass cannons would drop like rocks if even 1 person started AoEing you guys down.

I don’t have a screenshot or video, but feel free to try it out yourself if you are skeptical. You’d be surprised what 3 guardians with some good teamspeak communication can accomplish. Also per above, I do have +300 toughness in traits, so I’m not entirely defenseless. Orb bonuses help too.

I get 2500 dmg in 2 hits with greatsword while wearing my bulky armor. I also don’t have to worry about longbows killing me before I even reach the wielder.

lol, so you’re one of those guardians I take a moment to /laugh at before destroying?

Interesting indeed, I was too focused on alts to try new builds.
Will definitely try it out, hell even sounds like it can do wonders at DE’s combined with GS

What is the cap on number of hits from staff btw? anyone?

Good question, i was wondering that myself and also have the same question for virtues, shouts are capped at 5 but virtues and the staff seems to hit more people then that but its very hard to tell with the current combat log.

Regarding OP i can just agree and you dont even have to dressdown in berserker armor to hit hard as a truck.

Two staff guardians and a well composed group on ts means constant protection on the team, 25 might stacks almost 24/7, 50% crit (almost 50% uptime on fury for 70%) and over 50% critdamage and the team are all wearing vit/pov/tough armor and knights accessories or similar.

We are talking 2k hits every time with skill one on the staff and 6k hits with mighty blow if they charge in.

this is very interesting. i have been leveling in pve for giggles with a staff. the most interesting, and probably most underrated aspect of the staff, is that buttons 1 and 2 pierce. so the arc of button 1 is kind of like an ever going aoe with no cooldown. has kinda crappy range, but i find it doable. button 2 has a bit better damage, but it also pierces. and button 3 is nice to lay down a bit of aoe fire.

This is more psychological warfare than anything else. You are not that damaging, but it works on the instinct of people kittening out when they got hit, but you press on and gain momentum.

That said it could be improved by a GS/Hammer warrior to lead the charge, hammer kb, fear, and move in the Guardian glassstaff to mop everything up.

6k damage per target, ofc multiple targets, in just under 2 sec from one single guardian!!?

I think you might want to try out sigil of rage with a dps specced staff guardian in combination with 25 stacks of might.

Its more then phsycological, i can tell you that.

This sounds pretty garbage to be honest, and I don’t believe for one second you can kill a group of 30 people with 3 people in just a few seconds if you are on open ground and they see you coming.

If you tele into them and don’t get CC’ed, then maybe you can kill a couple.

Through a keep door, when there are stacks of melee, been there done that.

If you are backdooring a group, then yeah, any group with any spec worth it’s salt can destroy large numbers with smaller, if they are in teamspeak and the enemy has their back to you.

Staff guardian is fun, and I run it from time to time, but really you are just doing what people did with pbaoe chanters in DAoC, nothing really skillful about it, or fun for that matter. Just go into a zerg and spam 1 key, while hoping not to get knocked down etc.

I play GS/Staff build since the beggining and at that time I rarely saw any guardian using staff, but now I see a lot more using. I love staff, I play WvWvW 95% of the time and staff is great for that, the cone damage on a big group, the orb (yeah the speed sucks) can damage and heal at the same time, the simbols that I use for running and also to do damage on rangers on top of the walls, the might/heal buff is awesome to support your group and the barrier is pretty cool to stop some enemies, but I dont use it more often since they can pass it just with a dodge…
Staff is my main weapon on big groups (group damage/heal/support/chasing enemy) and GS is my “jump in the middle of a crowd and spin doing lots of damage” weapon.

Maybe I am being an idiot, but the staff autoattack can only hit up to 5 people, right?

Im sorry i cant believe you i jsut tested out this build and i was running 48% crit and 75% crit damage and my hits are only for like 1200 highest against players how are you getting 2500 are you fighting level 1

Don’t see 2500 just yet. I see maybe 1300s. Though should note, it is interesting with quickness sigil.

Beowoolf.3591:

Im sorry i cant believe you i jsut tested out this build and i was running 48% crit and 75% crit damage and my hits are only for like 1200 highest against players how are you getting 2500 are you fighting level 1

I think there is a misunderstanding.
He said he run with 2 other staff guardian.
I think one (or maybe two) of them apply might boon on each crit.
So he must have 25 stack of might permanently, and with that he should reach his incredible 2k5 on auto attack.

But I think his template is really good with his friend.

I tried staff + hammer with the typical meditation build in WvW (instead of sword and scepter). I survived so much it was ridiculous.

In his build, you can easily remove the +15% crit with one handed weapon.

I dunno, tripling the guardian can lead to interesting choices in utilites, for example chaining stability with shouts come to mind.

Also triple empower = lots of might I guess. And if you set your three walls just right you can split the zerg and create somewhat safe “killzone”

This sounds kind of interesting, you obviously need right situation for this to work but I am gonna try talking my guardian friend into this :p

edit: i checked wiki recently and 25stacks of might is about ~800 power. DAUM

edit button doesn’t work for me so:

I just got mental image of three guardians bashing people on head witht that lame rainbow animation xD

oh my god I have to try it

For those wondering about my 2.5k crits, I feel the need to elaborate that when I say glass cannon, I really mean glass cannon in as full of a sense as you can mean it. Consider this:

• I use superior rune of bloodlust on mobs before fighting (+250 power)

• I use superior rune of strength on my berserker staff (30% chance of a might stack on crit)

• I have a 57% crit rate, not counting orb bonuses up at the time or food. Read this again, and look up at list item #2. Now read it again while considering how many people I may be hitting at the same time. Sitting at 8 or 9 stacks of might without staff #4 ability is pretty normal in my case.

• I have 103% crit damage+, again this is before food bonus.

• I use staff #4 ability in good timing with my other staff buddies. This can lead to pretty insane boosts.

Someone mentioned I may have been fighting level 1 players, and you might be right because most of the time I use staff it is against large groups.

I can’t stress enough that the reason this works is purely psychological. With almost the same setup as above, I have hit some players for 11.2k with sword #3 (yeah, probably a noob, for the naysayers), so obviously staff isn’t winning because of superior DPS. It seems to me you would need to be just glass cannon enough to cause people to say “oh kitten” and run. For those saying we couldn’t have taken down 30, when half your zerg runs away do you stay and fight? They turned tail and got the hell out, and it was a mistake.

You’ll get no argument from me that we shouldn’t survive in doing it, and we probably won’t if/when people figure it out. Until then I am gonna go cash in.

Which food are you using ?
Superior bloodlust could be a little bit boring to use if you loose the bonus each time you die, which would happened often in WvW.

I’m gonna try the rune of the berserker.

I assume that your 57% crit without bonus is when you were your full berserker armor + jewel ?
What are the runes on your armor ?

Which food are you using?

Bowl of Curry Butternut Squash Soup

Superior bloodlust could be a little bit boring to use if you loose the bonus each time you die, which would happened often in WvW.

It can be, and sometimes I don’t go through the trouble of boosting it up all the way. I primarily use sword when I am fighting mobs or taking supply camps etc, so I equip my bloodlust sword and get what bonus I can.

I assume that your 57% crit without bonus is when you were your full berserker armor + jewel ?

Yes. Full Berserker’s Draconic set along with full Berserker jewelry, and the power/precision/crit backpiece from the level 80 storyline mission. The staff also has power/precision/crit.

What are the runes on your armor ?

I am using 6/6 Rune of Divinity, which ends up giving me +60 to all stats and +12% crit rate. There are probably better options for all out attack, but my initial plan was to have other set types with divinity runes so I could mix/match.

Brigandier, have you thought about equipping Superior Runes of the Pack? This gives you +90 Power and +100 Precision, upping your crit chance by 4%. Of course, you’ll be missing out on 600 HP and 12% crit damage increase. Don’t know which would be better in this build.

Also, the Superior Sigil of Perception can give you a 10% crit chance increase when fully charged.

Artisan Maintenence Oil will up Precision based on toughness and vitality I believe. You can use it in conjunction with the curry soup.