Guild Wars 2

I just hit level 80, and I’ve been using a pretty typical 0/15/30/20/5 build with altruistic healing and empowering might. I’ve been debating on equipment choices, specifically armor and trinkets.

Option one: Soldier’s armor with Berserker trinkets.

Option two: Magi’s armor with Knight’s trinkets

If I choose the first option, I gain +411 power, and +32% critical damage over the second option. But I lose: 315 healing power, 187 toughness, and 274 precision. If I choose the second option, I lose that 411 power and 32% critical damage in favor of the healing/toughness/precision.

Option two offers a 13% higher critical hit rate than option one. Which would allow for slightly more triggers of empowering might and vigorous precision. Option two would also double the amount of health I -and nearby allies- would gain from selfless daring. But all of this comes at a cost of a very large loss of power and critical damage.

Which would be of greater benefit?

Knights or Berserkers. Soldiers is for…going slow. Magi’s is for pure healing build that wants crit.

Yaki.9563:

Knights or Berserkers. Soldiers is for…going slow. Magi’s is for pure healing build that wants crit.

Berserker’s is out, mainly because I don’t want to fall like a house of cards in a stiff breeze after I’ve used up all my blocks and blinds. Knight’s is….I’ve used knights on different characters, but I really wanted to gear up with dungeon armor, mostly because I don’t have to spend gold on it.

On the subject of knight’s armor. If I were to use it, I would want to pair it with a trinket that gives vitality, because I don’t like running around with 10k health. The best trinket for that would be valkyrie. But, using that setup, I would wind up with even less precision than either of the setups in my original post. I want to keep a high enough critical hit rate to proc empowering might and vigorous precision reliably.

Use a mix of Knight’s and Soldiers then.

You can get armor from places other than AC. Sorrow’s Embrace and Arah have the Tou/Pow/Pre layout on armor.

I got full Knight’s atm but as Quarktastic said, it really takes out a chunk of your health and I was forced to equip a few Valkyrie trinkets to balance out for the lack of vitality. However since I’ve done that I’ve been very content about my setup, very ballanced and also usefull during dungeons.

I run 3x Berserkers and 3x knights, with a mix of knights/berserker trinkets and health is never an issue in PvE (don’t use guard in PvP).

You can add more knights or some soldiers, but to be honest your just gimping your dmg and slowing your group down when you do. I do still carry my soldiers gear with me for Arah runs (lupi) and higher level pug fractals encase pugs get me killed enough to have a 2nd gear set, but 99% of the time its way overkill.

here’s a bit of a WvW perspective. i tried PVT / Soldier’s gear for a while using an AH build, and i felt, i won’t say less survivable, but definitely less effective overall. so i guess in other words, i didn’t feel i was able to hold my own more. the added vit was nice, but losing crit and fighting power i didn’t enjoy so much. and AH still relies on crits a lot – least the way i traited and specced.

though if you really want, you can try Knight’s + Soldier’s chest and pants for the added vitality. many have said that’s a good starting place, but i still prefer the crit chance over vit any day. that might just be me though.

akamon.2769:

here’s a bit of a WvW perspective. i tried PVT / Soldier’s gear for a while using an AH build, and i felt, i won’t say less survivable, but definitely less effective overall. so i guess in other words, i didn’t feel i was able to hold my own more. the added vit was nice, but losing crit and fighting power i didn’t enjoy so much. and AH still relies on crits a lot – least the way i traited and specced.

though if you really want, you can try Knight’s + Soldier’s chest and pants for the added vitality. many have said that’s a good starting place, but i still prefer the crit chance over vit any day. that might just be me though.

Yeah. I wound up with knight’s armor and trinkets, but I picked up a soldier’s chest piece and pauldrons. Odd, I know, but I just happened to have them on hand. Full runes of the soldier, and a berserker weapon and back piece. (the weapon is still of rare quality, and the back piece is the green one from the personal story -same stats as the masterwork guild backpack)

I was considering replacing my knight’s rings with either cavalier’s or berserker’s ascended rings, and my back piece with a power/tough/crit back piece. That way, I’ll only drop about 100 toughness, but gain 21% critical damage. I would also gain +82 power. If I choose the cavalier rings and power/tough/crit back piece, I’ll lose roughly 3% crit rate, but gain 360 health. If I use a maintenance oil, my total crit rate will still be 49%.

My current stats without the berserker back piece.

I wear a Soldier’s Helm, rest Knights armor, and Soldier Runes on all 6. For Trinkets, I wear a Soldiers backpiece (capacitor) and Knights Earrings, and a Soldier+ Berserker Fractal ring. I keep my crit % at around 45% + 5% from some Sigil of Accuracy weapons that I occasionally equip. Combined with Omnomberry Pies, I steal 300-400 health for 1/3 of all my attacks from enemies, and there is no cooldown on this. In addition, I grant might on crit (1s cooldown unfortunately) and heal from that, combined with all the other AH benefits.

I used to rock full Soldier’s armor, but found that maintaining the 20k+ HP was not viable during longer engagements – I couldn’t heal that high and my teammates never got me to 20k. It just gave me a good crutch going in the fight, but my skill has improved and I can drop to 16 / 17k health without an issue. Knights armor actually granted me more toughness which is a slight reduction to damage taken, I just need to keep condition removal available for emergencies. The precision combined with the food buff is great in dungeons and attacking zergs in WvW. I switch equipped weapons often depending on the fight – if I have many enemies, I do GS / Staff, if I have a single target like a boss, I keep distance and range them with a Scepter or get close with a Hammer/Mace/Sword.

The weakness with this build is in soloing- without allies to grant boons, AH becomes less useful. Also, if I’m fighting 1 mobile enemy, it’s tough to steal health since I have less targets to crit, forcing me into weapons that have rapid attacks. In larger mob groups with a decent team, my damage output, healing, and boon application melts NPCs while keeping the team topped off health and power wise – it’s great group synergy.

The only other build I experimented with is full Clerics, which provides the smallest HP pool but allows me to sustain myself in longer engagements. It doesn’t provide as much benefit to the team (though it makes Virtue of Resolve amazing) but is a great WvW / PvP option. If you stick to weapons that attack rapidly, even with a small crit %, you can still keep Vigor up, which is great for the Selfless Daring (heal on dodge) trait, combined with Sigils of Energy.

It comes down to your playstyle and the role you want to fill!

Quarktastic.1027:

I just hit level 80, and I’ve been using a pretty typical 0/15/30/20/5 build with altruistic healing and empowering might. I’ve been debating on equipment choices, specifically armor and trinkets.

…

Which would be of greater benefit?

Quark, with your build I’d go with a knight set and soldier runes or crests. You’ll end up about 16k hp, and with the AH setup, you will regenerate it easily. I’m running a similar build with 0/5/30/30/5, and I’m honestly not hurting for the lack of HP. This is PvE though, can’t speak for wvwvw or sPvP.

Tomkatt.1684:

Quarktastic.1027:

I just hit level 80, and I’ve been using a pretty typical 0/15/30/20/5 build with altruistic healing and empowering might. I’ve been debating on equipment choices, specifically armor and trinkets.

…

Which would be of greater benefit?

Quark, with your build I’d go with a knight set and soldier runes or crests. You’ll end up about 16k hp, and with the AH setup, you will regenerate it easily. I’m running a similar build with 0/5/30/30/5, and I’m honestly not hurting for the lack of HP. This is PvE though, can’t speak for wvwvw or sPvP.

You didn’t really read the whole thread did you? I recommend that you go through it. There’s some interesting stuff in here.

Dungeons: Knights + Ruby set. Altruistic build.

World PvE: Full Glass cannon. 20/25/20/0/5. Focus on dealing more dmg to burning foes and to foes with conditions (+20% dmg) also add dmg increase by 50% while downed and losing health 33% slower while downed since you’ll be indeed down a lot

WvW: Knights + Ruby set. Same build as World PvE. (can replace 33% with glacial trait)

sPvP: Whatever works for you, as for build I recommend spirit weapons. Works splendid at 1 v 1.