Guild Wars 2

My position on it is that you should maximize burning without investing in condition damage. That’s the short version, and inelegantly put.

I do think that we deserve a condition damage based build, if Arenanet is going to maintain the party line of maximum build diversity. I think that all classes should be able to run either condition or direct damage and be able to carve out a niche for themselves in whatever arena they like.

We have the foundations for excellent melee AoE condition damage, which is a great counterpoint to necromancer’s excellent ranged AoE condition damage. Necros have Epidemic, and we have Permeating Wrath. It isn’t even remotely egalitarian in terms of effectiveness though, as necros can pull off some epic Epidemic bombs and Permeating Wrath – while fun and neat in its own right – is just one component to a potential build that doesn’t really exist yet.

We just need a little something extra. God willing, in one of these new traits and skills that Anet has announced is on it’s way, we will get the extra damaging condition we need to make this a truly viable option.

I really hope that is the case. I’d love to run a condition spec if it was just a shade more viable.

CMF.5461:

@ Lord Trejgon
OH! really, they “do” count as projectiles? Quite interesting… Like you said, ground fire fields, but really I am looking at how that works as far as group play and other fields, since we get a majority of our burning from VoJ.

As far as the #1 bullet. More burning (more stacks of burning) do not increase damage in intensity, but it does increase in duration. If I put 25 stacks of bleed on I get 25 different bleed ticks in 1 second.

If I put 25 applications of burn on (25 stacks) I have to wait for 25 full second ticks to see the burn happen, thus the 25 seconds to see the damage remark. Burn does not have a “burst” capability, it will always do the same damage no matter how many burns I put on a target.

So if my tool tip says it will do 3000 damage in burning….but I read that it has a duration of 10 seconds. In essence that is 10 stacks of burning doing 300 damage a tick for 10 seconds.

If I read that bleed will do 100 damage per a stack in 3 seconds, then I put 3 bleed stacks on. I am now doing 300 damage a tick in 3 seconds. If I put 10 bleeds on, now I’m doing 1000 damage a tick in 3 seconds. If I put 25 bleeds on, now I am doing 2500 damage a tick in 3 seconds.

So 2500 damage in 3 seconds bleed, or 3000 damage in 10 seconds burning.

One is more overall damage, the other is more damage per a second. High DPS is more threatening in pvp scenarios and faster kills in pve scenarios as well (if it can be maintained and not just burst).

Addressing bullet #2, apothecary is meh? I have not seen any functioning builds utilizing it…yet. So I will not discount it, but I have not seen a revolution on condition bunker either.

that seemed to while I was fighting that boss – but I need to test it more carefully – after some next tests it’s look more like x% chance to give a combo finisher…

about response to my #1 – Yeah I know how it works… but still damage is ticking every second and sometimes tooltip are not considering duration for tht what it says – so it isn’t something like “I wait 25+ seconds to have an efect” becuse normally in for example WvW there are not so many classes that can survive those 25+ second ofnice burning with some additional direct damage.

about #2 I didn’t said that I would be very viable – question was about support that would have good condi damage Mine support bunker guardian is dealing very low damage anyways so I have nearly nothing difference If I put this third attribute in power or condition dmg

It just gaved me idea of a little tweak into my build and stats to give me better burning – with the weapons I’m using power are still giving me very little and making acceptable burning dmg would give my build some dps instead of “only-supporting and surviving”

Projectiles have a flat 20% chance to trigger combos.

from reading descriptions I know there are some projectiles that have 100% chance on combos but that was that “unspammable” ones.
I need to finally find some time for gelms because on boss when shooting with scepter through hallowed ground I’ve seen that combo icon with burning, but on normal fight I cannot check it because all dies too quickly
and I’m not sure if I have same icon etc. if somebody else uses finisher

The general rule is if it is an auto attack, or of the skill fires multiple projectiles, its is 20%, I believe every other skill is 100%. The only exception I am aware of is that when you take the increased range on longbow skills for warrior, the AA becomes 100%.

I spend some time on golems in heart of the mists and sadly I have to tell that I was trying trying and in 30 minutes of test I have no once information about combo burning

so actually only thing I learned from that is the notification from the combo are showing when any part of combo is Yours (I though that notification is only when finisher is Yours)

meh ANet should decide if they want scepter auotatack be projectile or not to be,
because at the moment it have all the disavantages of the projectile and no advantages (it is reflectes when “reflect projectile” is up but it isn’t combo finisher)
so if it is not projectile so let avoid reflection and if it is so let be that finisher :/

I have been trying the 2 sample builds you posted here during the last two weeks on all the aspects of the game, sPvP included, and I have to say they work just great.

For Hotjoin I did swap SY with SyG for sPvP in the first one, and MI with CoP in the second one. You can also put sigils of energy in your weps for extra dodging. For the gameplay, the first one would be an epic support AoE damage for teamfights and the second sample would suit for roaming.

Congratulations for such a nice guide.

This is my attempt at Pyroclasm build. I think this build suits perfectly for celestial stat equipment. 100% bonus on burning duration might be too much, since Virtue of Justice proc alot. It proc on weapon swings, symbols damage and sigils(I’m using sigil of fire). If 4 targets stand in your symbol, for example, Symbol of Wrath, thats 5 times VoJ proc …from symbol alone.
I’ve been running 30,10,0,0,30 trait and its fun but a bit squishy. Been trying alot of more defensive build, but its not fun, pve-wise. IMO this build deal damage from 3 sources; lots of burning, retaliation and direct damage.

http://youtu.be/UBMd-F8-LT0

I would argue that torch is wasted, as you mentioned VoJ provides more than enough burning.

Sword also is too narrow of a field, and a wider area AE would provide more procs to trigger more permeating wrath.

Symbols work well because of the 5 target AOE that is in proximity of you, so greatsword, mace, staff, even hammer would work well with this.

Greatsword is probably going to be the primary weapon with this due to whirling wrath stacking burns on quickly.

Hammer works well to provide protection and prolong longevity.

I’m almost thinking a 10/0/0/30/30 to make use of regeneration and symbol heals, use apothecary if you want to increase heals per second to live long enough to see the burns tick. Dodge rolls provide more healing, and then cycle between greatsword and hammer when whirling wrath is ready.

Hammer is to sustain, greatsword is to stack on burning quickly

Put sigil of smoldering on greatsword to give some fraction of an extra 1/4 second burn, so that it adds up with the quick strikes of whirling wrath to add a few more seconds ontop of the full second ticks.

(Infact you could use givers greatsword and rare veggie pizza to gain 1 3/4 burning duration, to stack some quick burning then swap to hammer. This would result in extra ticks but not more damage per a tick.)

Hammer could have sigil of corruption, or maybe even sigil of battle for more might (condition damage and power). Although the focus is on condition damage.

Take Permeating Wrath and Supreme Justice to stack the AE burns.

Use apothecary or settlers gear for toughness/healing power/condition damage
Also use rampager gear here and there to gain some precision to keep vigor on crit active (more dodges and heals).

If burning has 100% uptime, then sacrifice condition duration gear for more condition damage or fill in where you think it is missing stats (healing power, precision, vitality, or even power).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARSlUgyCXFSJEf4ES2jV6AVwqCxD2DM6jyIA-jQyAodIsGAtAiEAk3LiGb1sIasaGMtJRUtDpIa1CBsYNA-e

Quickly threw together the above on a build editor, I’m sure it isn’t min/maxed. I’m not really sold on signets yet, but put it on there for the hell of it.

Could use might on crit also instead of 2h mastery for more burning damage.

Yes..hammer symbol work really well too..tested that but not included in that vid..I’ve test the 0,0,10,30,30 symbol build, more survival..0,0,30,10,30 for AH, only work well if alot allies near you. I’m using torch to demonstate Zealot’s Flame+Judge’s Intervention as opening strike, applying 10+ sec of burning to nearby foes. Cleansing Flame(torch) is a good skill to apply burning as it have 10 damage instances, but very situational, not every instance hit..
I’ve tried playing with mace for symbol, works wonder too. Symbols might be the real deal for Pyroclasm build. I’m trying to get full celestial set. Symbol damage can crit, proc sigil, proc VoJ, heals, apply boon..will try later, having good time experimenting this build

I did some theory crafting myself, and if I can get some feedback about it I’d really appreciate it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQNAsfWlYgCC3FyIEg4ES2DRCBVQrHEEC5PVFiHA-jkzA4MIsWAJIQkAQyCQKUZNHKIW5CS1Nal3wqZw0oAq0FV7RKiWtUAQsFA-w

I thought “try to do half/half boon/condition duration” to really bring out the idea of a hybrid style guardian. I have an ascended trinket variation that adds slightly higher vitality and toughness, and I wanted to show that exotics can prove just as useful.

Basically I aimed for high damage (didn’t want to worry about crit damage) and while the power and condition damage are mediocre, the potential behind 100% burn, 60% boon, and 80% might duration increases are really something to consider. Get your stacks of bloodlust and swap out whatever consecration you’d like (purging flame > party blast finishers > might splurges), and I think this is definitely a build around burning that fits what everyone has been trying to accomplish.

Ditch the torch! You’ll be getting tons of burning even without it.

foofad.5162:

Ditch the torch! You’ll be getting tons of burning even without it.

Only problem is I dont know if radiant fire applies to having the torch out or just a flat 20% increase. Do you know? Because I can’t test it currently.

It does. Just double checked in the mists. BTW, I think you’ll find that you’ll do better without condition damage gear. You’ll still have decent burn damage while having way, way better direct damage.

foofad.5162:

I think you’ll find that you’ll do better without condition damage gear. You’ll still have decent burn damage while having way, way better direct damage.

^
burning scale poorly with condition damage. I’m aiming for 500 dmg/sec, means 686 condition damage. Going 600 burning dmg/sec cost alot, 1086 condition. That 400 extra damage is better allocated to power, or whatever beneficial stat, maybe vit or toughness. We got only burning for condition, going all out cond build is not good atm.
cond calculator :
http://gw2.hazno.net/

so i haven’t given up entirely on this yet. lol. apologies folks, but with limited playtime, i’ev been trying to do as much of the achievement content as possible lol.

that being said, i did ditch my condition damage gear. at least, i won’t be trying for full condition damage as they tradeoff is too great. i find if we’re to capitalize on the burning we can do, it’ll be like what foofad, Rinn and others have said for various reasons.

Yeah, ultimately that’s the most frustrating part of this, is finding ways to exploit it without dipping into condition damage beyond Radiance.

foofad.5162:

Ditch the torch! You’ll be getting tons of burning even without it.

I think the torch is pretty good, depending which weapon you run with it. I’ve been running a burning build since around early Jan of this year. I would normally run with the mace+torch for pvp, with respectable results. I found it good for holding down points and keeping the pressure on enemies via burning, while having some defense at my disposal.

Torch 4 is a amazing fire and forget burning skill, since you can activate it while doing other things like shelter, renewed focus and using virtues. Torch 5 is very good as well, though I wish it cleansed conditions from the user.

The problem with Torch 5 is that the DPS is lower than autoattacking, it’s a cone that only hits 3 targets max, and it only cleanses conditions if you manage to breathe on someone. Generally speaking, there’s almost always something more useful you could be doing than wasting 5 seconds on a long channel that doesn’t even hit particularly hard.

The best part of torch 4 is the burst from throwing it, but frankly I’d rather have a focus or a shield for the wonderful things they bring to the table.

foofad.5162:

The problem with Torch 5 is that the DPS is lower than autoattacking, it’s a cone that only hits 3 targets max, and it only cleanses conditions if you manage to breathe on someone. Generally speaking, there’s almost always something more useful you could be doing than wasting 5 seconds on a long channel that doesn’t even hit particularly hard.

The best part of torch 4 is the burst from throwing it, but frankly I’d rather have a focus or a shield for the wonderful things they bring to the table.

I find myself not using the burst part very much, since it makes the CD a lot longer. I only use it to burn enemies while using shelter, renewed focus or other defense skills. I’ll occasionally use it on someone who is trying to flee though.

I can understand what you are saying about torch 5, but personally I’ve never considered it to be a dps skill but a party condition cleanser, with the bonus of doing dps.

What does the word meta mean

Greek I think? for hidden.

like meta words (hidden words) meta data (hidden data).

So meta game is pretty much “hidden” game. the bigger picture, or the game behind the game. All the stuff going on in the back ground that equates to what is going on now.

It is used here mostly to describe “how the game is currently played now”. Or what the popular set up is now.

Here are the more offical meanings if you want:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/meta-
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meta (click on the one that says “meta-”)

Thanks…
//

foofad.5162:

It does. Just double checked in the mists. BTW, I think you’ll find that you’ll do better without condition damage gear. You’ll still have decent burn damage while having way, way better direct damage.

I thought about what you said and ditched the carrion set. I changed a lot of my build but I think I hit a better spot than before..

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQJARWlYg6C33xKEf4ES2DRCBVQLFEkBhpAjgPA-jAzAYLAMGEBBisAkFLiGblLIV3oVeDruGTZmUlrgs3IpiAYmA-e

I figured the best way to not dip into condition damage and still have a nice amount was to do might stacking. It’s like your booninator build, but not really haha. Best way to show it is through a video I made of it. Pay attention to the might stacks I generate. If you get skeptical, notice while I rez a party member everybody’s might drops. And I know clerics armor isn’t the best choice but I love the added healing boosts. I have a set of zerker armor that I swap out when I want absolute damage, but this build has pretty awesome damage.

Please let me know what you think! I’m addicted to thinking about PW builds now!

Protip: Empower immediately on weapon swap rather than waiting. Sitting in staff lowers your DPS quite a bit; you want to Empower and swap back to Greatsword as soon as possible. If you do that, you’ll be able to swap weapons every cooldown and Empower with maximum efficiency. It’s a little easier with Two Handed Mastery because it turns Empower’s total elapsed time (including cooldown) between casts to 18 seconds instead of 22 as it is without it, but that’s still the best bet.

After much hemming and hawing, I finally finished a burny-boony hammery-healy Permeating Wrath sample build. I won’t be able to test it personally for a little while due to the use of Celestial armor, but I’m excited to give it a shot. If anyone has Celestial and would like to report on it, that’d be great.

• +Boons, boons everywhere
• +Above average AOE DPS
• +Blast finishers like a boss
• +Above average AOE healing with water combos, Empower, Selfless Daring
• +High Symbol uptime plus two AOE-heavy weapons yields good PW procs
• +Above average survivability – 400hp/s passive regen, reasonable HP and armor

• -Nothing about it is outstanding, everything is either above average or just okay
• -While PW does add some respectable AOE DPS, single target DPS is lacking
• -No burning beyond Justice, no burn duration beyond Zeal
• -Celestial armor is time-gated
• -You’re probably gonna get kicked out of some pugs for this
• -Only condition clearing comes from Absolute Resolution

Gameplay Notes:
This is essentially a variation on the Booninator, re-tooled for both Healing Power and higher EHP. Make no mistake: This costs damage. Some variations on the theme that you might consider are giving up the food in favor of DPS variety of choice, replacing one Water and one Monk rune with something else DPS-focused, and so on. You could also give up a shout for Bane Signet to squeeze out some more damage. Essentially should be played roughly like a Healway build; it’s more about outlasting than outfighting. Note: A one-handed weapon variant of this can also be achieved with 0/30/0/30/10 which dumps PW and AR completely in favor of RHS/EM/POV. Using a sword, you’ll end up with roughly 10-15% more DPS to single targets.

I was really thinking you were going to finish that title of the build with “wrathy”

Yeah, it’s late and I’m out of puns

Also, I REALLY wish I had reserved more space. I’m completely out of room. I’m going to have to split the guide up or rewrite sections for brevity. Very annoying.

So the build relies on hammer symbol to proc PW, stacking might from empower for good burning damage and symbol damage. Good rolling heals, permanent vigor, permanent retaliation. Damages come from symbols,burning,retaliation,weapon swing.
Using staff for secondary weapon is a good choice. I’ve been running with staff alot lately, since you get 1 symbol, might stack/heal, CC.
You got it right, going cond build is a bad move. Yes, the PW seems to suggest we go condition build wholly, max cond dmg and duration, lol its not, its another way around..since burning scale so bad with condition damage, its a better choice to gain cond damage from might stacking..as for cond duration, PW from symbols already more than enough(at least in pve :P), there is no point stacking 20+ sec of burning to a target that live for maybe 5-7 sec once you touch them..

sadness how intothemists is blocked at work. :// well not blocked, but i’m unable to upgrade our browsers – yes, that should tell you how dated my browser is right now lol

someone remind me to check it out when i get home! lol i’ll be posting a pseudo theorycrafted build soon, but only when i get enough testing done. : ))

foofad.5162:

Yeah, it’s late and I’m out of puns

Also, I REALLY wish I had reserved more space. I’m completely out of room. I’m going to have to split the guide up or rewrite sections for brevity. Very annoying.

Perhaps you can ask Knox to delete his first post, then you have another 5000 chars to play with.

Alternatively you dedicate your first post to a table of contents and embed anchors in your guide pages:

p(#Section1). Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.

"Link to Section 1":#Section1 

eg. Link to Section 1

That way you can do a Leap of Faith to different posts in the thread. ( I’d also recommend putting a “<Previous” and “Next>” link at the top and bottom of each post )

My post is gone now, so feel free to spread out some more.

foofad, you are obligated now – make sure Knox’s post didn’t die in vain! ;-)

foofad.5162:

After much hemming and hawing, I finally finished a burny-boony hammery-healy Permeating Wrath sample build. I won’t be able to test it personally for a little while due to the use of Celestial armor, but I’m excited to give it a shot. If anyone has Celestial and would like to report on it, that’d be great.

• +Boons, boons everywhere
• +Above average AOE DPS
• +Blast finishers like a boss
• +Above average AOE healing with water combos, Empower, Selfless Daring
• +High Symbol uptime plus two AOE-heavy weapons yields good PW procs
• +Above average survivability – 400hp/s passive regen, reasonable HP and armor

• -Nothing about it is outstanding, everything is either above average or just okay
• -While PW does add some respectable AOE DPS, single target DPS is lacking
• -No burning beyond Justice, no burn duration beyond Zeal
• -Celestial armor is time-gated
• -You’re probably gonna get kicked out of some pugs for this
• -Only condition clearing comes from Absolute Resolution

Gameplay Notes:
This is essentially a variation on the Booninator, re-tooled for both Healing Power and higher EHP. Make no mistake: This costs damage. Some variations on the theme that you might consider are giving up the food in favor of DPS variety of choice, replacing one Water and one Monk rune with something else DPS-focused, and so on. You could also give up a shout for Bane Signet to squeeze out some more damage. Essentially should be played roughly like a Healway build; it’s more about outlasting than outfighting. Note: A one-handed weapon variant of this can also be achieved with 0/30/0/30/10 which dumps PW and AR completely in favor of RHS/EM/POV. Using a sword, you’ll end up with roughly 10-15% more DPS to single targets.

I have full celestial armor and celestial rings and amulet.

I can try it out later this week and do a short write up regarding my impressions.

Will do it with 2*water and 4*altruism though since i dont want to waste my monks (will test my celestials with other stuff/runes/orbs later on) by replacing them later on.

foofad.5162:

Frequently Asked Questions

• How well does this work in sPvP and tPvP?

You run into issues with scaling – again, burn damage scales with the number of people you can burn at any one time. It’s also impossible to have both 30 Virtues and get 100% burn uptime so you can’t get double duration AoE Justices. That said, it’s worth trying just to see if you can make it work – it’s a good way to saturate the enemy team’s condition clearing and in theory it would really help to bring down bunkers.

in sPvP you can use 2 sigils of smoldering en use a 20/20/0/0/30 build to reach 100% burning duration + Permeating Wrath. Apparently they stack.
Downside is you cant use 2-handed weapons.
30% burning duration + 10% condition duration from runes, 20% condition duration from zeal, 20% from radiant fire and 20% from 2 sigils of smoldering

Are you sure they stack? I’ll double check later today. Thanks for bringing that up.

Knox.8962:

My post is gone now, so feel free to spread out some more.

Oh hey, thanks! Appreciate it.

foofad.5162:

Are you sure they stack? I’ll double check later today. Thanks for bringing that up.

From the wiki: Static bonus sigils
Static bonuses stack with themselves when used on dual-wielded weapons, except for Superior Sigil of Force (only +5% bonus to damage) and Superior Sigil of Accuracy (only +5% bonus to crit chance).

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sigil#Mechanics

BUT say also:

On-crit and condition duration sigils only function for the skills of the weapon which they are applied to.

Brutaly.6257:

foofad.5162:

After much hemming and hawing, I finally finished a burny-boony hammery-healy Permeating Wrath sample build. I won’t be able to test it personally for a little while due to the use of Celestial armor, but I’m excited to give it a shot. If anyone has Celestial and would like to report on it, that’d be great.

• +Boons, boons everywhere
• +Above average AOE DPS
• +Blast finishers like a boss
• +Above average AOE healing with water combos, Empower, Selfless Daring
• +High Symbol uptime plus two AOE-heavy weapons yields good PW procs
• +Above average survivability – 400hp/s passive regen, reasonable HP and armor

• -Nothing about it is outstanding, everything is either above average or just okay
• -While PW does add some respectable AOE DPS, single target DPS is lacking
• -No burning beyond Justice, no burn duration beyond Zeal
• -Celestial armor is time-gated
• -You’re probably gonna get kicked out of some pugs for this
• -Only condition clearing comes from Absolute Resolution

Gameplay Notes:
This is essentially a variation on the Booninator, re-tooled for both Healing Power and higher EHP. Make no mistake: This costs damage. Some variations on the theme that you might consider are giving up the food in favor of DPS variety of choice, replacing one Water and one Monk rune with something else DPS-focused, and so on. You could also give up a shout for Bane Signet to squeeze out some more damage. Essentially should be played roughly like a Healway build; it’s more about outlasting than outfighting. Note: A one-handed weapon variant of this can also be achieved with 0/30/0/30/10 which dumps PW and AR completely in favor of RHS/EM/POV. Using a sword, you’ll end up with roughly 10-15% more DPS to single targets.

I have full celestial armor and celestial rings and amulet.

I can try it out later this week and do a short write up regarding my impressions.

Will do it with 2*water and 4*altruism though since i dont want to waste my monks (will test my celestials with other stuff/runes/orbs later on) by replacing them later on.

Have tested this in wvw and swapped in boon duration food as well.

In short it works really well in aoe fights and when i say really well i mean great.

I also swapped hold the line for hallowed ground which allows for 9 stacks of might if coordinated properly and if you pop empower, swap, trigger hallowed ground two times and pop SyS this starts to hit extremely nice in aoe fights. The aoe burning alone is just amazing.

I also tried it with HG and purging flames and doing the above and after that pull purging flames makes it possible to stack 8-10 sec of aoe burning that hits hard, really hard.

The main drawback is that you are extremly sensitive to conditions. so i think the symbol trait should be swapped for pure of voice, which also improves the dps of the build thru more boons.

If you use hallowed ground and purging flames as main utility and one shout i think this build could be very nice indeed.

I need to get some more time in wvw to get the full picture but this was really fun and the first pure support build i played that actually was remotely enjoyable.

Perma swiftness thru staff is great btw.

Oh yeah, I definitely wouldn’t WvW without Pure of Voice. Persistence is nice but not that nice. I would also even consider dropping the boon duration food for -condition duration instead. Also, I realize now I goofed in that link and failed to put a sigil of energy on the staff as well; Swapping to either weapon should give you a guaranteed dodge.

For zerging, I would drop Save Yourselves for a consecration rather than the others, since at most you’re only getting the 3 conditions off with Resolve + one condition per shout, and you don’t want to kill yourself by mistake.

I have 3/6 Celestial armor now and I’ve started using the build. I find what I do is build up my 25 stacks with a pair of one handed weapons with the sigils of life for two per kill, and then swap back to the hammer.

I also went ahead and changed my runes a bit. Instead of 3/3 it’s now 2 water, 2 monk, 2 hoelbrak for the strength boon duration to bring it up to 100. I used to do this in an old build; it makes rotating between weapons on cooldown less awkward, you’ll keep your might the whole time (which makes swapping to staff less of a DPS killer).

Yeah i use energy in all my setups and with the heal power this build has its mandatory imo.

That setup in rune is really nice and i used it before but i only have two monks and if i end up with that setup i dont want to use them now. Would feel awful to salvage a celestail timegated armor or ditch the runes.

Yeah with consecrations you can really add in some huge might stacks. Think i got 12 stacks out of hallowed ground and purging flames during one fight in EB tonight. but you need to have both 2h mastery and master of consecrations.

I dont like the stack on kill sigils, i hate when i lose those stacks but if i use them i will use power sigils.

Unfortunately you can only get 3 blasts out of Hallowed Ground if there is absolutely zero lag and you manage to nail it right as it goes down. Mighty Blow takes 4 seconds to cool down, but it also has an animation time, and so you’re looking at more like 9.5 seconds between blasts rather than 8. Really annoying. Same deal with Purging Flames, 2 seems feasible but a lot of times it’s thwarted by lag or other factors.

Yup, it’s a bit easier to manage 2xhammer blasts + 1xFocus#5 if you have it in your setup.

Hi there,

first of all great work on th OP. I like that the condi guard has a voice of some sort. several discussions i had about that topic pretty much were a dead end couple of month ago.

I do want to add the permeating wrath is great but I use a build that does not rely on it which works very well imo. So: I do not think it is the core of every guardian burn build :-)

The following build was created several month ago and I also felt the need that pbaoe burning was essential for my playstyle and to increase the damage output overall.

I did not want to go that deep into virtues because i just love AH and meditations. I prefer AH so this is the build with it:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUMQNAsdRlUgKDHHSKEfIFRuALFAEh1Hm31DF6QGC-jAyA4MQsWgIPRkKAkCLiGbJrIasKZioalNmUAQsGA-e

sorry tinyurl does not like me today

note: you can use other gear of course if you feel that condi damage is wasted points (i don’t)

The build utilizes with 100% burn duration:

- superior rune of balthazar (6 secs pbaoe)
- shattered aegis & burn on block (4 secs pbaoe + 2 secs for the target that removed it)
- might on block (15 secs)
- purging flame (10s secs pbaoe)
- judges intervention (6secs pbaoe)
- active VoJ (8 secs)

My thoughts:

shattered aegis:
I find this to be a very usefull. With VoC, Retreat and RF and have three flexibel short pbaoe burns and defense as well. I need this!

shelter
this is pretty much the best skill of this build. due to the runes I can fire of a 6 secs pbaoe burn, block attacks while burning them even more and get might, which also heals me to increase the damage. yes please!

weapon choice
- GS is a must because binding blades ticking damage scales with condition damage, has a leap finisher for purging flames getting flame barrier up adding burn and might and therfore heals. The symbol gives retaliation and heals, the autoattack gives might and heals … i need all that.
- Sword has a blind and some defense against ranged as well as pretty okay damage
- Focus is just the best offhand we have… WAIT a minute you might say… you got that troch trait! why not use torch?? pretyy much the reason the OP gave: its lacking and focus is so much better as it gives a blast finisher for purging flames as well. and it blocks and burns and gives might and heals… case closed

sigils
Geomancy is a must imo if you invest in Condition Damage. the dps gain is better then added might stacks or sigil of earth (if it had no ICD I would consider it). Also the damage on swap is no joke.

defense
3 active blinds (more with VoJ and RF), RF, 4x aegis, shelter, focus .. you can pretty much avoid being hit at all.

inspired virtues
I chose inspired virtues over zealous blade because i prefer the boons from my virtues which use very actively – but that is up to personal taste.

damage applifiers
so close and yet so far… give me 15 aditional points and the build would be absolutely perfect. i do not miss them though

Of all the character i have so far in guildwars 2 this build is the one with the most synergies. i just love it. It has great surviveability, the damage output in solo pve is great especially if you round up 5 targets. Excellent mobility. condi removal could be better but if i need that I just swtich to meditations and i am good to go.
if i need single target control: signet of wrath is absolutely awesome with its 5 secs root.

this builds rules in orr and defetad chomper and his buddy. In spvp some classes are just fodder. (i use signet of wrath and bane ftw) signet so i can safely say it performs well.

have fun with it. feedback would be appreciated.

what about kindled zeal, signet of wrath, and perfect inscriptions?

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-7;4NF-40M3NGF90;9;49;0TT1;617A18AU;017;1Tu8Soxtbo-Fi0-k7;2Vn5oao5pap5qa-L0L-2i;9;9;9;9;9;9;10-6z

Minor update to the boony-burny build. I’ll be updating the thread on Monday with some house cleaning and a few new tidbits.

aww, i can’t access intothemists at work : (( (lol, outdated browser… how sad).

with a few new threads with talk of Perplexity runes, have you guys working on “burning”, i.e. conditions builds integrate that rune yet? i haven’t tested completely yet (so busy with PvE, lol sigh) but you get even more attrition via confusion, retal, burning and bleeding if you use corresponding sigils. that’s a decent arsenal of condi dmg me thniks.

This is awesome. I’ve actually been running a burn guardian since the beginning, with a bit of a fun composite build some of the awesome people hanging around the HOD forum helped me out with (lots of burn, not as much as detailed here, I don’t believe, but also some self healing and crit to try and keep me in it a little more. I enjoy it thus far), and the general consensus was that I’m nuts. But I’m glad I’m not the only one who was willing to play with burning focus.

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-7;4RFV10J3RG-90;9;4JJ;0T14-26;559BENk25;1CqNYCqNYb-kvVJF2H0;1vV0X5Y8ZG4L5250D-1T;5F18ZF18Z;9;9;9;9;7V6k3I

Here is my attempt at the pyro guardian. If I did my math right, I manage to get 90% burn duration on this build. You could put 10pts more into the zeal or add in the necessary runes to get it to 100% but I don’t think it’ll be a good balanced build if you do any of that. 90% duration is still quite good.

I went full soldier gear because I still want to be alive to burn the annoying dungeon boss to death and not kill myself in the process. Plus guards have a naturally low vitality pool so I want to be guaranteed at least 17k health on all my builds. Here we get more than enough but that makes up for the less than 3k toughness that most people like when tanking in dungeons.

For the runes, I like to go with Soldier runes because here I haven’t specced into Honor at all. Which means no pure of voice. So I like to have the condition removal on me.

For weapon choices, I decided to go scepter/torch because I don’t think it’s a great burning build without a torch. So burn baby burn! Scepter is good to have because you always need to have one ranged weapon to kite those bosses that are simply not tankable.

For those bosses that you can can up close and personal, sword is good bet just because its a good close range weapon to complement the torch even though there are any burning effects from the sword.

Overall, the trait/armour setup is quite flexible. If I want to get more burst dmg from my sword, there is one master trait in the radiance line to do it. And if I wanna get more precision or power I can use the necessary sharpening stones or maintenance oils to get more. And of course, if I want more dmg from my scepter this is also scepter power that I can switch out of combat.

thoughts?