Guild Wars 2

I’m using a 0/0/30/30/10 trait set up with a Hammer, Staff, Scepter + Shield, and Toughness > Power/Precision gear. More specifically my traits are;
- Lose 1 condition every 10 seconds
- 5% of Toughness converted to Precision
- Chill on Hammer crits
- Shouts recharge 20% faster
- Two Handed Weapon skills recharge 20% faster
- Shouts remove 1 Condition

So far my favorite combination of utilities has been “Stand Your Ground!”, “Save Yourselves!”/“Retreat!”, Signet of Judgement, and Renewed Focus. I’ve tried signet builds, pure support builds, and shout builds but I always end up feeling like I don’t contribute much to my team.

If I’m using a melee weapon I’ll just get kited to death but my two ranged options seem so incredibly lack-luster in PvP. Staff has a painfully short range, channeling Empower is just asking to get focused down, and Orb of Light misses or clips through terrain 80% of the time. Scepter’s attack projectile flies so slowly that any sort of movement will cause me to miss the majority of the time, Chains of Light has a fairly long CD, and my DPS relies a lot on Smite (which no one will stand in).

I absolutely adore Hammer, in both PvE and PvP, but if Zealot’s Embrace misses or gets dodged I’m completely unable to close the gap between myself and an enemy. Ring of Warding, although INCREDIBLY powerful, is pretty easy for the enemy to deal with if they’re paying attention because of its lengthy cast time and the fact that Stability hard counters it.

Could anyone offer some tips or anything that could help me in WvWvW? I feel useless at range, I get instantly zerged in melee, and I have difficulty tagging enemies for badges (I did WvWvW for about 5-6 hours today and only got 40 badges total).

You’re not playing w/ the right synergy when it comes to chasing people down.

If Hammer is your constant, then your second weapons would need to be Scepter, GS or Sword. Staff is not going to do it.

If you were going to run w/ Staff, drop Retreat and pick up Intervention.

Personally, I love Hammer/GS w/ Intervention + shouts. This gives me 2 gap closers, 1 immoblize, 1 pull and 1 ring of warding.

Very few people get away (minus stealthers /raise fists & curse). Though, it’s always awesome to kill stealthed, strictly because the fights only ever on thier terms…. just makes it that much sweeter. =]

I use Judge’s Intervention and Bane Signet, with a Hammer and Staff in SPvp. I never really have problems catching up with anyone. Staff is great for tagging people quickly and it never gets old beating someone’s face in with the hammer. I havent tried this in WvW yet, so its hard to say how well it works.

I usually run hammer/staff too. The staff is great for getting around the map quickly, but then I get cut down pretty quickly when I run into anything more than 1v1. If I’m running with a zerg I’ll switch to hammer/greatsword and rely on others to provide speed buffs. I’ve been ignoring range lately, I hang back when when we attack a keep and try to cut down any reinforcements that are coming in. On defense I usually jump on a siege or spam my staff behind the gate for chuckles.

I’ve been following the crithammer threads since Brutality seems to do a fair amount of WvW using hammer. I’m in rare gear saving up for Knight’s exotic and wondering how much of a difference rare vs. exotic will make.

I’m also resigned to the fact that I’m just not that good at pvp in general, so anything more than 1v1 I tend to run away or sit and hope for a quick death.

I should clarify that it’s my playing that’s not good, not the profession.

I would definitely drop the chill on crits; you can use a sigil that is much better than that. Use Altruistic Healing instead, and make sure your gear is traited properly to fill in the gaps. If you’re dying too much, add a bit of vitality and a lot of toughness. If you’re not hitting hard enough, go for power first and crit secondary. Remember that all of your gear doesn’t really need to stress the same three traits, so it’d be best to make your accessories/gems/runes cover the secondary stress of your build.

For instance, I run with pwr/vit/toughness on my armor with rune of the soldier, which gives me plenty of health, toughness, and power…while clearing conditions when I shout. So right there, you could perhaps drop the shouts clear a condition (which is bugged atm, I believe, and doesn’t work with a couple shouts properly) to instead utilize empowering might. Your choice.

I highly suggest you look at the base builds being shared on this board. If nothing else, you’ll learn what you don’t like to do, even if it is highly effective for others and their playstyles. Also, it will let you in on traits and setups that normally you wouldn’t think would work, but apparently do. Gear can be obtained, but a lot of WvW is knowing your build inside and out, and avoiding those fights you’re not going to win in the first place.

Case in point: I was defending a recently-gained tower in a borderlands. I had swung up around it to clear away some attackers, and found myself low on health and running from two enemies. I ran around to the cliffs and dropped a ward to split them up, and then proceeded to snare and launch one off the cliff. Now it’s 1v1, and the airborne one’s buddy got cold feet. He ran off, giving me time to recover.

Yeah I agree the hammer needs to be use with a weapon With high mobility perhaps sword/scepter and focus is a good choice, the blink skill on the sword has a ten second cd, and use judges intervent while ring of warding is charge and you have an almost fool proof way to lock some1 down for 5 seconds of hammer time and the focus for blinds and block if you start getting kited

I notice that some times ppl can get away from ring of warding, dont realy know if is it dodging or they use a taleport skill. It’s just me or something that usualy happends?

Perhaps they use stability xarrli? But blinking can also get you out of it; I do not think dodging will. I would say drop the 10 sec remove condition and use signet of resolve. I do not think you need all of those condition removers (2 should suffice). Intervention is the best for striking; then use retreat and renewed focus to escape. I personally like using gs. I don’t use a hammer much but perhaps you could JI→bind blade with gs→ring of warding→retreat and let your team finish them off or just fight them. GS has a high dps with whirling wrath so you can get some good dmg out from it too while waiting to swap back to hammer.

@xaarli.6358 @ArcTheFallen.7682

Wards can be bypassed by jumping, Teleporting, or Stability.

My suggestion to Anet: Get rid of the stability and jumping escapes on the wards. Jumping just feels really cheap since people never run out of jumps. Stability should negate the knockdown the wards cause, but not allow them to just run over the line. I think dodging to escape is fine as long as you remove the other two, because people only have so many dodges, and forcing someone to waste is very useful.

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@Somohexual.9157

I’ve been using the staff as my main weapon in WvW lately. My gameplan is basically to charge straight up to the enemy then cast a barrier, primarily Wall of reflection, and then tag everything with Wave of Wrath. I use shouts to escape if things start to go bad. Having a decent critical chance, Sigil of Fire, and Purging Flames with ground targeting helps a lot.